Word on Wednesday with John Mason

Twenty-five years ago Judith and I were living three short blocks south of the Twin Towers in Downtown Manhattan. I had received an invitation from Timothy Keller of Redeemer Presbyterian Church New York City, to set up a gospel-focused Anglican Church to complement the ministry of Redeemer Church in the city. On Tuesday morning, September 11, we had awakened to see from our apartment clear blue skies and the sparkling waters of New York Harbor. But it was not to last. We felt the shock in our building when the first tower was hit from the north. We heard the scream of the second jet flying low overhead and what sounded like a sonic boom when the south tower was hit. Later that day when we left our building, the scene of the inches of dust and paper was surreal. The silence was palpable. It’s easy to forget the evil that cut short the lives of people going about their daily affairs. Commercial airliners were used as missiles to crash into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon. And a further flight was intended for more destruction but was thwarted by the selfless heroic efforts of passengers. People on that flight prayed the Lord’s Prayer as the plane crashed. That evening, George W. Bush, then President, called for prayers for all who had lost loved ones. He continued: “And I pray they will be comforted by a power greater than any of us, spoken through the ages in Psalm 23: Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, for You are with me.” In the Wall Street Bible talks I was giving at the time, I spoke on Psalm 46 which begins: God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging. Creation in turmoil. The Bible is very aware of human evil and its devastating effects on this world. But Psalm 46 assure us that God continues his work even in the midst of the chaos. His supremacy and presence with his people is never thwarted. The biblical epic records the intrusion of evil into God’s good creation as we read in Genesis 3. God didn’t create evil, but because he didn’t make us robots, he allowed it. However, as the biblical narrative unfolds, we become aware of the reality and the depth of wickedness. As a side note, if we insist we’re here by chance and are nothing but atoms in an ordered cohesion bumping around in time and space, evil and suffering have no meaning for there is no transcendental moral compass. That said, we dare to believe that goodness matters because the God who made the world intends to give his moral verdict on human history. Without judgment life itself is reduced to moral indifference. This is not an invitation to hatred and vindictiveness, for the Bible commands us to be concerned even for the best interests of our enemies and to pray for them. The realities of the divine and of ultimate accountability have been integral to the life and practice of the US from its inception. The first president, George Washington, was inaugurated half a mile from what became the World Trade Center site. In the course of his inaugural address on April 30, 1789, he said: “[W]e ought to be no less persuaded that the propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right which Heaven itself has ordained . . .” The opening lines of Psalm 46 speak of the unchanging God who is our refuge and strength. In him alone we find a secure shelter and the power within to address any situation. Indeed, verses 2 and 3 exhort us not to fear, even if the world around us is undone, for God remains supreme over every facet of his creation – the earth, the mountains, and the seas. Humanity in turmoil. Psalm 46 moves from the upheaval of the material world to human turmoil: There is a river, whose streams make glad the city of God….God is the midst of the city; it will not be moved; God will help it when the morning dawns. Psalm 46, verse 6 speaks of the instability of evil and human tumult: The nations are in uproar, the kingdoms totter… However, God has the last word, for when he utters his voice, the earth melts. Verse 7 is so reassuring: The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge.  The Lord of hosts points to the mighty armies of heaven to which Jesus alluded when he was arrested (Matthew 26:53). Be still! Verses 8 and 9 are an invitation to catch the vision of God’s ultimate intention – to make wars to cease to the end of the earth. It is a picture of the perfect peace that will follow on the other side of God’s judgement – the accounting that precedes the perfect righteousness of the new heaven and the new earth (2 Peter 3:12f). The command ‘Be still’ is not so much a word of comfort to God’s people under duress but a command to every nation. Jesus’s word to the turbulent winds and waters, “Peace. Be still” display the power of God’s Word. Mind-bending though the idea is, at God’s command the nations will be called to order, confronted by God’s supreme and glorious power: “Know that I am God! I will be exalted among the nations … and in the earth” (46:10). In the closing words, the confidence in God in verse 1 returns with greater power: The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge – our high stronghold! With the coming of Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God into the world, we now have a clearer picture of God. Jesus experienced suffering, injustice and grief in the extreme. Yet he could say, “I am the Good Shepherd; I lay down my life for the sheep” (John 10:11). Through his suffering, death and resurrection we find freedom from sin, from fear and freedom from self. In Christ alone there is peace and joy, love and hope. It is that through the lens of the New Testament we begin to learn how God’s people should respond to the evil of the world. Jesus commands us to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us “so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 5:44f). Praying for opportunities to promote God’s good news is an aspect of this. Furthermore, as Paul exhorts in First Timothy, chapter 2, we are to pray for governments, that they may impartially administer justice, restrain wickedness and vice and, with discernment and wisdom, uphold integrity and truth that we may live at peace. Paul also writes in Romans chapter 12, verses 17 through 21: Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all… None of this means that justice will not occur. Paul continues, Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.”  On the contrary, “if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good, Paul exhorts. In the midst of the chaos and evil of this present time, Christ calls on us to put aside anger and rage, vengeance and violence, for the day of perfect justice will come. Prayer. We commend to your fatherly care, merciful God, all those who in this passing world are in any kind of trouble, sorrow, sickness, anxiety or need, especially we pray for…  Give them patience and confidence in your goodness, and in your mercy provide their every need. Father, hear our prayer, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. © John G. Mason The post 9/11 Twenty-Five Years On appeared first on The Anglican Connection.

