ISBN 978-0-099-49428-7
The book is sub-titled A Journey to Africa's Broken Heart. It is the story of one man's obsession. Tim Butcher was obsessed with the Congo. I knew next to nothing about it, and bought the book because it looked like an interesting story. His obsession is not just with the Congo River, but also with the question "What is wrong with Africa?" The Congo has gone from a Belgium colony, made famous by the film "The African Queen", to probably the most failed state in the world today. It is a huge country in the middle of Africa, and the river flows across it from east to west. Tim decides to re-create Stanley's (Sir Henry Morton) journey across Africa, down river from the source on lake Tanganyika to the Atlantic ocean. The current state of the Congo meant that the journey is even more dangerous than it was when Stanley tried, and (just) succeeded, and claimed the Country for the Belgian King. There are any number of groupings of 'rebels' - we'd call them terrorists anywhere else. The government is only in control of a small part of the country and to do anything there are government officials to get approval from, and to pay bribes to. Bribes are the only wages many of them get. The only real 'authority' lies with the U.N. peace keepers and aid workers - who seem to spend most of their time behind closed doors - or better concrete walls.
The book is split into chapters with sketch maps of the parts of the river that each chapter deals with. Tim sounds like a real expert on Congo history - he may possibly be the only non-resident in the world with such a knowledge. In each chapter we get not only the story of the people who he meets but also some of the history of the area. Almost all the histories involve massacres of some kind. It has to be said that they do rather merge into one as you read through the book. There are one or two that stand out as being unusually horrific even by Congo standards. There are time when he has weapons pointed at him, and when he is in fear for his life. The contrasts between these people, the aid workers, and some remaining missionaries, and a few locals is one of the great high lights of the book. There are many people struggling to make their own and other peoples lives work better in a situation that can rightly be described as hell on earth. Their stories are fascinating and leave you wondering why they bother and how they can stand the strain. Then there are those who are there for power and money. Some of those are even helpful to Tim.
Perhaps the most telling passage for me is a few paragraphs on a conversation with a peace keeper from Malaysia. His country was colonised and brutalised, but after independence it is now developing - "we even have a Grand Prix". While Africa, and in particular the Congo is going backwards. So you cannot put all the blame on the European colonists. No solution is offered, but paths are suggested in the last chapters. If you think you have a solution then after reading the book you may well change your mind.
It is not a page turner, not for me anyway. I had to stop a number of times - just to think a little about the horror and the squandering of human life.
Did he succeed in recreating Stanley's journey - you'll have to read it to find out ...
Monday, February 01, 2010
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Happy Families - Colossians 3:18-4:1
| Reading: Colossians 3:18-4:1 |
A Typical Roman FamilyThis week we move on from Rules for Holy living aimed at the individual, to look at rules for living in a Christian family. It is almost as difficult to describe a typical Roman family in the first century as it is to describe a typical English family in the 21st century. The Colossian church would have had a mixture of families from many different backgrounds, just as the Billericay church does today. So what was the Roman equivalent of '2.4 Children'? There would have been: Father The role of the father was very different to the role that fathers have today. The father was the head of the household. He had absolute authority over everything that happened in the household. Mother She was the subject of her husband. She had few rights, and could not divorce her husband except in the most extreme circumstances. Divorce would only be possible if, for example,if the husband caught leprosy. After giving birth she would take the new born and put it at her husbands feet. If he picked it up, the baby would live. If he didn't it would be taken away to die. Children Children were the property of their father and could be sold, or discarded as he saw fit. If sold they would be sold as slaves. They would most likely have had 6 Children, but only 3 would survive to adulthood. If the sons were grown up, their wives would be living in the house. Slaves There were not many slaves that had a life as good a Lurcio. (That's Frankie Howard from Up Pompeii, if you don't recognise him.) Slaves were usually prisoners of war. The Roman Empire was always fighting somewhere, and the prisoners were brought back to the centre of the empire and sold as slaves in various locations. This meant that slaves often came with useful skills, or from what we would now consider to be professional backgrounds. As a Roman, if you needed a teacher for your children you could buy a slave who had previously been a teacher somewhere else. Slave revolts were a relatively common occurrence as many slave were badly treated. It has been estimated that at the height of the Roman Empire up to 50% of the inhabitants were slaves. Think for a moment about the kind of world that Paul was writing in. It is almost impossible for us to understand the concept of owning another human being, or being owned by some else. By owning, I mean having the power of life and death, and by being owned I mean that your life depends entirely on your master. |
God's Transformational InstructionsJesus is referred to as Lord six times in this short passage, and Master once. When we chose to become Christians and accept Jesus as our Lord we put ourselves under His authority. If we are serious about living God's way – living under the authority of Christ, then it WILL change the way we live. Now lets read the scripture again as we try to focus our minds on the type of life that we might have lead in 1st century Rome: Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them. Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. Fathers, do not embitter your children, or they will become discouraged. Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything; and do it, not only when their eye is on you and to win their favour, but with sincerity of heart and reverence for the Lord. Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. Anyone who does wrong will be repaid for his wrong, and there is no favouritism. Masters, provide your slaves with what is right and fair, because you know that you also have a Master in heaven. These instructions are so radically different from the way society operated at the time it id difficult for us to believe that they could ever have taken hold. |
Obligation – AuthorityNotice that in each of the pairs Paul speaks firstly to the person with the obligation, and secondly to the person with the authority. The implication being that if you are carrying out your obligations it is easier for the person in authority to behave as they should. Notice also that each obligation as it is mentioned is in some way linked to your faith in Christ. Wives submit (as it is fitting in the Lord), husbands love Children Obey (because it pleases the Lord), Fathers encourage (or at least don't discourage) Slaves Obey and work honestly (they are serving the Lord) – Masters treat them fairly – because they too have a master. I'm now going to look at each of the roles in turn, but don't switch off while I'm talking about a role that you can't take. If you can't take the role, you can be on the other side of it. Our obligation – all of us – is to please the Lord. |
WivesGen 2:18 The LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him." Wives, before you as 21st century women get upset at what Paul is saying, lets try to take a look at just exactly what he is saying. It is important that we don't get stuck on the first word, as some do. Submission is 'to your husband' not 'to any male'. Chambers dictionary says submit means “to surrender; to give in, especially to the wishes or control of another person; to stop resisting them”. It comes from the Latin 'sub' meaning under and mittere meaning 'let go, send'. It has the meaning “refer to another for consideration”. Submission places no value on the person who is submitting, it does not imply that they are in any way inferior, and it is not slavery. So it seems to me that Paul is saying that the wife should refer to her husband for consideration anything that she thinks will materially affect their lives together. That means that the leadership of the family is the Husbands responsibility, not the wives. Gods model for all of our lives is authority and submission, without this approach there will be no leadership and chaos will result. |
ChildrenThe command here is quite simple 'Obey'. In Ephesians it is slightly more complex. Eph 6:2-3 "Honor your father and mother"—which is the first commandment with a promise— "that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth. How this command is interpreted really depends on the age of the Children. You would not expect older children to have to be given simple commands that young children are given. The message to Children though is 'obey', because that's what God wants from all His children. Children cannot see the point of view of their parents, as Mark Twain noted “When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years.” |
SlavesLargely due to Christianity there are no legally owned slaves in the world today. As Paul was writing though, the entire society was built on the use of Slaves. I have already noted that about half of the people in the Roman Empire were slaves. There are some other instructions to Slaves that are worth a look:
The nearest we can get to understanding the meaning of this is to look at how what is said might affect our employment. Work is worship we heard last week. We work for Christ first, and the boss second. We do the job that the boss has given us to do, but we do it for Christ. We do not have to turn our workplace into our own personal mission field, our responsibility is to get the job done and done well. In doing that we demonstrate our faith in Christ – whatever sort of boss we have. Many years ago I had an interview with a mainframe support company as one of their operating system experts, if I had been offered the job I would have been working for this company at various other companies. I was asked what I would do if I was given trivial work to do. I don't remember my answer. What they were looking for was that I would do as I was asked, but would tell them and my management that the work they were giving me was not the work they were supposed to be giving me. The key thing here for today is that I should do as I was asked by the people asking. Whatever work you are asked to do – do it and do it to the best of your ability. That way you can bring glory to God. Gerard Manley Hopkins wrote: "Smiting an anvil, sawing a beam, white-washing a wall, driving horses, sweeping, scouring, everything gives God some glory if being in his grace you do it as your duty." William McDonald has written that Christian slaves brought a higher price in the slave market in the first century. The same is said of Christians in Soviet Russia. Christians were known for their honesty and their hard work. As a result many employers protected them and kept quiet about their employees activities. Even today we can have an effect on the workplace by being honest and hard working, and may well have gained the respect of people there for our efforts. |
HusbandsMost of the instructions in this passage relate to the men who are Husbands, Fathers and Slave Masters (or Managers in out case). The story is told of a father of 5 who came home with a toy, he summoned his children and asked which one should be given the present. "Who is the most obedient, never talks back to mum and does every thing he or she is told to do?" He inquired. There was silence as the children looked around at each other, and then a chorus of voices rang out: "you play with it daddy!" Paul recognised God's intention that the man should be the Leader in the household. Many of the problems that we have in our society today are the result of men not understanding the role of leader, or not being permitted to perform it. There are few, if any, good public role models of the Husband / Father leader. The word that is translated love originally meant 'love of a spouse or family, or love of an activity'. It is not romantic or sexual love. Roman marriages were arranged marriages, and did not involve the couple choosing each other. It was used by early Christians to describe God's sacrificial love in Christ for His human family. The word Husband replaced the old English word wer which means married man, husband means head householder. Husbandry comes from husband, and relates to peasant farmers providing for their families. In Hebrews 12 in a section about discipline it says in verse 15 “See to it that no-one misses the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many.” This I think, sums up the challenge for Husbands and Fathers, as they seek to model Christ to their families. |
