The Story Chapter 31 - Revelation

In exactly one month’s time, Godwilling,  the McKeowns will be seven miles above the Atlantic in a KLM plane bound for Seattle Washington.

 

We’re going over to see our friends the Canlis’s, who up until last year were the manse family in Methlick, and we’ll be there for just over three weeks, staying with their family for part of the time. Longest holiday we’ve ever had, and the farthest flung as well.

 

Now by nature, the McKeowns like to have the detail figured out but at the time of writing there are still a lot of unknowns!

 

But we know this – the Canlis’s are good people, and we’re safe in their hands. They’re going to look after us. And though the fine detail’s still obscure, we’ve got a good idea of the big picture for the holiday. Time to see the sights in Seattle and Vancouver, a trip to Mount St Helen’s, a preaching gig at Matt’s church in Wenatchee, a week at a beach house on Whidbey Island, good food, good company and good conversation with dear friends whom we miss very much.

 

In my imagination I see us dining in Matt’s parents’ restaurant in Seattle; catching the ferry to Canada; drinking great coffee in the kitchen of their new home while the kids play in the yard; sliding a patio door and walking down to a beach where the waters of Puget sound lap at my feet; standing on the observation deck of the Space Needle and looking over to Mount Rainier, still covered with snow even in the height of summer.

 

And that vision of our time away fills the present moment with impetus. We need to get ready.

 

So the passports and the estas are in place. We’re organising our money and credit cards. We’ve studied the guide books. We’ve bought or borrowed suitcases, and they’re slowly beginning to fill up with summer clothes.

 

That imagined future which is, at one and the same time both real and as yet unrealised, is laying its hand on the present and giving it shape and content. We are living now in the light of what’s to come.

 

And I start with that this morning, because I think that’s a helpful way into this most complex and misunderstood of Biblical texts – the book of Revelation.

 

Revelation, to the best of our knowledge, was written by the apostle John. John was one of Jesus disciples, one of that inner circle of three who were especially close to him. John was with him on the mount of transfiguration, sat next to him at the Last Supper, stood by him at the foot of the cross and beat Peter into second place in that incredulous Easter Sunday dash to the newly empty tomb.

 

It was John, after a lifetime of service to Christ and his church, who wrote both the Gospel and the three letters in the New Testament that bear his name.

 

And now we find him, at the end of his days, in exile on the island of Patmos – the last of the disciples to escape martyrdom according to tradition, but imprisoned for his faith in Christ and his testimony about him.

 

Cut off from the rest of the world, and from his brothers and sisters in the churches. Confined. And yet given a vision of such huge breadth and imagination that its imagery still impresses itself on the mind  two millennia later.

 

To what end, though? What is this vision really about?

 

Down the centuries, many have argued that Revelation’s all about the future. Jesus gave John this vision so we might know what’s to come and if we can only unpick all the riddles and the imagery then we’ll get to the chronology. We’ll be able to work out how and when it’s all going to end.

 

So whether it’s 4^th century monks poring over the book by candlelight, or 21^st century bloggers posting their latest assessment of who the antichrist is, there has been a long and rather wacky tradition of Christians trying to read the future in the tealeaves of Revelation.

 

And that, I think, is to read it badly.

 

One commentator puts it this way – “people get interested in everything in this book except God, losing themselves in symbol hunting, intrigue with numbers, speculating with frenzied imaginations on times and seasons, despite Jesus’ severe stricture against that sort of thing.”

 

On the rare occasion when Jesus did speak about things to come, he admitted that even he didn’t know the day or the hour that his Father had set for the fulfilment of the ages. He didn’t  tell us to get out our diaries and calculators and make our best guess at when he might return. He told us to live each day in the light of his coming. “Be ready”, he said. “Stay awake! Don’t get caught napping.”

 

Jesus doesn’t encourage us to speculate on the future. He urges us to live each present day in the light of what’s to come. 

 

So although Revelation alludes to the future – the future itself is never the focus.

 

But nor, I have to say, is the political situation of the time in which John wrote.

 

That’s the line that I got at University when we studied Revelation. It was all about the politics of the day, they said. And there may be some degree of truth in that.

 

It might well be that John’s using cryptic language to critique the Roman Empire because he couldn’t do it overtly.

 

John writes of a powerful beast with seven heads and he tells us that these heads represent seven hills. And he speaks of a degenerate woman sitting on the beast, who represents a great city ruling over the kings of the earth.

