What are you hoping for?

When we think of the new heavens and the new earth, we tend to think of Revelation 21 - no more tears, death, mourning, crying or pain. Or we might think of the banquet of Matt 22 - they're great things to be looking forward to, but Paul has an interesting take on this in Galatians 5:5:

By faith we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope.

Are you eagerly awaiting and hoping for righteousness?! That is, pure justice, unsullied goodness, absolute truth, unquestionable integrity and so on. All these things in you and me and everyone else.
And when we put it like that, of course we're all eagerly awaiting these things! And when we live by faith and in the Spirit, we begin to experience these things now - it's as if they come into the present from the future.


PS Do you like the photo?! (Thanks Caz!)

Experiencing the Spirit as conflict

If you were at the Bible study last night, this will be old news to you, but I'm still mulling over the fact that, in Galatians 5, Paul shows that the normal experience of the Holy Spirit is one of conflict.

This is so unlike the experience that is peddled by so many preachers and authors today. They talk of power, tears of joy, overwhelming sense of the love of God, speaking in tongues and so on. Now these things may happen to some people, but Galatians 5 tells us what all of us who are filled with the Spirit experience:

 ¹⁶So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature. ¹⁷For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want.

It's similar to Romans 7 - the idea that deep down we want to live God's way, but regularly fail. But this is the experience of the Holy Spirit - desiring to please God, to live to honour Christ is to live in step with the Spirit.

So if you struggle with sin, and desire to please Jesus, be encouraged! It's a sure sign that God is at work in you by his Spirit.

Nothing on tv again?

I'm 47 (just). I'm a grumpy old man. And few things make me grumpier than the rubbish served up on tv. There are three things worth watching: sport (by which I mean rugby, cricket & golf), serious documentaries and the news (once a day). But whenever I do sit down in front of the box, decent sport is rarer than a panda in the bamboo in the Vicarage garden.

But now there's Clayton TV . Here you can watch Phillip Jensen speaking from Sydney Cathedral, or a talk by Don Carson at New Word Alive, or one of the Keswick Convention speakers. You can see discussions (in the 'Chat Room') on multiculturalism, cloning, art & censorship, and many other topics. There are Sunday services from Jesmond Parish Church (much better than Songs of Praise).
So have a look at Clayton TV.

Stating the obvious

Aren't scientists clever? Take, for example, these two quotes from the Daily Telegraph today:

Dr Neville Owen of the University of Queensland suggests people should simply pay more attention to sitting less. Most of us apparently spend more than half our waking hours on what he describes as "sedentary activities". And the longer people sit, the more likely they are to become overweight, irrespective of the amount of food consumed. [Italics mine].

And all this time, I thought sitting still would help me get thin!

Or,

Some children are just born with ODD - Oppositional Defiance Disorder - a pattern of negative and hostile behaviour that is impervious to the strictest disciplinary sanctions.

Well of course children are born with 'Oppositional Defiance Disorder' - it's proper name is 'original sin'!

Stained glass

Have you ever looked at the stained glass window and reredos (painted panel behind the Communion Table) at St Peter's? If so, have you spotted the common theme?

The verse in the middle of the window is john 11:25f

I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this?

The two repeated images in the window are grapes and wheat. On the right hand side of the reredos are the words, 'I am the true vine', and on the left, 'I am the bread of life'. So the words explain the pictures, and are linked by the theme of life (if you don't remain in the vine, you wither - John 15).

Then, either side of the words from John 11 is a tree. On the left, the fruit is ripe. On the right it's not. Is this the tree of life that stands either side of the river in Revelation 22 (cf Ezek 47:8-9, 12).

So there at the front of church is a window which proclaims life in the new heaven and new earth through Jesus.

The Old Testament for Christians

There's no doubt that how we, as Christians, are to read and apply the Old Testament (OT) is a difficult issue. Many Christians consider the 10 Commandments in Exodus 20 to be immediately applicable to us today, but they would not apply the laws about servants, personal injury or property in Exodus 21 in this way, and so their use of the OT is inconsistent.

The problem is our misunderstanding of the big picture of the Bible, and of God's plan for his people.
In Galatians, Paul shows us that there was only ever one gospel - the gospel of grace received by faith/trust in God's word of promise. So, 3:6-7,

⁶Consider Abraham: "He believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness." ⁷Understand, then, that those who believe are children of Abraham.

So before the law was given, God gave a promise which had to be believed, or trusted, and as soon as Abraham trusted God's promise, he received the benefit of the promise, i.e. 'righteousness' or 'right-standing with God'. And nothing has changed in God's economy - whoever believes his word of promise inherits the blessings of that promise. Not to believe what God says is not to believe him, to insult him, and to reject the blessings he offers.