FathersA little girl once said to her mother, “Mummy, if Father Christmas brings our presents, and God gives us our daily bread, and the Prime Minister gives us Social Security, why do we keep daddy around?” Its a good question. When we listen to our politicians trying to describe a family in the recent debate on supporting marriage, we hear all the old messages about not disadvantaging people who live in one parent families. No-one seems able to say that God's design is the best. That a man should be a husband of one wife for life and should be the leader of his family. Even though there is some evidence to suggest that children do better in this model. Men, if you're doing the job properly and to the best of your ability a lot is asked of you. You must find time for God, your wife, your children, your work and your self. A father had three very active boys. One summer evening, he was playing cops and robbers in the back garden after dinner. One of the boys "shot" his father and yelled, "Bang! You’re dead!" He slumped to the ground and when he didn’t get up straight away, a neighbour ran over to see if he had been hurt in the fall. When the neighbour bent over, the overworked father opened one eye and said, "Shhh! Don’t give me away. It’s the only chance I’ve had to rest all day." Fathers, you have to be ready to be the ultimate place of appeal for your children. There used to be a saying “Wait 'till you father gets home!” Then maybe a request would have to be denied, or some punishment given. A little girl was being punished by eating alone in the corner of the dining room. The family paid no attention to her until they heard her pray: “I thank You, Lord, for preparing a table before me in the presence of my enemies.” You have to be ready to deal with the consequences of any punishments you might apply too. Through all this you must remain a Dad, and not become a Dictator. There's more at stake than just your family: Confucius said, “the strength of a nation is derived from the integrity of its homes.” |
Masters (Slave Owners)To follow these instructions in the Roman world would have been difficult. Being fair to slaves was not considered. Nothing was considered about slaves except that they do their work. They were the equivalent of our machines, and disposed of as easily as a broken washing machine. Being fair would be seen as laughable, and a threat to your credibility. Nevertheless many Christians did treat their slaves reasonably and even better than that. As a result the practice of owning slaves in a Christian Roman Empire reduced to such an extent that the trade was undermined. Managers must strive for fairness in the workplace. That means fair pay for all, but more than that it means that employees should be treated with respect, they are after all making money for the company in one way or another. It does not mean that standards can be allowed to slip, once again we as managers are to do our job well, and expect the same from those we manage. |
ConclusionAll that I have been talking about today can be summed up in the Love of Christ or the Grace of God. It requires us to act in the same way. That requires us being ready to forgive. At a conference with their wives, two businessmen who had been room mates at university crossed paths. They sat in the bar all night talking. They knew they would be in trouble with their wives. The next day they happened to see each other. "What did your wife think?" "I walked in the door and my wife got historical." "Don’t you mean hysterical?" "No, historical. She told me everything I ever did wrong." Whether our role is as Father, Husband, Child, Mother or Wife none of us will fill it perfectly, neither will we ever meet anyone who will fill the other matching half perfectly. We must be ready to forgive each other and ourselves for our failings, just as God has forgiven us. Christianity has had an amazing effect on society over the last 20 centuries. Each small change has been caused by people - individuals like us - determining to follow God's way of living their lives, and slowly others have followed, until we have moved from seeing women as possessions to seeing women as partners, from seeing children as objects to seeing children as our future, from seeing slaves as non-human to seeing everyone as equal. But we are not perfect yet... |
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Free FLV Converter ** Warning **
It's very easy to capture video's from Youtube using FireFox and the Flashgot add-on. Now we have a decent projector, I can use video clips, but playing .FLV's (Flash Video's) is not the easiest thing to to. For personal use VLC is great, but these have to go on the secondary screen and the controls have to be somewhere else. I wanted something to convert the FLV's to something more useful, something my projections software has a chance of playing. I admit, this was the first thing I found.
It installed with a Toolbar "Dealio" - but this one insists on installing and doesn't give you the option not to. OK, as soon as the install was finished, I uninstalled it. I'm not sure if its a problem (malware) or not (google search results), but I don't want it simply because I am forced to have it. Well OK, I want the free software, but there are other methods of supporting free software. I downloaded it from CNET - a site I have come to trust, but one which I will be treating with much greater caution that previously.
Here's why: Free FLV Converter (or was it Dealio) also installed a Browser Helper Object (BHO) called SearchSettings.dll and ApplicationUpdate.dll - which I can't find much on..I have Scotty keeping watch - nothing much gets past him. Prevention is better than cure, so when he barked, I did not allow the change, and began to investigate. The uninstalls seemed to remove the offending programs, but there will be a Spybot and Ad-Aware scan later - just to be certain.
Free FLV Converter itself is simple to use, here are some results for just one file. The source file size is 3237Kb:
I have Windows Vista with all the latest updates from Microsoft.
It installed with a Toolbar "Dealio" - but this one insists on installing and doesn't give you the option not to. OK, as soon as the install was finished, I uninstalled it. I'm not sure if its a problem (malware) or not (google search results), but I don't want it simply because I am forced to have it. Well OK, I want the free software, but there are other methods of supporting free software. I downloaded it from CNET - a site I have come to trust, but one which I will be treating with much greater caution that previously.
Here's why: Free FLV Converter (or was it Dealio) also installed a Browser Helper Object (BHO) called SearchSettings.dll and ApplicationUpdate.dll - which I can't find much on..I have Scotty keeping watch - nothing much gets past him. Prevention is better than cure, so when he barked, I did not allow the change, and began to investigate. The uninstalls seemed to remove the offending programs, but there will be a Spybot and Ad-Aware scan later - just to be certain.
Free FLV Converter itself is simple to use, here are some results for just one file. The source file size is 3237Kb:
| To Type | File Size (Kb) | Windows Media Player | VLC |
| avi | 6546 | Video OK, no sound | Video and sound OK |
| mp4 | 10336 | Video and sound OK | Video and sound OK |
| wmv | 6886 | Video OK, no sound | Video and sound OK |
I have Windows Vista with all the latest updates from Microsoft.
Sunday, January 17, 2010
Rules for Holy living part 2 - new clothes
Reading: Col 3:12.
Col 3:12 Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.
Col 3:13 Bear with each other x and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.
Col 3:14 And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.
Rules for Holy living part 2 New Clothes
Reminders of part 1
Margaret spoke to us last week and covered the first part of Paul's instructions to the Colossians. In case you weren't here or like me your memory isn't that good lets look back and see what Paul was saying. Take a look back at verse 1 “Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above” Paul's concern is to get the focus of the Colossians off the world and its day-to-day problems, and on to Christ and their time with him in eternity. Eternity, obviously goes on forever, but for us it has a start – that's the moment we accept Christ as our saviour. So we come to eternal life with a life partly lived, but lived without the right instructions. Paul calls these old habits your 'earthly nature' and in verse 5 goes on to give some examples of just what the earthly nature consists of “sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry.” and in verse 8 and 9 “anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips.” and “Do not lie to each other”.
All these thing he says must be “put to death”; you must “rid yourselves of them”.
New clothes as a response to God.
At the start of the passage we had read to us today, Paul says we are “God's chosen people”. Think about it for a minute. The creator of the universe and all that it contains looked into your spirit and saw something. He didn't look at your CV and check your skill set, or your exam results to see if you'd reach the grade, or your good works to see how you were helping those in need, or your evil ways and say they were just too bad. He looked right into you and said “Yes, I'll take you”. That simple decision that God made – made you holy – set you apart for God, dedicated to Him. Because you now belong to God you are dearly loved, so dearly loved that He had already sent His son to die in your place so that your evil ways - those ways we looked at in verses 8 and 9 do not lead to your own death.
Qualities of the new Clothes
Put off your old self, and put on your new self, we are told back in verse 10
Then in verse 12 & 13 we get a description of the new self that Paul's wants us to wear.
Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.
A Change of Clothes?
I wonder if you bought a change of clothes with you this morning. Probably not. I did though. I have to change into the uniform of my office to do my job. Much like a policeman or a paramedic. Putting on my robes changes me. Its not just that I have to be careful how I walk or I might trip over, although walking more slowly and carefully does have an effect. Really it is more subtle. It tells me that I am 'in character' as an actor would say. It makes me think more carefully about what I say and how I say it. It makes me a different person – more focussed on the things above.
It changes the way people see me too. Occasionally people will say 'nice sermon vicar'. My reaction inside is to have a rant about not being ordained and not being a vicar, and explaining in great, and probably very boring detail just exactly what the ministry of a reader is. A more helpful reaction would be to ignore the misidentification and ask them what they liked about the sermon, but I usually just manage a smile and thank you.
How does changing your clothes affect you? Do you behave differently when you are dressed up to go out, than you do when you are at home relaxing. Do you behave differently when you are dressed for working in the garden, than when you are dressed to attend a wedding?
Paul's new Christian suit
Lets take a look at what the new clothes Paul has in mind look like.
Compassion
In Matthew 9:36 after Jesus has bee teaching and healing people it says “When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.”
Webster's dictionary says compassion means “sympathetic consciousness of others' distress together with a desire to alleviate it”.
Compassion:
One day a student asked anthropologist Margaret Mead for the earliest sign of civilization in a given culture. He expected the answer to be a clay pot or perhaps a fish hook or grinding stone. Her answer was "a healed femur." Mead explained that no healed femurs are found where the law of the jungle, survival of the fittest, reigns. A healed femur shows that someone cared. Someone had to do that injured person's hunting and gathering until the leg healed. The evidence of compassion is the first sign of civilization. -- R. Wayne Willis Louisville, Kentucky
In recent years we mainly hear the word 'compassion' in the phrase 'compassion fatigue'. It defines a condition where there is so much suffering that the desire to relieve it is overwhelmed. Thankfully I haven't heard the expression in relation to the earthquake in Haiti. There will be a retiring collection this morning to help the survivors of the earthquake. The Disasters Emergency committee collects money and coordinates emergency aid. If you contribute there you contribution can benefit from gift aided. Please consider your response how you are going to show compassion in this instance. I heard a woman on the radio – I think she was from the American embassy, which is still standing. She sounded really frightened saying she didn't know when they would be able to go out, or how they would get food or water. That really brought home to me the scale of the disaster. Of course it's really the people on the outside we have to worry about. They need clean water, food and shelter, or many many more of them will become ill and die.
http://elbourne.org/sermons/index.mv?illustration+4698
Kindness
Kindness is shown by smaller actions that are designed to make people feel comfortable and accepted rather than to meet a specific and urgent need.
