The World is Changed

Preached at Christ Church, Billericay on 1 March 2026 at 10:00

Recording here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nupbxKd6dbo from 33:50 to 48:08

Prayer Father God, speak into our shifting world. Open our hearts, steady our steps, and make us ready for the change Your Spirit brings. Amen. Introduction: The Shifting Soil "The world is changed," the ancient Treebeard says in Tolkien’s The Return of the King. "I feel it in the water. I feel it in the earth. I smell it in the air." If you believe all the hype around the Gorton and Denton by-election, you may think I’m referring to that, after all there is a sort of plumbing connection. Things may have changed, but by-elections throw up strange results, so we have to wait and see. For the person of faith, those words carry a different weight. When God enters a life, the world doesn't just "shift"—it is fundamentally rearranged. The coordinates are reset. Today, we look at two biblical figures—Abram and Nicodemus—who saw their lives dramatically changed. One walked into the desert, and the other walked into the night, but both found that once God speaks, staying the same is the only impossible option. Others have experienced similar things over the centuries, so we will look at three of those stories, and then ask how God may be speaking to us.

Abram: The Courage of the Departure In Genesis 12, we meet Abram. We know little about him at that stage. We can work out that he is a Bronze Age herdsman, and we are told that he is seventy-five years old, (that’s even older than me!). He’s settled and established in Haran. There’s nothing special about Abram, he will make some bad mistakes later in his life. Then comes the voice: “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.” The Radical "Went" The most staggering line in this text is verse 4: "So Abram went, as the Lord had told him." Just like that! In our modern world, we want a five-year plan, GPS coordinates, and a guaranteed pension. All Abram had was a command and a promise of blessing. Perhaps that’s what motivates him to leave. The Nature of the Blessing God promises to make him a "great nation," but notice the why. God says, "You will be a blessing... and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you." Abram’s change is geographical and will be generational. He had to move his body because God was moving the history of the world. Without Abram’s obedience, there are no Jews, so there can be no Christians, and no Muslims. With his move the world is changed.

Nicodemus: The Crisis of the Night Fast-forward to John 3. We meet Nicodemus, a man who has everything Abram’s descendants were promised: they are living in the land , they have status, knowledge, and religious authority. He’s heard things, seen things, that have challenged his understanding of God. So, he comes to Jesus under the cover of darkness. He knows the world is changing again, and he wants to be following God’s lead. But, he’s also afraid of those who are protecting the status quo. Born From Above Jesus meets Nicodemus’s polite flattery with a blunt response: “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.” The Limit of Heritage For Nicodemus, or for any Pharisee, being a child of Abram was the ultimate "golden ticket." But Jesus explains that the blessing of Abram—the physical lineage—is not enough. To see the Kingdom, you need a spiritual change. The kingdom of God is not a country; to live there, you need a new nature. Snakes on Poles Jesus reminds him of the bronze serpent in the wilderness. When the people were dying of snakebites, they needed to look up at the snake on the pole, then they would live. It’s a forerunner of looking up at the crucified Jesus on the cross and accepting that His death has paid for our lives. Jesus tells this scholar: "Your degrees won't save you. Only looking to the One who will be lifted up—the Son of Man—can heal you." For Nicodemus, the world changed when he realized God doesn't want our "best efforts" or our "religious traditions." He wants our death and our rebirth. Result for Nicodemas We know that the conversation with Jesus changed Nicodemus’s world. After the crucifixion, Nicodemus provided about 75 pounds of myrrh and aloes to prepare Jesus’s body for burial.

Three Moments of Modern Rebirth God does not stop speaking. He continues to disrupt comfortable lives. Let’s look at how that "The world is Changed" moment looked for three people in the last couple of centuries. 1. Hudson Taylor: The Finished Work In 1849, teenage Hudson Taylor was bored in his father’s library. He picked up a gospel tract (a pamphlet), thinking he’d read the story at the start and skip the "sermon" at the end. But he was struck by one phrase: "The finished work of Christ." The Result He realized that if the work was finished, there was nothing left for him to do but accept it. That was the moment his World was changed. That realization eventually drove him to China. He didn't just go as a colonial missionary; his approach was revolutionary. He changed his clothes, his hairstyle, to look like a local, and lived as a Chinese man to reach the interior. Because of a pamphlet, the China Inland Mission was born.

2. Mother Teresa: The Thirst In 1946, Sister Teresa was already a nun, teaching comfortably in a school in Calcutta. On a train journey to Darjeeling, she heard a voice within her heart. It wasn't a call to become a nun—she already was one. It was a "call within a call." The word she heard was: "I thirst." The Result She realized Jesus was thirsty for the love of the poorest of the poor. She left the walls of the convent, traded her habit for a simple blue-bordered sari, and walked into the slums to care for the dying. Everything about her life, and the world's view of mercy, was changed on that train ride.

3. Brother Andrew: The Step of Yes In the 1950s, a young Dutchman named Andrew was recovering from a war wound. He picked up a Bible and began to read it like a man dying of thirst. In 1952, God spoke a simple invitation to his heart: "Yes." Andrew responded by saying, "Lord, as I take my first step forward, will you consider this a step towards complete obedience to you? I’ll call it the step of yes." The Result God then gave him a specific word from Revelation: "Awake, and strengthen what remains." (Rev 3:”) Then "God's Smuggler" began driving a Volkswagen Beetle full of Bibles behind the Iron Curtain. He changed the face of the persecuted church because he was willing to say "Yes" to a God who makes seeing eyes blind at border crossings.

4. Me Not all experiences that the Bible reports are for everyone, but this is one I can identify with. I didn’t warn you about this at the start, because I didn’t want you to leave. For me God’s word came through a “Gifts” survey, that Peter Sandberg ran. It was intended to help us, and the church, identify our gifts. The Result For me that came out as teaching. It set me on a path that led me to lead Explorers, then Pathfinders, and finally to offer myself to be trained as a Reader. Speaking to Us Today If the world is changed, and if God is still speaking, what does that mean for each of us? As an Individual You may be here today like Nicodemus—respected, "fine," but carrying a restless heart. Perhaps you’ve been relying on your "good person" resume. Jesus is whispering the same thing to you: It is not enough to be improved; you must be made new. What is the "pamphlet" or the "train ride" moment God is offering you today? Our world is changed when we stop asking God to bless our plans and start asking God to give us His life. Final Prayer Lord God, You who called Abram out of Haran and Nicodemus out of the dark, call us now. We confess that we often fear change more than we love You. Shake the foundations of our self-sufficiency. Give us the courage to go where You lead, the humility to be born anew by Your Spirit, and the heart to be a blessing to a world that so desperately needs Your light. May we leave this place knowing that because of Christ, the world—the whole world—is changed.

 References

https://desperatepreacher.com/texts/gen12_1/gen12_1.htm

https://www.preaching.lexiwiki.com/2025/03/sermon-on-nicodemus-let-us-seek-truth.html

https://www.quotes.net/mquote/120314

https://clip.cafe/the-lord-of-the-rings-the-fellowship-of-the-ring-2001/the-world-changed/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hudson_Taylor

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