Why don’t we pray more consistently than we do? And how often when we do pray, do we look to the model prayers we find in the Bible – and not least from the lips of Jesus? Dr. J.I. Packer once commented, ‘I believe that prayer is the measure of God’s people, spiritually, in a way that nothing else is, so that how we pray is as important a question as we can ever face’. Come with me to the prayer that Jesus prayed on the night of his arrest. We find it in John chapter 17. In verse 1 we read: After Jesus had spoken these words, he looked up to heaven and said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you,…” Knowing he was about to die, Jesus prayed that he would be honored in carrying out God’s previously hidden plan. His impending death was now a certainty, for John tells us that Judas had gone out into the night to do his dark work of betrayal. And now, as Jesus looked into the darkness of this evil, he prayed that he would not only remain faithful to his mission but would also be glorified. The meaning of glory often eludes us for we tend to think of it more in terms of the splendor of fame or beauty. But the meaning of glory here is more subtle. It refers to the outward splendor of hidden, inner nature and qualities. In praying, “Father… glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you”, Jesus was asking God to clothe him with glory because his cross would reveal for all time the nature and cost of God’s love. Furthermore, he prays that as he himself is glorified, in carrying out this supreme mission, men and women will see the splendor of the extraordinary love of the Father for men and women, even though they choose to divorce him. Ashley Null has observed that for Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury during the reigns of Henry VIII and Edward VI, ‘The glory of God, is God’s love for the unworthy’. The theme of glory through his crucifixion continues in verse 4: “I glorified you on earth by finishing the work that you gave me to do”. Jesus is saying that he has completed the work God had given him to do. In his teaching he brought further revelation of God and in his miracles (signs) he revealed God’s compassion and power. One great work – his greatest work – remained. When he was lifted up on the cross at Calvary, he would bear in himself the sin of the whole world (John 3:14-15 and 16). And John chapter 19, verse 30 records Jesus’s final words: “It is finished”. With his death, Jesus had completed his mission. He had offered the one perfect sacrifice for the sins of the world, once and for all time. To try and repeat it, is to diminish and dishonor his work. Jesus’s prayer continues: “So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed” (John 17:5). The words of John Stainer’s Crucifixion capture something of John’s record: “Far more awful in Thy weakness, more than kingly in Thy meekness, Thou Son of God… Here in abasement; crownless, poor, disrobed, and bleeding: There in glory interceding; Thou art the King!” Prayer for the Disciples: “I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word” (17:6). The greater part of Jesus’s prayer is for his disciples. This tells us of their importance. They are to be the bridge between himself and the rest of humanity. Much will depend on their understanding of Jesus as the Christ – the Messiah – and their courage and loyalty. So he prays that the Father will give them eternal life. In verse 11, he prays that the Father will protect them; in verse 15, that the Father will keep them from the powers of evil; in verse 17, that the Father will make them holy in the truth; and in verse 16, that the love God the Father has for the Son, will be true for them as well. Jesus knows that the road ahead for the disciples will not be easy. Yet he doesn’t pray that they will be taken out of the world, but that they will be kept faithful and guarded from the powers of the evil one. Prayer for his people: “I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one” (17:20-22). In praying for his people through the ages, Jesus alerts us to the heart of his disciples’ mission. Their ministry is to be a declaratory (Word) mission. The content of their preaching and teaching will be that Jesus is God’s king who has come for us – to restore God’s friendship with us. Furthermore, Christ has come so that he might be in us – the oneness of God’s people (not denominational structures) will draw others to faith in Christ. In turn all his people through the ages will share with him as heirs in the glory to come. Which brings me back to prayer and the theme of God’s glory. How often do we pray that God will be glorified? After all, Jesus taught us to pray, “Father, hallowed, glorified be your name” (Luke 11:2). In this era of God’s mercy shouldn’t we be praying that God will glorify his name in the changing lives of his people – in you and me? Shouldn’t we also be praying that God will honor his name in drawing the lost to faith, turning hearts to their true home in Jesus Christ? A prayer. Lord Christ, eternal Word and Light of the Father’s glory: send your light and your truth so that we may both know and proclaim your word of life, to the glory of God the Father; for you now live and reign, God for all eternity. Amen. © John G. Mason The post God’s Glory …! appeared first on The Anglican Connection.

Loud voices today insist there is no God, leaving us adrift on the ocean of life without an agreed moral compass. Persuasive voices appeal to our basic, albeit unthinking instincts, while the profounder, wiser voices that speak to the depths of our souls are drowned out. Into this world of confusion and noise, anger and division, Jesus’s timeless words to all his followers in his Sermon on the Mount stand out: “You are the salt of the earth” and “You are the light of the world” (Matthew 5:13, 14). Jesus’ metaphor of salt is double-edged: his followers are to bring out the flavor of what it means to be men and women – to be human. We are also to act as a preservative, slowing down the decay of society. Both a tall order! Jesus has in mind the impact of the counter-cultural lifestyle he has just identified in his eight beatitudes – the ‘blessed’ who would experience the incomparable joys of God’s kingdom (Matthew 5:3-12). They are the people who understand their spiritual poverty before God, who mourn their failure to honor God and who grieve for a world that turns its back on God. They are ones who, instead of engaging in the power play and deceptions of the world, walk the tougher path of humility and service, truth and peace. Indeed, it is because Jesus knows that humanity without God will always spiral away from truth and goodness, he calls on his followers to be the salt of the earth. He expects all of us, who have turned to him in repentance and faith, to live in a way that exemplifies the beauty, goodness and joy of Godly living, and so slow down the rot of self-interest and greed, of injustice and the unchecked power-play of the powerful and the social elite. Today’s world either ignores or simply rejects the reality that none of us is good – that we’re all flawed. As Jesus is all too aware, the world needs good and godly examples pointing to him and his kingdom. But this will only happen when his followers don’t become insipid. That’s why he warns against salt losing its saltiness: “…if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet” (Matthew 5:13b). NaCl is a stable chemical compound. However, in the ancient world, salt was obtained more from salt marshes and contained many impurities. The actual salt could be leeched out, leaving a substance that tasted salty but in fact was worthless. ‘Watch out,’ Jesus warns, ‘that you don’t become insipid, wishy-washy fools’. How do people view you? Do you claim to be a believer, but your life remains unchanged? Is your lifestyle directed by the culture or by the Bible? Are you just as greedy, unforgiving, and selfish as everyone around you? ‘If you call yourself a follower of mine,’ Jesus says, let your life be transformed by my words, for “You are the salt of the earth”. In his Letter to the Colossians Paul the Apostle writes: Conduct yourselves wisely toward outsiders, making the most of the time… Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answereveryone (4:5-6). Salt here is a metaphor for sparkling conversations that trigger questions about life. Have you considered ways you could use news items and opinion columns to ask questions and spark conversations about the goodness of God and his good news? Do you look for opportunities to pass on a copy of my recent book, The Jesus Story: Seven Signs to others for whom you are praying? “You are the light of the world…” Jesus continues (Matthew 5:14). Negatively, he is saying that there is a darkness about our human existence – something we easily forget because we live in an age that has turned away from God’s compass bearings. Up until the 1960s and 70s morality in the West was grounded in the Judaeo-Christian ethic. But now all has changed. Over 700 years before Jesus was born, Isaiah wrote of the birth of God’s King. In chapter 9 he speaks of the people walking in darkness and seeing a great light: On those living in a land where the shadow of death falls, a light has dawned. A child will be born. He will be called “Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace.” Indeed, in John chapter 8 we read Jesus’s astonishing words: “Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life”. God, the source of all true light, has come into our world in person. Jesus, the light who reveals God, calls us out from the darkness of our own ego into his light. But how will our world today come to know him? “You are the light of the world,” Jesus says. “A city built on a hill cannot be hid. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house…” (Matthew 5:14f). ‘Everything you are, everything you do,’ Jesus says, ‘must reflect all I have taught you.’ He expects us to reflect the light of God in our lives to the world. Yet do we? Do we endeavor to live out what he teaches in his Sermon on the Mount? Or do we hide the light of our faith? “Let your light shine before others,” Jesus says, “so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven…” (Matthew 5:16). ‘Live your life in the light of my words,’ he says, ‘and others will be drawn to my light and love’. It’s an awesome thought. We’re all involved. When we’re tempted to despair at the moral decline around us, we need to ask ourselves, ‘How do my family and friends, my colleagues see me? Just like everyone else, or as someone who knows the hope and the joy of God’s gospel?’ Jesus calls us to two tasks – to be salt and light. As salt we are to play our part as Godly examples of what it means to be men and women and so slow down society’s decay. As light we are to awaken people to God’s truth, with its hope and joy. Beware therefore of sin or compromise that reduces your Godly influence as salt. Beware of hiding the light of your faith through laziness or fear. How are we to do this in a world that thinks it has all the answers? Ask questions. Ask if there is any real and long-lasting hope in the noise of today. And look for ways to show how good God is – especially for all who turn to Jesus in repentance and faith. Pray for God’s grace that the light in your life will shine for everyone to see – in your kindness and care for others; in the way you cope with the challenges of life. Jesus will use our good works and our words to draw people to his light so that on the last day they too will glorify God. “You are the salt of the earth,… You are the light of the world.” Prayers: God, our refuge and strength, the author of all godliness, hear the prayers of your people: and so grant us that whatever we ask for in faith we may surely obtain; through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen. Teach us, gracious Lord, to begin our works with reverence, to go on in obedience, and finish them with love; and then to wait patiently in hope, and with cheerful countenance to look up to you, whose promises are faithful and rewards infinite; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. © John G. Mason The post Salt and Light in a Troubled World appeared first on The Anglican Connection.