Rhodes Scholarship
British statesman and financier Cecil Rhodes, whose fortune was used to endow the world-famous Rhodes Scholarships, was a stickler for correct dress—but apparently not at the expense of someone else’s feelings. A young man invited to dine with Rhodes arrived by train and had to go directly to Rhodes’s home in his travel-stained clothes. Once there he was appalled to find the other guests already assembled, wearing full evening dress. After what seemed a long time Rhodes appeared, in a shabby old blue suit. Later the young man learned that his host had been dressed in evening clothes, but put on the old suit when he heard of his young guest’s dilemma.
Today in the Word, February, 1991, p. 10
http://elbourne.org/sermons/index.mv?illustration+4698
Humility
Humility is “not being proud or haughty; not being arrogant or assertive” according to Webster's dictionary. Its a very negative definition.
Winston Churchill was once asked, “Doesn’t it thrill you to know that every time you make a speech, the hall is packed to overflowing?”
“It’s quite flattering,” replied Sir Winston. “But whenever I feel that way, I always remember that if instead of making a political speech I was being hanged, the crowd would be twice as big.”
Norman McGowan, My Years With Winston Churchill, Souvenir Press, London.
http://bible.org/node/10552
If we are to define humility in a more positive way we would say that it is having a right view before God of your true worth and significance in relation to those around you. Remember what Paul said in verse 11: “Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.”
Barbarians covered people that did not speak greek, but were still considered uncivilised by the Jews.
Scythians were a race from southern Russia. They were known for their brutality.
Meekness
Gentleness is more traditionally translated as meekness and that is closer to the sense of the passage.
According to Bill Farmer, J. Upton Dickson was a fun-loving fellow who said he was writing a book entitled Cower Power. He also founded a group of submissive people. It was called "Dependent Organization Of Really Meek And Timid Souls -- if there are no objections." or DOORMATS. Their motto was: "The meek shall inherit the earth -- if that's okay with everybody."
A.W. Tozer in his book “The pursuit of God” wrote “The meek man is not a human mouse afflicted with a sense of his own inferiority. Rather he may be in his moral life as bold as a lion and as strong as Samson; but he has stopped being fooled about himself. He has accepted God's estimate of his own life. He knows he is as weak and helpless as God has declared him to be, but paradoxically, he knows at the same time that he is in the sight of God of more importance than angels. In himself, nothing; in God, everything. That is his motto. He knows well that the world will never see him as God sees him and he has stopped caring. He rests perfectly content to allow God to place His own values. He will be patient to wait for the day when everything will get its own price tag and real worth will come into its own. Then the righteous shall shine forth in the Kingdom of their Father. He is willing to wait for that day.
In the meantime he will have attained a place of soul rest. As he walks on in meekness he will be happy to let God defend him. The old struggle to defend himself is over. He has found the peace which meekness brings.”
http://www.theboc.com/freestuff/awtozer/books/the_pursuit_of_god/meekness_and_rest.html
Patience
Patience in this passage is not about being patient with God, or waiting patiently through the dark days of winter for your summer holiday in the sun. This is about being patient with people. This is about not reacting and writing people off when they are big a bit of an idiot.
Barnabus was patient with his cousin John Mark, when Paul had given upon him after he left them part way through a mission. Barnabus wanted to give him a second chance. There was a serious disagreement. As a result Barnabus went one way and Paul the other. You can read the story in Acts chapters 13 to 15. Years later Paul asks for John Mark to be sent to him, so Barnabus' patience clearly worked. We all need a second chance from time to time. Some of us need third and fourth chances as well. If people are not patient with us that will not be possible. This quality is linked to the next two.
Forgiveness
If patience deals with the inconsiderate, careless and thoughtless things that we do that cause misunderstandings. Forgiveness deals with the offensive that we give. Forgiveness applies when people tell lies about you, steal from you or give serious offence in other ways.
Act justly, love mercy and to walk humbly with your God it says in Micah 6:8. You may recognise that, it is included in our Holy communion liturgy. It means that we should apply justice to our own actions, and mercy to the actions of others.
We forgive because God first forgave us. If we do not forgive we will always be looking for some way to get back at the person who has offended us, so forgiveness has real benefits too us as these monkeys demonstrate.
Letting Go of Offences
Natives in Africa capture monkeys by setting up cages and placing bait inside. The bait can be anything a monkey would want, such as food or an unusual object. The monkeys are lured to the cages but are too smart to actually go inside. Instead, they reach through the bars, grab the bait, and try to pull it out. Because the object is too large to go through the bars, the only way the monkey can get away is to drop the bait. But monkeys refuse to let go. They kick and squeal but keep holding on. They stay trapped in bondage because they refuse to let go of the bait.
(Kent Crockett, I Once Was Blind But Now I Squint, Chattanooga, TN: AMG Publishers, 2004, 104-105)
http://www.kentcrockett.com/cgi-bin/illustrations/index.cgi?topic=Forgiving%20Others
Love
Finally, Love which brings all our actions relating to other people together. Paul describes Love to the Corinthian Church like this:
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.
Love the unselfish interest in someone else's well being is the overall look of the new clothes that Paul is asking us to wear on our Characters. It encompasses all I have talked about and much more. It is demonstrated by God in all his dealings with us, whether that's in our conversion, our life in this world, or eternity spent in heaven.
All we have to do is put it on.
Conclusion
Once you have changed into your new clothes they will last for all eternity. When you first put them they looked lovely and you were very pleased with them I'm sure. After a while they may feel a bit strange, you may wonder how you ever got into them. Perhaps in the same way that some of us wonder how we ever got into our wedding clothes. That is because we have grown larger since we were married. For our new Christian clothes its not so much an issue of growing out of them as growing into them.
As we put off our bad habits (monks wear habits by the way, and the word comes from 13th century French and meant “condition, demeanour, appearance, dress”)
They must be replaced by new ones, otherwise like evicted demons they will return
Luke 11:24"When an evil spirit comes out of a man, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. Then it says, 'I will return to the house I left.' When it arrives, it finds the house swept clean and put in order. Then it goes and takes seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that man is worse than the first."
If we haven't succeeded in replacing our old bad ways with new good ways then staying as a Christian will get harder and harder.
Just as paramedics, policemen and readers learn more about how to do their jobs once they have the uniform on, than they ever did in training, so it is with Christians. If the skills and habits are not practised they will not grow.
Compassion – relieving someone else's suffering
Kindness – consideration for someone's feeling and needs
Humility – a reasonable view of ourselves, so we have a reasonable view of others
Meekness – the strength of character to know that mostly its not profitable to fight back
Patience – giving everyone a second, third, or seventieth chance
Forgiveness – not holding on to the hurt that offences cause and allowing the relationship to be restored.
and
Love – which bids all of these new qualities together
OK, so stand up, take a walk over to the mirror, how do you look? More like Christ than last tie you looked?
Col 3:12 Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.
Col 3:13 Bear with each other x and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.
Col 3:14 And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.
Rules for Holy living part 2 New Clothes
Reminders of part 1
Margaret spoke to us last week and covered the first part of Paul's instructions to the Colossians. In case you weren't here or like me your memory isn't that good lets look back and see what Paul was saying. Take a look back at verse 1 “Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above” Paul's concern is to get the focus of the Colossians off the world and its day-to-day problems, and on to Christ and their time with him in eternity. Eternity, obviously goes on forever, but for us it has a start – that's the moment we accept Christ as our saviour. So we come to eternal life with a life partly lived, but lived without the right instructions. Paul calls these old habits your 'earthly nature' and in verse 5 goes on to give some examples of just what the earthly nature consists of “sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry.” and in verse 8 and 9 “anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips.” and “Do not lie to each other”.
All these thing he says must be “put to death”; you must “rid yourselves of them”.
New clothes as a response to God.
At the start of the passage we had read to us today, Paul says we are “God's chosen people”. Think about it for a minute. The creator of the universe and all that it contains looked into your spirit and saw something. He didn't look at your CV and check your skill set, or your exam results to see if you'd reach the grade, or your good works to see how you were helping those in need, or your evil ways and say they were just too bad. He looked right into you and said “Yes, I'll take you”. That simple decision that God made – made you holy – set you apart for God, dedicated to Him. Because you now belong to God you are dearly loved, so dearly loved that He had already sent His son to die in your place so that your evil ways - those ways we looked at in verses 8 and 9 do not lead to your own death.
Qualities of the new Clothes
Put off your old self, and put on your new self, we are told back in verse 10
Then in verse 12 & 13 we get a description of the new self that Paul's wants us to wear.
Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.
A Change of Clothes?
I wonder if you bought a change of clothes with you this morning. Probably not. I did though. I have to change into the uniform of my office to do my job. Much like a policeman or a paramedic. Putting on my robes changes me. Its not just that I have to be careful how I walk or I might trip over, although walking more slowly and carefully does have an effect. Really it is more subtle. It tells me that I am 'in character' as an actor would say. It makes me think more carefully about what I say and how I say it. It makes me a different person – more focussed on the things above.
