An art critic once decided to judge, once and for all, which of the great master painters was the most true to life. He arranged for representative works from each of these masters to be gathered in one gallery. He wandered around for a while, gazing upon paintings of great beauty, rich with colour and form, but try as he might he could not decide. Then he struck upon the answer: Going to the gallery’s lighting controls, he dimmed the lights until the paintings could barely be made out and, standing at a distance, declared them all to be the same!

This story is, of course, absurd. You cannot evaluate the truthfulness of a painting (or anything else) by obscuring or ignoring the things that make it distinctive… yet that is exactly what some people try to do when they examine the competing claims of the world’s religions! ‘All religions are the same,’ they claim, ‘they all teach the same things.’ A common illustration used to explain this is that different religions are simply different paths up the same mountain; they all lead to the same God in the end. The name given to this viewpoint by people who like to name such things is pluralism.

What motivates such people? Some do it out of laziness – there are so many religions, so many views and perspectives, that it is easier to lump them all together and condemn them all at once.¹ Others prefer a kind of generalised spirituality that borrows from each of the major religions, allowing them to pick and choose the elements that most appeal to them and binding them to none. More commonly in recent years, however, it is driven by a fear of religious intolerance. This last is a genuine concern, yet it is best dealt with not by closing our eyes to the differences between, say, Hinduism and Judaism, but by encouraging adherents of each to listen to one another respectfully even when we disagree.

Occasionally, pluralists will claim that, ‘If you put Abraham, Buddha, Jesus, Muhammad and other religious leaders in the same room they would get on just fine.’ This is the claim that I intend to explore today. To do so, we will consider the lives and teachings of three very different men, each of whom in his own way changed the world. Incidentally, if you wish to explore further on this topic, I can highly recommend John Dickson’s book A spectator’s guide to world religions, from which much of the material for this sermon has been gleaned.²

Some time in the 5th century BC, a man name Siddhartha Gautama was born into a Hindu family of the ‘warrior-king’ caste of Indian society. Around 29 years of age, so it is told, he left his palace to survey his kingdom, and was overcome with grief by what he saw: a frail old man; a desperately ill man; and a corpse. The next day, however, Gautama saw a very different man who was to change his life forever: a Hindu ‘ascetic’ – a guru who had chosen to pursue the ‘Path of Knowledge’. Siddhartha was so impressed by the serene appearance of this guru that he decided then and there to give up his life of luxury and seek the secret of serenity in a world of suffering. And so he left his privileged life, his beautiful wife, and his newborn baby, to search for an answer to the problem of suffering. He found it, one May night, sitting under a tree meditating. This was the moment of ‘enlightenment’ for Prince Siddhartha, and henceforth he was known to his disciples as the Buddha, which means ‘the enlightened one’.

What was the Buddha’s insight? It may be summarised in what has come to be known as ‘The Four Noble Truths’ of Buddhism: (1) suffering exists; (2) suffering springs from desire; (3) suffering goes when you eliminate desire; and (4) to eliminate desire you must follow the ‘Eightfold Path’, a sequence of steps that aim to help eliminate any concept of the self. The force of the logic is powerful: it is our desire for self-satisfaction, self-existence and self-advancement that creates the experience of pain. Therefore if you remove the self, desire goes; and when desire goes, so too does suffering.

Some thousand years after the Buddha lived another man, named Muhammad. Born in modern-day Saudi Arabia, his early life was filled with tragedy: before he was born his father died, whilst his mother also died when he was 6; after a brief stint living with his grandfather (who died when he was 8 ) he was cared for by his uncle, Abu Talib, a prominent clan leader in the city of Mecca. Muhammad was a contemplative man who frequently left the busyness of Mecca in favour of a cave where he could consider the mysteries of life.

One day, when he was about 40, he heard a heavenly voice repeating the word, ‘recite’. Muhammad didn’t know what to ‘recite’ until finally the voice – identified as that of the angel Gabriel – explained that he had been chosen as a ‘Messenger of God’ to restore to the world the truth about the Creator. From that moment on, Muhammad was referred to by his followers as the ‘Prophet’.

At first, Muhammad found little welcome in his home town of Mecca. His calls for equity and charity were not popular in this centre of commerce and trade. In the end, Muhammad was forced to leave Mecca for Medina, a city some 400km north. In Medina, Muhammad was able to establish a community founded on two things: belief in Allah as the one true God (rather than a Zeus-like overlord of the gods); and belief in Muhammad as his messenger. More than just being the religious leader of this community, however, he was also made the civil ruler of the city – and so the first Islamic state came into existence.³

Relations with Mecca continued to be strained until, in the year 624AD, Muhammad fought a major battle at the town of Badr. In spite of being massively outnumbered, by about 3 to 1, Muhammad prevailed. Over the following years, Muhammad’s forces steadily grew, until in 628AD the Meccans were forced to sign a truce, allowing the Prophet’s followers to visit his birthplace. This did not last long, however, for in the following year Muhammad accused the Meccans of breaking the truce, and lay siege to the city with 10, 000 men. The Meccans, helpless, surrendered and converted to Islam.⁴

The central concept of the Muslim life is submission to God’s law as revealed in the Koran and the example of the Prophet. Indeed, the word ‘Islam’ means ‘submission’, whilst the word ‘Muslim’ means ‘one who submits’ (to Allah). Surrendering yourself to God’s law leads to eternal Paradise, whilst disobedience leads to destruction on the Day of Judgement. The heart of the law is found in what are often called the ‘Five Pillars of Islam’. These are (1) a declaration of faith, that ‘There is no god but Allah, and Muhammad is his prophet'; (2) daily prayers; (3) payment of a tax for the poor; (4) the fast of Ramadan; and (5) a pilgrimage to Mecca. By submitting to these 5 demands, men and women hope to secure their place in Paradise.

Nestled in the middle of the years separating these two men is Jesus of Nazareth. The birth of this man literally divides history, with the preceding years numbered as BC – ‘before Christ’ – and the following numbered as AD – anno domini, or ‘the year of the Lord’. Born to working-class parents, and growing up in the backwater Palestinian town of Nazareth, Jesus had little to distinguish him from other men, except some unusual events surrounding his birth. Yet in his early thirties he began a public ministry that was attended by extraordinary miracles and, in the eyes of some at least, even more extraordinary teachings. About 3 years into this ministry, he was arrested by Jewish authorities, illegally tried, and turned over to the Roman authorities to be put to death. He was certified as dead by a Roman executioner, buried in a tomb, and yet 3 days later he was seen alive by numerous people – even as many as 500 at one time!

Chief among Jesus’ teachings concerned the nature of his relationship with God, whom he claimed as his Father in an utterly unprecedented way. As he spoke the words that we have heard read, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me’ (John 14:6), he both affirmed his own ability to bring others into relationship with God, and denied that anybody else was able. In fact, the relationship between Father and Son is so profound, that knowing the Son is equivalent to knowing the Father (14:7, 9), for Jesus and the Father are one (10:30)!

It is at this point that it becomes utterly impossible to sustain the belief that ‘all religions are the same’. The Buddha rejects the notion of any God at all, yet Jesus claims not only that there is a God, but that to know Jesus is to know God. You don’t have to be a mathematical genius to realise that no God is not the same as one God – let alone the many gods of the Hindu religion! Muhammad claimed to have a revelation from God, whereas Jesus claimed to be a revelation from God. And for Jesus to claim, as he did, that he and God are one would be cause for death in Muhammad’s eyes.

Another irreconcilable difference between Jesus and the others is their different solutions to the problems of human existence. The Buddha taught that the problem was suffering, which originates in desire; the solution, then is to eliminate desire and so eliminate suffering. The Prophet taught that the problem is that men and women are disobedient towards Allah, and that the solution is to submit to the Law. Both men implied that you have the ability, by what you do, to solve the problem of your existence. This is attractive in our age of self-help, where independence is almost the cardinal virtue.

Jesus’ view of the problem is similar to both the Prophet and the Buddha: disobedience towards God – which he calls sin – leads to suffering, death and, ultimately, judgement. It is Jesus’ solution that is so very different for, he says, men and women are not capable of overcoming this problem. Instead, it is only by the actions of Jesus himself – God taking on human flesh, suffering death as a penalty for sin and being raised from the dead – that sin, suffering and death can be defeated. Where the Buddha and the Prophet point you to what you must do, Jesus points to what he has already done.

It is this personal intervention that is at the heart of the often-used image of the shepherd in Jesus’ teaching. A man was travelling with a guide through Palestine, and came across a shepherd and his sheep. The shepherd showed him the fold into which the sheep were led at night; it consisted of four walls with a way in. The man said, ‘But there is no door,’ to which the shepherd replied, ‘I am the door.’ ‘What do you mean?’ ‘When the light has gone, and all the sheep are inside, I lie in that open space, and no sheep ever goes out but across my body, and no wolf comes in unless he crosses my body; I am the door.’⁵ This is what Jesus means when he says, ‘I am the gate for the sheep… whoever enters through me will be saved’ (Jn 10:7, 9) and ‘I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep’ (Jn 10:11). It is Jesus who acts to rescue us from the terrible fate that sin has brought us to. Without the shepherd we are but prey; with him, we are utterly safe. Men like Siddhartha Gautama and Muhammad may give an appearance of protection and security through what they teach, but when the wolf comes they are no help, for they are merely hired hands and have no investment in you.

Consider the case of Kobayashi Issa, a Japanese poet and devout Buddhist, whose life was marked with tragedy. He believed what the Buddha taught, that the things of this life are fleeting, in his words a ‘world of dew’. Yet after the death of his second child, he wrote the following haunting words:

This world of dew
Is only a world of dew
And yet… and yet…

When tragedy struck this man, the teachings of the Buddha were little consolation.

A lot more could be said in comparing these three men, if time permitted… but unfortunately it doesn’t! As mentioned earlier, if you’re interested in exploring these issues further, I highly recommend John Dickson’s book A spectator’s guide to world religions, which also considers the teachings of Hinduism and Judaism.

What then are we to conclude? Claiming that all religions are the same is nonsense, for as we have seen even the three religions we have examined are neither compatible nor interchangeable. Indeed, claiming two things are the same when they are not leads to tragedy, as witnessed by a Sydney couple convicted this week of the manslaughter of their nine-month-old daughter. Tragically, the couple wrongly believed that their homeopathic remedies for the girl’s eczema were as effective as western medicine… and their little girl paid the price as a result.

So a choice must be made. The Buddha offers a path from a life of suffering to a life stripped of desire. The Prophet prescribes a life of submission to the Law in order to achieve Paradise. Jesus Christ calls you to a life lived under the protection of the Good Shepherd… and has himself done everything necessary for that to happen. The choice is yours.

    – Tim Campbell (4/10/2009)

Bibliography

Dawkins, Richard. The God Delusion. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 2006.
Dickson, John. A Spectator’s Guide to World Religions : An Introduction to the Big Five. Sydney South: Blue Bottle Books, 2004.
Morris, Leon. The Gospel According to John. Rev. ed, The New International Commentary on the New Testament. Grand Rapids, Mich.: W.B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 1995.

Endnotes

1. e.g. Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 2006), 35-6. Dawkins writes, ‘Life is too short to bother with the distinction between one figment of the imagination and many… I decry supernaturalism in all its forms. I am attacking God, all gods, anything and everything supernatural wherever and whenever they have been or will be invented.’
2. John Dickson, A Spectator’s Guide to World Religions : An Introduction to the Big Five (Sydney South: Blue Bottle Books, 2004).
3. This event was so important, that it marks the beginning of the Muslim calendar. The current year, for a Muslim, is not 2009AD, but 1430 AH, where AH stands for the Latin anno Hegirae, ‘in the year of the emigration’ to Medina.
4. Lest it be thought that Islam is a religion founded on military force, it is important to recognise that Muhammad was no more warrior-like than any other clan leader of his time; in many ways he was considerably more just and compassionate. He customarily offered three options when communities came into contact with Islamic expansion: (1) Conversion; (2) Protection, meaning that the community could keep its way of life, but was obliged to pay a tax to the wider community; or (3) Battle. Only when a community refused the first two options was the third exercised.
5. Leon Morris, The Gospel According to John, Rev. ed., The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, Mich.: W.B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 1995), 451 n. 32.

On the first of January, 1863, the American Emancipation Proclamation came into effect. By it, all of the black slaves in the United States were set free. Yet a strange thing happened, for many continued to live in slavery. When an Alabama slave was asked what he thought of Abraham Lincoln, the Great Emancipator he replied, ‘I don’t know nothin’ ’bout Abraham Lincoln cep they say he sot us free. And I don’t know nothin’ ’bout that neither’.¹ It is not enough to declare someone as being free if they ‘don’t know nothin’ ’bout it’ – instead, they must be taught and shown what it means to be free. And, as we shall see, this is very close to the Apostle Paul’s heart.

In tonight’s passage, Paul proclaims life and freedom for those who are in Christ. But he doesn’t leave it there, going on to explain what this life and freedom looks like, and encouraging the Colossians not to return to the death and slavery from which they have been liberated. This is signalled in the opening three verses:

So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.

See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ. (6-8)

There are two things here. Firstly, Paul says to the Colossians ‘just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him’ (6). And secondly he gives an instruction: ‘See to it that no one takes you captive’ (8). These two ideas form the framework for the rest of this passage, as he explores them and explains them in greater depth.

‘Just as you received Christ Jesus, continue to live in him’ (6-7, 9-15)

We cannot know exactly what it was that prompted Paul to write this letter, but we can take some pretty good guesses based on the things he says. One of the recurring words in Colossians is the word ‘fullness’.² One of the most widely held theories about the situation in Colossae is that new teachers had come and were teaching that the gospel they had received was not the ‘full’ story, that there was more to know and to do. As we know, Paul did not bring the gospel to Colossae himself. That was the privilege of Epaphras. But Epaphras was not an apostle, and perhaps the newcomers were claiming some superior authority to proclaim that his gospel was in some way defective, and that to achieve ‘fullness’ as Christians more was required. The Colossians were missing out, unless they paid attention to the new teachers and did what they said.

