The Blessing of Humility

Daniel 1-4 tells the story of the King of Babylon’s attack on Jerusalem and its consequences for four of the teenagers he took captive. We read often the stories of these chapters with an eye on the four young Israelis. On another level, however, they describe a long battle between Nebuchadnezzar and God over who is truly the sovereign ruler of the world.

In Daniel 4 that battle comes to a head and we learn a simple but urgent lesson:

Pride cuts us off from God. But Jesus gives life to the humble.

The Plot

As Daniel 4 opens, Nebuchadnezzar is enjoying life as Emperor of a large part of the world. Life is good. But then he has a nightmare. It makes such an impact on him that he summons all his advisors including, finally, Daniel and asks what it means.

Daniel explained that Nebuchadnezzar is going to become ill and start to act like an animal. He will be driven from the throne and live wild until he learns humility: that God is ultimately in charge and not him.

Daniel urges Nebuchadnezzar to change his ways, humble himself, do what is right and show mercy so that he might avoid this fate. Nebuchadnezzar’s pride is too great for this, however. One day he is looking out over all that he has made, and the city he has built, and starts to reflect on how awesome he is.

It’s hard for us to understand quite how great Nebuchadnezzar was and how much he had achieved. To give a sense of it, here is a highlight from historians reflecting on some of the achievements of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign.

Nebuchadnezzar is there, thinking about his awesomeness, when without warning he hears a voice announcing that God’s judgement has come upon him. He loses his mind, is driven from his throne and lives with animals until he is willing to acknowledge that God rules and that Nebuchadnezzar has a received everything he has from God just like everyone else.

The King lives like this for a period of time until he is willing to humble himself and acknowledge God. When he does, his reason is restored and his returned to the throne.

It’s a fascinating story and one that is supported by the Babylonian records we have found. They show that Nebuchadnezzar was forced to leave his throne with a problem for extended period of time.

The story teaches us a lot about pride and how it affects our relationship with God and with others. I want to think about this with help from the great Christian writer, C.S. Lewis in his wonderful introduction to Christianity, Mere Christianity.

Recognise

First, we need to recognise how dangerous pride is and that we suffer from it.

“Pride,” C.S. Lewis tells us, “leads to every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind.”[1]

Pride is that quality in us which thinks highly of ourselves because we are better than others in some way.

Nebuchadnezzar was, above all, a proud man. In his own mind he had achieved so much because of his own greatness. He was better than others and so he achieved more than them. He was so great that he had no need of God, still less any need to submit himself to God or consider anyone else.

This kind of thinking is deadly. It is deadly for our relationship with God and with others.

Here Lewis again: “pride is essentially competitive… Pride gets no pleasure out of having something only out of having more of it than the next man.”[2]

In other words when we are proud, we believe we have no need for others, or God, save insofar as they, or he, increase our own greatness in some way.

The story of Daniel 1-4 is that of God breaking Nebuchadnezzar’s pride so that he could be restored to God and to others. The king had to learn that God rules the Earth and everything we have received comes from him. As John the Baptist replied to those who wanted him to compete with Jesus, “a person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven… Jesus must increase, but I must decrease.”[3]

Without this attitude, we cannot know God.

As Lewis explains: “as long as you are proud you cannot know God. A proud man is always looking down on things and people: and, of course, as long as you are looking down, you cannot to see something that is above you.”[4] Or, as Jesus put it, “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”[5]

The first step to getting past pride, Lewis comments, “is to realise that one is proud… If you think you are not conceited, it means you are very conceited indeed.”[6]

Resolve

Having recognised that we are by nature proud, and that this pride cuts us off from God and others, we need to begin to as God to do something about it.

This is tricky. Religious people can be the proudest and most unattractive people of all.

As Lewis notes, proud religious people can invent a false god for themselves to worship instead of coming before the true God. “They theoretically admit themselves to be nothing in the presence of this phantom God, but are all the time imagining how he approves of them and thinks them far better than ordinary people: that is, they pay a pennyworth of imaginary humility to him and get out of it a pound’s worth of pride towards their fellow-man.”[7]

How, then, do we begin to deal with our pride? The key is to start to be real with God and to be specific.

Nebuchadnezzar gives us a clue. The Kings pride was to do with his power, his position as King, and his greatness. When he came to pray in verse 34, he acknowledged that God was great in all the areas in which he had been proud and accepted that he was totally dependent on God.

This is, I think, the key to resolving the problem of pride. We need to see where we are proud and start to acknowledge that God is sovereign and supreme in those areas.

So to help us, what might be some areas where pride hits?

One helpful question is to ask:  What is it that I find hard to acknowledge has come from God?

This is different for everyone but here are some areas that I at least find myself at risk:

• When we are successful or powerful. Nebuchadnezzar looked over all that he had built and was proud.
• When others praise us and find us attractive.
• When we are complacent and at ease.
• When we suffer, but are proud of our suffering or our fortitude and bravery in facing it, and therefore refuse God’s help and his grace.

Only we, and God, can know where it hits for each of us. When we our areas of pride, we need to be willing to bring it to God and to do business with him about it.

Then we must acknowledge that God is supreme and sovereign – everything we have comes from him.

We must acknowledge that God is our Saviour – Jesus has come so that we can be accepted and we need him.

We must to accept that God is sufficient – God is what we need, not ourselves.

Receive

When we begin to acknowledge our pride and ask God to help us, we start to receive his grace and his healing and his blessing.

Jesus talked about this in Luke 18:9-14.

To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable: “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’

“But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’

“I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

Or as James, Jesus’s brother, put it:

“God opposes the proud
but shows favour to the humble.”[8]

When we are willing to humble ourselves we receive so much more than we had before. We can receive all that God wants to pour into us: forgiveness, acceptance, love, healing, hope, joy. But we have to let go of what we are holding on to and accept what he offers on his terms.

The tragedy of Nebuchadnezzar’s life is that he had so many chances to put stuff right with God before this time. He had seen prophecy, miracles, blessing, and prosperity. And yet it took suffering finally to get through to his heart.

I know from my own experience about how hard that is.

We will all be humbled. The question is whether it will take suffering or the return of Jesus, for us to be willing to respond. It is far, far better to humble yourself, and to receive the joy, peace and blessing that comes from acknowledging him and receiving his grace, before God begins to humble you.

Pride cuts us off from God. But Jesus gives life to the humble.

[1] C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, p.122.