Happiness is something we long for. But how can we achieve it? It’s elusive: one moment we can be feeling happy, but the next we’re not. Like moonlight it has slipped through our fingers. In fact ‘happiness’ can’t be a goal in the strict sense of the word. For a goal is something that is within our power to achieve. Happiness isn’t like that. There are too many variables outside our control. We can think that being successful, having a good family and friends, material assets and comfort, will make us happy. But it doesn’t. There will always be others more successful. And behind the best of families there is often unresolved pain or hurt; those with wealth often find they’re not satisfied – they want more, or they worry about the security of all they have. Despite experiencing much that is good in life we don’t always feel that overwhelming sense of real happiness and joy. Psalm 1 helps us. Blessed is the one … we read. Blessed means ‘happy’. The idea is echoed twenty-six times in the Psalms. It is also the word Jesus used in what are known as the Beatitudes in his Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:3-12). In Psalm 1 verses 1 through 3 we read: Happy is the one who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but their delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law they meditate day and night. We all have a real thirst, a longing for something that will satisfy us deeply. The thirst is not wrong. It is part of our complex make-up that makes us human. Our problem is that we look in the wrong places to satisfy it. The prophet Jeremiah records God’s words: “My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water,…” (Jeremiah 2:13). Verse 1 of the Psalm challenges us to consider our world-view. Our natural inclination is to adopt a world-view that appeals to our sense of self-sufficiency. We like the music emanating from the temples of materialism or humanism that puts us in control of our lives and our destiny. As we continue down this path, we indulge in behaviour that appeals to our feelings, even though it means flouting God’s directions and good purposes. And so we find ourselves marching in step with the crowds who live as though there is no God and no objective moral order. In turn we join the cynics who mock Christianity. We become part of a silent majority, failing to speak up for what we believe because we’re afraid. We sit in the seat of scoffers. What then is the path to real happiness? Verse 2 tells us: their delight is in the law of the Lord; and on his law they meditate day and night. The negatives of verse 1 are now contrasted in verse 2. As others have observed, they show us we have a choice. Like Adam and Eve in the original garden, God respects the gift of choice he has given us. It’s one of the features that makes us human. We are not puppets on a string in a mechanistic universe. We can choose. Verse 2 provides the key that unlocks our true humanity: Their delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law they meditate day and night. We need something to transform us from deep within. The law of the Lord which stands against the counsel of the wicked is a reference to God’s instruction. Interestingly the word meditate here is the same word plot Psalm 2:1. What goes on within our hearts and minds becomes evident in our words and actions. In Psalm 2:1 the plotting is the intention of darkness that leads to evil. In Psalm 1 meditating on God’s Word, his self-disclosure, leads to Godly growth and behaviour. People who are blessed meditate on God’s Word – God’s special self-disclosure. Here is the key to real and lasting happiness. It foreshadows Jesus’s reference to living waters that he promised to the woman at the well in Samaria. These ‘waters’ are bound up in knowing him. Sometimes we think that meditation is something carried out by the super-spiritual – people who are etched into stained-glass windows, people who have their heads in heaven but who are no earthly use. This is not so. The words here echo God’s command to Joshua – God’s man of action who needed just as much as anyone else to think hard about the will of God if he wanted to achieve anything worthwhile. Real happiness is found in our determination to be instructed and counselled by God himself. This isn’t easy. It will mean being prepared to look inside ourselves and consider why we say the things we sometimes do, why we think and behave the way we do, and then be willing to change. This can be tough. It means being honest with ourselves before God. It can take time. For to meditate on God’s teaching involves letting the weight of God’s Word press upon our hearts and minds, and our life-style. Where then do we find true happiness? Not swimming in the shallows of faith, but plunging into the mind of God found in the living waters of his Word. A prayer. Almighty God, you show to those who are in error the light of your truth so that they may return into the way of righteousness: grant to all who are admitted into the fellowship of Christ’s service so that we may renounce those things that are contrary to our profession and follow all such things as are agreeable to it; through our Lord Jesus Christ.  Amen. © John G. Mason The post Happiness… appeared first on The Anglican Connection.