This still happens today, doesn’t it? Our entire advertising industry is built on the premise that you, the consumer, are missing out unless you buy this product or that service. And Christian marketing is not immune. Consider the list of titles in a recent catalogue from a popular Christian bookstore: Happiness is a lifestyle; Leadership on the Front Foot; The Power of Prayer to Change Your Marriage; and Your Best Life Begins Each Morning. Each of these titles makes an implicit promise that your life will somehow be better, more fulfilling, if you buy and read the book.

Paul’s response is clear:

For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and you have been given fullness in Christ. (9-10)

The fullness of God is found in Jesus Christ. You can’t get much more full than that. And those who have received Christ, including the Colossians (6), have been given fullness in him. If you are a Christian then the good news is that you have been given all the fullness of God; you will spend the rest of your life learning what that means, but there is nothing more to do for all has been done for you by Jesus.
What does this fullness look like? Paul gives us a couple of images to help us understand, and they are all expressed in terms of freedom. First, we are freed from the dominion of other powers and authorities, for Christ is head over them all. The powers and authorities here are spiritual beings. Many of you will be familiar with C. S. Lewis’ The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, either from the book itself or the more recent movie. In it, the Witch stands before Aslan and demands the life of the traitor, Edmund. ‘You know,’ she says, ‘that every traitor belongs to me as my lawful prey and that for every treachery I have a right to a kill.’³ The impression is of a debt owed to the evil power, yet the reality is very different for God owes no debt to Satan. Jesus Christ is the head over every power and authority, and that includes the devil. No longer are the spiritual powers and authorities to be feared, for they have been publicly humiliated in Christ’s triumph on the cross (15).

We belong to Jesus, and so our allegiance is to him, not to the powers and authorities. We know this because of three signs: the sinful nature is removed by Christ, a kind of circumcision (11); the Christian is buried with Christ in baptism (12); and the Christian is raised to life through ‘faith in the power of God’ (12).

Paul expands on this point with his second picture of freedom, freedom from sin and death.

When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. (13)

Death comes because of sin, and sin from sinful nature. But for Christians, God has removed our sinful nature and forgiven our sins, thus making us alive! If you are not a Christian, you need to know that the only place where you will find fullness and life is in Jesus Christ. This is the amazingly good news – the gospel – of Christianity: those who are dead, God makes alive with Christ; those who are captive, God sets free in Christ… and that offer is open to you!
Paul’s point is that there is life, fullness and authority in Christ, and those who are in him are given freedom from oppression, sin and death. Why then does Paul warn the Colossians not to be taken captive (8)? I believe that he is correcting a misguided view of the gospel.

‘See to it that no one takes you captive’ (8, 16-23)

Christian brothers and sisters, how do you see the gospel? Some Christians think of it as the first step of the stairway that leads to God, or a doorway which one passes through and leaves behind as they approach him. Let me suggest to you a better image: the gospel is the hub which holds the wheel called ‘Christianity’ together. The gospel is the fullness, if you like, of Christian teaching and theology. If you cannot see the ‘spoke’ connecting a teaching to the gospel then it is likely an addition to what is already full. And you cannot add to fullness, or else, by definition, it was not really fullness in the first place.

It seems that that is exactly what was happening in Colossae, for Paul feels the need to instruct the Colossians not to let themselves be taken captive by things that are ‘hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ’ (8). He gives three examples of these: hyper-religion (16-17); hyper-spirituality (18-19); and hyper-discipline (20-23).

Hyper-religion is where the forms of religion are stretched beyond their original intention, and where observing them gives one a ‘status’ beyond that of other believers. The examples Paul gives are of people observing religious rules, festivals and holidays, things that he says are mere shadows of the reality found in Christ (16-17). Have you ever wondered why we do not make sacrifices as the Old Testament priests did? Or why we do not strictly observe the Sabbath as Jews did and do? The reason is that these things were pointers to Jesus who is both sacrifice (Heb 8:26) and Sabbath rest (Heb 3-4). So do not be fooled by those who say you must pray in a particular way, sing specific songs, perform certain rituals or support such and such a cause to be a ‘full’ Christian. The fullness that comes in Christ is not dependent upon which church you attend or which preacher you listen to. In Christ ‘you have been given [past tense]4 fullness’ (10).

A variant on this theme is hyper-spirituality. In Paul’s language, hyper-spiritualists are those who delight in ‘false humility and the worship of angels’ (18). Where hyper-religion says a person achieves fullness by what they do, hyper-spirituality emphasises what a person has experienced. Their humility is false because they point away from themselves to their experiences, expecting that they will in turn reflect well upon themselves. Some examples today might be Christian leaders who claim influence and authority because of a vision they have seen, a word that they have received from God, a supernatural healing performed through them and so on. When I was in Year 12, all I wanted was to be able to speak and pray in tongues. For a long time I felt like an inferior Christian, because I did not and do not. This seemed to me to be something every Christian should expect, and those who didn’t were missing out. But the truth we find in this passage is that fullness is found in Jesus Christ, not Christ plus something else.

Hyper-discipline is where a person imposes rules upon themselves and others in order to bring about perfection in themselves. Some examples would include those who fast, refuse alcohol or will not watch television in order to make a point to those around them how holy they are. In extreme cases, this manifests in what Paul calls ‘harsh treatment of the body’ (23), such as the self-imposed beatings and cilice employed by the fictional character Silas in Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code. The rationale such a person gives if asked is that they are ‘restraining sensual indulgence’, but Paul says that these things ‘lack any value’ in doing so (23).

One of the clearest signs of a hyper-religious, hyper-spiritual or hyper-disciplined person is that they judge others according to their religion, spirituality, discipline or lack thereof. ‘Unless you are like I am, you do not have everything that the Christian life has to offer,’ they say. Thus they ‘judge’ (16) and ‘disqualify’ (18) others. Their teachings ‘have an appearance of wisdom’ but they are ‘self-imposed worship’ (23) and so are ultimately ‘destined to perish’ (22).

How are we to respond when confronted with hyper-religious, hyper-spiritual or hyper-disciplined people? The instruction is clear: ‘Do not let anyone judge you… Do not let anyone… disqualify you’ (16, 18). Some will remember the 20km walking event at the Sydney Olympic Games, when Australian athlete Jane Saville was disqualified as she entered the stadium for violating the rules of the competition; how silly it would be if she had allowed herself to be disqualified because of something that was not in the rules, such as the brand of shoes she wore, or the amount of water she drank.

Religion, spirituality and discipline are not in and of themselves bad things. In most cases, in fact, they are tremendously beneficial. Yet good though they are, they do not have the authority or power to govern our lives, for life in Christ is governed by a different set of rules, namely Christ, the head. Unless teacher and teaching are connected to Jesus Christ and his gospel they are but ‘human commands and teachings’ (22) and they have no hold over us, so do not be taken captive by them.

The only thing more tragic than a slave who does not know he is free is one who, having experienced and understood freedom, returns to slavery. Let us suppose that the slave we heard from earlier, having tasted his freedom, was approached by a man claiming the virtues of slavery and offering to take him captive once more. Would he accept this proposal? Of course not!

If you are in Christ, you have been given fullness and freedom. Do not seek them in anything that does not have Christ as its head, or else you will be taken captive.

Bibliography

Lewis, C. S. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. London: Lions, 1980. Reprint, 1987.
Swindoll, Charles R. Swindoll’s Ultimate Book of Illustrations & Quotes (Formerly Tale of the Tardy Oxcart and 1501 Other Stories: A Collection of Stories, Anecdotes, Illustrations, and Quotes), Swindoll Leadership Library. Nashville: Word Pub., 1998.

Endnotes

1. Charles R. Swindoll, Swindoll’s Ultimate Book of Illustrations & Quotes (Formerly Tale of the Tardy Oxcart and 1501 Other Stories: A Collection of Stories, Anecdotes, Illustrations, and Quotes), Swindoll Leadership Library (Nashville: Word Pub., 1998), 524-25.
2. Gk. plērōma (1:19; 2:9) and the verbal cognate, plēroō (1:9; 1:25; 2:10; 4:12, 17).
3. C. S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (London: Lions, 1980; reprint, 1987), 128.

As you know, the sermons preached throughout this term have been ‘by request’, and tonight is no exception. In looking through the list of topics nominated by members of this congregation, the one that stuck out to me was, ‘Worshipping God in life’. I spent some time reflecting on what the topic was supposed to be about, and concluded that I was expected to talk about how Christians need to worship God not only on Sundays but every minute of every day. I might have preached such a message from any number of Scriptures, including the passage Rod preached on last week (Romans 12), and it would have been good to do so. However, the more I meditated upon it, the more I realised that the fundamental problem for Christians is not that they don’t worship enough, but rather that they worship the wrong things, or in the wrong way.

A young woman buys another pair of shoes she doesn’t need. An audience sits enthralled by Beethoven’s 6th Symphony. A middle-aged man buys the Lamborghini he has always dreamed of. A man spends his evenings buried in internet pornography. A new mum and dad greet their baby boy. A tour group gaze upon Monet’s ‘Water Lilies’. As many and varied as all of these things are, each one is an act of worship.

Worship is an act of response to someone or something’s worth.¹ Thus, any time we are provoked to wonder by an extraordinary sunset, or sacrifice to save up for a guitar, or just can’t wait for the new John Mayer album to be launched, we are worshipping. Everyone worships every day, whether they recognise it or not.

The Bible has two categories for worship: acceptable and unacceptable, which is called idolatry. Acceptable worship is worship directed to the God of the Bible. Idolatry is placing anything else – good or bad – ahead of God, and this is unacceptable worship. Everyone falls into one of these two categories.

Tonight we’re specifically interested in acceptable worship. We will focus primarily on John 4, where Jesus teaches that Christians must worship the Father in Spirit and in truth. But what does that mean? And how do I do it? Let’s turn to John 4 and find out!

At first glance, a discussion between a wandering Jewish rabbi and an unnamed Samaritan woman at a well in a rural town is probably not the first place you would look for a profound discussion. The conversation seems to start out conventionally enough: Jesus asks for a drink of water.² Pretty soon, however, the discussion turns in an unusual directions. Jesus, the one asking for a drink of water, tells the woman that she should be asking him for a drink!³ She asks for the living water that Jesus speaks of and is told to fetch her husband.⁴ She replies with a half-truth – “I have no husband”⁵ – and is absolutely blown away when Jesus shows that he knows the whole truth, for she has had five husbands and is now shacked up with a guy who is not her husband.

This is where we pick up our story:

“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet.⁶ Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.” (4:19-20)

The Samaritans were enemies of the Jews. They claimed to worship Yahweh, but chose to do so in their own way, rather than in the way God had commanded; they set up their own temple in opposition to the temple at Jerusalem.⁷ This was a source of great bitterness between Samaritans and Jews: the Jews had destroyed the Samaritan temple,⁸ whilst the Samaritans in return had attempted to desecrate the Jerusalem temple.⁹ So there are two conflicting temples, each claimed as the location of God’s presence. Each of these temples was built on a mountain: the Jewish temple on the imaginatively named Temple Mount, ¹⁰ and the Samaritan temple on Mount Gerizim (where this story takes place). Mountains in Scripture consistently represent places where people meet with God, and where God reveals himself.¹¹) The conflict between the Jews and Samaritans came down to this: where is God found, and to whom has he revealed himself?

It is not a surprise, then, that this woman should choose this issue as the litmus-test for establishing the identity of this ‘prophet’. She wants to know where she should go to find and worship the true God.

This is a quest that many today undertake. A 1998 survey found that 74% believe in a God, although only 35% believe in a personal God.¹² People seek god in many places, some physical but most not. For example, the same survey showed that in the previous twelve months 18% of Australians ‘often or occasionally sought direction from a horoscope’, whilst 9% practised Eastern meditation and 7% used psychic healing or crystals. How can we know the right ‘place’ to find God?

Once again, Jesus surprises us with his answer.

Jesus declared, “Believe me, woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. (4:21-23)

The woman wants to know which is the right place to worship: Jerusalem or Gerizim. Jesus says, in effect, “Your location doesn’t matter.” It is true that he asserts the Jewish position as being the correct one when he says, ‘You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we [Jews] worship what we do know’ (4:22). Doing so, however, is not so much about claiming that the Jews got it right but rather that God has the right to dictate the way he is approached.¹³

The only way to worship acceptably is in obedient response God’s revelation. The Samaritans had chosen to ignore a large portion of this revelation by throwing away all except the first 5 books of the Jewish Scriptures, those written by Moses.¹⁴ The Jews, whatever their other faults, had not.¹⁵ Yet Jesus declares that something new is happening: ‘A time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem… a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth’ (4:21, 23). Jesus shifts the focus from the where of worship to the how of worship. True worshipers of God will worship in spirit and truth.

The word ‘spirit’ in these verses is strongly contrasted with the idea of place. Jesus was asked where worship was to happen and his answer is ‘in spirit’. In other words, worship is no longer to be tied to a place – at least, not a physical place.¹⁶ ‘God is spirit,’ we are told, meaning, at the least, that he is not approachable in the physical sense. How then are we to approach him? The Apostle John doesn’t spell out the answer to this question here, but he doesn’t need to for he has already done so.

In chapter 3 Jesus tells a man named Nicodemus that he must be born again. ‘I tell you the truth,’ he says, ‘no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit’ (3:5-6). So for us to worship in spirit, we must first be born again, born of God’s Spirit; only then will our spirit be enabled to worship.