It changes the way people see me too. Occasionally people will say 'nice sermon vicar'. My reaction inside is to have a rant about not being ordained and not being a vicar, and explaining in great, and probably very boring detail just exactly what the ministry of a reader is. A more helpful reaction would be to ignore the misidentification and ask them what they liked about the sermon, but I usually just manage a smile and thank you.
How does changing your clothes affect you? Do you behave differently when you are dressed up to go out, than you do when you are at home relaxing. Do you behave differently when you are dressed for working in the garden, than when you are dressed to attend a wedding?
Paul's new Christian suit
Lets take a look at what the new clothes Paul has in mind look like.
Compassion
In Matthew 9:36 after Jesus has bee teaching and healing people it says “When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.”
Webster's dictionary says compassion means “sympathetic consciousness of others' distress together with a desire to alleviate it”.
Compassion:
One day a student asked anthropologist Margaret Mead for the earliest sign of civilization in a given culture. He expected the answer to be a clay pot or perhaps a fish hook or grinding stone. Her answer was "a healed femur." Mead explained that no healed femurs are found where the law of the jungle, survival of the fittest, reigns. A healed femur shows that someone cared. Someone had to do that injured person's hunting and gathering until the leg healed. The evidence of compassion is the first sign of civilization. -- R. Wayne Willis Louisville, Kentucky
In recent years we mainly hear the word 'compassion' in the phrase 'compassion fatigue'. It defines a condition where there is so much suffering that the desire to relieve it is overwhelmed. Thankfully I haven't heard the expression in relation to the earthquake in Haiti. There will be a retiring collection this morning to help the survivors of the earthquake. The Disasters Emergency committee collects money and coordinates emergency aid. If you contribute there you contribution can benefit from gift aided. Please consider your response how you are going to show compassion in this instance. I heard a woman on the radio – I think she was from the American embassy, which is still standing. She sounded really frightened saying she didn't know when they would be able to go out, or how they would get food or water. That really brought home to me the scale of the disaster. Of course it's really the people on the outside we have to worry about. They need clean water, food and shelter, or many many more of them will become ill and die.
http://elbourne.org/sermons/index.mv?illustration+4698
Kindness
Kindness is shown by smaller actions that are designed to make people feel comfortable and accepted rather than to meet a specific and urgent need.
Rhodes Scholarship
British statesman and financier Cecil Rhodes, whose fortune was used to endow the world-famous Rhodes Scholarships, was a stickler for correct dress—but apparently not at the expense of someone else’s feelings. A young man invited to dine with Rhodes arrived by train and had to go directly to Rhodes’s home in his travel-stained clothes. Once there he was appalled to find the other guests already assembled, wearing full evening dress. After what seemed a long time Rhodes appeared, in a shabby old blue suit. Later the young man learned that his host had been dressed in evening clothes, but put on the old suit when he heard of his young guest’s dilemma.
Today in the Word, February, 1991, p. 10
http://elbourne.org/sermons/index.mv?illustration+4698
Humility
Humility is “not being proud or haughty; not being arrogant or assertive” according to Webster's dictionary. Its a very negative definition.
Winston Churchill was once asked, “Doesn’t it thrill you to know that every time you make a speech, the hall is packed to overflowing?”
“It’s quite flattering,” replied Sir Winston. “But whenever I feel that way, I always remember that if instead of making a political speech I was being hanged, the crowd would be twice as big.”
Norman McGowan, My Years With Winston Churchill, Souvenir Press, London.
http://bible.org/node/10552
If we are to define humility in a more positive way we would say that it is having a right view before God of your true worth and significance in relation to those around you. Remember what Paul said in verse 11: “Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.”
Barbarians covered people that did not speak greek, but were still considered uncivilised by the Jews.
Scythians were a race from southern Russia. They were known for their brutality.
Meekness
Gentleness is more traditionally translated as meekness and that is closer to the sense of the passage.
According to Bill Farmer, J. Upton Dickson was a fun-loving fellow who said he was writing a book entitled Cower Power. He also founded a group of submissive people. It was called "Dependent Organization Of Really Meek And Timid Souls -- if there are no objections." or DOORMATS. Their motto was: "The meek shall inherit the earth -- if that's okay with everybody."
A.W. Tozer in his book “The pursuit of God” wrote “The meek man is not a human mouse afflicted with a sense of his own inferiority. Rather he may be in his moral life as bold as a lion and as strong as Samson; but he has stopped being fooled about himself. He has accepted God's estimate of his own life. He knows he is as weak and helpless as God has declared him to be, but paradoxically, he knows at the same time that he is in the sight of God of more importance than angels. In himself, nothing; in God, everything. That is his motto. He knows well that the world will never see him as God sees him and he has stopped caring. He rests perfectly content to allow God to place His own values. He will be patient to wait for the day when everything will get its own price tag and real worth will come into its own. Then the righteous shall shine forth in the Kingdom of their Father. He is willing to wait for that day.
In the meantime he will have attained a place of soul rest. As he walks on in meekness he will be happy to let God defend him. The old struggle to defend himself is over. He has found the peace which meekness brings.”
http://www.theboc.com/freestuff/awtozer/books/the_pursuit_of_god/meekness_and_rest.html
Patience
Patience in this passage is not about being patient with God, or waiting patiently through the dark days of winter for your summer holiday in the sun. This is about being patient with people. This is about not reacting and writing people off when they are big a bit of an idiot.
Barnabus was patient with his cousin John Mark, when Paul had given upon him after he left them part way through a mission. Barnabus wanted to give him a second chance. There was a serious disagreement. As a result Barnabus went one way and Paul the other. You can read the story in Acts chapters 13 to 15. Years later Paul asks for John Mark to be sent to him, so Barnabus' patience clearly worked. We all need a second chance from time to time. Some of us need third and fourth chances as well. If people are not patient with us that will not be possible. This quality is linked to the next two.
Forgiveness
If patience deals with the inconsiderate, careless and thoughtless things that we do that cause misunderstandings. Forgiveness deals with the offensive that we give. Forgiveness applies when people tell lies about you, steal from you or give serious offence in other ways.
Act justly, love mercy and to walk humbly with your God it says in Micah 6:8. You may recognise that, it is included in our Holy communion liturgy. It means that we should apply justice to our own actions, and mercy to the actions of others.
We forgive because God first forgave us. If we do not forgive we will always be looking for some way to get back at the person who has offended us, so forgiveness has real benefits too us as these monkeys demonstrate.
Letting Go of Offences
Natives in Africa capture monkeys by setting up cages and placing bait inside. The bait can be anything a monkey would want, such as food or an unusual object. The monkeys are lured to the cages but are too smart to actually go inside. Instead, they reach through the bars, grab the bait, and try to pull it out. Because the object is too large to go through the bars, the only way the monkey can get away is to drop the bait. But monkeys refuse to let go. They kick and squeal but keep holding on. They stay trapped in bondage because they refuse to let go of the bait.
(Kent Crockett, I Once Was Blind But Now I Squint, Chattanooga, TN: AMG Publishers, 2004, 104-105)
http://www.kentcrockett.com/cgi-bin/illustrations/index.cgi?topic=Forgiving%20Others
Love
Finally, Love which brings all our actions relating to other people together. Paul describes Love to the Corinthian Church like this:
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.
Love the unselfish interest in someone else's well being is the overall look of the new clothes that Paul is asking us to wear on our Characters. It encompasses all I have talked about and much more. It is demonstrated by God in all his dealings with us, whether that's in our conversion, our life in this world, or eternity spent in heaven.
All we have to do is put it on.
Conclusion
Once you have changed into your new clothes they will last for all eternity. When you first put them they looked lovely and you were very pleased with them I'm sure. After a while they may feel a bit strange, you may wonder how you ever got into them. Perhaps in the same way that some of us wonder how we ever got into our wedding clothes. That is because we have grown larger since we were married. For our new Christian clothes its not so much an issue of growing out of them as growing into them.
As we put off our bad habits (monks wear habits by the way, and the word comes from 13th century French and meant “condition, demeanour, appearance, dress”)
They must be replaced by new ones, otherwise like evicted demons they will return
Luke 11:24"When an evil spirit comes out of a man, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. Then it says, 'I will return to the house I left.' When it arrives, it finds the house swept clean and put in order. Then it goes and takes seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that man is worse than the first."
If we haven't succeeded in replacing our old bad ways with new good ways then staying as a Christian will get harder and harder.
Just as paramedics, policemen and readers learn more about how to do their jobs once they have the uniform on, than they ever did in training, so it is with Christians. If the skills and habits are not practised they will not grow.
Compassion – relieving someone else's suffering
Kindness – consideration for someone's feeling and needs
Humility – a reasonable view of ourselves, so we have a reasonable view of others
Meekness – the strength of character to know that mostly its not profitable to fight back
Patience – giving everyone a second, third, or seventieth chance
Forgiveness – not holding on to the hurt that offences cause and allowing the relationship to be restored.
and
Love – which bids all of these new qualities together
OK, so stand up, take a walk over to the mirror, how do you look? More like Christ than last tie you looked?
Sunday, December 27, 2009
A Shepherd tells his story
That was a night! I can remember it like it was yesterday. It was a cold night up on the hills, and a bit windy. Not really full on winter, but not a nice night to be sleeping under the stars. Even us Shepherds look forward to a nice warm bed you know, not that we get to sleep in one that often. There were five of us, or was it six, its a long time ago. Anyway there we were sitting together between a few rocks, trying to keep out of the wind, and keep a bit of warmth so that we could get some sleep. I'd just nodded off when someone switched a light on. There it was, this kind of person with wings, just sort of hanging there.
No don't look at me like that – its not one of them UFO stories – we don't have time to worry about them – this really happened – it did! There were five of us, or was it six, – we all saw it – the same thing – just there in the air – above our heads almost. It was glowing – not bright like the sun, so you couldn't look at it – more like a giant candle but the flame had no bright bit in the middle, but there was light all around too – not like the day time, cause it was still dark everywhere else.