 

A degenerate great city, built on seven hills? To the ancient mind that could only mean one thing – Rome. And it’s quite possible that when John talks about the destruction of the woman and the beast, he’s alluding to the truth that one day even the mighty Roman Empire will fall.

 

But if Revelation is nothing more than a subversive political tract, written to undermine the government of the day, it has little to say to us in our time and place.

 

No – there is a third way to read Revelation – a way that’s not obsessed with the future or stuck in the past, and for this I’m indebted to Eugene Peterson and his excellent commentary on Revelation called ‘Reversed Thunder’.

 

Peterson’s insight is that John’s motivation in writing – or better still, Christ’s motivation in getting John to write– is pastoral.

 

John isn’t writing into a void. He’s writing to churches. Seven of them, strung around the Mediterranean basin. Facing all kinds of challenges and persecutions. Thrown out of the synagogues for their faith in Jesus; torn to shreds by wild animals in the Coliseums; blamed by Nero for the great fire of Rome and persecuted in their home communities for being different.

 

They, like John in exile, are having a hard time. The political and social forces they have to reckon with seem to dwarf the church. To the casual eye, the Lower Story seems to be winning the day.

 

And that’s why the focus of Revelation isn’t the future. but the one who holds the past, the present and the future – Jesus the Christ. He is the centre of this text. He is the beginning, middle and end of the story.

 

At the turn of the year, Will Stalder preached a marvellous sermon on John’s opening Revelation vision of one like a son of man with a voice like many waters; burning eyes; a face like the sun in all its glory and feet like burnished bronze. At the sight of him, we’re told, John fell at his feet as though dead.

 

But the one in the vision speaks kindly to him. “Do not be afraid”  he says  “I am the First and the Last. I am the Living One; I was dead, and now look – I am alive for ever and ever.”

 

This is our Christ, John is saying. My Christ, even as I’m stuck here on this island in exile. Your Christ, even as you struggle on in your congregations. This is the one we’re worshipping. This is the one in whom we’ve placed our trust; our very lives.

 

He is, and was, and is to come. He is the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, the ruler of the kings of the earth.

 

He is the Alpha and Omega. The beginning and the end.

 

He holds the stars in his hand and walks among the golden lampstands which are the churches.

 

He is the Amen – the last word on everything. The ruler of creation.

 

He is the Lion of Judah; the Root of David;  the Lamb that was slain.

 

He is the rider on the white horse, whose name is Faithful and True and the Word of God.

 

He is King of Kings and Lord of Lords

 

Wave after wave after wave of names and titles gathering to a greatness. This is our Christ, our saviour.

 

I don’t know what worries or concerns you carry here with you this morning – whether they’re trivial or profound. But I know this – if you’re a person of faith, you don’t face them alone. Christ is with you in it all.

 

Never think that the Lower Story has the last word, no matter how challenging your circumstances might be. Christ always has the last word.

 

That’s the vision that John wants to inspire his people with.

 

All the vivid imagery of future battles against dark powers is there not to pique our curiosity, but to reassure us that the final victory of God over all that opposes him is certain. Nothing and no-one can stand against the Lamb who was Slain.

 

Much, as you know, is made of the number of the beast, which is 666, and throughout history - by playing around with names and Roman numeral -  people as diverse as Anwar Sedat and Mikhail Gorbachev have been accused of being the antichrist. Kind of helped that Gorbachev had that suspicious big birthmark on his head too.

 

But that’s barking up the wrong tree.

 

Numbers always have significance in the Bible – and 7 is seen as the perfect number. 7 days of creation, 7 miraculous signs of Jesus in John’s gospel, the sevenfold spirit of God before the throne.

 

And God is Trinity – Holy Holy Holy cry the angels. Seven Seven Seven.

 

So what’s 666? The number of man. The number that falls short of perfection. The number that represents every effort of man to deny God, forget God or usurp God.

 

When we live life that way, we dance to the enemy’s tune whether we know it or not. We take his number, so to speak.

 

And John wants us to understand that in the end, everything that stands against Christ will be brought low and held to account. Everything.

 

In John’s Revelation - The Dragon and the Beast, Death and Hades. In the experience of the seven churches to which John writes, Empires and Kingdoms. In their day and in ours- the arrogant, the cultured despisers, the selfish and immoral. And we applaud this. We would be angry if justice didn’t come on them.

 

But the things is, it’s not just them who gets judged.. For John goes on to tell us that God will judge everything in you and me and everyone, which refuses to bow the knee to God in Christ.

 

Books will be opened, he says. The dead, great and small will stand before the throne. And he tells us that some will go on to eternal life, while others will meet their final end, because they never acknowledged the Christ – either implicitly or explicitly.