How may we receive God’s Spirit in order that we be reborn? It is only by the gift of God; more specifically it is only by the action of Jesus. This is the meaning of the early part of the conversation with the Samaritan woman, the discussion about living water. Jesus often uses symbols and metaphors of himself – he describes himself as ‘the bread of life’,¹⁷ ‘the gate’,¹⁸ ‘the Good Shepherd’,¹⁹ ‘the way and the truth and the life’,²⁰ ‘the vine’,²¹ etc. Yet here, in chapter 4, Jesus is not the living water, but the giver of the living water (4:10). Instead, this living water is the Holy Spirit,²² who John refers to as the Spirit of Truth.²³ It is the transforming presence of the Holy Spirit that enables us to worship in spirit. Only Christians can truly worship God, for it is only through Jesus that the Spirit comes.²⁴ Once the Spirit is at work in us our worship is no longer tied to places or times. It is, instead, ‘a spring of water welling up to eternal life’ (4:14). And when the Spirit of Truth enters you, ‘he will guide you into all truth’ (16:13).

That being the case, what does it mean to worship in truth?²⁵ First, we must approach God truthfully. This means being honest with God; don’t try and hide from God your anger, sadness, fear or hope. If you are happy, be happy; if you are suffering then bring it to God rather than pretending you’re not.

Second, truthful worship must be according to God’s revelation of truth. Jesus prays for his disciples, ‘Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth’ (17:17). The Samaritans had rejected much of even the partial truth that they had been given, in throwing away the prophets and the Psalms and so on, leading Jesus to conclude that they worshipped what they didn’t know. We, however, are fortunate to have God’s word written down for us to learn from and to be sanctified by. Practically, this means reading, meditating on, praying and, finally, living the Scriptures.²⁶ These stages are described by a 12th Century monk called Guigo the Second:

Reading… puts the solid food in our mouths, meditation chews it and breaks it down, prayer obtains the flavour of it and contemplation is the very sweetness which makes us glad and refreshes us.²⁷

The Samaritans and Jews had only a fraction of the truth that we have, for we have been given God’s ultimate revelation in Jesus. ‘No one has ever seen God,’ John writes, ‘but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known’ (1:18).

Spirit and truth are both necessary all the time. They are like the map and compass of the Christian life: having one without the other is not sufficient. The map, God’s Word of Truth, gives us direction and purpose, and outlines the world around us. Yet without a compass, we have no way of orienting ourselves and applying the map to the surrounding landscape. Such worship ends up in dry religion, with God’s Word being an object for study but never application. The compass, God’s Spirit, allows us to be certain of the way we are facing and the direction we’re travelling, but without the map we are still lost. This kind of worship is full of passion and fire but lacks the deep roots of Truth, the strong foundation of bedrock, that will allow it to stand in the sun and the storm. ‘Our churches can’t be Spirit-led unless they’re Word-fed.’²⁸

Put both spirit and truth together, however, and you’re in business!²⁹

Worship in truth without spirit or in spirit without truth is not true worship, but rather idolatry. If either of these describe you, you must repent, and ask God to supply what you lack. It is only together that compass and map, spirit and truth, work together to provide navigation through this life and into the next.

And the only ‘place’ to find both spirit and truth is in Jesus. To worship in truth we must be in the one who says ‘I am the Truth’ (14:6). To worship in spirit we must be born of the Spirit, who can only come from Jesus. In previous chapters, Jesus is presented as the true tabernacle³⁰ and the true temple;³¹ here he is presented here as the true holy mountain where God can be encountered.³² The tabernacle, temple and mountain that we must go to if we are to offer acceptable worship is Jesus Christ. Spirit and truth are no longer found in a place but in a person.

This explains the apparent paradox of Jesus’ words: ‘a time is coming, and has now come…’ (4:23). How can something be coming and here at the same time? Jesus uses the same language in chapter 16, where he speaks of a pregnant woman whose ‘time has come’ giving birth. The child in the womb can be considered to be both ‘coming’ and ‘here’. Clearly, however, this implies a momentous event, a ‘birth’, that will signal a transition from one stage to another. What is this event?

In John’s Gospel, the word translated here as ‘time’³³ regularly refers to the events of Jesus’ crucifixion, resurrection and exaltation.³⁴ At the time he spoke these words, Jesus was the only true worshiper. He was the one upon whom God’s Spirit came down and remained,³⁵ whereas the Spirit had not yet been given to anyone else,³⁶ for that could only happen by means of his death.³⁷ Without wanting to push the image too far, there is a sense in which the true worship of God is conceived in Christ, and given birth by his work on the Cross. The result is that we can also be true worshippers. More than this, we must be true worshippers, for that is what the Father seeks (4:23). ‘God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship him in spirit and in truth’ (4:24).

There are three main occurrences of the word ‘must’ in John, and together they outline the gospel.³⁸ First, Jesus instructs Nicodemus: ‘You must be born again’ (3:7). This is the first step, the source from which a life of faith and worship springs. If you are not a Christian, this is where you must start, for flesh can only give birth to flesh and not to spirit; if you want to worship God in spirit, as he requires, you must first be born again. Jesus knew that this could not happen unless he was obedient to his Father, submitting himself to his Father’s will even though it meant death. This is the meaning of the second ‘must': ‘Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert the Son of Man must be lifted up’ (3:14). Walking through the desert, the people sinned against God, and his wrath was turned against them; only those who looked to the bronze snake that the LORD told Moses to make and lift up on a pole were saved.³⁹ The message is clear: we must be born again, but cannot because we are sinful and God’s wrath is against us… yet God has provided a way by ‘lifting up’ Jesus, so that anyone who looks to him can be saved. There is only one proper response to this, the third ‘must': ‘God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship him in spirit and in truth’ (4:24).

Don’t miss the importance of this. Worship is not an additional extra to the Christian life; it is not something the Christian chooses to do, or not, according to their preferences, plans or passions. It’s not just that God accepts worship in spirit and truth, God seeks it! (4:23) Worshipping God is the responsibility of all believers. ‘God is spirit, and his worshippers’ – all of us! – ‘must worship him in spirit and in truth’ (4:24).

Bibliography

“A Question of Beliefs.” National Church Life Survey, http://www.ncls.org.au/default.aspx?sitemapid=2336.
Boice, James Montgomery. The Gospel of John : An Expositional Commentary. Pbk. ed. 5 vols. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Books, 2005.
Bruce, F. F. The Gospel of John. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans Pub. Co., 1983.
Carson, D. A. The Gospel According to John. Grand Rapids, Mich.: W.B. Eerdmans, 1991.
Josephus, Flavius. The Works of Josephus : Complete and Unabridged. Translated by William Whiston. New updated ed. Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson Publishers, 1987.
Kauflin, Bob. Worship Matters : Leading Others to Encounter the Greatness of God. Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway Books, 2008.
Morris, Leon. The Gospel According to John. Rev. ed, The New International Commentary on the New Testament. Grand Rapids, Mich.: W.B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 1995.
Peterson, David. Engaging with God : A Biblical Theology of Worship. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1992.
Peterson, Eugene H. Eat This Book : A Conversation in the Art of Spiritual Reading. Grand Rapids, Mich.: W.B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 2006.
Piper, John. Desiring God : Meditations of a Christian Hedonist. Updated [i.e. 3rd] ed. ed. Leicester: Inter-Varsity, 2004.
Thettayil, Benny. In Spirit and Truth : An Exegetical Study of John 4:19-26 and a Theological Investigation of the Replacement Theme in the Fourth Gospel, Contributions to Biblical Exegesis & Theology. Leuven ; Dudley, MA: Peeters, 2007.

Endnotes

1. In fact, the English word ‘worship’ is derived from an older word ‘worth-ship’ – words and actions that demonstrate worth.
2. Actually, this was highly unusual for the culture of the day; for a Rabbi to be alone with a woman was scandalous, and for a Jew (especially a Jewish Rabbi) to talk to a Samaritan was unheard of (cf. 4:9).
3. 4:10
4. 4:15-16
5. 4:17
6. The Samaritans interpreted Dt. 34:10 to mean there were to be no other prophets until the coming of the great prophet promised in Dt. 18:15, 18. On this basis, they rejected all the Jewish Scriptures except for those written by Moses. Thus, if the Samaritan woman is serious about thinking Jesus a prophet, she is already on the verge of concluding what she is later told: Jesus is the Messiah. [F. F. Bruce, The Gospel of John (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans Pub. Co., 1983), 108.] The Samaritan name for the Messiah was Taheb, which means restorer, although the evidence for this is from a 4th Century Samaritan text (Memar Markah 4:12) cf. Benny Thettayil, In Spirit and Truth : An Exegetical Study of John 4:19-26 and a Theological Investigation of the Replacement Theme in the Fourth Gospel, Contributions to Biblical Exegesis & Theology (Leuven ; Dudley, MA: Peeters, 2007), 185ff.
7. The justification for this rests on their rejection of the other Scriptures, for the Pentateuch only speaks of the place where God would place his name (e.g. Deut. 12:5, 11, 21; 14:23; 16:2 etc.), and not specifically Jerusalem. However, Josephus’ account in Ant. 11.306-312 suggests that the temple was set up by a high-priest who was censured for marrying a foreigner. Perhaps the theological position was taken to justify an action already performed?
8. Josephus, Ant. 13.275-81.
9. According to Josephus, the Samaritans ‘threw about dead men’s bodies in the cloisters’ (Ant. 18.30).
10. Whilst Mount Zion is traditionally associated with Jerusalem and the temple, particularly in eschatological literature, it was not the location of the Temple. It is, instead, a mountain just outside of Jerusalem.
11. The most obvious example is the meeting at Mount Sinai, where God gave the law to Moses (Ex 19:3ff.
12. “A Question of Beliefs,” National Church Life Survey, http://www.ncls.org.au/default.aspx?sitemapid=2336.
13. cf. Boice, who writes, ‘Salvation is always of God’s grace, not of human merit; and since grace was offered to the sinner on the grounds of the death of an atoning sacrifice and since in Christ’s time that sacrifice could only be offered at Jerusalem by a legitimate priest, a descendant of Aaron, it is obvious that there could be no salvation for anyone except through the Jewish priesthood which in turn was available only to a circumcised member of one of the tribes of Israel. Jesus was impressing this upon the woman, thereby reasserting the right of God to establish the means of approach to him and encouraging her to turn from any trust in human religions.’ James Montgomery Boice, The Gospel of John : An Expositional Commentary, Pbk. ed., 5 vols. (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Books, 2005), 290.
14. See note above.
15. Thus ‘salvation is from the Jews’ for they were the people chosen by God to bear his name and receive his self-revelation.
16. Leon Morris, The Gospel According to John, Rev. ed., The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, Mich.: W.B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 1995), 240. fn. ‘Cf. G. S. Hendry, “[John 4:24] has commonly been taken to mean that God, being Spirit, is present everywhere and can be worshiped anywhere; the important thing is not where men worship, but how they worship.” This he vigorously denies. The saying “means the precise opposite; it means that God is present in his own realm, to which man as such has no access. To worship God in spirit is not a possibility that is always and everywhere open to man… But this is just the gospel of Christ, that this possibility has now been opened to men… The meaning is that the location has been redefined, and God is now to be worshiped in the place where he is present, i.e., in Him who is the truth incarnate”.’
17. 6:35
18. 10:9
19. 10:11
20. 14:6
21. 15:5
22. 17:38-39
23. 14:17; 15:26; 16:13
24. 7:39; cf. 16:7
25. Adapted from James Montgomery Boice, The Gospel of John : An Expositional Commentary, Pbk. ed., 5 vols. (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Books, 2005), 298.
26. Eugene H. Peterson, Eat This Book : A Conversation in the Art of Spiritual Reading (Grand Rapids, Mich.: W.B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 2006), 91.
27. Ibid. fn.
28. Bob Kauflin, Worship Matters : Leading Others to Encounter the Greatness of God (Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway Books, 2008), 89.
29. ‘The fuel of worship is a true vision of the greatness of God; the fire that makes the fuel burn white hot is the quickening of the Holy Spirit; the furnace made alive and warm by the flame of truth is our renewed spirit; and the resulting heat of our affections is powerful worship, pushing its way out in confessions, longings, acclamations, tears, songs, shouts, bowed heads, lifted hands, and obedient lives.’ John Piper, Desiring God : Meditations of a Christian Hedonist, Updated [i.e. 3rd] ed. (Leicester: Inter-Varsity, 2004), 82.
30. 1:14
31. 2:19
32. David Peterson, Engaging with God : A Biblical Theology of Worship (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1992), 97.
33. Gk. hōra = ‘hour’.
34. 2:4; 4:21, 23; 5:25, 28; 7:30; 8:20; 12:23, 27; 13:1; 16:2, 4, 21, 25, 32; 17:1. cf. D. A. Carson, The Gospel According to John (Grand Rapids, Mich.: W.B. Eerdmans, 1991), 223.
35. 1:32-33
36. 7:39. cf. 14:16-17; 15:26-27; 16:13ff.
37. 16:13
38. Actually, there are 10 occurrences of the word dei in John (3:7, 14, 30; 4:4, 20, 24; 9:4; 10:16; 12:34; 20:9). The three under consideration here, however, are the so-called ‘divine imperatives’.
39. Num. 21:4-9

Anyone who has been a Christian for any reasonable amount of time has suffered disappointment in their church. Maybe you feel that the church is heading in a direction you consider unwise or unwarranted, or teaching things that you can’t agree with. Possibly you are frustrated because you feel the church is not moving in the direction God is calling it, or is moving too slowly. Perhaps it is because you have been sinned against by a leader or another member. In my case it came when one of my leaders told me that she had committed adultery and was getting a divorce.

Whatever the reason, it hurts. It hurts because when we join a church and engage in community with others we open ourselves up to one another, we trust each other. So when sin comes – and it will, for we are all sinful – we feel the betrayal that much more than if we had never let our barriers down.

