Life is distracting. We can be full
of something one moment, and then we can feel a bit empty in the next. We struggle
to maintain an even keel at the best of times, blowing hot and cold; becoming
lukewarm in our approach to life and ultimately, to God. We can often breathe a
collective sigh when things happen to us such as in our working patterns
becoming strained or when the boundaries of friendships are stretched. We get
home at the end of a week and feel shattered; physically, mentally and
emotionally.
Some are able to
live in the expectation of a future event: a night out; meeting friends;
sharing a meal; watching that movie we’d been waiting for; going to the pub and
onto a club afterwards for a good boogie. Longer term dreams are for that
sunshine holiday expedition or the expectation of a pay-raise that might enable
us to make that larger purchase you have always wanted, but never thought was
possible.
Even these
memories can fade quite quickly. In our western culture particularly in the UK,
we expect a lot. Fashion and advertising bombards our consciousness to the
point that we get bored with perfectly functioning products and covet new ones…
mobile phones being the ultimate expression of this. In the UK, we get tied
into a mobile-phone contract for 24mths. Just as you start the contract,
you see advertised that new model of phone, making your model look obsolete.
You know, we can do
the same with our faith in God. I know that I have seasons of going good with
God, and seasons where I feel a bit dry. When I look at my experiences of life and
the commitment I am willing to make in serving God in church and in my
workplace, not too much has changed. But I can still feel like I’ve run out of
steam, or that something is missing. Then I recognise it is me... I have
changed. I have allowed my mood, my tiredness and the busyness of life, to
prevent me from placing quality devotional time with the one who has rescued me
from all this stuff!
So why is life so cyclical? Why
do I return to that same old place of quiet despairing? Where is my energy to
press in when times get harder? People can see the same types of pattern in the
world: Wars and rumour of war; natural disasters; disease and sickness; poverty
and hunger… Where is God in all of this?
We have looked at this issue in a previous blog so do not want to dwell too much on this here, but we cannot escape the fact that our emotions respond to the flow of life. If we depend purely on our emotion and neglect our rationality and common sense, we can get side tracked by the passing horses, preferring to hitch a ride to a new destination, when the horse we were on, was perfectly suited to our future hopes and expectations, if only we had persevered.
We have looked at this issue in a previous blog so do not want to dwell too much on this here, but we cannot escape the fact that our emotions respond to the flow of life. If we depend purely on our emotion and neglect our rationality and common sense, we can get side tracked by the passing horses, preferring to hitch a ride to a new destination, when the horse we were on, was perfectly suited to our future hopes and expectations, if only we had persevered.
I have spoken before
of my brush with cancer after finding a malignant melanoma and how it could be
easy to blame God for something happening to me that I couldn’t control;
however I do not know the depths and courage that people need to draw from to
withstand the chemotherapy process. This treatment is so invasive that it kills
the healthy cells of our immune system as well as the bad, in order to eradicate
any chance that the un-healthy cells might return. There are those that will
want to blame God for these types of medical predicament's, almost as though it confirms the
suspicions they had made about him in the first place.
In reality, our
bodies are in a constant state of regeneration. Our cells age as we do, and they
begin to fail with the passage of time or mutate due to the level of toxins we
have absorbed in our bodies. We are told that our DNA can have identifiable
markers that indicate the risk we have towards contracting many different
illnesses; our health reflecting what is within. Christians live with the
reality of death, the threat of long term illness and the inequality caused in
the world, alongside those that have no faith. The difference for Christians is
that through Jesus, we recognise that this world is broken and we live in hope
for that which is to come. God encourages us to pray that his kingdom come, and that his will be done, no matter what troubles we may face.