Writing in The Australian last year (April 23, 2024), Dr Greg Sheridan observed, ‘Politics, as they say is downstream of culture, and culture is downstream of faith. Having lost faith in any transcendental truth, the West now is in a permanent crisis of meaning, which leads to political entropy, a kind of political vertigo, forever on the edge of a nervous breakdown’. Over this Easter Season we’ve touched on the Gospel record of Jesus’s physical resurrection as well as what Paul the Apostle writes in First Corinthians chapter 15. We’ve noted that the events of the crucifixion and resurrection are inextricably tied together – through his death Jesus perfectly satisfied the just requirements of a holy God in his interface with a sinful humanity; through his resurrection Jesus assures all who turn to him of God’s full and free forgiveness and new life in all its glory. In First Corinthians chapter 15, Paul lifts a corner of the curtain on what this new life means – a physical resurrection with Jesus where there will be a continuity with our present experience (15:21-38). But we will also experience a significant discontinuity between our present and future bodies. In verses 40b and 41 we read: There are both heavenly bodies and earthly bodies, but the glory of the heavenly bodies is one kind and the glory of the earthly bodies is another. There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; indeed, star differs from star in glory. All around us there’s evidence of God’s awesome ability to create a vast variety of different physical bodies. When we think about this, we shouldn’t dismiss the possibility of there being more than one type of human body, having a different kind of glory or splendor from its old form. A new, resurrection body is not only possible, but there’s every reason to believe that it will have an appearance more glorious than the first. The following verses develop the point: So it is with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable, what is raised is imperishable. It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power. It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body (15:42-44). Someone once sent me a birthday card. On the front was a caricature of Benjamin Franklin with the caption: “We all age from the top downwards – first the hair, then the eyes, mouth, neck, the chins.” On the inside were the words, “What exquisite ankles you have”. Paul is saying that our new resurrection body will be marked by imperish-ability and immortality. It will no longer suffer from disease, disability or death. It will be raised up in glory – in vitality and power. It will no longer be weak and powerless. It will be all the things we cry out for: a healthy, vital, body that will live for ever. Ideas of reincarnation pale into a shadow compared with this robust, glorious picture of Paul’s. Currently we have a physical body suitable for our existence on earth. However, God will provide a spiritual body appropriate for our existence in heaven. Notice how all this will occur: If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. So it is written: “The first man Adam became a living being” the last Adam, a life-giving spirit. The spiritual did not come first, but the natural, and after that the spiritual. The first man was of the dust of the earth, the second man from heaven. As was the earthly man, so are those who are on the earth; and as is the man from heaven, so also are those who are of heaven. And just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so we shall bear the likeness of the man from heaven (15:45-49). Paul identifies two proto-types – Adam and Christ. One is formed from the dust of the earth. The other is the life-giving spirit from heaven. We need to experience bodily transformation and acquire a spiritual body if we are to live in the new heaven and the new earth. As frail mortals we can’t exist with Christ in heaven. We need a body appropriate for God’s promised new order – a body that has the form and shape of our present body, but one in which our perfected spirit will exist. It will be perfectly adapted to the new heaven and the new earth. Just as the disciples recognised the risen Jesus, so we will recognise each other. A computer with its hardware and software may assist with these complex ideas. We could liken the inner self, the conscious self, to computer software, and the body to the hardware. In God’s purposes, when we turn to Christ and take hold of God’s promises, our ‘software’ – our inner self – is subject to a major re-programming: all our imperfections are removed. Our resurrected body – our new ‘hardware’ – will reflect the glory of this perfection. Paul continues by lifting the curtain on the future scene a little more: I declare to you, brothers and sisters that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Listen I tell you a mystery: we cannot all die, but we will be changed— as in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and the mortal will put on immortality. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: ‘Death has been swallowed up in victory’ (15:50-54). This amazing chapter moves to a magnificent climax: we will be changed, as will also those who are alive when that day comes. We will no longer have bodies liable to death and decay. Paul wants each one of us to rejoice with him in the triumph that has been won over death itself. And what a triumph: “Where, O death is your victory? Where, O death is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ (15:55-57). The success of life over death is not in our hands. The victory is God’s. He’s done it all. And we mustn’t dismiss Paul’s note about those who benefit: the victory is for those who know Christ Jesus. Let me quote Malcolm Muggeridge, one-time editor of the English Punch magazine: “Confronted with the reality of death,” he wrote, “we may rage or despair, induce forgetfulness, solace ourselves with fantasies that science will in due course discover how we came to be here and to what end, and how we may project our existence, individually or collectively, into some Brave New World spanning the universe in which Man reigns supreme. God’s alternative proposition is the Resurrection – a man dying who rises from the dead… I close with, ‘Done’…: Christ is risen!’” Paul wants us to know the reality of Jesus’s resurrection and to understand the continuity / discontinuity between our present and future existence. But he also wants us to understand something else. He wants us to appreciate how the resurrection impacts our life now. He writes: Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, be steadfast, immovable, abounding in the work of the Lord, because you know that in the Lord your labor is not in vain. Live now in the light of the reality of the resurrection glory that is to come, he says. In a world that has lost its awareness of transcendental truth, continue steadfast and immovable in your walk through life with Christ Jesus. Continue steadfast in prayer. Pray for wisdom to discern and take up opportunities to introduce family and friends, colleagues and people in the wider world to the Lord Jesus. Continue steadfast and true in your faith in Christ and the hope of the resurrection, knowing that no matter the cost, your work in his service will not be in vain. Others may not know what we do or they may forget, but Jesus won’t. The day will come when he will shout it from the roof-tops. – – – Let me ask, are you praying for three people with whom you would like to share the good news of Jesus’s resurrection? Consider purchasing copies of The Jesus Story: Seven Signs using the link on the banner below. Simply pass on a copy at an appropriate moment. A prayer. Heavenly Father, the giver of all good things, fill our hearts with thankfulness, and grant that by your holy inspiration we may think those things that are good, and by your grace and guidance do them; through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. © John G. Mason The post Steadfast, Immovable…! appeared first on The Anglican Connection.

In The Return of the King, the 3rd volume in The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkein portrays the struggles Frodo and Samwise Gamgee faced on the final stretch of their perilous journey to Mt Doom. Utterly exhausted, Frodo is barely able to press on. Sam, despairing of achieving their goal, looked up: ‘There, peeping among the cloud-wrack above a dark tor high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty forever beyond its reach’. Anyone who is alert to the strange mixture of good and evil in the world around us, can well be tempted to despair. Is there any hope for the future? This was a very real question for the first followers of Jesus of Nazareth. Consider what they experienced. They had seen the man they thought was God’s Messiah die a brutal death on a Roman cross outside Jerusalem. They were numb with grief. ‘How could he allow this to happen? He was always in control,’ they must have said. They had given up three years of their lives to follow this man and now he was dead. Was Jesus all a lie? Was he another failed leader? Like us today, they had watched leaders come and go. Many had shown promise as they flared into prominence but then they had sputtered out as their failures or the failures of those around them subsumed them. With Jesus’ death their hopes and dreams for the future were dashed to pieces. Yet an extraordinary thing had happened on the Sunday following that fateful Friday: their lives were dramatically changed. Their tears of grief turned to tears of unbounded joy. Why? What had brought about that dramatic change? Come with me to First Corinthians chapter 15, the single most important chapter in the New Testament on the subject of Jesus’s resurrection. In verses 3 following, Paul the Apostle writes: For I passed on to you as of first importance that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. After that he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living… Christianity didn’t start because a group of fanatics had invented a story about their hero, nor had it started because a group of philosophers had come to the same conclusions about life. And it hadn’t started because a group of mystics shared the same vision about Jesus. The Christian story began with a group of eye-witnesses – a company of very ordinary men and women who saw something very extraordinary happen. When Jesus was put to death John the Gospel-writer