At such times, it is only natural to ask, ‘Why do I need the church?’ Wouldn’t it be easier and safer for me to just go it alone and do my own thing? Surely it’s enough if I read my Bible and pray – just me and Jesus, no need for anyone else.

It might be nice to think so, but the reality is very different. If you take time to read through Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, you will find that he uses a number of images to describe the Church. The church is Christ’s family, his temple and his body. All of these are images that imply participation as a group. There is one family, and the whole church is a part of it. There is one temple, and each member is a stone, being built together to make it.¹ There is one body and each one of us is a part of it.² Whether we like it or not, regardless of whether it is convenient or not, we are dependent upon one another. C. S. Lewis writes:

[Jesus] works on us in all sorts of ways… through Nature, through our own bodies, through books, sometimes through experiences which seem (at the time) anti-Christian… But above all, He works on us through each other.³

Men are mirrors, or “carriers” of Christ to other men. Sometimes unconscious carriers.

Another thing to note about the images that Paul chooses to illustrate the nature of the church is that there is no real choice involved. Do you get to choose what family you are born into? Of course not. Can the brick say to the builder, “Please use me for this building and not for that” ? No, it cannot.

This is an important message for our society, where the consumer is king. Recent years have given birth to the phenomenon of ‘church shopping’. This is where people go from church to church looking for one that is a good ‘fit’. Once again, C. S. Lewis offers some helpful insight here. In The Screwtape Letters a senior demon, Screwtape, writes to his inexperienced nephew, Wormwood, who is on his first assignment.

Surely you know that if a man can’t be cured of churchgoing, the next best thing is to send him all over the neighbourhood looking for the church that ‘suits’ him until he becomes a taster or connoisseur of churches… the search for a ‘suitable’ church makes the man a critic where the Enemy [i.e. God] wants him to be a pupil.⁴

God wants us to be pupils; ‘church-shopping’ makes us into critics.

This requires common sense, of course. There should be certain minimum requirements – for example a church should proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ and should be committed to teaching the Bible. It’s no good showing up to your local mosque or Kingdom Hall just because it is the closest religious establishment and calling that ‘church’. You will have to work out for yourself what your minimum requirements are, but so long as the church you are in meets those requirements, don’t go shopping around for one that is ‘better’. And if you do happen to stumble on a ‘perfect’ church, whatever you do don’t join… for then it will no longer be perfect!

Brothers, the Bible makes it clear that we are dependent upon one another. God’s people are being prepared to serve each other so that the whole body of Christ may be built up.⁵ This means that we are responsible for supporting one another. Why do we lay bricks the way we do so that they overlap? I am no builder, but I imagine that at least part of the reason is so that they spread the weight of the building more evenly. Imagine what kind of building you would have if you had to check each morning to make sure none of the bricks had decided to move on to another building! Similarly, if we are always on the lookout for something better then we will be hesitant to commit to the overall work – and others will be hesitant to depend upon us.

So, like many of the other disciplines we have considered this weekend, the discipline of church requires that we be committed. If we are not, then we are short-changing ourselves and others. Kent Hughes writes,

We are tragically diminished by non-participation in Christ’s Body. Correspondingly, the Church is diminished by our non-participation as well.⁶

This why the writer to the Hebrews commands that we ‘not give up meeting together… but let us encourage one another – and all the more as you see the Day approaching.’⁷

In our remaining time, then, let’s consider what such discipline looks like in practice. Firstly, it involves regular attendance. ‘[Y]ou do not have to go to church to be a Christian. You do not have to go home to be married either. But in both cases if you do not, you will have a very poor relationship.’⁸ Positively, participating regularly in the life of the church allows us to experience the benefits of community, such as love, support, good teaching and fellowship.

Secondly, the discipline of church requires that you become a member. Membership means different things to different people, but in a church context it is a covenant relationship between you and your church. You agree to participate in the life of the church, and to support it through the good times and the bad. In the same way, the church commits to supporting you. It also means submitting to the leadership of the church and, if necessary, church discipline.

Thirdly, financial giving is an important part of the discipline of church. Your giving should be regular and systematic, and should take precedence over your parachurch commitments (missions, charities etc.). It is only by your support that the church can continue to minister in the name of Jesus – both to you and to others.

Finally, your church needs your participation. This is where you pour your time, talents, expertise and creativity into your church to the glory of God. This may mean joining a cleaning or mowing roster, helping out with one of the Sunday services, mentoring a child through the Kid’s Hope program or just about anything else. This has the twin benefits of being of service to others (both inside and outside our church community) and allowing you to grow.

This area of participation is probably one of the hardest parts of the discipline of church to get right, for it requires a balance. On the one hand we cannot simply give every available minute of the day to the church – to do so is to rob ourselves and our family. In 1 Corinthians 7, Paul is counselling those considering marriage to think carefully before diving in, for it involves being concerned about how they can please their wives as well as please the Lord. In Paul’s eyes this is a necessary consequence of being married – it means having less time to serve the Lord. Having kids decreases the available time even further… or so I am told!

On the other hand we cannot go entirely the other way and not participate at all because we have family (or friends, or hobbies, or work, or…). If we do then we end up as a bunch of islands, and we might as well not have a church at all. We become consumers, infants who are totally dependent on others for their sustenance rather than adults who are able to find and fix their own food… and perhaps some for someone else!

I’m afraid I don’t have a nice, easy solution for you – the truth is I don’t have it figured out myself! It would be easy for me to stand up here and say, “You should give 10% of your time/talents/money etc. to the church” but to do so would be dishonest. The truth is that the amount you can and should give will vary from person to person. Some people will be better equipped for particular kinds of service. The amount you can commit to will vary even throughout the course of your life – immediately after you get married, for example, is probably not a good time to be signing on to a ministry that will have you out every weeknight and weekend – whereas this might have been a possibility when you were single. If this is an issue that you struggle with (as I do) I encourage you to discuss it further small groups after this talk. Even better, find someone who knows you well and discuss it with them. This could be your spouse, or a Christian friend. Ask them to hold you accountable to whatever you decide – and regularly reevaluate together as your life changes.

Hopefully you see from all this that the discipline of church is a necessary part of the Christian life. However it is not something we do for the sake of doing the right thing – it also brings tremendous benefits for us and for our whole church. Without discipline we all suffer; only with it may we become the kind of church that Paul describes in Colossians 3:

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.

Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.’

- Colossians 3:12-17

If this is the kind of church that you want, it is going to require a partnership between you and your church; you must develop the discipline of church.

- Tim Campbell (16/11/2008)

Questions

1. Why is the idea of church so unpopular today? Why aren’t more people interested in being a part of a good church?
2. What are the advantages of being committed to a (single) church? What are the disadvantages?
3. What are the minimum requirements for a church? Under what circumstances should you leave a church?
4. Read Colossians 3:12-17. What does Paul expect of a healthy church? Note particularly how concerned he is about the relationships between church members. How do you see these qualities working out in our church?
5. How should you be disciplined about church? You may wish to consider things like attendance, giving, participation and membership, as well as how you can contribute to the qualities identified out of Colossians 3:12-17 above.
6. How do you strike a balance between too much and too little in your commitment to your church?

References

Lewis, C. S. 1997, Mere Christianity, London: Fount.
Lewis, C. S. 2002, The Screwtape Letters, London: HarperCollins.
Hughes, R. K. 2001, Disciplines of a Godly Man, Wheaton: Crossway.

Endnotes

1. 1 Pet. 2:5
2. 1 Cor. 12:27
3. 1997, 157
4. 2002, 81
5. Eph. 4:12
6. 2001, 174
7. Heb. 10:25
8. Hughes 2001, 175

(The following message was preached at St. John’s on the 12/10/08.)

Hebrews 11 is one of the best-loved and most-hated portions of Scripture. Best-loved because we are presented with a catalogue of the heroes of the faith, men and women who have gone before us and lived a life commendable and commended for its faithfulness. Most-hated because, by comparison, we cannot help but feel a little shabby. Speaking for myself, I know that my life does not always reflect my faith. I say I believe in Jesus, but what does that faith amount to? How would my life be different without it? Today we shall attempt to address these questions and more.

One of the great dangers of studying such a well-known passage is that we risk losing sight of its context. Consider, for example, how we read 1 Corinthians 13, Paul’s magnificent hymn about love. I have yet to attend a wedding where this text was placed in its proper context – a rebuke to a church intent on showing off their own gifts, rather than using them for each other’s benefit. It is when we understand the larger picture that we feel the sting of the Apostle’s words: ‘If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal’ (1 Cor. 13:1). Similarly, sometimes, at a low point in my relationship with God, I have turned to Hebrews chapter 11 looking for inspiration. Only rarely have I stopped to wonder why the author turns to the subject of faith at this point in his epistle. So that is where we shall start today, with context.

This discussion of faith does not just spring out of nowhere, although our English translations do their level best to conceal this from us. For the Greek word translated here as ‘faith’ has been used both positively and negatively throughout the letter to this point. Positively, the author has written of trust,¹ faithfulness,² faith,³ belief,⁴ confidence;⁵ and negatively of unbelief⁶ and disobedience⁷ – all of which derive from the same Greek word. No wonder he feels the need to clarify exactly what he means by it!

Most recently, at the end of chapter 10, he has quoted from the prophet Habakkuk, saying:

“He who is coming will come and will not delay. But my righteous one will live by faith. And if he shrinks back, I will not be pleased with him.” (10:37-8; cf. Hab. 2:3, 4)

This in itself is quoted in support of his strong call for perseverance: ‘Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful’ (10:23). So the flow of thought for the entire letter to this point is something like this: Jesus is in every way superior to the teachers and trappings of the Old Covenant,⁸ for he is the mediator and High Priest⁹ of the New Covenant¹⁰ which has superseded the Old; you have accepted him as your prophet, high priest and sacrifice so hold on to him rather than attempting to return to that which is obsolete;¹¹ indeed there is now no sacrifice for sin other than Jesus,¹² and to reject him is to face judgment;¹³ so you need to persevere with Jesus in order to receive that which he has promised.¹⁴ For, he says,

“He who is coming will come and will not delay. But my righteous one will live by faith. And if he shrinks back, I will not be pleased with him.” (10:37-8)

Hebrews 11 follows directly from this and is, in fact, the author’s exposition and interpretation of that passage from Habakkuk: he shows us what it means to ‘live by faith'; and he warns us against shrinking back. This will be our roadmap as we navigate Hebrews 11.

Live by faith!

As already mentioned, the Apostle has used the word ‘faith’ many times in his letter, and done so in many different contexts. Yet even now, he is not terribly concerned with giving us a definition of what faith is; his interest is in showing us what faith does. Thus we get the briefest of definitions – ‘faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see’ – before moving on into examples of what it means to live by (or according to) faith.

There are 9 individuals in this chapter who are specifically commended for their faith. Each of them deserves a sermon of their own; you will be pleased to hear, however, that it is not my intention to offer you 9 mini-sermons today! Instead I shall do my best to draw out some of the things the author is teaching us about what living by faith looks like.

1) Faith trusts God’s word… and obeys his commands!

Faith is our response to what God says. Sometimes this means proclaiming God’s truths even when they are unpopular, unacceptable or incomprehensible to our society: ‘By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible’ (11:3). It prompts us to obey God’s instruction: ‘Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going’ (11:8). In Noah’s case, both of these were true, for he was surely ridiculed for his actions yet by faith he obeyed God anyway.

We are told that Abraham left his home ‘even though he did not know where he was going’ (11:8). Sometimes God’s word is a lantern that lights only one or two steps in front of us; trusting God’s word means stepping out along the path you can see and relying on God for the rest. Abel did not have as full a picture of God as Abraham did, yet Abel recognised God as worthy of honour and worship and acted accordingly. Similarly Abraham did not have the law as it was given to Moses, but he did trust in what he had received from God.

There is a gentle rebuke here for the recipients of this epistle. They were possessed of a much greater revelation of God than Abel, Abraham or Moses. Yet whilst they had started out strong¹⁵ they were now drifting back in to the rituals and practices of Judaism. What should have encouraged them to go on was instead causing them to drift away. They had heard but not yet ingested the ‘elementary truths of God’s word’ (5:12) – they were refusing milk let alone dining on solid food.¹⁶ Perhaps they were disillusioned because they could not see how God could possibly be in control when they were enduring ‘great suffering’ (10:32), ‘insult and persecution’ (10:33) ‘prison’ and confiscation of property (10:34). ‘Faith,’ the Apostle says in response, ‘is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see’ (11:1).

This rebuke is also for us. Does God’s word lead to a response in your life? Are you worried because you do not understand God’s entire plan for your life? Don’t be, for in this you are like Abraham. Mark Twain once said, ‘It ain’t the parts of the Bible that I can’t understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand.’ We must act in obedience to the parts of God’s word that we do understand, then trust in him to make the rest clear when the time is right.

2) Faith trusts more in God than in God’s gifts

By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had received the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, even though God had said to him, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.” Abraham reasoned that God could raise the dead, and figuratively speaking, he did receive Isaac back from death. (11:17-19)

Abraham had been promised that he would become the father of many nations¹⁷ and that it would be through Isaac that this would come about.¹⁸ Yet when God asked him to give up his son, he obeyed. We are told that this is because he ‘reasoned that God could raise the dead’. This is a strong contrast to the story told in Genesis 17, where he had tried to convince God to bless Ishmael as it was clear to him that his wife Sarah would never conceive. Evidently he had learned his lesson about trying to control the way God fulfilled his promises.

Perhaps you, too, have some vision of the way your life is ‘supposed’ to pan out. Maybe God has given you a child or a spouse, a job, a house or something else in response to prayer. What would you do if he called you to give that person or possession up for his sake, in the cause of the gospel? Could you do it? Would you? This requires great faith, but be assured that the one who asks it of you is forever faithful.