Anyway we'd have all been behind the rocks, but we were in the middle of nowhere and the rocks were just about big enough to sleep against, not really big enough to hide us so we just kind of froze to the spot. Funny thing was the sheep didn't even notice, just kept grazing and bleating like normal.
Anyway we got our breath back and old Joseph said "That's an Angel that is".
"Do not be afraid" he (or should that be she, or it? - I don't know – not that it matters, so I'll keep saying 'he' cause it sounds right somehow.). So anyway "do not be afraid" he said. Talk about asking the impossible. We don't scare easy you know, we have to fight great big bears, and chase off wolves and all if we're gonna keep the sheep safe, but we'd never seen the like of that before and we didn't know what it wanted – he wanted. Probably us, not the sheep – they were still eating – its what they do best.
"I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people" he said. Well it would have to be for everyone for us to get to hear about it. They don't tell us anything when we go down into town, in fact they do their level best to keep well clear of us. You'd think we were lepers sometimes, or thieves and murderers perhaps. So we don't find out what's going on, and were not allowed in the temple either, so we don't even get to hear the notices. One day they'll invent CNN, then there won't be any need for angels scaring the living daylights out of people.
But we do know enough, 'cause we're not stupid. We know the scriptures, we know all about angels and the different forms they take, we hear the stories of how God used to talk us Jews – they teach all the children all of those stories. That was hundreds of years ago, but we upset him somehow and he hasn't sent any of his messengers for getting on for 20 generations – that's a long time. So an angel now was something special – but there wasn't any time for us to decide which of us was the next prophet. God was speaking to us –all five, or was it six, its a long time ago. God was speaking to us – just us after all this time. Well that's how it looked, of course, he'd been speaking to lots of other people and doing lots of other things to, but we didn't know that then.
Alright I'll get to the news, cause I know you want to hear it.
"Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign a to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”
He spoke to us in Greek, but that didn't matter we all knew what it meant.
Messiah is here!
Here, now, in our lifetime,. My old granddad used to say that we'd had our last chance, that we failed God so often he'd given up on us. Well its true, we have failed God, more times than I can count, but he's never forgotten us. He made us see, and he chose us, and he loves us, and if my old granddad didn't give up on me I can't see how God could give up on us. Well, yes I can – cause we can be awful always fighting and killing and stealing.
Not us five, or was it six, its a long time ago. No we were best mates, and we didn't have anyone to fight or steal from anyway, no not us – just ... everybody!
Anyway Messiah here now, in our lifetime – difficult to believe, I didn't think I'd live to see it, even then, but we all knew the prophesies, we all knew what it meant.
Old Isaiah gave us the best ones, but he went on a bit, so I'll just give you the high lights:
"Therefore the LORD himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel." (Isaiah 7:14)
the a bit further on he says
Isa 9:2 The people walking in darkness have seen a great light;on those living in the land of the shadow of death 26 a light has dawned.
Isa 9:6 For to us a child is born,to us a son is given,and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
Isa 9:7 Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David’s throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the LORD Almighty will accomplish this.
and Micah said
Mic 5:2 But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times.
Before we had a chance to move or even discuss what to do next the whole sky lights up – all sorts of creatures, wings, wheels and eyes everywhere, and all of them singing at the tops of their voices:
“Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favour rests”
That's all they sung – but not once or one at a time – seemed to go on for ages – not that I mind, I like a good concert as much as the next man,and these were perfectly in tune and perfectly in time – heavenly it was. Oh, yes, of course it WAS heavenly, that's the point. So who might God's favour rest on then? I tell you my theory on that later, if you've got time.
Then just as suddenly as it started they were gone. Just a few thousand stars in a dark sky and the sound of the sheep bleating in the gusts of wind.
The Messiah is here – now as a baby and just a short walk away, just down there somewhere at the bottom of those hills. And we're up here with a load of sheep. We must go and see God's son all of us agreed. I had five sons you know, or was it six, its a long time ago.
We must pay our respects welcome him into the world. Suppose I should say welcome him into his world but it sounds strange even now. So the five of us or was it six, its a long time ago – well we had a bit of a discussion and reckoned that God would look after the sheep for one night, so off we went in search of the baby.
It wasn't so difficult finding the baby as we'd expected. Bethlehem is a very small place really. We were on the right side of town too, and there were lots of old women fussing around making sure he was OK. We could do with their help at lambing time, but they won't come up in the hills and get messy. Anyway we started off for Bethlehem, singing the angels song - “Glory to God in the highest and peace on earth to his favoured men” over and over. We must have seemed like a drunken mob of religious fanatics, but Messiah's here and we're on our way to actually see him – really in the flesh and all. We got shussed by the old women, but that didn't stop us singing. We didn't shut-up until we saw him, then all of us just knelt in front of him in awe.
This is God in person, wrapped in cloths and sleeping peacefully.
We listened to His mum Mary tell her story, more visits by angels, God had been busier than we could have imagined, and then they had the journey to Bethlehem to register in the census. The town was heaving with people – fuller than I've ever seen it. So its no surprise she ended up out in the back where the animals usually are. Joseph, Mary's soon to be husband was there too so we heard about angels. They were going to call the baby Jesus.
Then young Rubens said “so you still a virgin then?” and the look he got in reply said it all. Time for us to leave.
That's it! I'd forgotten about him – Rubens had only been with us a few day, and he'd put his foot in his mouth on every one of them.
The six of us – it definitely was six, got back to the sheep just after first light and had a quick count 'cause if there were any missing explaining why we were away from our jobs might have been a bit tricky. Anyway perhaps we are the ones who had Gods favour – cause they were all still there – every last one.
So there you have it – the story of the most remarkable night in my life, but the Messiah's story doesn't end there.
After about thirty winters more of sheep, I heard of this bloke called Jesus of Nazareth, people said he was a prophet from God. How he got from Bethlehem to Nazareth I haven't a clue, but it was definitely him. I never met him as a man, only as a baby. He's certainly had power though – healing some people and feeding others. His teaching and story telling amazed lots of people. People love a good prophet, specially when he's on their side. Trouble is that prophets never really are on their side, cause everyone's mostly just on his own side, so sooner or later the prophet is saying things you don't want to hear. They say he said 'no more divorce' – and upset a lot of people. They say he said the Romans could keep their currency for themselves and us Jews aren't to use it, but you can't live like that. He was clever though and a lot of those priests in the temple didn't like the things he was saying and couldn't get him to shut up. So I suppose it had to happen eventually - they found a way to get the Romans to crucify him. Horrible way to go that – treating people worse than sheep. One thing you can say for the Romans – they're good at suffering and death. Our law says that anyone who is hung on a tree is cursed by God and that's how He ended his days amongst us – cursed by God because of all of us they say. And for all of you as well. 'cause that's what God's son does: He put the worlds to right. Not like us six in the inn after a hard nights shepherding – properly. Means we can be friends with God like Adam was.
And to prove it God brought him back to life. There's loads of people around who saw him on the cross, and loads who've seen him since, and He's got a bigger following in Jerusalem now than he ever had before his death.
Now have you got a minute or two, or are you dashing off somewhere? Thought you might like to hear my theory on who has Gods favour?
Alright then, as you haven't moved. It's simple really almost obvious when you think about it, and we get plenty of time for that. Most of the time there's not a lot to do on the hills. So long as you keep your wits about you. Some people write songs, others sit and think, some just idle their time away.
Oh sorry, yes, I was telling you my theory wasn't I – well I reckon God's favour is on anyone who takes him seriously, anyone who worships in the temple regularly, and really tries to keep all the law, but more than that anyone who cares for God people, and make sure they are treated right. Like David, I suppose – made a few mistakes, but God really loved him – you could see it. Now, of course there's Jesus, so I don't have to worry about not being allowed in the temple until I've gone through the purification rituals and spent days away from the sheep. I can worship him any time, anywhere.
Yes that night really changed things for us shepherds, and for everyone else too I suppose.
No don't look at me like that – its not one of them UFO stories – we don't have time to worry about them – this really happened – it did! There were five of us, or was it six, – we all saw it – the same thing – just there in the air – above our heads almost. It was glowing – not bright like the sun, so you couldn't look at it – more like a giant candle but the flame had no bright bit in the middle, but there was light all around too – not like the day time, cause it was still dark everywhere else.
Anyway we'd have all been behind the rocks, but we were in the middle of nowhere and the rocks were just about big enough to sleep against, not really big enough to hide us so we just kind of froze to the spot. Funny thing was the sheep didn't even notice, just kept grazing and bleating like normal.
Anyway we got our breath back and old Joseph said "That's an Angel that is".
"Do not be afraid" he (or should that be she, or it? - I don't know – not that it matters, so I'll keep saying 'he' cause it sounds right somehow.). So anyway "do not be afraid" he said. Talk about asking the impossible. We don't scare easy you know, we have to fight great big bears, and chase off wolves and all if we're gonna keep the sheep safe, but we'd never seen the like of that before and we didn't know what it wanted – he wanted. Probably us, not the sheep – they were still eating – its what they do best.
"I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people" he said. Well it would have to be for everyone for us to get to hear about it. They don't tell us anything when we go down into town, in fact they do their level best to keep well clear of us. You'd think we were lepers sometimes, or thieves and murderers perhaps. So we don't find out what's going on, and were not allowed in the temple either, so we don't even get to hear the notices. One day they'll invent CNN, then there won't be any need for angels scaring the living daylights out of people.
But we do know enough, 'cause we're not stupid. We know the scriptures, we know all about angels and the different forms they take, we hear the stories of how God used to talk us Jews – they teach all the children all of those stories. That was hundreds of years ago, but we upset him somehow and he hasn't sent any of his messengers for getting on for 20 generations – that's a long time. So an angel now was something special – but there wasn't any time for us to decide which of us was the next prophet. God was speaking to us –all five, or was it six, its a long time ago. God was speaking to us – just us after all this time. Well that's how it looked, of course, he'd been speaking to lots of other people and doing lots of other things to, but we didn't know that then.