 

This is a hard word, but it’s the word of the Lord. And we need to reckon with it.

 

CS Lewis puts it this way – “When the author walks onto the stage, the play is over. God is going to invade, all right. But what is the good of saying you are on His side then, when you see the whole natural universe melting away like a dream and something else comes crashing in? This time it will be God without disguise; something so overwhelming that it will strike either irresistible love or irresistible horror into every creature. It will be too late, then, to choose your side. That will not be the time for choosing; it will be the time when we discover which side we have really chosen, whether we realised it before or not. Now, today, this moment, is our chance to choose the right side.

 

 

We’ve reached the end of the story, and it ends with a new beginning where all that stands in opposition to God is put away and dealt with once and for all.

 

And in its place come a new heaven and a new earth, a new city where God dwells with his people in harmony and peace – which has been his heart’s desire all along. A new beginning, were death and mourning and crying and pain are things that have passed away.

 

Because of what Christ has done, that’s the future the cosmos is heading for. And the good news is that we can choose to find a place in it. “In my Father’s house are many rooms” said Jesus. If it were not so, I would have told you.

 

“I am going there to prepare a place for you, and if I go and prepare a place for you I will come back and take you to be with me, that you also may be where I am”.

 

From the first nanosecond of creation, this is what God has been bringing creation to.

 

“Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.”

 

 This is where it’s all been going.

 

So let us learn to live in the light of that sure and certain future. May we let it shape the way we live and the people we’re becoming

 

May we give him our yes, both now and forevermore.

 

Amen

 

The Story Chapter 30 - Paul's Final Days

Take a look at the apostle Paul with me this morning, will you?

You might need to bring a candle. It’s dark down here, and far beneath the baking heat of Rome’s streets, the cells are cold and stink of human waste.

 

The prisoners flinch from the light; some raise their hands to shield their eyes, clanking their chains. Most turn away; but one lifts his head and accepts the pain so he can watch the light come, and as you approach you see that same light reflected in the deep wells that are his eyes, making them shine like stars.

 

Through the dirt and grime, and matted hair, it’s hard to tell if he’s old, or just looks old because life has weathered him. But for all his dishevelment, he has a presence about him that’s hard to define;  a bearing that tells you that although he may be a prisoner in body, his soul is unfettered and unbroken.

 

This is Paul, apostle to the Gentiles by the will of God, in the last few weeks of his life. Chained up in a Roman dungeon, waiting for whatever fate God has in store for him. A loser in the Lower Story; a giant in the Upper.

 

And one of the things that strikes you when you read Paul is how his confidence in God gave him the strength to endure and overcome all the challenges he faced in the Lower Story. He was no superman. He was as weak as the next person and he never tired of telling us so. It was God within him who gave him the power to endure. This is how he put it to the church in Corinth:

 

We have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all–surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.

 

Again and again in today’s chapter, we find Paul embracing risk, hardship, even violence and imprisonment for the sake of the gospel. Jail in Jerusalem and Caesarea, shipwreck on Malta, house arrest in Rome and after a brief spell of freedom, this final incarceration before martyrdom under Nero in around 67AD.

 

Paul’s life is so singular and dedicated that beside him, all of us are left feeling a little like the ‘before’ picture in those old Charles Atlas bodybuilding advertisements! Compared to him, we might well find ourselves wondering whether we should even be called disciples or followers of Jesus at all.

 

But as ever, we have to begin where we are. We have to play the ball where it lies. And it lies in a certain place for you and for me. In this place, with these people, and these limitations, and these opportunities.

 

We’re never asked to live someone else’s life. Not everyone in the Bible was a Paul, thank goodness! Somebody had to be there to pick up the pieces when he moved on from town to town! The church needs different kinds of people. But every single one of us is called to follow Jesus with the same kind of passion and commitment that Paul showed, even if it’s expressed in different ways.

 

And that, maybe, is where we can learn from Paul this morning – for all that his experience and ours are of a different order. And if I could ask one question of him as he sat there, chained to a dungeon wall but with his eyes still bright with hope, I’d ask him “How did you do it? What’s the source of that inner strength that’s kept you going throughout all of this?”

 

And maybe he’d smile and say – “I’ve already told you. Go and read my letters – it’s all there.”

 

And sure enough, it is. Even the cursory glance we’ve taken at Paul’s letters over the past few weeks in the Story has told us all that we need to know.

 

It seems to me that his strength came from two sources – his sense of God’s call on his life, and his deep personal knowledge of God, in Christ.