3) Faith looks forward, not back

Hope is an intrinsic part of faith, and hope by its very nature looks forward rather than backward. We are told that, whilst these heroes of faith ‘did not receive the things promised’ nevertheless ‘they saw them and welcomed them from a distance’ (11:13). For them, the fact that God had said it was sufficient for them to believe it. Furthermore they were not content to settle for less than what God promised; that is where their eyes were focused. ‘If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. Instead, they were longing for a better country — a heavenly one’ (11:15-16).

Are your eyes fixed on the promises of God? Are you ‘longing for a better country’ or are you enamoured of the country you are in… or even the one you have been called out of? It’s true, isn’t it, that we sometimes become comfortable in our routine to the point where change seems too much like hard work, and so we potentially miss out on God’s blessings. Worse still is when we deliberately turn our back on God and return to the situation we were in before he called us. Please don’t settle for either of these – you can’t afford it, and we as a church can’t afford it. You need to press on and ‘persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised’ (10:36).

Don’t shrink back!

The Apostle is desperate to impress upon us this need to persevere. This is evident from the fact that he bookends this chapter with encouragement to press on and not to hold back: he starts by saying, ‘we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who believe and are saved’ (10:39); and he concludes, ‘therefore… let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us’ (12:1).

As we have heard many times in this series, this letter was probably written to Jewish Christians. As persecution arose and intensified against them, however, the prospect of simply merging back into mainstream Judaism (which was protected by Roman law) rather than holding on to their Christian faith (which, increasingly, was not) would have become increasingly attractive. The author’s method of persuasion throughout the letter to the Hebrews has been to show how much superior Jesus is to anything offered by Old Covenant Judaism: he is superior to prophets¹⁹ (including the greatly revered prophet Moses²⁰ ) and angels;²¹ he represents a greater salvation,²² for he is a greater high priest²³ who serves in a greater tabernacle²⁴ as mediator of a New and better Covenant,²⁵ offering a greater sacrifice for sins.²⁶ His consistent argument has been that the old ‘is only a shadow of the good things that are coming – not the realities themselves’ (10:1) and that ‘what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear’ (8:13).

True to form, the Apostle continues this theme. He has presented the heroes of the Jewish faith. ‘These were all commended for their faith,’ he writes, ‘yet none of them received what had been promised’ (11:39). This is not to say that they did not receive any part of what was promised, for this would clearly be untrue. For Abraham had a son according to promise and he entered the land that was promised (11:11); similarly Noah, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses and Joshua all receive in part according to God’s promises. But they all died before seeing God’s promises completely fulfilled. Their faith was in this sense imperfect. The reason for this is that ‘God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect’ (11:40).

Faith made perfect

Before we go any further we need to understand this word ‘perfect’. The idea is of completion and wholeness, a goal or objective achieved. (It may please you to know that this sermon is nearly ‘perfect’ – i.e. I am nearly done!) Thus Jesus shared in our humanity in order to be made perfect through suffering (2:10) and ‘once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him’ (5:9); the sacrifices made under the old covenant were not able to ‘make perfect those who draw near to worship’ (10:1) but Jesus is able ‘because by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy’ (10:14).

Perfection is when the shadow becomes the reality, the dream takes on flesh, and the unseen heavenly reality becomes the seen earthly reality. It comes as no surprise then that the author is not shy about relating the ‘something better’ that God had planned (11:40):

‘Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.’ (12:1-3)

The only faith that is perfect is the one that rests in Jesus, ‘the author and perfecter of our faith’ (12:2). And for more on that, you will need to join us again in 3 weeks time when we pick up with Hebrews 12…

Endnotes

1. 2:13
2. 2:17; 3:2, 5; 10:23
3. 4:2; 6:1, 12; 10:22, 38
4. 4:3; 10:39
5. 6:9
6. 3:12, 19
7. 4:6; 4:11
8. Chapters 1-4
9. 4:14ff.
10. Chapter 8
11. 8:13
12. 10:26b
13. 10:27
14. 10:36
15. 10:32-4
16. 5:12-13
17. Gen. 17:4
18. Gen. 21:12
19. 1:1-2
20. 3:3
21. 1:4
22. 2:3
23. 8:1-2
24. 9:11
25. 8:13
26. 9:14

The following message was preached at the St. John’s 7pm service on the 31/8/08.

‘The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.’ (14)

The lights dim and the buzz dissipates into stillness. Amidst hushed anticipation, the gathered gloom gives birth to a lone figure, striding purposefully towards her post. Having secured attention, evidenced by swelling applause from behind her and watchful readiness in front, she takes her place and, after the slightest of pauses, signals commencement.

The music that follows is not the feature; this is understood, for the curtains are not yet open. Yet it is of one piece with the show, and none can doubt it, for it is a tapestry of themes that are to come. This is known as the overture, and it is deliberately designed to set the scene for the play that is about to commence. The audience is introduced to the musical motifs that are so closely entwined with the plot as to be indistinguishable: the hero’s theme; the sinister tones of the villain’s refrain; the lovers’ duet; the haunting strains of an aria of loss. Before an actor so much as appears on stage, we are already familiar with the musical anchor points ahead of us. They are never explained; it is only if you know what is to come that it ‘makes sense’.

John opens his gospel in the same sort of fashion. In these first 18 verses, we are exposed to many of the mega themes that will come up over and over again throughout the rest of his message, such as light, darkness, life, rebirth, witness and revelation. Yet there is one thread woven all the way through this overture, like an instrument that plays the same riff in the midst of all the other themes, contributing to each and binding them all together. What’s more, this specific instrument doesn’t actually play again throughout the rest of the show! It is important, then, that we appreciate its contribution now whilst it plays. We will have the rest of this series on John to appreciate the other important themes, but tonight we want to focus on ‘the Word’.

‘The Word…’

John begins:

‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.’ (1)

More than any other creature on earth, human beings love to communicate with one another; words are the way we do it. Some of us communicate with many words, some with few. We write them down, type them out, whisper them and shout them. We constantly invent technologies to allow us to communicate over greater distances more efficiently and effectively: the loud speaker; the radio; the telephone; video; the internet… and the list goes on! Myspace and Facebook are just the latest in a long line of products that tap into our desire to, in words and pictures, communicate ourselves to one another. Can you imagine what those sites would be like if we took the words away?

What about explaining our actions? Who hasn’t heard a child launch in to a long and complicated explanation of exactly how they ended up where they did. Have a look at the following comic:

Calvin’s mum is, naturally, mystified – as are we. How did Calvin end up in this state?

It is only when we understand, in Calvin’s own words, the events leading up to his predicament that it begins to make a (twisted) kind of sense. His words give us a fuller picture of what was going on from his perspective.

We also use words to teach and to learn; I’m using them right now! We express important ideas and concepts that we need to convey using our words. When we go to school, a large part of our education is in learning the right phrases and terms to accurately express ourselves. We take complicated concepts like algebra, art and assonance and condense them down to a single representative word or phrase. We then use these words as a shorthand that allows us to build up even more complicated and interesting ideas, and the process repeats.

We choose our words carefully, because unless we do so they may be misunderstood, or may convey a message other than – or even contrary to – the one we intended.

We can sum these three ideas up – expressing ourselves, explaining our actions, and instructing others – using the word ‘revelation’. Some things cannot be discovered or found; they must be revealed.

God uses words for all of these purposes as well. First and foremost, God reveals himself to us through his Word. He speaks to Adam & Eve, Noah, Abraham, Jacob and so on. To each one he shares a little bit more of his essence, who he is. We can infer some things about God based on his creation, but without his words we are unable to understand what makes him tick, who he is.

Who God is defines what God does. If we do not know his character, we cannot possibly understand what drives his actions. Take the story of the Flood in Genesis 6. A massive flood comes and wipes out the population of the Earth, excepting only 8 people; this is a tragedy by anyone’s standards. It is only when we hear God’s words about this event that we realise that God is a holy and just God, who cannot abide evil. Yet he is also a merciful God, who gives grace to those whom he chooses.

Of course, God also uses words for our instruction. Perhaps the most famous example of this is found in Exodus 20; it is the rare person who has not at least heard of the 10 Commandments. These are a series of explicit instructions that outline how God’s people are to act; at the same time, they further reveal God’s character and show what is important to him. They are what distinguished the people of Israel from all other nations, for God had revealed himself particularly to them.

In addition to the aspects of revelation we have already mentioned, God’s words have one more important characteristic: they accomplish his will. Think back to Genesis 1 & 2. God speaks the word – ‘light’ – and there is light. He speaks again and the waters separate from the sky, then recede to reveal dry land… and so on. It is God’s word that is the vehicle for his will. We can not do this. Occasionally I test this. I lie in bed after I wake up and say ‘up’. You might be surprised that often this has no measurable result at all; when it does, it usually only serves to make my wife grumpy enough to kick me out of bed!

These are God’s words; and they are valuable to us beyond measure. We are fortunate to have God’s words written down for us. As I sit at my desk and write this, I can count 11 different translations of God’s word within arm’s reach. From these, from what God has said, I can something about who God is. Yet John speaks not of God’s words, but of his Word. This Word is a person in his own right, for though he “was with God” and indeed “was God”, he can nevertheless be spoken of as distinct from God. John speaks of a revelation greater than that given through Moses. And just in case we have no idea what he is talking about, John makes it clear:

‘For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ’ (17).

‘… became flesh…’

Jesus combines all of these aspects of revelation in his person, works and words. He is the new and better – indeed the final and complete – revelation of God. He expresses God’s character in his own character, for he is God. When Jesus shows compassion, it is because his Father is compassionate; when Jesus is angry, we know that the Father is angry. Similarly, Jesus explains to us why God does what he does. He teaches us the response that God desires. And ultimately he accomplishes God’s purposes in the way that no other can. John summarises this at the end of tonight’s passage:

‘No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known.’ (18)

There is an important question to be answered here: if God has expressed himself fully and finally in Jesus, why do we need the rest of the Bible? Perhaps the New Testament is OK, for at least it is talking about Jesus, but why should I read the Old Testament? The answer is at the same time both simple and profound. The Bible as a whole gives us the vocabulary to understand Jesus. Let me see if I can explain.

Let’s say that Rod’s four year old grandson Josiah sits down by himself in front of the television to watch a Bledisloe Cup match. Unless his indoctrination has already commenced, chances are good he won’t be able to make much of the game. If you asked him about it afterwards, he might be able to tell you that some of the people wore yellow and some black, that the yellow people were cheering at the end and the black ones looked sad… but that would probably be extent of it. If he sat down with Grumps, however, who explained what a try is, a lineout, a scrum, a drop-goal and so on, he would be starting to develop the vocabulary with which to understand and explain the game. As his knowledge and experience increased he would be able to grasp the more complicated aspects of the game, and the words associated with them – rules governing who is offside, what merits a penalty, tactics etc. Eventually he would reach a point where he could describe in detail all the events taking place on the field, and appreciate a Wallaby victory in all its glory!¹

Is it any wonder that God, preparing the greatest event in history, wanted us to have the words and concepts with which to appreciate it? So we find that both the Old and New Testaments are riddled with ideas which we can use to understand Jesus. They are important ideas in their own right, and certainly had meaning to their original audience; but in addition to that role they also provide a context for catching some small portion of Jesus’ purpose, words and works. So we can say that Jesus is the new and better Adam, who faced his temptation in the garden yet remained without sin; he is the new and better Abel, killed because the sacrifice he brought was more acceptable than his brother, whose blood cries out, not for vengeance, but for forgiveness; the new and better Joseph, sent ahead by God to make preparation for the salvation of his people; the new and better Moses, through whom come ‘grace and truth’ not just ‘law’. I could keep going like this all night – but I won’t, because to do that would be to miss out on the rest of what John has to say to us. But before I leave this subject let me say that if you have no idea what I am talking about, let encourage you to make some time to spend reading through the Old Testament; don’t settle for a four-year-old’s perspective on the most important event the world has seen or will ever see.

‘… and made his dwelling among us.’

Let us return, then, to the subject at hand: Jesus is the full and final revelatory Word of God. John points out very clearly that there are only two responses to this Word. On the one hand, it is possible to ignore him and even reject him; we know that many do. ‘He was in the world, but though the world was made through him, the world did not recognise him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him’ (10-11). What a tragedy! Imagine that, instead of Rod explaining the game it is now the inventor of Rugby; what a shame it would be if Josiah decided to ignore him or reject him, because he could have no better opportunity of understanding it than that! Or, to shift the illustration, let’s say  you were trying to act in one of Shakespeare’s plays and by some freak occurrence of time and space the author appeared to you and wanted to explain your part to you. Would you ignore him? Take this situation and multiply its magnitude many millions of times, and you might be starting to get close to the enormity of what John records: the Author of Life wrote himself into history in order to communicate with his creation.

It is far better, it seems to me, to take advantage of contact with the author, to develop relationship with him. According to John, ‘to all who received him, to those who believed on his name, he gave the right to be children of God’ (12). This is important: in fact, it is what John has been leading up to. The reason Jesus, God’s Word, became flesh, was in order that we might become children of God. It is for this that ‘the Word became flesh and made his dwelling amongst us’ (14).

How does this relationship come about? According to John, it is ‘to those who received’ the Word that God gives the right to be children of God. How then do you receive Jesus? The first thing is to be sure that we are receiving the right person… and not some other pretending to be him. What’s more, our relationship must be founded on who he has revealed himself to be. Imagine I introduced myself to you as Tim, but you persisted in calling me Ralph, because that’s how you prefer to think of me; or that I told you I couldn’t stand eggs and the next week you serve me up omelette for dinner. Our relationship would not be going good places! This may seem obvious, but it is often overlooked as we choose to receive the Jesus of our imagination rather than the Jesus revealed to us in Scripture. If you do that, you end up worshiping an imaginary God; if, instead, you commit yourself to seeking out the God of the Bible, he will not hide himself from you. After all, ‘the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us’ (14) for this very reason. ‘No one has seen the Father, but God, the One and Only, has made him known’ (18).