Alright I'll get to the news, cause I know you want to hear it.
"Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign a to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”
He spoke to us in Greek, but that didn't matter we all knew what it meant.
Messiah is here!
Here, now, in our lifetime,. My old granddad used to say that we'd had our last chance, that we failed God so often he'd given up on us. Well its true, we have failed God, more times than I can count, but he's never forgotten us. He made us see, and he chose us, and he loves us, and if my old granddad didn't give up on me I can't see how God could give up on us. Well, yes I can – cause we can be awful always fighting and killing and stealing.
Not us five, or was it six, its a long time ago. No we were best mates, and we didn't have anyone to fight or steal from anyway, no not us – just ... everybody!
Anyway Messiah here now, in our lifetime – difficult to believe, I didn't think I'd live to see it, even then, but we all knew the prophesies, we all knew what it meant.
Old Isaiah gave us the best ones, but he went on a bit, so I'll just give you the high lights:
"Therefore the LORD himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel." (Isaiah 7:14)
the a bit further on he says
Isa 9:2 The people walking in darkness have seen a great light;on those living in the land of the shadow of death 26 a light has dawned.
Isa 9:6 For to us a child is born,to us a son is given,and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
Isa 9:7 Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David’s throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the LORD Almighty will accomplish this.
and Micah said
Mic 5:2 But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times.
Before we had a chance to move or even discuss what to do next the whole sky lights up – all sorts of creatures, wings, wheels and eyes everywhere, and all of them singing at the tops of their voices:
“Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favour rests”
That's all they sung – but not once or one at a time – seemed to go on for ages – not that I mind, I like a good concert as much as the next man,and these were perfectly in tune and perfectly in time – heavenly it was. Oh, yes, of course it WAS heavenly, that's the point. So who might God's favour rest on then? I tell you my theory on that later, if you've got time.
Then just as suddenly as it started they were gone. Just a few thousand stars in a dark sky and the sound of the sheep bleating in the gusts of wind.
The Messiah is here – now as a baby and just a short walk away, just down there somewhere at the bottom of those hills. And we're up here with a load of sheep. We must go and see God's son all of us agreed. I had five sons you know, or was it six, its a long time ago.
We must pay our respects welcome him into the world. Suppose I should say welcome him into his world but it sounds strange even now. So the five of us or was it six, its a long time ago – well we had a bit of a discussion and reckoned that God would look after the sheep for one night, so off we went in search of the baby.
It wasn't so difficult finding the baby as we'd expected. Bethlehem is a very small place really. We were on the right side of town too, and there were lots of old women fussing around making sure he was OK. We could do with their help at lambing time, but they won't come up in the hills and get messy. Anyway we started off for Bethlehem, singing the angels song - “Glory to God in the highest and peace on earth to his favoured men” over and over. We must have seemed like a drunken mob of religious fanatics, but Messiah's here and we're on our way to actually see him – really in the flesh and all. We got shussed by the old women, but that didn't stop us singing. We didn't shut-up until we saw him, then all of us just knelt in front of him in awe.
This is God in person, wrapped in cloths and sleeping peacefully.
We listened to His mum Mary tell her story, more visits by angels, God had been busier than we could have imagined, and then they had the journey to Bethlehem to register in the census. The town was heaving with people – fuller than I've ever seen it. So its no surprise she ended up out in the back where the animals usually are. Joseph, Mary's soon to be husband was there too so we heard about angels. They were going to call the baby Jesus.
Then young Rubens said “so you still a virgin then?” and the look he got in reply said it all. Time for us to leave.
That's it! I'd forgotten about him – Rubens had only been with us a few day, and he'd put his foot in his mouth on every one of them.
The six of us – it definitely was six, got back to the sheep just after first light and had a quick count 'cause if there were any missing explaining why we were away from our jobs might have been a bit tricky. Anyway perhaps we are the ones who had Gods favour – cause they were all still there – every last one.
So there you have it – the story of the most remarkable night in my life, but the Messiah's story doesn't end there.
After about thirty winters more of sheep, I heard of this bloke called Jesus of Nazareth, people said he was a prophet from God. How he got from Bethlehem to Nazareth I haven't a clue, but it was definitely him. I never met him as a man, only as a baby. He's certainly had power though – healing some people and feeding others. His teaching and story telling amazed lots of people. People love a good prophet, specially when he's on their side. Trouble is that prophets never really are on their side, cause everyone's mostly just on his own side, so sooner or later the prophet is saying things you don't want to hear. They say he said 'no more divorce' – and upset a lot of people. They say he said the Romans could keep their currency for themselves and us Jews aren't to use it, but you can't live like that. He was clever though and a lot of those priests in the temple didn't like the things he was saying and couldn't get him to shut up. So I suppose it had to happen eventually - they found a way to get the Romans to crucify him. Horrible way to go that – treating people worse than sheep. One thing you can say for the Romans – they're good at suffering and death. Our law says that anyone who is hung on a tree is cursed by God and that's how He ended his days amongst us – cursed by God because of all of us they say. And for all of you as well. 'cause that's what God's son does: He put the worlds to right. Not like us six in the inn after a hard nights shepherding – properly. Means we can be friends with God like Adam was.
And to prove it God brought him back to life. There's loads of people around who saw him on the cross, and loads who've seen him since, and He's got a bigger following in Jerusalem now than he ever had before his death.
Now have you got a minute or two, or are you dashing off somewhere? Thought you might like to hear my theory on who has Gods favour?
Alright then, as you haven't moved. It's simple really almost obvious when you think about it, and we get plenty of time for that. Most of the time there's not a lot to do on the hills. So long as you keep your wits about you. Some people write songs, others sit and think, some just idle their time away.
Oh sorry, yes, I was telling you my theory wasn't I – well I reckon God's favour is on anyone who takes him seriously, anyone who worships in the temple regularly, and really tries to keep all the law, but more than that anyone who cares for God people, and make sure they are treated right. Like David, I suppose – made a few mistakes, but God really loved him – you could see it. Now, of course there's Jesus, so I don't have to worry about not being allowed in the temple until I've gone through the purification rituals and spent days away from the sheep. I can worship him any time, anywhere.
Yes that night really changed things for us shepherds, and for everyone else too I suppose.
Sunday, November 29, 2009
of Signs and Traps
Of Signs and Traps
Aim
To Alerts the congregation to the signs or the return of Christ& to encourage them to avoid the traps on the way
To introduce Advent
Introduction – Advent
Happy New Year. That may sound like a strange thing to say just before Christmas, but the season of Advent is the start of the churches year. Today is the first of four Sundays in the run up to the birth of God into our world.
So I'm going to ask you to make a new years resolution – one that you will keep and build on during the year.
Advent means
1 coming or arrival; first appearance.
2 (Advent) Christianity the period which includes the four Sundays before Christmas.
3 (Advent) Christianity the first or second coming of Christ.
Each of the four Sundays in Advent is used to help us prepare our selves for that Arrival. On the first Sunday , right at the start of the year we look at the coming and the coming back – perhaps better known as the first and second comings.
Background to passage
The passage that was read today is just a short part of Jesus teaching to his disciples on the future. The full passage starts back in verse 5. The disciples are admiring the great architecture of the temple. Jesus sees his opportunity. His chance to make an impact. Every one of these stones will be thrown down. That got their attention. Then there is the famous Wars and rumours of Wars passage. These things must happen but the end is not yet. There will be persecutions and witnessing – and then Jerusalem will be destroyed. Watch for the signs of that Jesus says and when you see them RUN AWAY. Then follows the time of the Gentiles – the time we are now living in, or towards the end of. Then we come to the passage we heard this morning.
Signs
Then Jesus starts talking about signs – “you recognise the signs of the seasons” he says to his disciples, and so do we. Even if sometimes we are less than certain about when they start an finish. It's advent, but we're all talking about Christmas – the expectation of some time away from work or school, a chance to enjoy some good food and drink and take it easy for a few days before the worst of the winter arrives. But when does Christmas actually start.
Of Christmas
It's not really Christmas until ...
- X-Factor (or Strictly) is on TV
- Children in Need
- The first Carol service (tonight 5pm @ Christ Church)
- The town lights are switched on (next Wednesday)
- Break up for school holidays
- The coke ad is on TV – you know the one with the big truck with way too many lights on it bringing the Christmas Coke.
- Until there's a postal strike
- The shopping is complete.
- In my house it will be until Pete has started his Christmas shopping, or was that Its not Boxing day until …). Well I'm ashamed to say its early this year – I've already received some of the gifts I have ordered for people.)
- The decorations are up and the tree decorated.
- midnight on December 24th
We know how to read the signs of the seasons because we grow up with them and are taught them. We have plenty of practice, but for most Children it only takes two or three attempts before they have the basic idea of Christmas, and the looking forward to it.
Signs in the World
The longer term signs are much harder to read though. The signs that Jesus talks about are in the Sun, Moon and Stars, and in the roaring and tossing of the sea. These may refer to physical events, but I think it is a LOT more likely that they refer to political events. The sea is a Jewish symbol for Chaos and Danger. The Sun, moon and Stars are the heavenly bodies – those placed over us – our political and religious leaders, and the systems they work in.