 

Flick through the letters that Paul wrote to the churches, and almost without exception the opening verses say something like this – “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, by the will of God.” This is who he was. Or better still, who he became. An apostle – one who was sent – and sent by the will and purpose of God.

 

He wasn’t always Paul, remember. He was Saul. And then he had that encounter with Christ on the Damascus road, and everything changed. And it’s fair to say that Paul never got over that encounter. It was the formative experience of his life. It cast a shadow over everything that was to come, but a shadow made of light, not darkness. It illuminated everything for him  - within and without, present and future. From now on he would see everything in the light of that meeting with the risen Christ.

 

And the gospel’s peppered with such stories. The newness of it all, the radical nature of the changes people were being asked to make, brought the whole question of call and conversion into sharp relief.  You had to leave something in order to follow the Christ. Your Judaism, your pagan religion, maybe even your family if they disapproved of your newfound faith. You’d heard Christ’s call on your life, and you’d made your own personal response to it. You knew where you stood. You’d crossed the line, burnt your bridges. And that decision brought a whole new direction and purpose to your life.

 

Outwardly, nothing might have changed. You might have been a midwife, or a washerwoman, a soldier or a farmer. You would still be those things. But inside, you were living for something new – the King of Kings had displaced self from the throne room of your life and you knew that you were no longer your own. You’d been bought at a price, and you owed God not just your service, but your very life. A Copernican shift had taken place inside, and the rest of your days would be spent working it out and living it out.

 

And the same Christ still calls, as he called Saul all those years ago.

Still calls us to choose, to follow. To decide.

 

Easy for Saul – you might say. He got the whole son et lumiere experience! Shining lights and heavenly voices. Yes – and blindness, persecutions and martyrdom to boot, don’t forget.

 

You want your Damascus road? Do this for me. Take yourself off to a quiet room and spend an hour in your imagination at the foot of the cross. Read one of the gospel accounts if it helps ground you in the story, but then set the book aside and simply sit with the crucified Christ for an hour. There’s your call. There’s your proof of God’s enduring love. A grace planned for us and given to us before the beginning of time.

All that remains is what you will make of it – and as the hymnwriter reminds us, there is only one valid response to the call of Christ at Calvary. “Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life my all”.

 

That’s part of the reason Paul’s faith was so strong – he answered the call of Christ  with all that was in him. But then secondly, he also knew his God. Knew him well.

 

It’s thought that Paul’s second letter to Timothy was written from this dungeon in Rome, and as he languishes there he dictates these words to his young colleague, who was like a son to him: “Of this gospel, I was appointed a herald and an apostle and a teacher – there it is again- That is why I am suffering as I am. Yet I am not ashamed, because I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him for that day”

 

 I know whom I have believed.

 

That encounter with Christ on the road to Damascus was the beginning of a deep, abiding relationship with God, worked out in the ordinary things of daily life – relationships, conversations, travel arrangements, troubles, joys. Prayer didn’t remove Paul from the real world. It embedded him more deeply within it.

 

Prayer was a hallmark of Paul’s life, he knew the scriptures like the back of his hand, but these weren’t just ends in themselves -  religious duties or observance. They were means to an end – the end of knowing Christ, so Paul could live out his faith effectively in the places God put him.

 

I know whom I have believed, he said.

And we need to take care with that word ‘know’ because it’s easily misunderstood.

 

For us, knowledge is about information and facts. But Paul’s not talking about that here. He doesn’t say ‘I know what I have believed’ He’s saying ‘I know whom I have believed’. He’s not talking about facts, he’s talking about a person. Someone he knows intimately.

 

Those of us familiar with the King James Bible will remember the use of that kind of language around human intimacy – we read lines like “And Abraham knew Sarah and she bore him a son.” So much summed up in that one word. Love, intimacy, openness, sharing. The closest kind of communication.

 

You see there’s knowing and there’s knowing.

 

There’s knowledge about someone, and then there’s actually knowing them.

 

I was down in Glasgow a couple of weekends ago for the 10^th anniversary of the Stockline disaster, and the former Chief Fire Officer Brian Sweeney was there as well. Brian was the public face of the rescue operation over those three or four days and was constantly on the news giving updates. And one day, during the emergency,  a Maryhill punter, a bit worse for wear, stopped him in the street and started bragging about how he knew that big man Brian Sweeney. “If you see him, you tell him Rab says hello”. “Don’t you worry - I’ll make sure I tell him” said Mr Sweeney.