Read your Bible, and ask that God would reveal his Son to you through it; then ask that he would reveal himself to you through Jesus his Son.

Endnotes

1. If, on the other hand, the All Blacks won, he may well learn some vocabulary from his grandfather of an entirely different nature!

What essential qualities make a leader? Courage? Wisdom? Insight? Integrity? Yes, all of these things are necessary. But what about humility? In today’s culture, it seems, leadership and humility are mutually exclusive – you can have one or the other, but not both.

This is not the way the Bible portrays leadership, however.

Moses would have to take the prize for one of the greatest leaders of the Old Testament. Through his leadership, an entire nation (600,000 men¹ plus who knows how many women and children!) were released from slavery; he was the one to whom God first revealed his name; he met with God face to face; Moses received stone tablets detailing God’s commandments on the mountain at Sinai; and, if that weren’t enough, he wrote the first 5 books of the Bible! Quite a resumé, hey?

For all these remarkable achievements, however, the Bible describes him as, ‘very humble man, more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth’ !²

But it was not always this way. Consider the story told of him in Exodus 2. Moses was an Israelite brought up as a prince of the land of Egypt, in Pharaoh’s own house. He ‘was educated in all the wisdom of the Egyptians and was powerful in speech and action’.³ One day, he decided to visit his fellow Israelites. He came across ‘an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his own people. Glancing this way and that and seeing no one, he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.’⁴ Stephen, retelling the story in Acts 7, says that ‘Moses thought that his own people would realize that God was using him to rescue them, but they did not.’⁵ Humility doesn’t even get a look in here! Look, then at the results of his ‘ministry': he has no credibility with his fellow Israelites, who reject him; Pharaoh attempts to kill Moses; and Moses is forced to flee Egypt for his life!⁶

Let’s face it: nobody wants to follow someone who believes that they are God’s gift to humanity; some will follow in hopes of securing their own ambitions and power by clinging to the egotist’s coat-tails, but nobody wants to follow such a person. Moses surely fit into this category based on the evidence we have seen. So what was it that transformed him into the leader of hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people?

I believe that the answer may be found in the next chapter of Exodus. Whilst minding his father-in-law’s sheep, God appears to him in the form of a burning bush and instructs Moses to lead his people out of Egypt.

Moses asks God two very important questions in this passage: ‘Who am I?’ (v. 11); and ‘Who are you?’ (v. 13). In the answers to these two questions, Moses learned what was required to be a good leader. When he asks ‘Who am I?’, God’s response is not, ‘you are a learned man,’ nor is it, ‘you are a man strong in word and deed’. God says, ‘I will be with you.’ Moses asks, ‘Who are you?’ and is told ‘I am who I am’ (v. 14), and ‘the God of your fathers – the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob’.

Humility comes in recognising that it is through God that we are who we are; trying to lead outside of this truth will result in failure, but humbling ourselves and acknowledging him as the one to whom all glory and honour is due frees us to be the leaders God calls us to be.

Perhaps some of you are wondering, ‘Does being humble mean denying our own God-given gifts, talents and abilities?’ Others might be thinking ‘Isn’t humility just another word for doormat?’ The answer is no, of course not. Evangelist Billy Graham puts it like this, “Jesus said, ‘Blessed are the gentle, for they shall inherit the earth.’… Nowhere in Scripture does this word carry with it the idea of being spiritless and timid. It carries the idea of being tamed, like a wild horse that has been brought under control.”⁷ The picture is of a powerful creature who uses his strength according to his master’s will.

How does this look in practice? I can only apply these teachings to my own life. To do so and then talk about it I run the risk of being understood to say, ‘See, I have it all figured out’… which is both untrue and undermines the very message I am trying to get across. The story is told of the preacher whose congregation gave him a medal for being the most humble preacher ever… then took it away from him the next week when he wore it!⁸ Nevertheless I must take that risk, hoping that God might use my example to speak to you. I want to give you a few specific examples of how I apply this message of humility in the area of preaching.

I ask God the same two questions that Moses asked: who am I? and who are you? When I preach, I recognise that I am unable to change a life by my words, but that God is gracious and merciful, desiring that people should know him and love him – and his words are ‘power… for the salvation of everyone who believes’⁹. When I have that sorted out, I can preach confidently, knowing that it is God’s word that changes lives.

Before I preach, however, I must first apply God’s word in my own life. Tonight I am sharing a part of that process with you, but this is not always the case. Nevertheless it is important that I do it, otherwise I am saying this truth is good enough for others, but not good enough for me. The arrogant leader tells others to do what he himself is unwilling to do; we call this hypocrisy.

Another area where I must be humble is to listen to the instruction of others; I call this being teachable. I recognise that I am far from being a perfect preacher (or musician, or husband… or anything else, for that matter). For that reason I listen to those who have experience in these things – and I try and learn from whatever lessons they are willing and able to teach me.

Finally, I submit to those who have authority over me. I may not agree entirely with their decisions, and I may respectfully argue my case; but once a decision is made I ‘submit to their authority’ and ‘obey them so that their work will be a joy, not a burden’ since ultimately ‘they keep watch over [me] as men who must give an account’.

There are many other things I could say here, but I believe that it is more important that you take some time to consider what role humility will play in your life. To help you do this, I have listed some Bible passages and associated questions to act as a starting point.

Questions

Moses

Read Exodus 3 for yourself.

• What questions does Moses ask God? How and why are these significant?
• What are God’s replies?
• What changes do you see in Moses?

You may wish to consider the contrast between: Exodus 2 (Moses kills the Egyptian and flees Egypt); Acts 7:20-37 (Stephen’s retelling of Exodus 2-3); and Numbers 12:1-8 (Aaron & Miriam challenge Moses’ leadership).

John the Baptist

John the Baptist is a good example of humility in the New Testament. John baptised many people before Jesus showed up, and ministered to many hundreds if not thousands. Jesus said of him ‘Among those born of women, there hs not risen anyone greater than John the Baptist’ (Matthew 11:11; also Luke 7:28). Yet when his younger cousin (i.e. Jesus) shows up, the crowds flock to Jesus instead.

• How would this make you feel? How would you respond?

Read John 3:22-36 (John says of Jesus, ‘He must become greater; I must become less.’) for John’s response.

• What do you think made John so gracious? How would he have answered the questions, ‘Who am I?’ and ‘Who is Jesus?’
• In what ways are you like John? In what ways different? What are you going to do about it?

Jesus

As always when looking for a positive role model in the Bible, we find our best example in Jesus. If anyone had reason to think they were something, surely it would be Jesus! The Bible describes him as the Son of God, in whom God is well pleased (Matthew 3:17; see also Mark 1:11 and Luke 3:22).

Read Philippians 2:5-11.

• What is Jesus’ attitude? How does he demonstrate humility?
• How is your attitude the same? How is it different? What are you going to do about it?

Take some time to pray through any insights and applications that God has brought to mind; ask that God will help you to have the attitude of Christ Jesus.

Endnotes

1. Exodus 12:36
2. Numbers 12:3
3. Acts 7:22
4. Exodus 2:11-12
5. Acts 7:25
6. Exodus 2:13-15
7. Quoted in Myra & Shelley 2005, The Leadership Secrets of Billy Graham, Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 197.
8. Swindoll, C. R. 1998, Swindoll’s Ultimate Book of Illustrations & Quotes, Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 278.
9. Romans 1:16

What makes you anxious? I mean really anxious, not just, “I hope the guy in front of me doesn’t order the last cheese & bacon pie,” or “Will I catch some disease if I don’t wash my hands?” I’m talking gut-wrenching, break out in a sweat, unable to sleep anxious.

Does the Bible have anything say to you in your anxiety? Does God care about what you care about? Yes and yes! Tonight we will examine just one of many passages that demonstrate how much God is involved in our pain, our trials, our doubts and our cares. What’s more, he understands the causes… and he has plans for dealing with them! Does that sound like useful information to have?

1 To the elders among you, I appeal as a fellow elder, a witness of Christ’s sufferings and one who also will share in the glory to be revealed: 2 Be shepherds of God’s flock that is under your care, serving as overseers—not because you must, but because you are willing, as God wants you to be; not greedy for money, but eager to serve; 3 not lording it over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock. 4 And when the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the crown of glory that will never fade away.

5 Young men, in the same way be submissive to those who are older. All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because,
“God opposes the proud 
      but gives grace to the humble.”

6 Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. 7 Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.

8 Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. 9 Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings.

10 And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. 11 To him be the power for ever and ever. Amen.

- 1 Peter 5:1-11

“Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you” (7). That is the heart of tonight’s message. God’s love for you is without parallel. He desires that you should bring all the things that weigh you down, that hold you back and burden you, and give them up for him to deal with.

In this passage, Peter shares with us three common causes of anxiety. More importantly, however, he lets us know how he has already put plans in place to deal with those causes.

God’s plan for Lions: Shepherds

In the wake of the terrorist attacks on New York’s World Trade Center, many people found themselves increasingly fretful: where would the next attack come? Would terrorists take issue with Australia because they were involved in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq? One friend of mine was afraid to catch the train to work, because that would inevitably involve sitting at Circular Quay for a while, and that was, in her eyes, a prime terrorist target.

The problem arose because we believed we had an enemy who was out to do us harm – and we did not know when or where he might show up next, or what he might do when he did.

This is not a new problem though. The events of the 11th of September, 2001 may have made it more real and immediate for some of us, but the threat was always there. In Peter’s day it was even worse. Instead of being a handful of extremists, the source of the threat was his own government. We are not sure whether we are a target; he knew he was! Again and again in this letter, Peter returns to the theme of suffering, reminding us that we share in the sufferings of Jesus… and it was Jesus’ own government that arrested him, tortured him and ultimately put him to death in the most horrible way.

In 1 Peter 5, Peter goes one step further, acknowledging the ultimate source of this persecution is spiritual as well as political.

8 Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. 9 Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings.

The image he uses is a strong one, particularly when you join it up with the image at the start of the chapter, where he writes to those who are to be “shepherds” of the flock. Lions were a fact of life in first century Palestine. They were dangerous to anyone, but they were particularly dangerous for unprotected flocks.

The role of the shepherd, then, was to guard against such predators. He or she would do this, first and foremost, by keeping the flock together in one group. If one wandered off, they must be found and returned, otherwise they would be vulnerable to attack.

That’s how it is with us. God has appointed men and women to be our shepherds. Theirs is the responsibility to keep us together, to stand between us and our enemy. They are the ones best equipped to recognise and defend against the attacks of the enemy.

But we have our own part to play too. “Be self-controlled and alert,” (8) Peter says, keep your eyes open, and when you see signs of our enemy, get the word out and make sure your brothers and sisters are alerted. When you hear the lion roaring, you have two choices – fight or flight. If we all scatter and go our own way, then what hope have our shepherds of defending us? Peter calls us to “resist him, standing firm in the faith” (9). In the face of outside attack, let us stand together and support and defend one another! In short, we need to be alert, but not alarmed.

No doubt in writing these words, Peter was reflecting on his last encounter with the risen Jesus.¹ Three times Jesus asked him, “Do you love me?” and three times Peter’s affirmative response was met with an instruction: “Feed my lambs”; “Take care of my sheep”; and finally “Feed my sheep”. Jesus is committed to seeing that his flock is tended, and his logic here is simple: if you love me, you will care for my flock.

Lions require shepherds. And when you have Jesus as your Chief Shepherd, you can, and should, “cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you” (7).

But this meeting served another purpose. Jesus was interested in more than seeing his flocks tended to; he also wanted to deal with Peter’s pride.

God’s Plan for Pride: Humility

One imagines that Peter would have been awash with emotions when he met the resurrected Jesus: joy, obviously, at seeing his friend whom he had thought dead restored to life; but also, I am sure, no small amount of embarrassment and hesitation. Peter, overcome with excitement, impetuously dives out of the boat to swim back and be the first to greet Jesus; the closer he came, however, the less certain he was.

“Lord, why can’t I follow you now? I will lay down my life for you”² … “even if all fall away, I will not.”³ With words like these, words spoken out of pride, Peter declared his undying devotion to the man he knew to be God’s Messiah; within 24 hours, he was doing his best to deny any knowledge of him at all. How would Jesus respond to him? Would he mention it? Would he even speak to Peter at all?

Jesus asks his question – “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” – three times in order to break Peter of his pride. Peter was hurt,⁴ but Jesus was reminding him that he wasn’t perfect, that even he who had spent so much time with Jesus, had no reason for pride in his position, and certainly not in any sort of moral superiority. Even Peter, the first to acknowledge Jesus as God’s Messiah, even he had failed when push came to shove. Jesus deliberately humbled Peter in order that he might also restore him.

Peter relays that same lesson:

5 Young men, in the same way be submissive to those who are older. All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because,

“God opposes the proud
but gives grace to the humble.”

6 Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.

At its heart, all sin can be traced back to pride: we believe that we know better than God, and so we act according to our own judgment and desires rather than God’s will for us. As a result, we bring needless worry upon ourselves, because we don’t actually have the capacity to make right judgments, or even the will to always follow through on our own convictions. We make mistakes, and those mistakes have consequences.

More significantly, when we are proud we are in opposition to God – and God hasn’t lost a battle yet! We cannot expect to go on sinning and yet be free from anxiety, for if we are sinning then we are right to be anxious. The Judge of all the Earth sees and knows, and will act in justice. Peter has just finished reminding us that “it is better, if it is God’s will, to suffer for doing good than for doing evil.”⁵

Peter’s solution is simple… at least simple on paper. “Humble yourselves… under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.” (6) As Peter was humbled, so too must we be – and better if we do it ourselves, rather than waiting until God has to do it for us! If you find yourself in opposition to God, then confess that to him and ask his forgiveness. Seek his help in overcoming your own pride that would otherwise draw you away from him. Recognise that he knows best and wants the best for you, and that you are not capable of making those judgments for yourself. That is what humility looks like.