[2] Ibid.

[3] John 3:27, 30.

[4] Lewis, p.124.

[5] Matthew 5:3.

[6] Lewis, p.128.

[7] Lewis, p.124.

[8] James 4:6.

Patience… and how to get it now!

Lockdown can be really difficult. As a weekend bonus, here’s a short article from the wonderful Heather Fellows reflecting on what God is doing in us when we find our circumstances hard.

We are living in strange times and I have got to confess that having started this lockdown process with a fairly positive mindset and feeing like I was succeeding in the transition to home-schooling mum, I have found the last couple of week much harder.  I am definitely struggling with being patient with the people around me and my attitude towards this situation in general.  And I came across this verse in Romans which really struck me.  I thought I would share it with you, as I imagine lots of us are struggling with similar feelings:

“Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.”

Romans 5:1-5

The book of Romans is a letter written by Paul to the early church in Rome.  It seems a strange thing for Paul to say that they ‘glory’ in their sufferings.  More often I complain about mine!  And it got me thinking why Paul was able to say this.  What was it about his sufferings that he was able to glory in?  

Firstly, suffering is inevitable in the world.  Jesus is recorded as saying in John 16:33 that, “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”  I love that Jesus doesn’t hide that from us.  He never promised us a life that would be easy and in fact he is very upfront that we will have trouble in this world.  And Jesus reminds us here that we should take comfort in the fact that he has overcome the world – in other words, if we believe in Jesus, then we can know that there is nothing that this world has to throw at us that he has not already overcome.  There is hope, in other words, for a better future.

But what about when we are in the midst of the suffering?  Paul says that suffering produces perseverance.  The word is also translated patience.  So Paul seems to be saying here that suffering actually produces patience in us.  (Clearly I need to endure some more suffering because i don’t feel very patient yet!).  In other words, what Paul seems to be saying here is that it is only actually through struggles and suffering that we ever really learn patience.  It makes sense I guess – when life is going well and the people around us treat us well or don’t bother us we don’t need much patience.  The apostle James says something very similar in James 1:2-3.

So why is patience important?  Well Paul says that it produces ‘character’.  Character here means like the process of proving who you are.  James 1:4 gives us a bit more detail on this:

“Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”

So this perseverance or patience is necessary because it is part of the process of completing us and making us mature in our faith.  So we see that learning patience is actually a really important part of the process of shaping us to be more like Jesus.

But that’s all very well, but it’s really hard!  I am finding it incredibly hard to be patient, especially with my kids, when I am with them 24/7.  Well because Jesus loves us and is so gracious and understands that we are weak willed beings, he has sent us some help.  

In Paul’s letter to the Colossians he says this:

“For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives, so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and giving joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light. For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”  – Colossians 1:9-14

Paul is reminding the church that Jesus has given us the Holy Spirit and that when we are filled with the Holy Spirit, we are strengthened with power that we might have patience.  Again and again at the moment I am reading about just how much we NEED the Holy Spirit to help us.  I think because at the moment I feel all the worst bits of my character being exposed and so I really need that supernatural power from the Holy Spirit if I am going to stand any chance of learning patience.

And so I want to pray, like Paul did, that we would all be filled with the Holy Spirit to strengthen us for the challenges we face right now, that we might learn to persevere and so that our character would be proven in Christ.

And finally, Paul said in our original passage that character produces hope.  That hope is the hope of the fulfilment of all the promises we see presented in the gospel.  The promise that Jesus died for us.  The promise that he died for all our sins.  That when we believe in him, those sins are forgiven and not only that but we are washed whiter than snow by the blood of Christ.  The promise that in Jesus we are a new creation and that we have been given the gift of eternal life to enjoy with God – not because of anything we have earned on our own merits, but because it is the free gift of a God who loves us more than we can possibly imagine.  And having been forgiven and cleaned up in Jesus, he sends us his Spirit to help us to live differently, to live as God intended his beautiful creation to live.  Not consumed by selfishness and greed anymore, but characterised, as he is, by love.

When we suffer and learn to persevere in Jesus and our faith is proven, we have hope.  We have hope because if God can change a wretched, stubborn sinner like me, then God can do anything.

I hope this blesses you today.

Being Christians in a Time of Political Conflict

This is a repost of an article I wrote 3 years ago. I hope it’s helpful. If anyone would like to talk further or finds themselves struggling this morning, please feel free to message me.

The Immediate Problem

I know it is possible to romanticise the past – Disraeli and Gladstone tore strips off each other, Churchill was incredibly rude, St Nicholas allegedly punched Arius at the Council of Nicea (OK, that one’s probably justified), there was intense social conflict during Thatcher’s Britain, and so on.

Even so, it seems to me that after many years of (relative) consensus (Iraq notwithstanding) we live in an age when an increasingly strident and polarised politics has spread through a wider body of the public. In Britain this has become particularly acute during the referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU and reached its zenith when ‘Leave’ unexpectedly won, 52:48, a victory margin of 1.3m votes.

Some people are afraid. They are afraid of the future, of a thousand decisions and consequences outside our control, of the ‘other’ (whether foreign or domestic).

Some people are angry. They are angry at the powerful talking down to and threatening the powerless, at having been ignored for many years, at decisions being taken with which they do not agree, at perceived attacks on their ‘tribe’.

These trends are made more pronounced, and unrelenting, as tools such as Facebook or Twitter build to generate a sense of guilt or shame, resulting in moral pressure to conform to the mood of our extended network of ‘friends’.

I don’t think this type of behaviour is limited to one group or the other – there is wisdom in Paul’s citation of the Psalms:

‘None is righteous, no, not one.’[1]

In the midst of all of this I want to ask how we can respond as Christians.

• What are our duties to the society in which we live?
• What are our duties to God?
• How should we behave towards our neighbours and opponents?

Incidentally, I’m not going to address the politics of the referendum itself. I know Christians and people of good will who voted on both sides and I can see good and reasonable arguments, consistent with Christian faith, for having voted Out or Remain (and I’m not going to say how I voted).  Rather, I am concerned here with how we should live in the light of what has happened. In doing so we are going to examine our citizenship, our service, and our security (I know – awesome alliteration…)

Our Citizenship

First, how should we understand our citizenship – what is our role in the society in which we live?