Signs of the End
The world is fascinated with looming disaster – especially the end of the world. There is always some scare, some threat – real or imagined that sets an end date for us all. The latest is 2012. Not the Olympics, but 21 December 2012. Its the date on which the Mayan calendar ends. Their calendar runs from August 11, 3114 BC to 21 December 2012 and is based on astronomic cycles. It is said that it ends as our solar system moves across the galactic equator. This is due to cause all sorts of physical disruption on the earth – from an eruption of the Yellowstone super volcano to earth quakes, tsunamis and environmental collapse. Inevitably someone has also calculated 2012 as the date for the battle at Armageddon, but so many of those have been calculated and proved to be false, I will not be worrying about this one. As for the Mayan calendar, it ends because that is the end of the astronomic cycle – just as our yearly calendar ends at a fixed point after the winter solstice. When its finished we just start again, so would the Mayans. There's a lot more to the 2012 disaster predictions, but we must remember that Jesus also said Mk 13:32 “No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. x
Signs of the return
We should look elsewhere for signs of his return, because there ARE signs. The fig tree is singled out for special mention because it the symbol for Israel. So one of the signs we might consider is the re-birth of Israel. It occurred on 15 May 1948. There had not been a proper state since before the Roman invasion, and the last vestiges were destroyed with the temple in AD 70. That was the event Jesus was talking about at the start of the Chapter. The establishment of Israel has brought more focus to the problems in the region, and may well have created even more chaos. More recently we have seen the destruction of Soviet communist empire and the resulting Chaos in its outlying regions – the Balkans and Chechnya to name but two. The loss of one of the two great powers in the world lead to de-stabilisation in many other places as well.
"This Generation"
There is one little difficulty with the prophecy that we are looking at this morning. It is verse 32.
Lk 21:32 “I tell you the truth, this generation 83 g will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened.
In our thinking we would expect 'this generation' to mean the people alive at the time it was spoken. When the last of the WW1 veterans in England died we said that the war had passed into history because the generation that fought it were now dead.
There were most certainly people in the early church who had that expectation too. It could be argued that John waited so long to write his Gospel because he though that Jesus would be back and he wouldn't need to take the time and trouble. The word can mean generation in the sense that we are discussing it here, It can also mean race, in the sense of a people.
“I tell you the truth, this race 83 g will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened.”
This translation gives the passage quite a different meaning. Particularly when you consider how close the Jews have come to annihilation recently. While the most usual use of the word translates to generation in English, I think we must be prepared to accept that Jesus did not mean it in that sense.
Traps
Jesus continues with a warning:
“Be careful, or your hearts will be weighed down with dissipation, drunkenness and the anxieties of life, i and that day will close on you unexpectedly j like a trap.
There are three things to watch out for, three traps for the unwary - dissipation, drunkenness and the anxieties of life.
Drunkenness I understand, the anxieties of life I understand, so lets deal with them first.
Drunkenness
Did anyone see the program on the “Red Lions” - a look at public houses all around the country with the name “Red Lion”. Drunkenness, perhaps as you'd expect was also one of the key elements of the program. There were some groups, no quite a few groups that were interviewed whose main aim was to get drunk. It is fairly obvious that someone who is drunk is going to have trouble reading the signs, let alone heed them. Most of them could barely find their way home. I'm assuming that drunkenness does not apply to anyone here.
Anxieties of life
Everyone has something to worry about to keep their life going on as it should. A living has to be earned, the family has to be looked after. The problem is that for some people these things become all consuming. For sure there will be times when there is just too much to do, and your focus will be on a sick relative rather than anything else, but that should only be for a while. If the normal day to day activities become an end in themselves then you will not be able to focus on what is happening in the wider world, and you may get caught in the trap.
Dissipation
Unsurprisingly the root of the word is the same as disperse, according to Chambers UK dictionary dissipate means:
- to separate and scatter.
- to use up something carelessly; to squander it. dissipated adj over-indulging in pleasure and enjoyment; debauched. dissipation noun.
The second definition contains the information we need.
“to use up something carelessly; to squander it. dissipated adj over-indulging in pleasure and enjoyment; debauched. dissipation noun. “
That sounds like it describes the world we live in. For years we have been using up the resources of the planet carelessly. Doing whatever we want for our pleasure and over-indulging. Car engines are left running when the car is going nowhere, heaters are left switched on – because we can't be bothered to turn them off. Our insistence on high quality produce means that up to a third of the food we produce is rejected as not good enough.
The “Red Lions” program also visited Billericay, and interviewed two old ladies, both were well past retirement age, and both spent a lot of their time in the pub drinking bottles of port – if I remember correctly. Neither of them were drunken, although their blood alcohol level must have been off the scale. Both of them were well past retirements and both their husbands had died, some considerable time before the interview. When I was trying to understand what Jesus was getting at here, I thought of their interview immediately. They are the perfect illustration. Their lives do not matter, they exist simply for the pleasure that they can get. Their time together in the pub, and a bottle of port seems to be all they are living for.
Call me driven, if you like, but I can't help thinking that even at that age there must be more to life. Yet is is what many people aspire to. To be comfortable, have some pleasures in life, and not to have any responsibilities.
If that isn't a great help in understanding, let me tell you the story of Wally, the wild duck.
Story of Wally: "The Call of the Farmyard" (Author Unknown)
(Found here: http://www.sermoncentral.com/sermon.asp?SermonID=56399)
A flock of wild ducks were flying in formation, heading south for the Winter. They formed a beautiful "V" in the sky, and were admired by everyone who saw them from below.
One day, Wally, one of the wild ducks in the formation, spotted something on the ground that caught his eye. It was a Farmyard with a flock of tame ducks who lived on the farm. They were waddling around on the ground, quacking merrily and eating corn that was thrown on the ground for them every day.
Wally liked what he saw. "It sure would be nice to have some of that corn," he thought to himself. "And all this flying is very tiring. I’d like to just waddle around for a while." So after thinking it over a while, Wally left the formation of wild ducks, made a sharp dive to the left, and headed for the barn yard.
He landed among the tame ducks, and began to waddle around and quack merrily. He also started eating corn. The formation of wild ducks continued their journey south, but Wally didn’t care. I’ll rejoin them when they come back this way in a few months, he said to himself.
Several months went by and sure enough, Wally looked up and spotted the flock of wild ducks in formation, heading north. They looked beautiful up there. And Wally was tired of the barn yard.
It was muddy and everywhere he waddled, nothing but duck-doo. "It’s time to leave," said Wally. So Wally flapped his wings furiously and tried to get airborne. But he had gained some weight from all his corn eating, and he hadn’t exercised his wings much either.
He finally got off the ground, but he was flying too low and slammed into the side of the barn. He fell to the ground with a thud and said to himself,"Oh well, I’ll just wait until they fly South in a few months. Then I’ll rejoin them and become a wild duck again."
But when the flock flew overhead once more, Wally again tried to lift himself out of the barn yard. He simply didn’t have the strength. Every Winter and every Spring, he saw his wild duck friends flying over head, and they would call out to him. But his attempts to leave were all in vain.
Eventually Wally no longer paid any attention to the wild ducks flying overhead. He hardly even noticed them. He had after all, become a Farmyard duck.
Commentary on Wally
Sometimes we get tired of being wild ducks . . . followers of Jesus Christ. It’s not always easy to be obedient to God and to discipline ourselves to hang in there for the long haul. When we are feeling that way, that’s when Satan tempts us to "fall out of formation" and to join the Farmyard ducks . . . the world . . .
Watch and Pray
Jesus says “be careful, or your hearts will be weighed down with dissipation, drunkenness and the anxieties of life”. “Be always on the watch. Pray that you may be able to escape all that is about to happen.”
Be watchful. Keep your eyes and ears open – know what is happening in the world. Be ready to fly away. Keep your wing muscles in good working order. It was interesting watching the program “Life” about predators and pray. In south India the deer were grazing on the grasses as a tiger approached. Bite, Head up, chew, listen and look around, swallow, listen and look around. Bite, Head up, chew, listen and look around, swallow, listen and look around. The alarm was given, but the deer stayed in their routine. Bite, Head up, chew, listen and look around, swallow, listen and look around. Its not time to go yet. Why not run now? Its simple. They do not know where the tiger is – if they run the way they are facing they might run toward the predator. Bite, Head up, chew, listen and look around, swallow, listen and look around. More alarms – enough for them to work out the location – then they turn and are gone in a second. Poor tiger goes hungry.
When you go into a strange building – for example a holiday hotel or a new office, do you check out the fire exits. One expert (he investigates deaths cause by building fires) recommends practising the route out of the building so that you know where to go, if the worst should happen. It could save your life.
You may have to leave you church, your town or your country to stay safe, I cannot tell you what it will be. Or you may not. You wouldn't want to run away and find yourself in serious danger.
Watch and Pray. Or are you like the disciples at Jesus arrest and can't keep your eyes open? Jesus says “Stop worrying about your stuff, or you life with all of its comforts, instead turn to prayer and preparation.” We may not know when the second coming is, but one thing is certain. It is a year closer than it was last advent.
Conclusion
So as the new year starts will you make a new years resolution? This is not going to be one that you can drop after Christmas.
Will you decide to pray more and more, and to be more alert and ever more watchful as the year progresses. Are you prepared to get into the habit of watching and praying, so that when the time comes you know what you have to do, or where you can go.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
The Kingdom of Heaven is like ... from Matthew 13:31-35
The Kingdom of Heaven is like ...
Why Parables
Why not just tell it like it is? Why do we always have to wrap everything up in stories? There are a number of possible reasons. The truth is often quite are to convey directly, but by reference to something else, some of the truth can be uncovered.
How would you describe an Elephant to a blind man? Or how would you tell him about the colour yellow? That is the type of problem that Jesus faces when he tries to tell us about the kingdom of heaven. He's trying to describe something that we start off with only the vaguest of ideas about – and they may even be wrong. When blind men were asked to describe what they were feeling this is what they came up with:
leg is like a pillar;
tail is like a rope;
the trunk is like a tree branch;
the ear is like a hand fan;
belly is like a wall;
the tusk is like a solid pipe.
... but that doesn't give me a picture of an elephant and neither would it much help another blind man -- perhaps if we started with a horse?