When you humble yourself before God, he goes from being against you to being on your side – not just “not against you” but actively for you! Only then can you “cast all your anxiety on him” (7) for he will “lift [us] up in due time”.

But what about when we just don’t know what is going to happen?

God’s Plan for Uncertainty: Purpose

Let me tell you about the most anxious day of my life. Some friends and I came up from Nowra to visit another friend who had recently moved to Sydney. The plan was that we would go into Darling Harbour and catch a movie at Imax, then do some shopping and generally just hang out together. This was great, because I love spending time with those guys… but this day I had something else on my mind. You see there was recent addition to our group, a particularly lovely young lady upon whom I had my eye. And I had decided that today was the day I was going to do something about it.

Having spent most of the morning trying to separate her out from the others and get her alone (I was the prowling lion this time!) I finally found my chance. With all the calm sophistication I could muster, I asked, “So… do you have a boyfriend?” “No.” “Would you like one?” Something about her expression caused me to rush on with, “Because I’m really interested in you, and I will understand if you’re not interested in me, and how about I give you some time to think about it.” And with that, and not waiting for a reply, I clutched the tattered remains of my dignity tightly around myself and beat a hasty retreat.

Six hours later, I finally got the answer I was looking for. (In the interests of journalistic integrity, I should tell you that she claims it was only two hours… but believe me, it was 6. After all, I should know – I was there!)

There are few things more likely to cause stress and anxiety than not knowing what the future holds. Those six hours were agony for me, because I had no way of knowing if what I hoped for would actually come about.

Those of you who know me well know that one of the deepest desires of my heart is to one day be a dad. It is something that I long for – but which I cannot be certain of until it actually happens. And even then, that is hardly the end of anxiety! Those who are parents hope for good things for their children: that they will be safe; that they will grow up to love Jesus; that they will get married and have children of their own… but there are no guarantees that any of those things will happen.

Peter addresses this kind of anxiety too – in fact, you could almost say that this entire letter has been about addressing it!

10 And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast.

Overcoming anxiety about the future will only happen when we understand our identity in Christ. If you are in Christ, then you have been called by God for a specific purpose – and unlike us, he is able to bring his purposes to completion. Whilst we may suffer in the short term, God promises that he will restore us and bring us to completion in him. “Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you” (7).

This list of Peter’s is not meant to be exhaustive – not every care or concern will fall under one of these three categories (although I suspect most will). But there is an underlying thread to all of his solutions: if you want to deal with anxiety, you need to know Jesus. He is the Chief Shepherd; he is our model of humility; and he is he one who will bring about God’s ultimate purposes for the future.

Consider what a difference knowing someone makes. Nearly 3 years after my 6-hour ordeal, I stood at the front of a church, waiting for my bride. Was I anxious then? No, not really, for I had spent the intervening time getting to know her. I knew her heart, and I knew that she was going to do everything in her power to be there, and to be there on time.

Ultimately, all of the promises Peter offers rely on knowing God. He is writing to those who are “God’s elect… chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Sprit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and sprinkling by his blood” (1:1,2). He is speaking to those who have received new birth into the family of God, who are heirs with Christ of an inheritance that can never perish spoil or fade (1:3-4). This is good news for those of us who know the Lord Jesus Christ – we have a shepherd to care for us; we have been shown the way of humility before God, and allowed the grace to cover over our inevitable stuff-ups; and we have the sure knowledge of our purpose in Christ and God’s will to bring us to fulfillment of that purpose. But what if you don’t know Jesus?

If you’re here tonight and you are not a Christian, we’re really glad that you’re here… but I’m afraid that I can’t make any promises about your worries and concerns. Unless you know Jesus, you are a sheep wandered away from their shepherd; you are in opposition to the God of the universe; and even if you have your own sense of purpose, you haven’t the power to see it through. You are right to be anxious!

But there is good news: Jesus Christ invites you to meet him, and to know God through him. He is the Chief Shepherd, and he invites you into his flock. He promises that if you repent of your sin and turn to him then you too can be an heir of all the good things that you have heard tonight, as well as many more found in God’s word. Let me urge you to grab hold of that promise – and do it now! Don’t carry those worries around any longer! If you want to do that, grab someone after the service – perhaps one or two Christian friends, or a leader, or some other Christian that you respect. Whilst you don’t need anyone else involved – it’s between you and Jesus! – it often helps to have someone to share your decision with, who can pray with you and for you and encourage you.

Perhaps you’re not sure you want to become a Christian, perhaps you want some time to think it over. I did: I heard the very same good news that I am sharing with you tonight, but wanted to make sure I was making a decision with my head not just with my heart. I wanted to be sure that everything added up. And so I didn’t take Jesus up on his offer straight away. But all the next day I kept thinking about it and thinking about it, and every way I looked at it it made more sense than anything else I had ever heard, any other way of life I had ever come across. So I did it, I gave my life to Jesus, convinced that he cares for me better than I can even care for myself. 17 years on, I have no cause to regret that decision. So it’s OK to take some time to think – but make sure you do think, don’t just use that as an excuse to put off having to make a decision. If you need more information then ask; if you need someone to talk it through with then grab a Christian friend or two.

Perhaps you are a Christian and your life is beset with worries, cares and concerns. Perhaps you have heard God’s invitation to cast your anxieties upon him but you’re not quite sure what your next step should be. The best thing that you can do is to pray. You can come and pray with someone, or grab a Christian friend or just pray by yourself, but whatever you do, pray. Ask God to show you the steps that he has already taken to care for and protect you, as well as his plan for your future, and then trust in him. He cares for you more than you can know, and invites you to cast your anxieties upon him.

Endnotes

1. John 21
2. John 13:37
3. Mark 14:29
4. John 21:17
5. 1 Peter 3:17

Authenticity is a big deal. When you buy something, particularly something precious, you want to be sure you are getting what you paid for. Whether it is a house, a car, a watch, a computer or anything else, if it’s not the real deal then you are getting ripped off. Some time ago, I bought some microphones on eBay that appeared to be genuine; I very quickly discovered, through their poor performance and the rate at which they fell apart, that they were not.

Rolex manufacture very expensive, very valuable watches. In order to give their customers confidence that what they are buying is a genuine Rolex, and not some copy that has been cheaply manufactured, they embed all kinds of tell-tale signs that are very difficult to fake. Similarly in this country, as in others, our currency is marked with special security features that are very difficult to emulate. So long as you know what to look for, it is very easy to spot a fake, and thus to judge between what is valuable and what is not.

Over the course of this term we have been delving in to the world of the early church, as recorded by Luke in the book of Acts. They certainly weren’t perfect, as tonight’s passage highlights… but they were authentic. As you read through, ask yourself, “What are the signs of an authentic church?” Then ask, “Is our church authentic?”

The Choosing of the Seven
In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Grecian Jews among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food. So the Twelve gathered all the disciples together and said, “It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables. Brothers, choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them and will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word.”

This proposal pleased the whole group. They chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit; also Philip, Procorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicolas from Antioch, a convert to Judaism. They presented these men to the apostles, who prayed and laid their hands on them.

So the word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and a large number of priests became obedient to the faith.¹

The authentic church deals with problems

I rate perfection as one of the biggest problems Australians face today. Not so much its absence, and certainly not its presence… but just that we expect it. We are always in search of the perfect latté, the perfect tan, the perfect teacher, the perfect job, the perfect holiday. If it’s not perfect then it is not good enough: if the service is slow we don’t go back; if we aren’t good at something first time then it ‘wasn’t meant to be’ and we move on.

We take this attitude into our relationships. It comes as no surprise to us to hear that the official divorce rate in Australia is that just over 40% of marriages in this country end in divorce. Australian social researcher Hugh Mackay traces this, in part, to what he calls our “cult of perfectionism”.² As he says, our expectations “can infect our experience of love and happiness by introducing the gnawing doubt that this isn’t as good as it should be; that perfect bliss is eluding us; that romantic love should never fade; that we should be able to establish perfect (or even excellent) relationships without too much hard work.”³ And so whenever we come across evidence to reinforce our doubts, when disappointment inevitably comes our way, it is easier to conclude that this is not the real deal; we deserve better.⁴

As if that weren’t enough, many Christians apply the same reasoning to their churches; they won’t commit to a church that is anything less than perfect. If the music is too loud or the wrong style; the congregation too big or too small; the sermons too long or too short then it is not perfect, and therefore cannot be an authentic church.⁵

Well, it is clear from tonight’s text that the church in Jerusalem was not perfect. Very early in their life together a problem arose. Luke wastes no words in getting to the point: In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Grecian Jews among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food (1).

The church was the Centrelink of its day – if you were getting any kind of welfare payment at all, then you were getting it from the church. In particular if you were a widow without family to support you then you were utterly reliant upon the church for your livelihood. So it’s a big deal if certain groups in the church are missing out. Luke is not entirely clear whether the complaint was actually justified, he simply notes that the complaint arose. And in some ways it doesn’t really matter as it is the result that is important: the church was divided, split into factions and arguing with one another.

Do you think we face these kind of issues in our church today? You bet we do! How often have you heard someone complaining, “Why do they have to do that?” Or, “I wish this was different.” You might have even done it yourself – I’m pretty sure I have. And sometimes those whinges become a little more significant, gain a little bit of support from someone else, and someone else again. Meanwhile, someone else is arguing the other side of your case and before you can blink you have 2 or more factions, each absolutely adamant that they are in the right and unwilling to budge.

When I was leading youth group at another church, we had a new youth pastor come to our church. He had some new and exciting ideas about how the youth group should be run. Chief among them was that the youth group should be divided in to two groups: a senior and a junior high school group, much the way that we have Zion and the Cross here at St John’s. There were 2 main reactions to this. Some were interested to explore this new idea and see where it led. Others were convinced that this would be the worst thing ever, and opposed it every way that they could. As a result, the group, already intentionally divided into smaller groups, further divided; and ultimately disintegrated altogether, eventually culminating in most group members leaving to go and join other groups.

Unlike us, however, the church in Jerusalem didn’t have the option of just moving down the street to Trinity Baptist Church, or All Saints Uniting, or even Christian City Church Jerusalem. For good or ill, they were all in it together. So how did they deal with their problems?

Here’s how it went down: So the Twelve gathered all the disciples together and said, “It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables. Brothers, choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom. We will turn the responsibility over to them and will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word (2-4).

It sometimes amazes me how quickly a big problem can be dealt with when you take it to the right people. If you have a busted up car, you take it to the panel beater, not the dentist; if your dog is sick you go to the vet, not the butcher; and no matter how good a photographer your neighbour is, you don’t necessarily ask them to fix your plumbing. Well, the same is true in this case: the problem (perhaps straight away, perhaps eventually, we can’t say for certain) reached the ears of the apostles – the only ones with the authority and respect to not only come up with a solution but also put it into practice.

I think we can learn a lot from that. How often have you seen something wrong, or something you didn’t agree with, and done nothing about it? Or perhaps just had a quiet whinge to your friend, your family or your Bible study group? Let me tell you that, unless you take it to the right person or people, nothing is going to happen. Let’s say you have a suggestion for how we can improve things here at the 7pm service. You could tell your friend about it, or your mum, or your work-mate… but whilst they might give you a pat on the back and tell you what a good idea it is, chances are that they are not going to be able to do much more than that. If, on the other hand, you raised it with Jake, or with the 7pm team, then there is a much better chance that something will be done about it. At the very least, your idea will be considered by those who have the ability to make a decision.

Coming back to the passage, the first thing to note about the apostles’ response is that they recognised there was a problem. It would have been all too easy to simply say, “We don’t have time for this now,” or “This is not terribly important in the scheme of things,” either of which would no doubt have been true. The apostles, however, accepted that this was a problem – if not the stated issue of food distribution which, as already mentioned, may have been an issue in perception rather than reality, then certainly that there was division and factionalism.

Let’s be very clear about one thing here: conflict by itself is not a problem. Actually it’s a normal part of any group of people. A community without conflict is more than likely a community that has given in to apathy. But when conflict causes us to turn away from our purpose as a community, that is when it becomes a problem. As Jesus said, “Any kingdom divided against itself will be ruined, and a house divided against itself will fall.” ⁶

The sign of a truly healthy and authentic church is that it deals with its conflict. No denying that it is there; no sweeping it under the carpet; no suppression of the minority in the name of democracy. This last one is probably the most common in today’s church – it is all too easy to put it to a vote and leave it at that, whilst not really meeting the needs of some people just because they are in the minority.

Finally, having decided upon a course of action – a decision, by the way, no doubt reached through a great deal of prayer – they implemented it. They stood up, presented their plan, and asked the disciples to follow their lead. They were committed to dealing with the issue, and dealing with it quickly – and in this commitment they demonstrated their love for all of those involved. It is this love at the heart of our conflict-resolution that makes the authentic church distinct from any other organisation. Clearly Jesus’ words still rang in their hearts: “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”⁷

What kind of church are we? Do we:

• Take our problems to the people that can deal with them?
• Recognise and accept that there is an issue, rather than ignoring it and hoping it will go away?
• Follow through and deal with the problem, rather than just endlessly talking about it?

The authentic church focuses on its calling

There is an interesting verse in the middle of this story: “It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables” (2). For the record, I don’t think the apostles had anything against waiters and waitresses! When you sat down to a meal in those days, it was the head of the household’s responsibility to distribute the food – a very important and prestigious job.⁸ Nevertheless, the apostles are quite clear that what they have been called to is even more important – so important, in fact, that they cannot afford to be distracted.