Christians have often disagreed about how we should relate to the world around us, particularly in the (historically very unusual) situation where ordinary people play a part in choosing their government and directing its policy. There is a spectrum of views from withdrawing from it to engaging in it at least as deeply if not more so than others with a view to transforming it. It is worth digging into the theology of this more if you have time.

For most purposes, and for most people, however, the answer lies somewhere in the middle.

We can gain some instruction from St Peter’s instructions to the earliest Christians. These are people living in the midst of a pan-national empire whose rulers were brutal and remote.

Dear friends, I urge you, as foreigners and exiles, to abstain from sinful desires, which wage war against your soul. Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us.

Submit yourselves for the Lord’s sake to every human authority: whether to the emperor, as the supreme authority, or to governors, who are sent by him to punish those who do wrong and to commend those who do right. For it is God’s will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish people. Live as free people, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as God’s slaves. Show proper respect to everyone, love the family of believers, fear God, honour the emperor.[2]

Peter addresses them as if they are foreigners, guests within the society that they live. They were not really foreigners and exiles, of course; nevertheless, they should regard themselves as such. Peter explains that they should be interested in the good of that society and should submit to its rulers where it does not conflict with their worship of God. Moreover they should actively try to do good for the country in which they live.

However, they should never forget that it is not their true home. They are guests, temporarily staying there. As such, the political state in which they live did not command their highest loyalty and did not have the primary claim on their attention or their energy.

Applying this to our lives, we should be good guests in the UK (or wherever you are), but guests nonetheless, not forgetting our true allegiance and first concern is the kingdom of God. We should focus on loving and serving God and loving others irrespective of who they are or what they think.

Practically speaking:

• some Christians may well be specifically called to a life engaging with high politics – they should do what they believe God is calling them to;
• the rest of us should be informed, should pray and should vote according to our consciences; but
• we should not become overly-immersed or caught up in the success of a particular political idea or movement.

We should remember that the kingdom of God, and God’s work in this world, does not depend upon politicians (whether of the left or right) or the success of a political movement (however large or apparently significant) but on the Spirit of God and on the faithful and loving actions of Christians within their own spheres of influence.

We are not, ultimately, citizens of this country but of heaven; our loyalty is not, ultimately, to any particular person, party, institution or cause, but to God in heaven.

Tomorrow we consider how we should behave in the face of conflict.

[1] Rom. 3:10.

[2] 1 Pet. 2:11-17

Morning Prayer: 13th December

Here are Friday’s morning prayers and Bible meditations. They are designed to be read in 5 to 10 minutes. 

Opening Prayer: Heavenly King, Comforter, the Spirit of Truth,
present in all places and filling all things,
the treasury of blessings and Giver of life:
come and abide in me.

Text: For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all God’s people, I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is the same as the mighty strength he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way. (Ephesians 1:15-23)

Explanation: Paul tells the Ephesian Christians what he prays for them. Above all he asks that God enables them to know him better by giving them more of his Spirit. Paul then prays that when they are filled with the Spirit they may know what their hope is. 

As Christians, Paul says, our hope is that the same power that worked to raise Jesus from the dead is at work in us. We can therefore also be raised from the dead. Moreover, the same inheritance that God the Father gave Jesus is shared with us.

These things are true even when we forget them or are tempted to despair. Our future does not depend on how hard we believe or how hopeful we feel; it is entirely based on what Jesus has done for us. Jesus is alive and we are his whether we feel it or not.

Yet God does want us to experience that hope and his resurrection power now even in the midst of our trials. This is part of why we pray, care for one another, and pursue the Holy Spirit.

Questions: Take a moment and give thanks for all that Jesus has done for you over the last day. Then ask: 1. When was the last time you remembered the power of God that is at work in you? Thank God that the same power that raised Jesus is at work in you now and will raise you from the dead. 2. If you are going through hard times then pray that God will pour his Spirit into you and enable you to know him better even in your circumstances.

Prayer: Father, thank you that my hope is secure because of what you have done in Jesus. Thank you that even when I don’t feel strong or I am tempted to despair, your power is still at work in me. Fill me with your Spirit so that I can know you better. Amen.

Prayer for the Day: Lord, grant me to greet the coming day in peace.
Help me in all things to rely upon Your holy will.
In every hour of the day reveal Your will to me.
Bless my dealings with all who surround me.
 Teach me to treat all that come to me throughout the day with peace of soul and with firm conviction that Your will governs all.
In all my deeds and words guide my thoughts and feelings.
In unforeseen events let me not forget that all things are under Your care.
Teach me to act firmly and wisely, without embittering and embarrassing others.
Give me strength to bear the fatigue of the coming day with all that it shall bring.
Direct my will, teach me to pray, pray Yourself in me. Amen.

Image Credit: Fadi Mikhail

Morning Prayer: 12th December

Here are Thursday’s morning prayers and Bible meditations. They are designed to be read in 5 to 10 minutes. 

Opening Prayer: Heavenly King, Comforter, the Spirit of Truth,
present in all places and filling all things,
the treasury of blessings and Giver of life:
come and abide in me.

Text: For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through the endurance taught in the Scriptures and the encouragement they provide we might have hope.

May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you the same attitude of mind toward each other that Christ Jesus had, so that with one mind and one voice you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God. For I tell you that Christ has become a servant of the Jews on behalf of God’s truth, so that the promises made to the patriarchs might be confirmed and, moreover, that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy. As it is written:

“Therefore I will praise you among the Gentiles;
I will sing the praises of your name.”

Again, it says,

“Rejoice, you Gentiles, with his people.”

And again,

“Praise the Lord, all you Gentiles;
let all the peoples extol him.”

And again, Isaiah says,

“The Root of Jesse will spring up,
one who will arise to rule over the nations;
in him the Gentiles will hope.”

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. (Romans 15:4-13)

Explanation: This passage from Paul’s letter to the church in Rome draws together several of the themes we have been reading about this week. The Roman Church had become divided between Jewish Christians and non-Jewish (“Gentile”) Christians. A large part of the reason Paul wrote his letter was to explain to both groups that they came to follow Jesus in the same way by Grace, through faith. Now he turns to explain some of what this means for how they (and we) should live

They should read Scripture because it teachers endurance and gives hope. We need the Bible to know about Jesus, to know how to follow him, and to fill our minds with the hope we have in him. Yet we also need each other. Even when we find it hard to get along with one another we need to realise and remember that Jesus’ work, and the gospel he brings, is one of reconciliation both to God and to other people. This is a fulfilment of everything promised in passages such as Isaiah 11:1-10. Jess came to bring men and women of every don’t nation, ethnicity, language, culture and personality together to the glory of God.