 

There’s a world of difference between knowing about someone and actually knowing them. We can know all the Bible stories, all the history, all the theology and still not know the Christ they point to. We know him not by opening our minds to absorb knowledge about him, but by opening our hearts to receive him as Lord and Saviour. All the rest flows from that. That’s the kind of knowing that matters.

 

Folk often tell me that they struggle to speak up about their faith with others because they don’t know enough. “I don’t know my Bible well enough” they say. “Or, I can’t answer all the difficult questions they’re asking”. Well, there’s a time for those kind of discussions, but in all honesty, that’s not the kind of knowledge that really matters. The knowledge that matters is the kind that comes through a life of prayer and walking closely with God – the kind that flows out into the way you are and the way you live. People are rarely argued into the kingdom. They’re attracted into it. A life lived in Christ naturally radiates.

 

In other words, it’s not just about what you know. It’s about who you know.

 

I’ll finish with a story.

 

There’s a story about a renowned actor, many years ago, who was at a function, and the host asked if he would recite something for the entertainment of the guests.

 

The actor asked if there was anything special they’d like to hear, and an elderly minister asked if he’d recite the 23^rd Psalm.

 

And after pausing for a moment, the actor said he would, if the minister would do the same. And although the old man protested that his delivery would inevitably be inferior, he agreed.

 

So the actor began – and he spoke beautifully, placing just the right weight on every word and syllable. And when he finished he got a great round of applause from the guests.

 

And then the minister stood, and recited the same words. And though his voice was unremarkable, by the time he’d finished there wasn’t a dry eye in the room.

 

And the actor rose again, and he said “Ladies and gentlemen – I reached your eyes and your ears; this man has reached your hearts. The difference is just this: I know the Psalm. But he knows the Shepherd”.

 

What was the secret of Paul’s inner strength? Strength that saw him through all the challenges of an apostolic life? Two things: a deep sense of God’s call on his life, and a commitment to do whatever it took to know God better. That’s what it took, and that’s what it takes, to be able to give this kind of testimony:

 

“For me, to live is Christ – to die is gain.”

“I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. ¹²I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. ¹³I can do everything through him who gives me strength”.

The Story Chapter 29 - Paul's Mission

The eminent preacher Dr Martin Lloyd Jones was said to have delivered over 350 sermons on Paul’s letter to the Romans.

 

The editors of The Story in their wisdom have decided to cram Acts, Romans, Corinthians, Galatians and Thessalonians into this week’s chapter. So preparing for today did feel a bit like trying to summarise the Encyclopaedia Britannica in two thousand words or less!

 

But all we’re trying to do just now is get more of the big picture of the Biblical story, and even a whistlestop tour like today’s can be helpful in that respect. And for all that it’s hugely ambitious to try and hold so much material together in one chapter, one of the things I did enjoy about it was reading about Paul’s missionary journeys, and then bringing alongside that Paul’s letters  - written to the very same churches that he’d founded. It reminded me that these were real places he visited; real people that he’d spent time with.

 

Real faith never happens above the grid of life. It’s always located, always personal, always specific. These people, this place, this culture, this time. The cosmic truth is always worked out in the local setting, in the loci of individual human hearts. And it’s Paul, more than any other New Testament figure, who teaches us that.

 

Paul, of course, didn’t always bear that fine name. Before his conversion, Paul was Saul – a learned young Jew, zealous in his persecution of the church, overseeing the martyrdom of Stephen, going town to town to try and destroy these heretics who were called the followers of the Way.

 

But thanks to a close encounter with the risen Jesus on the road to Damascus, that was all to change.  A surge of light, a heavenly voice, and then blindness. His travelling companions led him by the hand into Damascus where he ate nothing for three days and sat in the darkness contemplating the words that had shaken his world to the core. “Saul, Saul. Why are you persecuting me?”. It was the voice of Christ himself, and he knew it.

 

Ananias, one of the local believers, came as instructed by God and brought healing through prayer, and Saul himself was baptised that same evening. And so began the Christian life of one of the most productive, committed, persuasive and controversial figures in all of church history. Things were rarely, if ever, dull around the apostle Paul.