The colour yellow is in the visible spectrum and has a wavelength of 590–560 nm and a frequency of 510–540 THz. It's the truth, but it doesn't help us or especially someone who is blind get any sense of what yellow is. Perhaps we should have started by talking about the sun.
Hidden Meaning
When Jesus was alone, the Twelve and the others around him asked him about the parables. He told them, "The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you. But to those on the outside everything is said in parables so that,
" 'they may be ever seeing but never perceiving,
and ever hearing but never understanding;
otherwise they might turn and be forgiven!'"
" 'they may be ever seeing but never perceiving,
and ever hearing but never understanding;
otherwise they might turn and be forgiven!'"
Parables are used to help some people understand and to make it impossible for others to understand.
Surprise Usage
The way parables are told often contains something to make the hearer startled in some way. Its a technique for getting someone's attention and trying to help them to think differently. It also serves to make the saying memorable.
Over interpretation – missing the point
You will often hear sermons and talks on parables that go into great depths about the detail in the parable and all the possible meanings and imagery that goes around it. In preparation for this talk I read and listened to a number of other sermons based on this passage. One was an exhortation to evangelism and one was about the apostate church. Both had entirely missed the main point of what Jesus is saying. As I take a look at some of the detail and the surprising things that can come from these parables I will do my very best not to miss the main point.
Background / Setting Series
In Matthew the parables describing the Kingdom of heaven are in one section that take most of Chapter 13. In Mark and Luke they are spread more widely. Matthew has helpfully grouped the parables together to give us a wider view of what the Kingdom of Heaven is like.
You can read the other ones later, but for now we are going to concentrate on the mustard seed and the yeast.
I'm going to talk about the yeast first, because I think it is the easiest one for us to understand.
Yeast Parable
“The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into a large amount of flour until it worked all through the dough.”
Summary of Message
It seems fairly obvious what this parable is trying to convey. A small amount of yeast added to the dough makes an enormous difference to the resulting bread. It must of course be well mixed in other wise the bread will be uneven, hard is some places and full of holes in others.
Surprising Elements
To Jesus' hearers there would have been some surprising elements to the story.
Yeast was normally associated with evil. Later Jesus would say to his disciples "Be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees." (Matthew 16:6). In Exodus, whenever the Jews are to celebrate God they are always told to bake unleavened bread – bread without yeast. You can imagine the reaction – “What! The Kingdom of heaven is like yeast”. Jesus would not have got the same reaction if he had said “The Kingdom of Heaven is like the drop of milk that a woman put in her tea.” Although the spiritual lesson would be similar the impact is completely lost. You wouldn't react, so the saying would not be memorable. (OK, I know first century Jews didn't have cups of tea – but I hope you get the point!)
In the English Standard version and the Amplified Bible we read that the woman took “three measures of flour”. That's about 22 Litres, 13 kilograms or nearly 30 pounds of flour. That's the same amount that Sarah prepared when God visited Abraham in Genesis 18. It is the most bread dough that could be kneaded at a time.
Mustard Seed
Mustard Seed joke
A company sent out advertising with a mustard seed attached to a card which read “If you have faith as small as a mustard seed in our products you are guaranteed to get excellent results and be totally satisfied.” A few months later they received a letter “Dear Sir, You will be interested to know that I planted the mustard seed you sent on your advertising card and it has grown into a very healthy bush producing wonderful tomatoes”
The mustard seed is less straight forward, and brings with it some intriguing questions. The parable is told slightly differently in Mark and Luke.
Mark 4:30-32.
Again he said, “What shall we say the kingdom of God is like, or what parable shall we use to describe it? It is like a mustard seed, which is the smallest seed you plant in the ground. Yet when planted, it grows and becomes the largest of all garden plants, with such big branches that the birds of the air can perch in its shade.”
Luke 13:18-19
Then Jesus asked, “What is the kingdom of God like? i What shall I compare it to? It is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his garden. It grew and became a tree, and the birds of the air perched in its branches.”
Summary of message
A simple seed – in Jewish thought at the time proverbially the smallest thing – planted in the garden – becomes one of the tallest crops. The seed is not actually that small at 2 to 3 millimetres (tenth of an inch) in diameter, but bit holds that image. The Kingdom of heaven planted in a world, or perhaps in a person grows to become the greatest thing in the world, or the person. It seemingly came from nowhere and yet Christianity is the largest religion on the planet, so it seems to work.
Surprising Elements
The mustard plant is both a crop and a weed. It was grown in gardens for mustard, but could also easily be found in the wild. There are birds that build their nest amongst mustard plants because of the shade that they provide. Apart from the dove, birds were considered dirty pests, and it would have been surprising for them to get a mention. Jesus seems to be saying that the Kingdom of heaven, when it is grown, provides shelter for the world.
In Matthews parable the plant is described as a tree. So, if Jesus was trying to find an image of something small that grows into something big, and provides shelter, then why not the Cedars of Lebanon. That was certainly common imagery – for strength and protection. Our own saying “From little acorns grow mighty oaks” sums up that part of the message perfectly. A tree though comes from a clearly defined seed, and here the imagery would fail. To make his point Jesus must use the smallest of small things – the mustard seed. The mustard seed image is also used in Luke 17:4-6
If he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times comes back to you and says, ‘I repent,’ forgive him.” The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!” He replied, “If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, b you can say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it will obey you.
Jesus also seems to be picking up on Nebuchadnezzar 's dream in Daniel 4, where he describes an enormous tree, and Daniel says “The tree you saw, which grew large and strong, with its top touching the sky, visible to the whole earth, with beautiful leaves and abundant fruit, providing food for all, giving shelter to the beasts of the field, and having nesting places in its branches for the birds of the air. O king, you are that tree”. The tree is to be destroyed by God. Nebuchadnezzar was king of Babylon – Babylon was later used as a synonym for all that is evil.
Jesus' hears would have found that profoundly shocking.
To get some sense of what he is saying perhaps we should start the modern day version of the parable with “The Kingdom of heaven is like a cutting of Japanese Knotweed that a man planted in his garden ...”
Japanese Knotweed has an amazing ability to regenerate from a tiny piece of rhizome, stem or even leaf material.
Application
Kingdom of Heaven
Place
The Kingdom of heaven is not a place. Well, not a physical place, although there are places that feel like they are in the Kingdom and places that feel like they're not. Have you ever been somewhere where there is a sense of peace and a sense of holiness. Some old churches have that feel. Jo and I recently visited Coventry Cathedral. The new Cathedral was almost empty, it is huge, spacious and quite dark. You can hear your feet move on the floor, even as you take a step. The building certainly speaks of the awesomeness of God, but I didn't sense God in there. Then we went outside. 'Over the road' to the old cathedral – the one destroyed in WWII. There had been a wedding there only a few minutes, before and it was crowded with young people taking photo's and chatting. As we walked around looking at the walls and thinking there was a definite sense that we were in a different place. This place belonged to Kingdom of heaven somehow, in a way that the new building didn't.
Of course it is us, not the building that belongs in the Kingdom of heaven. We become part of the Kingdom of heaven the minute we accept Jesus as Lord and saviour.
Becoming part of the Kingdom has effects on us and on the world around us.
Corporate Kingdom
We can see, if we take even the most rudimentary glance at the world that the parable is also a prophecy. Jesus – the mustard seed – was planted in the world 2000 years ago. We read in the Acts of the apostles the initial sprouting of the Kingdom of Heaven. As we look at the world today about a third of the population – 1about 2.1 billion people are part of the Kingdom of Heaven. In many areas there is still phenomenal growth – particularly in China.
Looking at our own country we can see that the Kingdom of Heaven has had some dramatic effects on Society. Perhaps most notably is the abolition of slavery. Campaigns such as Fair Trade, and Make Poverty History have a Christian background and continue to do good works – changing the very nature of our world.
Personal Kingdom
From the point we accept Jesus onwards we begin to understand what it is like. Slowly, as we spend time with God, as we drink in the Holy Spirit, as we join in prayer and worship with other Christians, the truths spoken in these parables begin to be revealed. Their message becomes clearer and we grow closer to God as a result.
Some of the parables that Jesus told are harder to understand than others. Some are so hard that he has to explain them to the disciples himself. The two we are looking at today do not fall into that category, so it our job to work out their meaning.
They are clearly both to do with growth. The Kingdom of heaven is like a seed – something small, that turns into a 3 meter (10 feet) high plant. The Kingdom of Heaven is like the yeast – something small but it affects the whole of the dough.
In both cases we do not see what causes the growth. Chemical and biological processes occur and as a result things change. In the Kingdom of heaven there are no Chemical or biological processes – only spiritual ones. When we accept Jesus as our Lord and saviour the Holy Spirit is planted in us. When we join with fellow Christians in prayer and worship the mixing process provides us with new ideas and thoughts about God, and how we relate to Him. All of this leads to Spiritual growth. So from being a spiritual baby we can grow into a spiritual giant and take the place prepared for us in the Kingdom.
Planting Seeds
We know that we too must continue plant seeds of faith in other peoples lives. Anyone who has tried to grow anything will realise that not all seeds germinate, and some that do take a very long time before they do. We know that not all seedlings grow to become mature plants, and that not all mature plants go on to produce their own seed. It is the same with us, and with those around us. When I look back at my life before I was a Christian, I can see many many examples of seeds planted. My mum took my sister and I to church when we were very young. I spent a few weeks in an organisation called Sea Scouts – which was affiliated to the church at the top of our road. At secondary school one of my friends became a Christian. All these things – and many more I expect – had no apparent effect on me at the time. Who knows which of those seeds first began to grow?
Is it the same for you? When you look back before you had made your decision for Christ – do you see a number of seeds?
If you see the seeds of faith in your life, how many are you scattering in the hope that they will grow in others?
1http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_Christians_are_there_worldwide
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