When you go to see a doctor, you want them to be focused on the most important thing first. No point your doctor pouring all their energy into healing your acne if you are dying of liver disease in the meantime. The same is true in the church. In this case, the distribution of food was important… but the ministry of teaching and preaching God’s word was even more important. So the apostles chose to pursue what they had been called to, and to seek others whom God would raise up to meet the practical needs of mouths to feed.

And others were found, men who were full of the Spirit and wisdom (3), men whose passion and gifting combined to allow them to serve in this way. And by stepping up to take responsibility for that, they freed the apostles up to pursue their main calling of prayer and the ministry of the word (4).

That is why we, as a church, employ Sue and Graham: they use their gifts to deal with things that would otherwise prove a distraction to Rod and to Jake. That is why we have wardens and parish councillors; why we have a variety of people leading services and preaching; why we form teams of people to take responsibility for areas of our church life, rather than just relying on Rod and Jake to do it. And by doing so, we free them up to pursue their vital calling to preach and to teach God’s word.

God gives us gifts in order to bless the whole church. Whilst we don’t have time to pursue this now, I encourage you to ponder what gift or gifts he has placed in you and how you can use them to strengthen our church. Even when it looks as though everything is ‘covered’ and under control, speak up anyway; it may be that in exercising your gift, you will free someone else up to exercise gifts in other areas.

Let me make this a little more concrete with an example from my life. Many of you will know that for some years I acted as the webmaster for this church. I enjoyed doing it, but it took up quite a lot of my time, meaning that I was unable to properly devote that time to other important things: my wife, my job, music ministry etc. Then Patty came along and took that role over, and all of a sudden I was able to focus on those other things. And as a result we as a church were strengthened in our ministry. If Patty had sat back and said, “Well, Tim is doing a good job, I don’t need to get involved,” then we would all have missed out: Patty on the opportunity to grow and develop his gift in IT; me in being able to focus on the other priorities in my life; and the church as a whole because less would have been achieved, and we would have been less effective in our overall ministry. So please, even if you are thinking to yourself, “There are so many service leaders or musicians or preachers or scripture teachers or… there’s no need for one more,” or, “I’m not really sure I have that gift anyway”… please talk to someone! You getting involved makes us all stronger!

Once you have identified what your gift and your calling is you will need to develop and grow it, and you also need to guard from being distracted. This is what the apostles were doing. They knew that they were meant to be preaching the gospel and so they could not afford to be distracted by the details of allocating food day by day. Perhaps you have been blessed with one gift, one special gift that God has given you to serve the church with… if so, use it! Perhaps you have been blessed with a number of gifts… my advice to you is to ask God to show you which one he wants you to be focusing on at the moment and use and develop that gift. God may call you to use different gifts over time, but for now focus on the one that he has put in front of you.

To me, this is one of the most powerful signs of an authentic church: church members are enabled and encouraged to use their gifts to strengthen the church. And the result of this is that the church as a whole is better able to focus on its main priority: spreading the gospel.

• What are you called to? Are you pursuing, developing, growing and protecting that calling? Are you focused on it?
• Does our church enable and encourage people to use their gifts in Christ’s service?
• Does our church prioritise sharing the gospel?

The authentic church grows

If you watched any of the election coverage last night, you’ll know that some people love statistics. We count votes, then calculate margins and swings and all kinds of other things that tell us how successful each candidate and party is in getting people on board with their message. The tricky thing with statistics, though, is that they can be very easy to collect, but much harder to interpret. For example, does the fact that Labor had such an overwhelming victory at the polls yesterday mean that the Australian public genuinely approves of their policy? Or were they just sick of the old government, and Labor were the best of a bad lot? We are at risk of the same issues when we start thinking about church growth.

Luke starts and ends this passage with growth: In those days when the number of disciples was increasing… (1) and So the word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and a large number of priests became obedient to the faith (7). The word ‘so’ there is important, as it suggests that the word of God spread as a consequence of the story just told. In other words, a church that deals with divisions in a God-honouring and loving way, a church that focuses on its mission, will eventually see growth.

Notice I said ‘eventually’. One of the easiest traps that we can fall into is that of playing numbers games – our church is increasing faster than the church down the road, so we must be a healthier church. Whilst this may be true, it is not necessarily so. For example, if I offered money to people to come to St. John’s, we might see an increase in the number of people showing up on Sundays, but that is not really what I would call growth. Sometimes you might find church numbers dropping off immediately before a huge growth spurt.

Of course, there other kinds of growth that having nothing at all to do with the number of people attending a church, and which are much more difficult to measure than a simple head count can achieve: are church members growing in the way they understand and act out the Christian life?

Growth is a useful indicator in combination with the other marks of authenticity that we have already looked at, but not so useful on its own. It’s very easy to collect statistics, but much harder to interpret them – to ask the difficult questions like “Why is this so?”, “What does it mean?” and “What should we do about it?”

Part of being an authentic church is asking these hard questions.

• Is our church growing? If so, is it growing for the right reasons?
• Are members of our church growing into more mature, God-honouring Christians?

The authentic church is full of authentic Christians

So there you have it: the authentic church. Committed to dispatching division; minding its mission; and going for growth. Whilst these are not the only requirements for an authentic church, they are certainly good signs that a church is healthy.

But what is true for a church is also true for a Christian; after all, churches are made up of Christians. How can I expect my church to deal with arguments if I cannot overcome my differences with others? If my mission is out of focus, is it reasonable to expect my church to be focused? How will my church grow unless I am growing?

Take some time and look over your list of problems in the church… do you have stuff you need to deal with first? Are the church’s problems your problems too? You bet they are!

The best sign of an authentic church? It is full of authentic Christians. Are you one of them?

Endnotes

1. Acts 6:1-7
2. Mackay, Advance Australia… Where? (Hachette 2007) pp. 176ff.
3. Ibid. p. 177
4. Of course, the wedding day is ultimate evidence of “the cult of perfectionism” in full flight: dress, hair, limo, location, video, photos. Mackay quotes the average wedding today as costing more than $30, 000! (Ibid. p. 179)
5. A good friend of mine, when asked what it would take to keep him at a church he was visiting, responded, “1000 virgins”!
6. Luke 11:17
7. John 13:35
8. cf. Jesus’ role at the Last Supper

God’s delight

In the 18th and 19th Centuries it was quite fashionable to view God as being a watchmaker who, having brought about a magnificent creation, wound it up and left it to work according to its own principles.¹ That is, he invented the world, he put in place the laws of physics, chemistry, biology and everything else that makes it ‘tick’… and then he left it to its own devices.

But this is a long way from the God that the Bible presents to us. Jesus tells us that he knows when each sparrow falls,² that no raven goes unfed nor lily unclothed.³ Is this a description of a God who is disconnected and uninvolved? Does this sound like a God who does not care about the fate of his creation?

Check out God’s words to Job:

Then the LORD answered Job out of the storm. He said:

“Who is this that darkens my counsel
with words without knowledge?

Brace yourself like a man;
I will question you,
and you shall answer me.

“Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation?
Tell me, if you understand.

Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know!
Who stretched a measuring line across it?

On what were its footings set,
or who laid its cornerstone-

while the morning stars sang together
and all the angels shouted for joy?

“Who shut up the sea behind doors
when it burst forth from the womb,

when I made the clouds its garment
and wrapped it in thick darkness,

when I fixed limits for it
and set its doors and bars in place,

when I said, ‘This far you may come and no farther;
here is where your proud waves halt’?

“Have you ever given orders to the morning,
or shown the dawn its place,

that it might take the earth by the edges
and shake the wicked out of it?⁴

And again:

“Do you know when the mountain goats give birth?
Do you watch when the doe bears her fawn?
Do you count the months till they bear?
Do you know the time they give birth?

They crouch down and bring forth their young;
their labor pains are ended.

Their young thrive and grow strong in the wilds;
they leave and do not return.

“Who let the wild donkey go free?
Who untied his ropes?

I gave him the wasteland as his home,
the salt flats as his habitat.

He laughs at the commotion in the town;
he does not hear a driver’s shout.

He ranges the hills for his pasture
and searches for any green thing.⁵

God’s solution to Job’s problems is not a stinging rebuke for his lack of faith; nor is it a reasoned argument about why he needs to suffer. God calls on Job to look up and to look around at the world that God has created, a world which itself points back to God; the Creation that reminds us of the Creator. The Apostle Paul puts it like this: “since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.”⁶

God delights in his world, great and small. We are invited to enjoy the creation and to delight in it as God does. Again and again, God invites Job to consider, to wonder, to rejoice and to reflect on the splendour of what he has created.

The trouble is that we have become consumers rather than lovers; our delight has turned to greed, our service to exploitation.

Created to protect and serve

Now the LORD God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. And the LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

A river watering the garden flowed from Eden; from there it was separated into four headwaters. The name of the first is the Pishon; it winds through the entire land of Havilah, where there is gold. (The gold of that land is good; aromatic resin and onyx are also there.) The name of the second river is the Gihon; it winds through the entire land of Cush. The name of the third river is the Tigris; it runs along the east side of Asshur. And the fourth river is the Euphrates.

The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. And the LORD God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.”⁷

Adam and Eve were created to “work [the Garden] and take care of it” – to protect and to serve. In return, they were given the run of the place, and God provided “trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food.”

The Garden centred around the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, not the man and his wife, perhaps to remind Adam and Eve that the garden was not theirs: God’s plan was one of interdependence, of relationship; that is what makes what follows even more tragic.

First Eve and then Adam reach out and take from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, the only tree which God had put off-limits, and in doing so sought to place themselves at the centre of the garden.

When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it.⁸

This is the first recorded example of humankind exploiting the environment for their own benefit, rather than working to enjoy it and protect it; sadly it is but the first of many.

The consequences were catastrophic, not only for Adam and Eve, not just for the human race, but for the whole of creation:

To Adam [God] said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat of it,’

“Cursed is the ground because of you;
through painful toil you will eat of it
all the days of your life.

It will produce thorns and thistles for you,
and you will eat the plants of the field.

By the sweat of your brow
you will eat your food
until you return to the ground,
since from it you were taken;
for dust you are
and to dust you will return.”⁹

God’s creation has been corrupted. Not for nothing does the Apostle Paul write, “[w]e know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.”¹⁰ However, just a paragraph earlier, he writes, “[t]he creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.”¹¹ Christians look forward to the day when God’s new creation dawns, when he will make all things new.¹²

Some Christians take this to extremes, though, claiming that the degradation of this world is OK, because it means that that day of new creation will come all the quicker. This is (literally) rubbish! If God grieves over each sparrow that falls and each lily that dies, can you imagine how offended he is by our wilful and persistent destruction of the world that he has entrusted to our care?

No, Christians should be leading the charge towards protecting and serving our environment.

This is easy to say; but how can we do this? Where do we start?

Tending the Garden

There are many things that can be said here, but let me highlight a few of the common ones that we can all do in order to preserve this world that God has entrusted to our care.

Broadly speaking, Jack Johnson has the right idea when he says “we gotta learn to reduce, reuse, recycle” – in that order. Recycling is good… but reusing is better. Reusing is good… but reduction is better!

Appliances

• Refrigerator: The single household appliance that uses the most energy is the refrigerator. So let me ask, do you really need that second fridge? If you only use the second one when you’re having a party, why not consider turning it off and unplugging it the rest of the time? Do you need one that big?
• Lights: The next biggest energy consumer is electric lighting. Some simple ways of reducing the amount of energy you use:
  • Use compact fluorescents – traditional incandescent bulbs waste about 90% of their energy as heat.
  • Turn off the lights when you’re out of the room for more than 60 seconds.
• Televisions: The third biggest power user is the television. Even when they’re not on, most televisions are still drawing power in order to be able to turn on in response to a remote. Consider turning them off at the wall. Other ways to save power here are to watch less (!) and to not fall asleep with them on!!
• Audio equipment: The U.S. Government has published statistics that show that Americans spend more money to power audio equipment when they’re off than when on! Again, consider turning off at the wall.
• Computers: Turn off when not in use. Laptops use about half the power of desktops.
• Microwaves: Whilst microwaves draw a large current, they do so only for a short time. Don’t be shy about using them to precook food – in that way you can cut down on using larger (less efficient) appliances like ovens.

Transport

If you drive a car, make sure the tyres are inflated correctly. Having under-inflated tyres will reduce your fuel efficiency by up to 10% !

On the subject of fuels, ethanol based-fuels are better for the environment (less emissions), but have impacts in other areas. This is because much ethanol used for fuel is derived from corn, a staple food around the world, and so an increase in demand for corn can have a devastating effect on the global poor, so think carefully.

The new seatbelt

Many years ago seatbelts in cars were unheard of; then they were an optional extra; required by law; and, finally, so common-place that to not wear one makes us feel as though something is wrong.

We need to promote the same kind of mentality regarding the environment. This will involve a transformational change… and there is only one who has ever been good at transformational change – God. Ultimately we need to realise that any solution that relies entirely upon our own efforts is doomed to fail. Our natural sinfulness will lead us to take short-cuts, to seek our own advantage, to leave it for someone else to deal with. If we want to see our world changed for the better, if we want to see God’s creation restored to the point where God once again declares it ‘Very Good,’ then we must first seek transformation of ourselves. We must once again become God’s caretakers, his gardeners, people who delight in and protect the world God has entrusted to our care rather than consuming and exploiting it; and this kind of transformation can come only through the saving work of Jesus. Jesus’ sacrifice, his blood, his death on the Cross on our behalf, is the only means by which we can be recreated – reborn – as the people God wants us to be.

Endnotes

1. See, for example, William Paley’s Natural Theology.
2. Matt 10:29
3. Luke 12:24,27
4. Job 38:1-13
5. Job 39:1-8
6. Rom 1:20
7. Gen 2:8-17
8. Gen 3:6
9. Gen 3:17-19, emphasis added.
10. Rom 8:22
11. Rom 8:19-21
12. Rev 21:5