 

And you can imagine it took a while for the fledgling church to accept him! Isn’t this the guy who’s been persecuting us all these years?  But over time, and with the backing of respected men like Barnabas, they came to trust him. And after something like ten years, spent between Damascus, Jerusalem, Tarsus and Antioch, the congregation in Antioch commissioned Paul and Barnabas to take the message about Jesus to the province of Asia Minor. And that was the beginning of three missionary journeys that we read about in Acts. Helps enormously if find a good map! (IMAGE)

 

Going to say first fairly localised – days before plane travel, that would be a nonsense! Southern Turkey – won’t see many names you recognise, but GALATIA is there. Plan was simple – go to the synagogue, tell people news about Jesus when they were invited to speak, and they’d follow up that message with those who were interested. Those folk, whether Jews or god-fearing Gentiles, would become the nucleus of the local church. But resistance always came, often with violence, and as the mission progressed, the focus of the preaching shifted away from the Jews and towards the more responsive Gentiles.

 

Paul’s second journey (IMAGE), undertaken with Silas, saw him go back and encourage the new churches that had been planted in Asia Minor,  but this time they went further and crossed the Aegean sea to witness in Macedonia (modern Greece). And here you’ll see some more familiar names. Phillipi, Thessalonica, Athens and Corinth, where he spent two years working alongside Priscilla and Aquila earning a living as a tentmaker, while establishing a new congregation.

 

Paul had a brief stopover in Ephesus on the way back to Palestine, but on his third journey (IMAGE), he made Ephesus his priority and stayed there for three years before doing one last tour of the Macedonian churches. Later on he was imprisoned and taken as a captive to Rome but that’s a story for another day.

 

So Paul, this dyed in the wool Jew and son of Abraham, became the means through which God fulfilled his word to Abraham. God had promised to bless all nations through Abraham’s seed – Jesus - and it’s Paul, and others, who bring the message of Jesus to the nations on these three epic journeys.

 

Remember earlier I said that faith never happens above the grid of life. It’s always located, always personal, always specific. What we’re going to do for the rest of the service is look very briefly at four towns Paul visited, read excerpts from the letters he wrote to them, and we’re going to distil Paul’s teaching in each letter down to one word that was crucial to his teaching. One word for each church. How’s that for economy?

 

And we’re going to start with Thessalonica (Modern Image – then Map)

Thessalonica was the largest city in Macedonia, an important centre for trade and transport; it was the first place where Paul’s preaching took a firm hold, and scholars believe that his letters to the Thessalonians are among the earliest New Testament documents, dating from around AD 51

 

And the word for Thessalonica is ‘Trials’

 

READING -    

 

In spite of severe suffering, you welcomed the message with the joy given by the Holy Spirit. The church in Thessalonica had a hard start. Luke tells us in Acts that Paul’s opponents rounded up a mob, started a riot, and dragged some of the brand-new believers before the city officials complaining that Paul and his like were defying Caesar by claiming that Jesus was King. The city, we’re told, was in turmoil.

 

And this would happen again and again as Paul travelled around with this message.

 

Why? Because it upset the status quo. It challenged Judaism with its denial of the Messiah. It challenged paganism with its pantheon of gods. It challenged politics by talking about a new king and a new kingdom. It challenged the economic system by calling us to radically rethink how and why we spend our money. In Ephesus, the silversmiths who made idols rioted against Paul because his teaching was going to put them out of business!

 

Lots of vested interests, threatened by this gospel. And the believers suffered for it.

 

And in parts of our world believers still suffer today. There’s nothing new under the sun.

 

Map of Christian persecution 2013. Open Doors. (IMAGE)

Central African Republic – 16^th on list; Severe persecution.

 

Central African Republic is a Christian majority country that in 2013 witnessed brutal violence against Christians by the Seleka movement. Seleka is a coalition of rebels dissatisfied with the regime; it has no apparent Islamist agenda, but is composed of mostly foreign Muslims who have ravaged the country, specifically targeting Christians and non-Muslims. This is evidenced by the desecration of churches, the high number of violent attacks on Christians – through rape, robbery, kidnapping, torture and murder – and the killing of at least 13 pastors.

 

In this world, you will have trouble, Jesus told his disciples. And Paul would undoubtedly give his Amen to that.

 

But Paul’s word to the church facing trials is not to lose hope. The litany of his own suffering was staggering – shipwrecks, imprisonment, whippings, stonings, beatings, but his faith helped him view all of that as a sharing in Christ’s sufferings and an opportunity for growth. Later on in his ministry, he’d write that “suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope”.

 

It takes deep roots in Christ to view your troubles in that way. But that’s what Paul had; and that’s what he desired for his churches.

 

HYMN 556 – I Need Thee Every Hour

 

Next up is Rome (IMAGE) – and the word we need for Romans is Righteousness. (IMAGE)

 

READING

 

Righteousness is a key word for Paul and in the book of Romans he uses it over 30 times. But what does it mean?