tells us that Jesus’s disciples thought for a while that they had been deluded. Thomas had said, ‘I’m not going to believe in him any more’. But a week after ten of the disciples had seen the risen Jesus, Thomas also saw him. “Put your finger here Thomas,” Jesus had said. “Don’t be faithless but believing” (20:22). Was this a fantasy? Were these people deluding themselves, trying to make the best of the worst moment of their lives? Do you know the first Christian sermon was preached around three miles from Jesus’s tomb? Nobody could have been in a better position to test the trustworthiness of the story of the resurrection than those who were there in Jerusalem that day. Yet when Peter insisted that Jesus was risen from the dead, we don’t find 3,000 skeptics, but 3,000 converts. The first preachers are insistent. The tomb of Jesus of Nazareth was empty on the third day, not because the body had been stolen, nor because the disciples had removed it, nor because Jesus had come out of a coma in the cool of the tomb, but because of a divine intervention. No historical event can be certain in the same way that 2+2 = 4. Ken Handley, a former Justice of the Court of Appeal in the Supreme Court of New South Wales, Australia, points out that all history is a matter of weighing up evidence and probability. The New Testament faith cannot survive without evidence. It needs history, for without history faith is indistinguishable from fantasy. If someone turned up with conclusive evidence that Jesus had not risen from the dead, would you still be a Christian? I wouldn’t. Nor would the apostle Paul. Jesus’s resurrection was not a myth. It was the creator God, breaking into history at a particular place and at a particular time. We know this because of the eye-witness evidence. If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins, Paul continues. Humanity has a problem: all of us are flawed one way or another. Malcolm Muggeridge, a former editor of the English Punch magazine once commented, The depravity of man is at once the most unpopular of all dogmas, but the most empirically verifiable. Throughout his public life Jesus Christ spoke of our flaws in terms of our relationship with God and with one another. When asked what is the greatest commandment, he responded: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart mind, soul and strength, and love your neighbour as yourself.” Jesus taught that the primary purpose of his life was to rescue the lost. He had also taught that his death would be for the ransom, the rescue, of many (Mark 10:45). And this is what Paul says in verse 3 of this resurrection chapter: Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures. Now in verses 17 – 19 he writes, If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins.  Then those also who have died in Christ have perished. If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied. The English philosopher Edmund Burke wrote: ‘All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing’. Jesus is the ultimate good man who through his death has overcome once and for all the powers of sin, evil and death. He didn’t achieve this by a call to arms, nor by calling down the powers of heaven. He achieved it by laying down his life in our place – the just for the unjust, the godly for the ungodly. In our world of toil and trouble, how much we need to let the bright star of Jesus’s death and resurrection smite our hearts… and so find hope. For, to draw from the words of Samwise Gamgee, ‘there is light and high beauty beyond the reach of the darkness of this world’. – – – So let me ask, are you praying for three people to whom you would like to share the good news of Jesus’s resurrection? Consider purchasing copies of The Jesus Story: Seven Signs using the link on the banner below. Simply pass on a copy at an appropriate moment. Prayer. Almighty God, you alone can order the unruly wills and passions of sinful men and women.  Help us so to love what you command and desire what you promise, that among the many and varied changes of this world, our hearts may surely there be fixed where true joys may be found; through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen. © John G. Mason The post He is Risen Indeed. Hallelujah! appeared first on The Anglican Connection.

Eleven years ago this month the world watched William and Kate’s wedding. More than 2 billion people took time out to view this royal event with its rich pageantry and ceremony. It was all that we would expect of a royal occasion. How different was Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem on the first Palm Sunday. As Luke’s narrative unfolds, we find that Jesus’ mission has been a movement towards Jerusalem – the city where the Temple symbolized God’s presence with his people. It was inevitable that Jesus’ work would reach its climax there. But how would the city receive him? During his three years of public ministry Jesus had been confronted by representatives from Jerusalem who had quizzed him and opposed him. Preparation. When Jesus had come near Bethphage and Bethany, at the place called the Mount of Olives, he sent two of the disciples, saying, ‘Go into the village ahead of you, and as you enter it you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden. Untie it and bring it here.  If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ just say this, ‘The Lord needs it’ (Luke 19:29-31). The path Jesus trod with thousands of others on their way to Jerusalem for Passover involved a long climb from Jericho, the lowest city in the world, through the villages of Bethphage and Bethany, up to the Mount of Olives. From there, Jerusalem comes into view, and for most Jewish people, the end of the journey – Passover in the city of God. For Jesus this was a moment for which he had prepared. He sent two of his disciples to a village to fetch a donkey, telling anyone who asked, ‘The Lord has need of it’. Jesus was deliberately fulfilling the words of the prophet Zechariah, who had spoken some 500 years earlier about God’s king riding on the foal of a donkey. It was always said that no one but the king was permitted to ride his horse. This colt had never been ridden. Throwing their cloaks on to the colt, the disciples set Jesus on it. Great Expectations. As Jesus journeyed down the steep path from the Mount of Olives into the Kidron Valley that day, people not only spread their cloaks on the road, but also started singing from Psalm 118, one of the festival psalms: ‘Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven!’ The cloaks on the road and the singing suggested that a king was entering his city. Psalm 118 is a song of victory. There’s something here that is quite often overlooked. The crowds that joyfully sang that day were people from the provinces who had seen and heard Jesus outside the city. Now these people saw Jesus coming in fulfillment of their hopes, answering their longings for a king who would bring peace to earth from heaven itself. The words they sang echoed the words of Jesus earlier in his ministry: ‘If Israel will repent and greet with blessing the One who comes in the name of the Lord, then Israel will experience the advent of salvation’ (Luke 13:35). A Discordant Note. However, there was an irony here that the crowds in their enthusiasm seemed to have missed. This king was not riding a warrior horse. This was no royal or presidential motorcade with armed security. This king was riding a donkey, fulfilling for anyone who knew the Scriptures, the words of Zechariah 9:9. Indeed, some of the Pharisees going along with the crowd appear to have become anxious about how the authorities in Jerusalem would respond. ‘Tell these people to keep quiet’, they said to Jesus. But, contrary to his call for silence when Peter had confessed him as the Christ (Luke 9:20), now he said: ‘If I tell these people to be quiet, even the very stones would sing out…’ He is anticipating the day when even the inanimate elements of creation will respond with joy – the day of the full and final redemption of God’s people. It was time to sing out: God’s king was coming to the city to bring about God’s rescue for his people. Jesus’ work would provide the greater exodus, not just for Israel but for all people, through his own Passover act when he was crucified. Tears for the City. As Jesus came near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, ‘If you, even you, had only recognized on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes…’ (Luke 19:41-42). The people thought Jesus was coming to take up his kingship in Jerusalem. But Jesus went on to predict that because Jerusalem had failed to see and welcome him as God’s long-promised king, it would become a smoking, desolate ruin. With this description of Jesus’ entry into the city of David, Luke turns our attention away from the glory of the kingdom to focus on the suffering the king would endure before the week was out. There would be no glory without his suffering; no crown without his cross. There is a lesson here for us. Luke wants us to understand that God’s king will come one day in awesome power and glory. Yes, without a doubt that will happen. Jesus’ death and resurrection and the fall of Jerusalem in 70AD, point to the reality of divine intervention in human affairs. But Luke also wants us to turn our eyes from the political transformation of society to the greatest need of everyone – the spiritual transformation of our souls. Before we experience our great expectations of Jesus’ kingdom in all its fullness and glory, we must first receive him into our hearts. In every age preachers have wept for the people in the towns and cities where they have ministered God’s truth. I know I have – wept for those who have come and walked away because they didn’t want to hear about what CS Lewis called the divine interferer. Without Jesus, God’s king in our lives we are lost. A Prayer. Almighty ever living God, you have given to all men and women Jesus Christ our Savior as a model of humility. He fulfilled your will by choosing to take on human form and give his life for us on the cross. Turn our hearts to you and help us bear witness to you by following his example of suffering; make us worthy to share in his resurrection. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. © John G. Mason You may want to listen to In Christ Alone from Keith & Kristyn Getty and Alison Kraus. The post ’Great Expectations …?’ appeared first on The Anglican Connection.