This is hard. Naturally we drift apart from one another and fallout. That is why Paul prays for us to be filled with the Holy Spirit. It is as the Holy Spirit comes to fill us, and we yield control to him, that we come to be filled with joy and peace and hope.

Questions: Take a moment and give thanks for all that Jesus has done for you over the last day. Then ask: 1. How do you relate to others in the church? Is it a challenge? 2. What could you do to build your relationships with other Christians? 3. What might this mean for your life?

Prayer: Father, thank you that you give us a certain hope for the future. Help me to live a life that is useful and productive, loving others and always ready to meet you. Amen

Prayer for the Day: Lord, grant me to greet the coming day in peace.
Help me in all things to rely upon Your holy will.
In every hour of the day reveal Your will to me.
Bless my dealings with all who surround me.
 Teach me to treat all that come to me throughout the day with peace of soul and with firm conviction that Your will governs all.
In all my deeds and words guide my thoughts and feelings.
In unforeseen events let me not forget that all things are under Your care.
Teach me to act firmly and wisely, without embittering and embarrassing others.
Give me strength to bear the fatigue of the coming day with all that it shall bring.
Direct my will, teach me to pray, pray Yourself in me. Amen. 

Image Credit: Fadi Mikhail

Morning Prayer: 10th December

Here are Tuesday’s morning prayers and Bible meditations. They are designed to be read in 5 to 10 minutes. 

Opening Prayer: Heavenly King, Comforter, the Spirit of Truth,
present in all places and filling all things,
the treasury of blessings and Giver of life:
come and abide in me.

Text: Endow the king with your justice, O God,
the royal son with your righteousness.
May he judge your people in righteousness,
your afflicted ones with justice.

May the mountains bring prosperity to the people,
the hills the fruit of righteousness.
May he defend the afflicted among the people
and save the children of the needy;
may he crush the oppressor.
May he endure as long as the sun,
as long as the moon, through all generations.
May he be like rain falling on a mown field,
like showers watering the earth.
In his days may the righteous flourish
and prosperity abound till the moon is no more. 

Praise be to the Lord God, the God of Israel,
who alone does marvellous deeds.
Praise be to his glorious name forever;
may the whole earth be filled with his glory.
Amen and Amen. (Psalm 72:1-7, 18-19)

Explanation: is this some David is praying for his son, Solomon’s, reign to be like that of God. Yet he also looks forward to the reign of a king who can be like God in a way that was never possible for Solomon.

The coming king will reign forever (“endure as long as the sun”). He will bless those who follow him, defend the lost and lonely, resist the cruel and oppressive, refresh and bring life to his subjects, and reward what is right.

This is what Jesus is like. This is also the effect of his reign. He is not only a king who brings about spiritual peace for those who will trust him but also seeks those who will do justice and resist evil. His kingdom is designed to be a material as well as a spiritual blessing for the world.

This is at the heart of the gospel. When Jesus died and rose again, he established a new kingdom that is radically open to all even those who have been rejected by the kingdoms of this world. But this kingdom is not simply a place for all to come and worship. Rather it should be a force for challenging injustice, oppression and poverty in material and spiritual ways. This is what we are called to do as those that follow Jesus today.

In the midst of all this, however, we know that we will not be able to end injustice, oppression or poverty in this life. We are therefore looking forward with hope to the day when Jesus returns in this work is completed.

Questions: 1. Do you make time to receive refreshing from God? What helps you most with this (some find prayer, Bible reading or singing particularly helpful)? 2. How could you build regular times of refreshing into your everyday life? 3. Where are you aware of those who are poor, neglected or oppressed? What could you do to help? 4. What might this mean for your life?

Prayer:  Thank you Father, that Jesus came to bring healing and refreshing to our souls. Thank you that he also cares about the rest of our lives. Help me to be a force for helping those in need. Amen

Prayer for the Day: Lord, grant me to greet the coming day in peace.
Help me in all things to rely upon Your holy will.
In every hour of the day reveal Your will to me.
Bless my dealings with all who surround me.
 Teach me to treat all that come to me throughout the day with peace of soul and with firm conviction that Your will governs all.
In all my deeds and words guide my thoughts and feelings.
In unforeseen events let me not forget that all things are under Your care.
Teach me to act firmly and wisely, without embittering and embarrassing others.
Give me strength to bear the fatigue of the coming day with all that it shall bring.
Direct my will, teach me to pray, pray Yourself in me. Amen. 

Image Credit: Fadi Mikhail

Morning Prayer: 9th December

Here are Monday’s morning prayers and Bible meditations. They are designed to be read in 5 to 10 minutes.

We are now in the season of Advent when the church prepares to celebrate Jesus’ coming at Christmas and looks forward to his coming again. The theme of this week’s readings is hope.

Opening Prayer: Heavenly King, Comforter, the Spirit of Truth,
present in all places and filling all things,
the treasury of blessings and Giver of life:
come and abide in me.

Text: “A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse;
from his roots a Branch will bear fruit.
The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him—
the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding,
the Spirit of counsel and of might,
the Spirit of the knowledge and fear of the Lord—
and he will delight in the fear of the Lord.

He will not judge by what he sees with his eyes,
or decide by what he hears with his ears;
but with righteousness he will judge the needy,
with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the earth.
He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth;
with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked.
Righteousness will be his belt
and faithfulness the sash around his waist.

The wolf will live with the lamb,
the leopard will lie down with the goat,
the calf and the lion and the yearling together;
and a little child will lead them.
The cow will feed with the bear,
their young will lie down together,
and the lion will eat straw like the ox.
The infant will play near the cobra’s den,
and the young child will put its hand into the viper’s nest.
They will neither harm nor destroy
on all my holy mountain,
for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Lord
as the waters cover the sea.

In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples; the nations will rally to him, and his resting place will be glorious. (Isaiah 11:1-10)

Explanation: Isaiah wrote these famous words 700 years before Jesus was born. And then he tries to provide comfort for a people facing disaster. The line of kings that had governed Israel looked as if it was going to collapse. It is pictured here as a stump, a tree that has been felled and no longer has any hope of life. In the midst of this despair Isaiah points to the hope of what God would do in the future. God is going to provide a new king who would be both a man (the shoot coming from Jesse) but also more than a man (the root of the whole line of kings). Christians understand that this prediction is fulfilled in Jesus (compare Matthew 22:41–46).