 

Well basically, righteousness is the state of being in right standing with God. We know that God is holy. We know that we aren’t, much of the time. So how on earth can people like us be at peace with God? How can we find this righteousness?

 

Well, the ancient world offered many solutions. Offer sacrifices. Try harder. Keep your nose clean. Do good works. Be pure.

 

That was the way the Pharisees took. They tried really hard. But the problem was, instead of acquiring righteousness they just became self-righteous. Proud of their own efforts to be holy. Sure that God must be really pleased with them, when in fact he wasn’t. As Jesus said to the crowds, “unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven."

 

The bad news is, our own righteousness will never be good enough, no matter how hard we try. Paul says that all our righteous acts are like filthy rags. But the good news is, that doesn’t matter anymore. “For in the gospel – Paul says - a righteousness from God is revealed.  A righteousness that is by faith from first to last”.

 

Did you hear that – a righteousness that comes by faith, not by works.   A righteousness that’s gifted to us, not earned. That’s what the gospel is all about.

 

Many years ago a homeless man and a businessman ended up in the same lunchtime meeting in a city centre church and they were both deeply moved by the same sermon.

 

That evening the homeless man thought about what he’d heard, and he opened his life to Christ. But for weeks and weeks the businessman refused to accept the message, even though he knew it was true and at some point he’d have to respond.

 

Eventually he also gave in, admitted his need of Christ and accepted him as Saviour. In the months that followed, he got to know the homeless man at church and as they shared their stories, he asked his newfound friend “Why do you think it took me so long to decide, while you responded right away?”

“I guess you could think of it like this” the homeless man said. “Let’s say Jesus is like a rich man who wanted to give each of us a new coat. You shook your head and said, ‘I don’t think so; I’m perfectly happy with the one I’ve got.’ When he made the same offer to me, I looked at the old blanket I wear around my shoulders, and I couldn’t get a hold of that new coat quick enough.

 

You struggled to give up your own righteousness. I didn’t. It’s those who think they’re doing ok who find it hardest to admit that they actually need help.

If you ever tune in to the Academy Awards or the Oscars, you’ll be familiar with the fashionistas lined up on the red carpet to interview the stars on their way into the show. “Who are you wearing?” they shout to the actresses – meaning Dior, or Versace.

 

When it comes to the red carpet at the end of days, the only thing to be seen wearing is Christ. Either we dress in his righteousness, by accepting what he did for us, or we end up wearing the tattered rags of our own righteousness and finding that the bouncers won’t allow us into the show because we’re not dressed correctly. The choice is down to us.

 

HY 396 - AND CAN IT BE?

 

Our next port of call is Galatia (IMAGE) – the group of churches in the region of Asia Minor that Paul travelled to on his first missionary journey. And things are afoot in Galatia by the time Paul writes to them. He needs to speak to them about GRACE (IMAGE)

 

The roots of the early church were in Judaism. Jesus was Jewish, the disciples were Jewish, almost all the converts to the new faith had Jewish roots. But as the word about Jesus spread, Gentiles came to faith as well. But what was required of them? Did they have to take on all the Jewish traditions too, in order to be real believers? This was a huge debate in the early church, and one in which Paul was to have a big say.

 

Some visitors had come to Galatia and told the churches that in order to be real Christians, the Gentiles among them would have to take on all the requirements of the Jewish law. Paul strongly disagrees. The new faith, based on Jesus, is all about grace. Not about law. To go back to the old ways is like becoming a slave all over again.

 

READING: “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free!”

 

Do you see what he’s saying here? If you’re trying to be set right with God by obeying the law, you’re back in the bad old days.

 

Legalism says God will love us if we change. The gospel says God will change us because He loves us. The love comes first. Miss that, and you’ve missed the gospel.

 

Grace is the free, unmerited goodness of God reaching out to us before we have done anything to warrant it. And we have such a hard time understanding that, because the world we live in is a meritocracy. You get what you deserve; there’s no such thing as a free lunch; scores must be kept, and settled. Some are in, some are out. End of story.

 

But not where there’s grace.

 

John Stott says that grace is love that cares and stoops and rescues. The Good Samaritan didn’t engage the wounded traveller in a short interview process to see if he was worthy of assistance. He got down off his donkey and went to help him. The Prodigal’s father didn’t grill the boy thoroughly before he’d agree to take him back into the home. He ran down the path to meet him. Christ didn’t shun the woman at the well for having a messed up life, or the lepers for their illness, or the tax collectors for their unpopularity, or the drunks and hookers for their immorality. He went out to them so he could rescue them. That’s what grace does. It meets us where we are, but then hopes and works for the better.