Years ago, I met an academic from China, who told me that when on June 4, 1989, the people’s army turned on the pro-democracy movement in Tiananmen Square, Marxism and Maoism within him died. He said he knew then that if there was such a thing as truth, it must come from outside human invention – from God, if he exists. That night he went home and read from cover to cover a book he had been given years before. It was a New Testament. Reading it through at least twice that night he realized that here was a book that was beyond human imagining. I introduce this conversation because many today are being swept along by the tide of current opinion that denies the existence of God. Indeed, occasionally someone says to me, ‘I don’t know what to believe. It’s difficult to work out what’s true and what’s not.’  And while this kind of comment is often true for the non-churchgoer, it can also be true for God’s people. In troubled times, we may be tempted to allow a sure faith in Christ to be subverted. We may be tempted to doubt the substantial truth of God’s gospel; we may be tempted to so focus our faith on the important issues of human equality – yes, they are important – but lose sight of a prior, vital love for God and for the Lord Jesus Christ. And, in the extreme, we may be so attracted by the voices of the ‘new’ faith of atheism, that we come to deny the reality and the significance of Jesus Christ, and the true freedoms that he brings. Come with me to Paul’s words in Colossians chapter 2:8 See to it that no one makes a prey of you by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the universe, and not according to Christ… Deception. Paul was convinced that God’s people in Colossae were in danger of losing the freedom that they’d found through their faith in Jesus Christ. They were vulnerable to being carried away by an empty philosophy that was being persuasively marketed. The framers of these subversive ideas do not seem to have been promoting an immoral life. Rather, they were promoting a world-view that distorted or subverted the truth of God’s gospel and faith in the Lord Jesus. Now it’s fair to say that Paul was not against philosophy in its simple meaning of a love for knowledge and truth. But his language here of philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, speaks of philosophy that has its source in human reasoning. For Paul, God’s gospel was supernaturally revealed in the context of God’s acts in history. We can only come to understand the significance of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ because God has revealed it. Yes, we need to use our minds to understand God’s revelation in Christ, but our starting point is with his self-revelation in the Scriptures. Consider what Paul goes on to write: For in Christ the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, Divinity. God’s people in Colossae needed to refocus their thinking on Jesus Christ. They needed to ask again: Who is he? What does he mean for us? Paul says again what he has said in the previous chapter: Christ is truly God and man. While many find this hard to believe, the evidence is there that Jesus is a man who is also truly God. Think of the miracles he performed— his ability to control nature, to heal the sick, to feed thousands, and his ability to raise even the dead. Furthermore, his actions reveal the compassion of a merciful God. Jesus didn’t do these things because he was a man of great faith. Rather, he did them because he was both 100% God and 100% man. Philosophers and other religions may say that he was a great teacher or a prophet, but they don’t agree that he is God in the flesh. Yet, if the fullness of God lives in Jesus, if Jesus is truly divinity who walked amongst us, then he is the source of truth. Paul is not simply repeating what he has said about Jesus Christ in the previous chapter. Here he is telling us that in Jesus Christ we find the very essence of God. God is love. And, notice, Jesus Christ doesn’t simply reveal a God of power and might, but one whose very nature is to show mercy. This is so important for us to know. Think of it this way. We say that God is love. But love is a relationship word. To say God is love, is meaningless unless God has someone throughout eternity to love. CS Lewis in Mere Christianity wrote: ‘Love is something that one person has for another person. If God was a single person, then before the world was made, he was not love.’ The very existence of the eternal Son of God who has taken on human form, that Paul tells us about in Colossians, assures us that God is personal, and because his central nature is to love, is also a compassionate and merciful God. Here is the God worth knowing – the God whose nature is not just power and majesty, but love and mercy. Don’t be deceived. In John 1:14 we read John the Gospel writer’s testimony concerning Jesus Christ: And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth. In Psalm 1 we read: Happy are those … whose delight is in the law, the revelation of the Lord. A prayer: Almighty God, the protector of all who put their trust in you, without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy: increase and multiply your mercy upon us, so that with you as our ruler and guide, we may so pass through things temporal that we finally lose not the things eternal: grant this, heavenly Father, for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ.  Amen. The post ‘Deceivers in a Troubled World’ appeared first on The Anglican Connection.

In an article in The Weekend Australian (July 11-12, 2020) Dr. Greg Sheridan, writing of the cancel culture forces at work within the West, concludes: ‘The West is under profound challenge internally and externally today. The irrational hatred of the West, within the West, is one symptom of a deep malaise…’ So, how can we live in a rapidly changing and troubled world? We need wisdom, understanding, and the strength to persevere that springs from a growing relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. In the opening lines of chapter 2 of his Letter to the young church in Colossae, Paul the Apostle writes of his agonized striving in prayer for the growth and rich quality of his readers’ faith. And in verses 6 and 7 we find keys that unlock the central theme of his letter. He writes: As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving (2:6-7). God’s people can waver in their faith in troubled times because there is no change in their life, they are not growing in their relationship with Christ, and they have no heartfelt thanks to God, for who he is and what he has done. So, let me identify three themes in Colossians 2: 6 and 7. First, As you received Christ… so now live. Paul expects the lives of God’s people to be shaped by a heartfelt love for God and a genuine neighbor love – the two themes that we find in the Ten Commandments and in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. Having received Christ Jesus the Lord we are now to live in him. We can think of it like this. When Christ moves into our lives there are many things with which he is not comfortable. There’s a lot of cleaning up to be done, repairs and renovation. But, as anyone who has been involved in renovation and repairs knows, it takes longer and costs much more than originally thought. You only have to watch the program ‘Grand Designs’ to see the truth of this. It’s like this with our lives. It takes a lot longer and costs a lot more to make our lives a place fit for the king. The challenge is to make Christ Lord in all our affairs. Paul develops examples of this in the second half of his Letter. In chapter 3:5 he writes: Put to death therefore what is earthly in you:…  Toss out of your life what doesn’t fit this new life with Christ. Is it lust or sexual immorality, evil desire or greed? Is it anger or rage, malice or slander? Do you always tell the truth? These things belong to the old self. Put on the new self which is being renewed after the image of its creator. Second, As you were rooted… be built up;… With mixed metaphors, one from botany the other from building, Paul stresses the need for growth. He doesn’t want God’s people to be stunted in their relationship with Christ Jesus. Yet there are many who have accepted Christ – that he died for their sins – but who have never gone any further. Consequently, their faith has shriveled up and they have neither a biblical framework to discern the issues, nor the resources to remain firm in their faith in changing and uncertain times. So how does growth occur? By focusing on ritual and ceremony at church? By chasing after ecstatic spiritual experiences?  No. A genuine growth in Christ rarely comes to people who are not spending time in the Scriptures. And this can true of churches. As ceremony increases, sermons become shorter. There are times when we’re not motivated to dig deeper into the Scriptures. But sometimes God uses sickness or a crisis in life to awaken us to our need to read the Bible. Sometimes it’s not until we see houses and other trophies of the world for what they are – transient trifles that have a fading and passing splendor – that we see the lasting treasure of God’s truth. And that’s when we begin to grow. As you were taught… be established in the truth, Paul continues. For some years a little saying kept me focused on my need for consistent Bible reading: ‘No Bible, no breakfast; no prayer, no paper.’ Yes, the danger with this kind of line is that Bible reading and prayer become a law. But if it is taken as a guide it can be a useful reminder of our need for daily Bible reading and prayer. This is how we can grow in our understanding of God and a richer relationship with him. And thirdly, …abounding in thanksgiving. To have a thankful heart is to have a contented heart. How often do we get anxious because thankfulness to God is not part of our psyche. The sense of thankfulness within us is a real measure of our growth in Christ. We can’t get taken up with our own desires and moans and groans for long if a spirit of thankfulness to Christ is an essential part of our daily attitude. When we know deep down in our heart that Christ Jesus is the Lord, that he is our good shepherd bringing good for us out of all the confusion, frustrations and challenges of life, we will find that, quite surprisingly, we will be able to press on with determination and joy in our hearts. As you have received Christ… so live – honoring Christ through Godly living. As you were rooted… be built up, and as you were taught… be established in the truth – growing in a rich relationship with God through biblical understanding. And, …abounding in thanksgiving – with heartfelt gratitude to God. A prayer. Lord of all power and might, the author and giver of all good things, graft in our  hearts the love of your Name, increase in us a true faith, nourish us with all goodness, and so by your mercy keep us; through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen. The post ‘Faithfulness in a Troubled World…’ appeared first on The Anglican Connection.