Isaiah tells us a number of incredible things about this coming king. He will be a man who is filled with the Holy Spirit of God. That Spirit will give him wisdom and understanding, counsel and power, knowledge and the fear of God. He will delight in those who know God in humility; he will do justice, seeing and valuing those who are poor, oppressed and ignored; he will be faithful – he will not let us down.

The effect of his presence on those who accept his reign is dramatic: they receive a new nature; former enemies are brought to peace with each other and with God; there is no harm or destruction where he reigns. Moreover, his reign is both infectious and it spreads-and attractive.

The gospel is hope for those in the midst of darkness and death. It says that while we are without hope, stock separate from God and each other, Christ came for us. Moreover, the gospel is the promise not only that we can receive forgiveness but also that we can be filled with the same Spirit that was in Jesus and so be transformed and empowered to live as Jesus did. This process has gone along way. We look forward to it being completed when Christ returns.

Questions: Take a moment and give thanks for all that Jesus has done for you over the last day. Then ask: 1. Have you been filled with the Holy Spirit? If not, ask God to fill you with his Spirit today. 2. Is there anyone you need to make peace with? 3. What does this mean for your life?

Prayer: Father, thank you that there is no situation that you cannot bring light and hope into. Fill me with the same Spirit that was at work in Jesus. May my life bring peace and hope to those around me. May others meet Jesus through me. Amen

Prayer for the Day: Lord, grant me to greet the coming day in peace.
Help me in all things to rely upon Your holy will.
In every hour of the day reveal Your will to me.
Bless my dealings with all who surround me.
 Teach me to treat all that come to me throughout the day with peace of soul and with firm conviction that Your will governs all.
In all my deeds and words guide my thoughts and feelings.
In unforeseen events let me not forget that all things are under Your care.
Teach me to act firmly and wisely, without embittering and embarrassing others.
Give me strength to bear the fatigue of the coming day with all that it shall bring.
Direct my will, teach me to pray, pray Yourself in me. Amen.

Image Credit: Fadi Mikhail

Victory: Why the Resurrection of Jesus Matters

The resurrection of Jesus is the greatest, most certain, and most hopeful fact of human history. It changes everything.

Introduction

Why should we believe that there is good and that it will triumph over evil?

Over the past few months, I have looked at a whole range of issues from a Christian perspective including sexual ethics, marriage, politics, joy, how we can experience God’s presence and be used by him, predestination and freewill. These are all big issues but they receive meaning from this one question.

I’ve noticed that it is common for people to share or comment phrases such as ‘love wins’ or ‘love trumps hate’. Whenever I see these posts or t-shirts or banners I want to ask why the person believes it to be true.

People do seem to believe that good will win. In the big stories we tell ourselves, good seems to triumph over evil.

I am very fond of superhero movies and so, it seems, are a lot of other people. The Marvel Cinematic Universe has taken somewhere in the region of $17.5 billion. That isn’t even taking into account Star Wars or the DC movies. Every single one of these movies (save where they are the first of a two part story) has good triumphing over evil usually through someone behaving like Jesus. Even Wonder Woman ends up refusing to judge humanity according to what they deserve (showing grace) before being raised up into the air in the shape of a cross and destroying the devil (don’t believe me? Check out the movie from 2:04 onwards).

My point is that even in a society in the West that is losing touch with its religious and philosophical roots, we keep telling ourselves the story of Jesus but putting different clothes on it.

We tend to believe that good will triumph over evil but increasingly we are not sure why. We need a good reason to believe that it is not the person with the biggest stick or ego who will ultimately win the day. We need some foundation for believing that it is not simply the strongest who win, that hate will not triumph, that darkness will not prevail, that life will triumph over death.

This becomes particularly pressing when we are confronted with real evil or despair that seems to confound our optimism.

Christians believe that the resurrection of Jesus provides us with that reason.

Suggested Reading: 1 Corinthians 15

The Resurrection Happened

Christians believe that Jesus Christ really did rise from the dead.

It is tempting to think of Christianity as a body of great moral and philosophical teaching. It is one of the greatest traditions of thought in human history. If we include the Jewish Scriptures (the Christian Old Testament), it dates back thousands of years. Many of the greatest minds in the history of Western and Middle Eastern philosophy and theology have contributed to it. But it is not simply a great tradition.

It is tempting to think that Christianity as a great social movement. Wherever it has spread, Christianity led to improvements in medicine, schools, science, social conditions, and the position of minorities. For example, the Christian roots of the Enlightenment and contemporary Western society are well understood (however convenient it might be to overlook them).[1]Similarly, social scientists and historians have demonstrated that areas where Protestant missionaries have had a significant presence are on average more economically developed, have better health, higher educational attainment (particularly for women), lower corruption, greater literacy and on, and on.[2]Christianity is one of the greatest social movements in human history. But it is not merely a social movement.

It is tempting to think of Christianity as a great mystical spirituality. At our church and at others we have documented people being healed of sicknesses, people being spoken to through dreams and other supernatural means, and people being comforted and given spiritual strength to face the challenges of ill-health, bereavement, joblessness and heart-break. Christianity is a great mystical movement. But it is not merely a mystical spirituality.

Christianity is, above all, a claim about something that really happened.

For Christians Jesus really did live, really was dead, really was buried and really did come to life. We are aware that this belief sounds weird but it happens to be true.

There have been 2,000 years of hostile critics from outside Western Europe through engagement with the other great religious faiths and latterly with the noisy but shrinking phenomenon of atheism. The central way almost everyone has sought to undermine Christianity is by attacking the truth of the resurrection and in 2,000 years no one has come up with a plausible explanation.

Most of the time we avoid thinking about it. I want to challenge anyone who has taken the trouble to read what I have written and never thought about this, I want to challenge you to do so. You can check it out in a number of ways. There are plenty of books that have been written by people who were skeptics and were converted when they explored the evidence. You could try Frank Morrison, Who Moved the Stone, Lee Strobel, The Case for Christ, Josh McDowell, The Resurrection Factor, or (if you are feeling up for a challenge) William Lane Craig’s The Son Rises (be warned – he has many phDs in theology and philosophy).

The Resurrection Matters

If this is true, why does it matter?