 

And this is what God does for us in Christ. He gives us his son. He tells us that if we place our faith in him, all will be well despite what we know ourselves to be. He asks us to trust him. To trust in his grace. To accept Christ’s righteousness and live joyfully and thankfully out of that freedom rather than becoming bean-counting moralists trying to earn our own way into God’s favour.

 

Works matter – yes. Behaviour matters. But they should be a  response to God’s love – not as a futile attempt to earn it.

 

Object lesson in grace, now. All being well, you got a sweetie when you came in this morning! Hope enough to go round!

 

You’re probably wondering why you got a sweetie. Some of you might even have refused! But if the folk on the door were doing their job, they’ll have insisted!

 

Thing is - what you do with that sweetie is up to you. You might take the plunge and eat it. You might hold it in your hand and reflect on the kindness of whoever gave it to you. You might stick it in your pocket or your handbag and take it home with you. You might just decide to leave it sitting on the pew.

 

There are all kinds of responses to grace. And there are all kinds of responses to the grace we are shown in the Christ. Will you take it, or will you leave it?  Once again, the choice is entirely yours.

 

HY 555 – AMAZING GRACE

 

Our last visit this morning takes us to the cosmopolitan city of Corinth (IMAGE) where once again trouble’s afoot and Paul has to teach them about the importance of COMMUNITY. (IMAGE)

 

READING

 

The church in Corinth was a mess. They weren’t best pleased to be told it, but it was true. Some had become puffed up because they had particular spiritual gifts, others were feeling neglected and ignored, there were instances of serious immorality and endless disputes and divisions between the members. It was a mess. And in that sense it was just like every other church there has ever been and ever will be.

 

You may have noticed this, but churches are made up of people. And whether they’re in the church or not, people are people. We come to God, and to one another, as works in progress and not as the finished article.

 

In the Screwtape letters, CS Lewis writes in the guise of a senior devil advising a junior how to lead astray the human ‘patient’ he’s been assigned to.

 

Screwtape describes how even a trip to church can be an opportunity to advance the devil’s work in the man’s life. (“The Enemy” is God.)

 

“ When your patient gets to his pew and looks around him, he sees just that selection of his neighbours whom he has hitherto avoided. You want to lean pretty heavily on those neighbours. Make his mind flit to and fro between an expression like ‘the body of Christ’ and the actual faces in the next pew. It matters very little, of course, what kind of people that next pew really contains. You may know one of them to be a great warrior on The Enemy’s side. No matter. Your patient, thanks to our Father below, is a fool. Provided that any of these neighbours sing out of tune, or have boots that squeak, or double chins, or odd clothes, the patient will quite easily believe that their faith must therefore somehow be ridiculous.

 

Work hard, then, on the disappointment and anti-climax which is certainly coming to the patient in his first few weeks as a churchman.  The Enemy allows this disappointment to occur on the threshold of every human endeavour. It occurs when the boy who has been enchanted in the nursery by stories from the Odyssey buckles down to really learning Greek. It occurs when lovers have got married and begin the real task of learning to live together. In every department of life it marks the transition from dreaming aspiration to laborious doing. Or to put it another way, the transition from childishness to maturity.

 

Life with other people, in any context, is never straightforward. But it’s in community that we get our own rough edges knocked off a little, and become more of the people God wants us to be.

 

And that’s why, in Corinthians, Paul reminds his congregation what love looks like. That love is patient, love is kind. That is doesn’t envy, or boast. That it’s not proud or self-seeking.

 

He teaches them that the church is a body where every part, though different, is entirely necessary – bringing it’s own unique function to the whole.

 

He reminds them that spiritual gifts aren’t badges of status. They’re gifts given to the whole church for service in the whole church. No room for private agendas and personal empire building.

 

We’re a community who have received the grace of God, he tells them. And if that’s who we are, it behoves us to show the grace of God to one another. Nether you nor I are anything, he says. We are not the focus. God is the focus. It’s God who makes things grow.

 

And this, I think, is the sum of so much of Paul’s teaching. God, in Christ, is at the centre of it all. And the beauty of his letters is how that same truth finds a particular slant in each different congregation.

 

It’s God who supports us through our trials

It’s God who gives us a righteousness we couldn’t ever earn.

It’s God who chooses the way of grace over legalism.

It’s God who’s the true centre of our lives and our community.

 

May that same God show us how to live out this same truth in our lives, in our place, and in our time – for his glory.

 

Amen