With the continued spread of Covid-19, concerns are being raised about the mental health of many who have lost their job, experience loneliness, or have a sense of helplessness – especially young adults. That is the generation that will experience the impact of the pandemic on their lives, not just now, but for years to come. How can we help people, especially the young, find purpose and hope? In Colossians 1:27 Paul the Apostle summarizes the essence of God’s gospel: Christ in you, the hope of glory. In the preceding two verses and the subsequent two verses he explains how people come to learn this. Speaking of his own ministry, he says that he was called by God to be a minister to serve God’s people and the wider world by making the word of God fully known. Effective ministry. God’s plan to reveal himself to the world was not through miracles, but through words – spoken and written. Paul saw that it was his task to communicate God’s self-revelation fully and faithfully. This is important. It tells us that we don’t achieve a deeper insight into the Christian faith by having some mystical experience of Christ. The challenge of effective ministry is to equip people of all ages with an understanding of God’s Word so that they are drawn into a true and vital relationship with God through the Lord Jesus Christ. An effective ministry on Sundays will help God’s people to read the Bible for themselves. Good preaching will enable God’s people to see from where and how preachers have drawn their teaching. As Paul says, the first task of ministry is to make the Word of God known. Message of ministry. And so Paul speaks of the content of his ministry. For millennia God had kept the essentials of his plans wrapped in confidentiality. But now, Paul tells us, God has chosen to declare himself. His message is for God’s ancient people, the Jewish people, as well as, surprisingly, the non-Jewish world. Paul’s passion was to draw people to the heart of the gospel: Christ in you, the hope of glory. There is an amazing simplicity to this. It is the kind of marketing line advertisers dream about creating. It can be summarised in just two phrases: Christ in you, and the hope of glory. On the one hand it is about a present experience, Christ in you; on the other hand, it speaks about a future reality: the hope of glory. For many people Christianity is little more than a moral rule-book they must struggle to observe, or a creed they must mindlessly recite. Christianity for them is legalistic and dull. However, Paul wants us to understand that at the center of Christianity is a relationship. Christianity is about having Christ in our lives through his Spirit. Many feel cut off from God— sometimes by feelings of failure or unworthiness, by feelings of ignorance or unbelief, or by their life situations. The great news is that if you are looking for God you don’t have to despair. Something has happened that has made it possible for us to experience supernatural reality in our lives – Christ in you. And with a present experience of the indwelling of the Spirit of Christ, we also have the hope of glory. The presence of Christ in our lives now is only half the story. It is only a foretaste of something far greater that God has in store for the future. Christianity is not just a present experience but a future hope. Glory is waiting for us, Paul says. The good things that we have tasted of Christ living in us now are but a tiny glimpse of our future experience when we live openly in the presence God. The best is yet to be. It is important to think this through. There are times when we feel disappointed with the way life treats us. In fact you may be disillusioned with Christianity because of life’s experiences: you had thought that becoming a Christian would solve all your problems. You may have thought that whatever was on your heart, you could put it to God, and await for him to act. But becoming a Christian does not mean this. Our bodies are still subject to sickness, and jobs are still subject to redundancy. What the gospel message offers us in terms of life here and now is not transformed outward circumstances, but transformed inner spiritual resources – Christ in you. Outwardly our bodies are wasting away, Paul writes elsewhere. Inwardly we are being renewed, day by day. Yes, the Bible speaks of a better world where there is no pain and frustration, or loneliness and grief. But we need to understand that this is a future world that we perceive by faith, not by sight. However, the hope of glory is not some vague, wistful, ‘maybe it will happen, maybe it won’t, kind of hope’. It is a sure, confident hope, guaranteed by Jesus’ own resurrection from the dead. How then can we help the many around us – especially the young generation – who feel they have no hope? We need to care for them and pray for them. We need to look for practical ways our local church can support them. For school-aged children and teens, perhaps through an after-school mentoring program which also has Christian education component. We need to pray that we, together with our churches will be proactive in bringing God’s good news to a troubled generation, so that they too may know, Christ in you, the hope of glory. A prayer. Lord Christ, eternal Word and Light of the Father’s glory: send your light and your truth so that we may both know and proclaim your word of life, to the glory of God the Father; for you now live and reign, God for all eternity. Amen. The post ‘Hope for a Troubled Generation’ appeared first on The Anglican Connection.