It matters because death is defeated.
If Jesus rose from the death then there is good reason to believe that death is defeated. It shows that God can, has, and will overcome death. Death is the great enemy of humanity. 1 in 1 will die. From every tradition, creed, colour, race, gender, we will all face the same enemy at the end. We can’t hide from it.
Because Jesus Christ is alive we can know that death is not the final word on humanity. There is hope because Jesus is alive.

It matters because evil will be overcome.
When Jesus died, everything that humanity does to each other was at work in his death. He was the victim of injustice, he was executed by a people who loved violence, he was the subject of bitterness and hatred, he was betrayed for the sake of jealousy by a man who was greedy.
Lest we be tempted to throw stones we should examine our own hearts and see the seeds of each one of these evils there. And yet the resurrection of Jesus shows that God is capable of absorbing all of that hatred and bitterness, jealousy and envy, unkind words and unkind actions and overcoming them. It was as if God stood there and said ‘do your worst and was left still standing.’
Because Jesus is alive we can know that the evil and injustice of this world can be overcome by God. Moreover, because of Jesus’ death and resurrection our part in that evil can be forgiven. This is not a just world but there is hope because Jesus is alive.

It matters because love is ultimately triumphant.
The final word on humanity is not hatred but love. The love of God cannot be defeated. Love is a winning strategy.

The Resurrection Changes How We Live

Why am I writing this? If Jesus Christ is alive it changes everything.

It teaches us to repent and have faith.
We should stop doing wrong and start living differently. If Jesus Christ is risen from the dead, if hope triumphs over despair, love over hate, life over death, then we should align ourselves with love and with Jesus. Join the winning team. Why stay on the side of death if Jesus is alive?

It teaches us to choose hope.
Whatever is happening in the world or in your life is not the final word. There is hope because Christ has overcome death. So be hopeful. Don’t despair. Set your face to worship even in the worst of time.

It prompts us to love.
It may not always be met with joy and gratitude; Jesus was not always welcomed. Nevertheless, we should set our faces to choose love.

The resurrection of Jesus is the greatest, most certain, and most hopeful fact of human history. It changes everything.

[1]Nick Spencer, Enlightenment and Progress, <https://www.theosthinktank.co.uk/comment/2018/02/20/enlightenment-and-progress-or-why-steven-pinker-is-wrong >; Ross Douthat, The Edge of Reason, < https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/24/opinion/sunday/steven-pinker-reason.html >

[2]For example, Robert D. Woodberry, ‘The Missionary Roots of Liberal Democracy’, American Political Science Review,106.2 (2012), pp.244-274 < https://www.academia.edu/2128659/The_Missionary_Roots_of_Liberal_Democracy>; https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2014/january-february/world-missionaries-made.html

Love: Advent

All you need is love
All you need is love
All you need is love, love
Love is all you need[1]

Last week I began a short series of posts for advent thinking about how we can prepare ourselves to celebrate Christmas. Each week I’m looking at a different aspect of what the coming of Jesus was and is intended to signify for us and how we can prepare ourselves to receive it.

My last post considered how Christmas is about hope. Hope is a good beginning but it isn’t enough by itself.  Hope implies that we are confident that things will change, even that they will change for the better, but we still need to give it content.

This is what the final three weeks of advent begin to fill in. This week we are looking at ‘Love’.

Suggested readings: Isaiah 40:1-12; 1 John 4:7-21; 1 Corinthians 13:1-13

The Need for Love

‘All you need is love,’ so say the Beatles. It is a popular sentiment and it is easy to dismiss; love is not, obviously, all that we need. Yet with that said, the Beatles were on to something. In his sermon on marriage St John Chrysostom (the greatest preacher of the first thousand years of Christianity) commented that ‘The love of husband and wife is the force that welds society together.’[2] Similarly, John Wesley, for whom the whole of Christian life was the pursuit of holy love argued that ‘Love is the end, the sole end, of every dispensation of God, from the beginning of the world to the consummation of all things.’[3]

It isn’t just singers and saints who have argued for the centrality of love to humanity. Psychologist, Dr Raj Raghunathan, describes the need to be loved as ‘one of our most basic and fundamental needs’ while the need to show love ‘is hard-wired and deep-seated.’ [4]

This shouldn’t be a surprise. Jesus said that truly ‘it is better to give than to receive.’[5]

To love and to be loved is part of what we are created for – to be loved first by God and then to show love to each other. The failures of humanity can largely be traced back to the rebellion and insecurity which prevents us from receiving the divine love for which we were created and our subsequent failure show that love to one another. When we pray for God to come to us, when we become people of hope, we are praying for God to show us love, to teach us what it means to love and to enable us in turn to love one another.

Christmas is both God’s act of love for us and his demonstration to us of how we should love.

Christmas is God’s Love for Us

The passage I suggested reading from Isaiah speaks of a day when God would come to his people and demonstrate his love for them. It is taken up in the New Testament and explicitly referred to being fulfilled in the coming of Jesus.

In the prediction the prophet paints a picture of what God’s love for us is like and how we can experience it when he comes.

It is love that forgives.[6]

The birth of Jesus is about God doing everything that is necessary to restore our relationship with him. The prophet doesn’t hide from the fact that his people are sinners. We cannot hide from our failings, shame, or even our guilt. It simply won’t do to pretend that we are fine – for how then will we ever get better?

Christmas is not about pretending that we’re fine and God can come anyway – like a family barely containing their feud around a Turkey dinner. When Jesus comes he comes not to hide our sin but to deal with it. God has taken the punishment, paid the debt, healed the disease – whatever picture you like to use – that separated us from him. This is love that forgives and renews.

It is love that reveals.[7]

At Christmas we find out what God is like – he makes himself accessible to us by revealing himself to us in a way we can understand. This is the absolute minimum requirement for a relationship of love – to know the other person. Christmas is where we begin to see the glory of God in a way we can understand.

To put it another way, if you want to know what God is like, come and look at Jesus. This is love that reveals

It is love that is faithful and reliable.[8]

We know that human beings fail and are unreliable. We let each other down – we can’t help it. Isaiah uses the picture of flowers falling or grass withering when it gets hot.

Yet God’s love is not like that.

As Isaiah says ‘the word of our God endures forever.’ God’s love will not fail, is totally reliable, and endures forever. When Jesus was born, humanity encountered the first and only wholly dependable love that has ever been. This is love that endures.