So what about the law? Why did God give so many pages & pages of instructions & laws? Paul says that no-one was ever justified (put right with God) by obeying the law because everyone fails to obey all the law. So what's it for?

Well, in Galatians 3:19 Paul asks this very question, and then answers it in v24:

²⁴So the law was put in charge to lead us to Christ that we might be justified by faith.

The law is there to lead us to Christ. God gave the promise, and then gave the law as an interim measure until the promise was fulfilled in Jesus. So when I read about the Passover, I'm reminded that Jesus is the true Passover lamb. When I read about circumcision, I'm reminded that this was an outward sign of the inward reality that Jesus brings - membership of his people. When I read about the tabernacle, I'm reminded of heaven. And so on. Every OT law points to something Jesus has won for us, or something Jesus is to us. This is a consistent use of the OT. It's how the NT uses the OT.

But in Galatia, as in the church today, people could not see this and kept wanting to reinstate OT laws. For the Galatians, it was circumcision that was reinstated in order to ensure God's blessing. Today it's, "I'll be more acceptable to God, and he will really fill me with his Spirit, if I pray more, evangelise more, abstain from this or that, observe the Sabbath properly, keep the church building holy, read my Bible more." And having arrived at this belief for themselves, they try to persuade others that unless they too undergo this kind of discipline, they are not really very spiritual. In so doing they lead people into 'weak and miserable' religious slavery (Gal 4:9). But Paul is quite clear in v25:

²⁵Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law.

Yes, you read it correctly, 'We are no longer under the supervision of the law'. The OT no longer applies to us in the same way it applied to Israel.  It was an interim measure until Jesus came. In fact, Paul goes further in 3:10-11,

 ¹⁰All who rely on observing the law are under a curse, for it is written: "Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law." ¹¹Clearly no one is justified before God by the law, because, "The righteous will live by faith."

You see, if we rely on keeping the Sabbath or reading the Bible or praying or any other religious activity to keep us right with God, we are cursed! Cursed because we will fail to keep the Sabbath perfectly, or read or pray enough or with our full attention and so on.

From the moment God made his first promise to Abraham, all he wanted was for us to believe his promise. When we trust God's word of promise, we receive all that God has promised. We don't have to earn it - God simply wants us to trust what he says, and therefore to trust him.

This truth was so important, so fundamental to our relationship with God, that Paul was prepared to rebuke Peter and the Galatians very, very firmly, "When Peter came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face because he was clearly in the wrong." (2:11); "You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you?" (3:1). When he wrote to the Colossians, he made the same point, 'do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a new moon celebration or a Sabbath day. These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ. Do not let anyone who delights in false humility and the worship of angels disqualify you for the prize.' (Col. 2:16f)

Christ is everything, and so a simple faith in Christ is everything. Trust him, and you receive every blessing of every promise he makes.

Who to please?

My quiet time this morning took me to Galatians 1:7-10

 ⁶I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— ⁷ not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. ⁸But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. ⁹As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received let him be accursed.
 ¹⁰For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.

Here's a question every preacher-teacher must ask himself - Am I distorting the gospel to suit my congregation? Now, I take it that 'distorting the gospel' can be safely applied to any part of God's word and that none of it is open to distortion in order to please men & women, and so when I was faced with preparing to preach from 1 Corinthians 14, and the section about women in church, it was initially very tempting to find a way around what the apostle teaches there. But when you look at the bigger context of the passage - at chapter 11, and the meaning of Christ's submission to the Father - then what appears to be a really big problem becomes a wonderful possibility for imitating Christ. Men are to be servant leaders - laying down their lives for their wives and for the church. Loving the church and their wives with no thought for themselves, but always and only seeking the good of others. And if men did this, would women find it so hard not to follow Christ's example of humility and accept loving, considerate, Christ-like leadership?

This is, of course, completely counter-cultural. We've been bombarded with some fairly extreme feminism for 50 years - feminism which, at times, has been filled with hatred to men and demeaning of men (though it has to be admitted, that the reaction against men's inappropriate subjugation of women was understandable - indeed right. It's just that the pendulum always swings too far in reactionary movements).

But then the whole of the gospel is counter-cultural. The world encourages us to elevate our self-worth and pride. The gospel says, 'humble yourself and admit your sinful rebellion'. The world offers no forgiveness, because it has no basis for moral right or wrong and no source of mercy to deal with guilt. The gospel offers infinite mercy and forgivenss from a loving heavenly Father and a self-sacrificing Son.

Since this gospel is such a glorious, life-giving, freeing, hope-filled, divine gospel, I know who I shall try to please!