God’s people will sometimes have doubts about their faith, for there is much in life that threatens to undermine our confidence in a God who is good. How can a good God allow the continuing spread of the novel coronavirus, not least amongst the poor? The only sort of faith that is immune to the silent question, ‘How can a good God allow these things’ is a blind faith, a faith that closes its mind to reality. Real faith has to confront the evil and suffering in the world. Paul the Apostle in his Letter to the Colossians, speaks of humanity being estranged and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds. For many centuries the western world recognized the existence of God, but in recent decades it has arbitrarily dismissed him together with the notions of heaven and hell, good and evil. Indeed, back in 2011 Jarvis Cocker in an interview with Decca Aitkenhead commented: “I think basically becoming famous has taken the place of going to heaven in modern society, hasn’t it? That’s the place where your dreams will come true. It’s an act of faith now; they think that’s going to sort things out.” That said, there are some who define themselves as atheist but who say that only Christianity could have changed society from the brutalities of the Roman Empire to a culture where life has been respected. William Wilberforce, for example, because of his Christian faith, was a leader in the movement that legislated against slavery in Britain in 1833. But I have to say that the step of faith that says God does not exist, not only ignores the evidence and experience of history it does not provide the solution to the ills of the world. A solution that is outside human invention is needed, because as history shows, no human solution has provided or can provide a just and lasting peace. Let’s think about this. God could have written the universe off as a fiasco. He could have scrapped it and gone back to the drawing board. If the world was going to go this wrong why did he make it in the first place? That would have been an admission of defeat on God’s part. It would have meant that in some measure he couldn’t allow evil because he knew he couldn’t beat it. The Bible tells us that from the very beginning of time, God was determined to defeat it. He decided on a much more costly strategy. He wouldn’t abandon this evil and ungrateful world that had rejected him. Rather, he would rescue it. Paul tells us here that when Jesus died on the cross he laid the foundation for a just and lasting peace. Think of it this way. Suppose there is someone very close to you— a wife or husband, a brother or sister or parent – who profoundly hurts you. They trample over your feelings, ignore you, and have no respect for you. In spite of all your kindness they reject you. But now you see them in deep trouble. If you don’t step in to help them, it will be the end for them. What do you do? You could tell them to go to hell. But supposing when you consult your feelings, you find within your heart a love that wants to see them restored to your family. What do you do then? You have to find the resources within yourself to absorb all the pain, the injury, and the anger, that boils up within you at the very sight of them, so that you can stretch out your hand and help them. What we see happening on the cross of Jesus Christ is God, finding a way whereby he can absorb within himself the pain, the injury and the anger, that is rightly within him, when he looks at people like you and me who have hurt him and sinned against him. And, Paul tells us, we know he succeeded, for the growing community of God’s people is the evidence of this. Because of Jesus’ sacrificial death these people have been reconciled with God and have peace with him. They now stand in his sight holy and unstained before him. John Newton who wrote Amazing Grace could say: I once was lost, but now am found… Furthermore, the reconciliation Jesus has achieved has implications far beyond men and women. It will embrace the whole of the cosmos. From the time of the events recorded in Genesis 3, the universe has been under judgement. Romans 8:20f tells us that the creation was subjected to futility. Because of Jesus’ death a day will come when God’s people will experience the joy of standing in the presence of Jesus Christ in all his glory. Indeed, we will find our true place in his creation as the new heaven and the new earth of truth and justice, perfection and peace are revealed. So, when we have times of doubt, it’s useful to ask ourselves afresh whether any information has come to light showing that Jesus’ death and resurrection didn’t actually happen. For if Jesus did die and was raised to life we have the assurance that he is true, and that his promises will one day be perfectly fulfilled. Jesus Christ has provided the solution for a troubled world. The big question we all need to ask is whether we will turn to him, freely acknowledging him as our Lord and Savior. Furthermore, will we admit that he alone has the authority to present repentant fallen men and women before a holy God, without blemish, freed from all accusation? The post ‘Reconciliation for a Troubled World’ appeared first on The Anglican Connection.

In the current crises of Covid-19 and the cultural challenges in the West, is there anywhere can we turn for hope? We may feel inclined to echo the words of Jean Paul Sartre, the French Existentialist who said, ‘That God does not exist I cannot deny; that my whole being cries out for God, I cannot forget’. The encouraging news is that historical evidence and human experience point to a solution to Sartre’s crie de coeur. The answer centers on the question, ‘Who is Jesus of Nazareth?’ In Colossians 1:15 Paul the Apostle writes:  Jesus Christ is the image of the invisible God,… We can deny the existence of God, or we can attempt to make images of God, but both are human imaginings that deface the glory of God. I say that even the denial of God’s existence is human imagining, because all around us, especially what are called the laws of nature, point to the existence of a powerful intelligence that created the universe. For example, against those who say that miracles are inconsistent with the laws of nature, Professor John Lennox, emeritus professor of mathematics at Oxford University comments: ‘From a theistic perspective, the laws of nature predict what is bound to happen if God does not intervene… God’s people understand that the laws of nature are the observable regularities that God the creator has built into the universe. ‘However, such laws don’t prevent God from intervening if he chooses. When he does, we are able to identify the irregularity and speak of it as a miracle’. Jesus’ resurrection, for example, is not the result of a natural mechanism. Rather, as the New Testament says, it happened because God intervened, using his awesome, supernatural power. The Supremacy of Jesus. To return to Paul’s words, Jesus Christ is the image of the invisible God,… John’s Gospel makes the same point. In the opening lines we read: In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. And in verse 14: And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. John makes the connection between the image of God and God in terms of a Father and Son relationship – a relationship that always has existed and always will exist. This is critical, for it tells us that God lives, and acts as a Father, the perfect father. Relationship is the heart-beat of God’s existence. In Colossians 1 Paul goes on to say: for in the Son all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or authorities …  Paul is telling us that the Son existed before anything else in creation. Logically, he himself was not created. He always existed and always will exist.  Putting these ideas together, we understand that in Jesus, the Son of God, we see God. And because he is also truly human, we see what we were meant to be. This helps us to understand ourselves and what we are designed for. We are rational because God is rational. We are moral, because God is moral. We have the capacity for relationship because God has always existed in relationship. We begin to see why Christianity can’t allow itself to be put on the same level as any other religion. Nobody else who has walked this earth could ever be described in terms of such unequivocal divinity as Jesus. He alone is supreme. Furthermore, we read: By him all things were created,… As the creating agent, Jesus put it all together. And the words, ‘all things were created by him and for him’ tell us that Jesus is also the sustainer of the universe. When we plumb the depths of the universe, we will find not so much a mathematical equation or a scientific formula, but divinity. Jesus is the logic, the intelligence, the wisdom, who gives the universe its rationality. This in turn helps us to make sense of our lives in the present and in the future. We see that we’re not just part of a meaningless journey going nowhere. There is a purpose, a goal for us: relationship with God and with one another. The Source of True Peace. In verse 19 Paul continues: For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross. Too often our world reveals the tragic results of its brokenness: hatred and greed, evil and injustice, suffering and death. Indeed, history shows us only too plainly that we don’t have the resources within us to rescue ourselves from the evil and injustices we have created. None of us is good enough or powerful enough to bring about the kind of peace we long for. The amazing story of the Bible is that from the very beginning of time, God was not going to reject this evil and ungrateful world, but instead chose to rescue it. Paul is telling us here that when Jesus died God laid the foundation for a just and lasting peace. Through the blood that Jesus shed, God reconciled to himself all things. One day God is going to make a new heaven and a new earth, where Jesus will reign in truth and goodness, justice and peace forever. But more of this next week. In the meantime, we need to consider afresh our own understanding of Jesus Christ and our relationship with him. Do we daily turn to him asking for his forgiveness? Furthermore, what are we doing to introduce others to him? Are you even planning to forward this ‘Word’ to start a conversation? The post ‘The Hope for a Troubled World’ appeared first on The Anglican Connection.