It is love that is strong and protects.[9]

This may seem a strange theme to bring out in a prophecy about Christmas. After all, we are in the season where we worship a baby born, ‘meek and mild’, totally vulnerable, in relative poverty. Yet Isaiah points out that this baby will crush the head of our enemies and redeem us from the curse of death.

Isaiah wants to stand at the manger in Bethlehem and cry out ‘See the Sovereign LORD comes with power and rules with a mighty arm.’ By his life and death and resurrection this Son of God will love us by protecting us from all that can harm us. Here is love that is strong and protects.

Finally, we have a picture of love that is gentle and kind.[10]

Here is a God who is able to gather us up in his arms, who is gentle with those who are hurt and sore, who looks to restore and to heal his children. This is the Father who will fight furiously to protect his children and then gently carry them home to tend to their wounds, love them and hold them close to his heart.

This is THE love. The love that defines all other loves, that gives them meaning and inspiration.

As we read from 1 John,

This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.[11]

Christmas is Love that Costs and Inspires

It is a wonderful picture, beautiful, true and making sense of all that we desire and intuitively know about ourselves but it is not yet complete.

John tells us that this is love that costs.

This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.

The coming of the Son of God at Christmas was already a demonstration of God’s love but it was not enough to accomplish all that he had for us. To remove the curse of sin and death from us would cost the Son of God his life; to celebrate the child in a manger is to look forward to the man on a cross.

In other words, Christmas is the beginning of God’s demonstration of love for us, not the end.

God’s love cost him. True love will always cost us.  It calls us to be committed to the good of another, to prefer their interests ahead of ours, to seek their good even at the price of our pain. When the Son of God came to earth he loved us even to the cost of his life.

He loved you enough to die for you.

Even that is not enough, however. Most love-stories would end with death but not this one.

As surely as the stable led to the cross, the cross led to the resurrection. Jesus dying and coming back to life is the final demonstration that the vision and gift of love that we receive at Christmas can overcome everything. To coin a phrase, it is the proof that love, or if you prefer Christmas, wins. And now we are called to live it out.

John goes on:

Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.[12]

John is talking about love between Christians but the principle extends further than that. We are called to embrace the love that characterises Christmas – that forgives, reveals God, keeps faith, protects, and nurtures – and to allow it to become completed in us.

Application

How can we live differently in light of this?

First, encounter Christ.

If you haven’t encountered the love of God given to us in his Son then this Christmas can be the best you have ever had. Isaiah speaks about ‘preparing the way of the Lord.’ You can prepare yourself to receive Christ by asking God and examining yourself to see where your life is out of line with what he wants. Then receive him by trusting him.

Second, embody Christ.

We can be a people who love others as God loves us. This begins with asking ourselves hard questions:

• Do we love our family or friends with forgiveness, with gentleness, with protection, with nurture?
• How are our relationships this Christmas?

If there is someone with whom you are not at peace then today is the day to fix that.

Third, present Christ to others.

We present Christ to others by demonstrating his love for them in our words and in our actions. Why not find someone to encourage or nurture? If you know of anyone with practical needs then go out and meet them. Don’t expect anything in return – do it for love.

 

This is part of a series of reflections focussed on preparing for Christmas. If you’re looking for a service to go to during this season, you’re welcome to join us at Hersham Baptist Church.

• Sunday 10th December, 10:30 am family worship.
• Sunday 17th December, 10:30 am, communion.
• Sunday 17th December, 5:30pm, family carol service.
• Sunday 24th December, 10:30am, communion.
• Sunday 24th December, 3:00pm, come and join in nativity.
• Monday 25th December, 10:00am, family Christmas celebration.

[1] ‘All You Need Is Love’, Lennon-McCartney, 1967.

[2] St John Chrysostom, Homily on Marriage, < http://www.roca.org/OA/121/121b.htm > [accessed 7 December 2017]

[3] John Wesley, ‘Sermon 36: The Law Established Through Faith’, Sermons on Several Occasions

[4] Raj Raghunathan, ‘The Need to Love’, Psychology Today (8 January 2014) < https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/sapient-nature/201401/the-need-love > [accessed 7 December 2017]

[5] Acts 20:35.

[6] Isaiah 40:1-2

[7] Isaiah 40:3-5.

[8] Isaiah 40:6-8

[9] Isaiah 40:9-11.

[10] Isaiah 40:10-11.

[11] 1 John 4:9

[12] 1 John 4:11

Hope: Advent

Just what makes that little old ant
Think he’ll move that rubber tree plant
Anyone knows an ant, can’t
Move a rubber tree plant
But he’s got high hopes[1]

Over the next few weeks I’m posting some reflections on how we can prepare ourselves for Christmas. This week our topic is ‘Hope’.

Suggested readings: Isaiah 64:1-12; Mark 13:24-37; Romans 8:18-27

Introduction

Humanity needs hope.

To hope is to be confident that there is someone or something that can overcome the problems and futility of the world we live in and make it better. It is to believe that this is not all that there is but both that there is another world that could be – a world without cancer and crying, without heartache and lying, a world of peace and not war, where there is no famine and our hearts are content – and that there is someone who can bring that about. This is necessarily spiritual – it looks to something beyond us that can deliver us and heal us, that can save us from the darkness that lurks within each of us.

It is unsurprising, therefore, that the philosopher Friederich Nietzsche who rejected the idea of God warned us ‘do not believe those who speak to you of extra terrestrial hopes!’ only to then conclude that hope itself was ‘the worst of all evils because it prolongs the torments of man.’[2] In other words, we might as well despair, because there is no one coming to help – there is no answer to the problems we face.

As a Spurs fan I can sympathise with Nietzsche; it is the hope that kills you.

Christianity rejects Nietzsche’s counsel of despair completely as contrary both to our experience of the world and God’s revelation to us.

We are programmed to hope and when we do not, we suffer enormously. [3] We cannot help it. Yet if our hope is to be well-founded, if it is to escape wishful thinking and become a confident assurance of something to come, we need to understand what the problem is that we believe needs to be overcome and what we believe needs to be done to fix it.

The Absence of Hope

Christians understand that the problems we face flow from the distance between humanity and God.

The reading I suggested from Isaiah is an extended meditation on the corruption that follows naturally when we are distant from God and a plea that God come to his people to heal them. Isaiah’s prayer is stark in its honesty about the consequences of that distance and the position that Israel found herself in. It holds a mirror up to our own lives. They often faced cruelty from others and in turn showed cruelty to each other. To use the language of Jesus, they lived in a world in which people do not love one another as they love themselves; they did not seek the good of others in everything but instead uses and abused them.

I can only speak from my own experience but I think Isaiah’s description is basically true of all of us.

We are capable of good; yet we do not always do it.

There are times when we are selfless and sense a call to look beyond ourselves; yet there are times when we are cruel and selfish.

It can be tempting to think that the problem is with another group of other people (Tories or Socialists, bigots or liberals, Jane down the road or Tim at work), who are the bad ones while we are entirely without blame. I understand that temptation but Isaiah will not allow us to go there.

We are all, he says, stained by the actions, thoughts and attitudes we do and cannot help doing.

Even the good that we do is tinged with unrighteousness. You can think of this theologically – if we are not acting from trust in God and for his glory then we are by definition acting apart from him and for the glory of another. Or we can think about it economically – we live in a world in which every single one of us benefits from injustices and perpetuates those injustices and we cannot escape from them. Or we can think socially – how often do we do what is good in part because we want the respect and applause of others?

This sin flows from our being distant from God and has the effect of re-affirming and deepening that separation.

Isaiah uses the picture of a leaf that is broken off the branch by the wind. The leaf inevitably, naturally withers and dies when it is removed from the tree. When we cut ourselves off from God the consequence is that we too wilt – we don’t have what we need to carry on living and so we die both physically and spiritually.

Christmas is About Hope

There is only one thing that can provide legitimate hope in this situation. We cannot reach back to God.  So Isaiah prays that God would come down from heaven and be reunited with his people.

Our hope is that God will not hold himself back forever but come to us. This is message of hope at Christmas: we cut ourselves off from God and yet God has chosen to come to us.

When God comes to dwell with his people, the corruption and death, the injustice and iniquity, that Isaiah laments and that is at the heart of much that causes us despair is changed. Where we were formerly cut off from the thing that gave us life, now we have been put back on. It is as if the tree stooped down and picked up its leaf, brown, curling and dying and reattached it.

The coming of Jesus at Christmas marks the beginning of God’s reversal of all that Isaiah laments and offers us hope that it will not always be like this.

• If God has come to us then we can be confident in the promise of life in the midst of death.
• If God has come to us then we can be confident in the promise of righteousness in the face of sin.
• If God has come to us then we can be confident in the promise of love in the midst of hate.

The birth of Jesus is the absolute proof of God’s determination and desire not to abandon us to corruption but rather redeem us and grant us life.

To put it another way, Christmas is the best, truest and firmest ground for hope that we can imagine because God has come to us. When we call the child Immanuel – God with us – we are saying ‘you, in all your weakness and helplessness – are the proof that God has not finished with this world and its people but still loves it and cares for it.

Our Final Hope

Christmas, then, is the foundation of our hope. But it is not hope’s completion. Christmas is not the final word on the story of God’s redemption of the world. This is what St Paul was referring to in the passage I suggested from Romans.

We have hope because Jesus came to us. Yet there is a sense in which the story is not complete. We long for more. We, along with all creation, long for the hope to be completed: for God and creation to dwell together fully and permanently, for every tear-stained eye to be dried and broken heart to be healed, for wars to cease and disease to be destroyed.

Christmas prompts us not just to look back at hope begun but to look forward to the time when hope is completed. Jesus came once to bring us hope and he will come again to complete it. Christian philosopher, Soren Kierkegaard, referred to this as eternal hope ‘which is never put to shame’ and means ‘at every moment always to hope all things’.[4] It is to believe that anything and anyone, any situation and any problem, can be redeemed at the return of Christ.

Living as People of Hope

If this is true, then how can we live as people of hope?

First, let me ask if you have encountered Jesus and received the hope that he brings? To meet with God as a man is fundamentally to receive hope for the future if we will trust him and follow him. If you haven’t yet done that and you feel like you would like to then ask God to show himself to you this Christmas, resolve to trust him, to turn away from selfishness and sin, and to be baptised. You will receive the presence of God with you and in you and find a hope that cannot be taken away.

Second, even those of us who have already come to know Jesus can live as if we have not. I’m talking primarily about a sense of hopelessness. This is not what we are called to – we are called to live lives of hope.

Our lives should demonstrate that, however bad it seems, God is committed to our good, to redeeming us. Whatever situations we face, whether you are someone who despairs at the future of our country, or suffer unemployment or bereavement or frustration or failure, we should never lose hope.

Christians are not people of despair but of hope because we know the one person who can change the world, who can redeem our situations, who can keep us in any hardship. Who will even raise us from the dead.

This doesn’t mean that Christians will never suffer depression. I, myself, have gone through periods of depression and so have many of the great saints of history. When we do, we should recognise it and get help. But it does mean that our default position should not be cynical or negative, should not be harsh or hopeless. We should believe and trust that God will redeem and restore. This attitude of hope is cultivated through prayer, above all, and through fellowship and familiarity with Scripture.

Finally, we can then be people of hope for others. As we prepare for Christmas, we can resolve to be a cause of hope for others rather than for their despair. In our words and actions we can show them that the world can and will one day be redeemed by a God who loves it and came to be born as a part of it.

 

This is part of a series of reflections focused on preparing for Christmas. If you’re looking for a service to go to during this season, you’re welcome to join us at Hersham Baptist Church.

• Sunday 10th December, 10:30 am family worship.
• Sunday 17th December, 10:30 am, communion.
• Sunday 17th December, 5:30pm, family carol service.
• Sunday 24th December, 10:30am, communion.
• Sunday 24th December, 3:00pm, come and join in nativity.
• Monday 25th December, 10:00am, family Christmas celebration.

[1] High Hopes, Sammy Cahn and Jimmy Van Heusen, 1959.

[2] Thus Spake Zarathrustra, [1883-85] 2006: 6; and Human, All Too Human, 1878: s.71 cited in Bloeser, Claudia and Stahl, Titus, “Hope”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2017 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2017/entries/hope/&gt;

[3] Dr Stephen A. Diamond, ‘Clinical Despair: Science, Psychotherapy and Spirituality in the Treatment of Depression’ in Psychology Today, 4 March 2011 < https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evil-deeds/201103/clinical-despair-science-psychotherapy-and-spirituality-in-the-treatment > [accessed 30 November 2017]

[4] Soren Kierkegaard, Works of Love [1847] 19995, p.260 and 249 cited in Bloeser,and Stahl.

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