This rather old
but great song from Andy Williams, (have a look on YouTube) and sung by many including Frank Sinatra, sums
up how we can strive for that which might seem too hard to grasp:
To dream the impossible dream,
To fight the unbeatable foe,
To bear with unbearable sorrow,
To bear with unbearable sorrow,
To run where the brave dare not go
To right the un-right able wrong,
To right the un-right able wrong,
To love pure and chaste from afar
To try when your arms are too weary,
To try when your arms are too weary,
To reach the unreachable star
This is my quest, to follow that star,
No matter how hopeless, no matter how far
To fight for the right, without question or pause
To be willing to march into hell, for that heavenly cause
And I know, If I'll only be true, to this glorious quest
To fight for the right, without question or pause
To be willing to march into hell, for that heavenly cause
And I know, If I'll only be true, to this glorious quest
And the world will be better for this
That one man, scorned and covered with scars
Still strove with his last ounce of courage
To reach the unreachable star
That one man, scorned and covered with scars
Still strove with his last ounce of courage
To reach the unreachable star
Through Jesus we
know that God isn’t the unreachable star, but that he is within our grasp; we
can wrestle with day to day fears and may feel that he is being distant but in
reality, he always draws closer in times of suffering. We don’t deserve to have
this closeness to God, but our access to him was bought at a great price. As it
says in the final verse of the song: ‘And the world will be better for this; that one
man (Jesus), scorned and covered with scars; still strove with his last ounce
of courage…’ We already know
the ending to the greatest story ever told; God came as a child to redeem the
world of its sin – to beat OUR unbeatable foe; to bear OUR unbearable sorrow;
to go where the brave dare not go… my GOD did this for me.
It is only natural to struggle with dealing with illnesses such as cancer, but this struggle is also emulated in our spiritual lives too. If I fill my mind with day-to-day ‘life’ stuff, I begin to model the ‘life’ I am living. Just as cancer cells mutate when dysfunctional, I have to recognise that unhealthy acts will lead to dysfunctional living. I have to be aware that some aspects of life can be healthy for me, and others are not so… For example, if I don’t reject pornography, I will allow that aspect of sexual expression to impress upon my character and in doing so ruin the purity of the real relationship I have with my wife. If I give in to my sweet tooth and indulge in excess without exercising and eating healthily in between, then my body shape will reflect that… as it does!
In computer
studies we use the phrase: ‘Garbage in, Garbage out!’ It refers to the idea
that the computer is just a ‘processor’. It cannot think for itself and does
what it is told to do. If the programming is wrong, then the processor will not
work correctly, and the computer will perform random functions we did not want...
It cannot think for itself and detect problems. Similarly, we might think that
we have developed the correct software to run our computer, but it can become
corrupted by the user. It may simply be the case that we didn’t have the
capacity to think through all of the possible combinations to the action
requested of the software. Life can be like this… we simply do not have all of
the facts to make informed decisions or contemplate all of the consequences. We
take risks… we get hurt... it's painful.
This is how some
people view God. People may not believe in God as a creator, but if there is a
God, they do believe that somewhere in the programme of creation, something has
gone wrong… Some might even add that God doesn’t seem interested in helping fix
the problem. It is important however to make a distinction between the
limitations in our understanding of life-as we-know-it, and the breadth of what
we believe God can do. So is our God still too small?
So who is the God that you believe
in? What
has led you to make the assumptions you have reached in your determination of
how God works? How do those assumptions limit what you believe or expect God to
do in his world? The Bible talks about God being King, and as his people, we
are his subjects… this needs some explaining.
In the UK, we
still have a monarchy that commissions an elected government. Many of us in the
UK believe that this is an effective system to prevent the domination of an
autocratic leader who has full authority to over-ride the will of others. We favour an
egalitarian ideal under a symbolic monarchy where political, economic, social
and civil
rights are equally accepted cornerstones to civilisation. We have the
democratic process so that in electing a member of parliament, we have been
involved in choosing someone to represent the wishes of the community. As
voters, we are charged with reading the manifesto of those that pledge to serve
our communities, and sign-up to the best fit.
Over time
however, we get disenfranchised by the promises of these political leaders and
demand change. When no political party can fulfil the needs of the people, we
either stop voting or we vote for the political party, rather than the person
standing to represent us. This is a common problem in the UK simply because
people have become apathetic towards the political system. People do not always feel
that their opinion has a voice. To put it more clearly, people distrust the
promise of the life-chances implied in the pledges that our political leaders
make; they fail to match-up to our reality. Don’t we sometimes view God and his
Son Jesus in similar ways?
In the UK, the
Queen has sovereignty in name only, representing the wishes of the state and
its people, yet wielding little power to make law. Those that see through this
arrangement would prefer a truly democratic presidential system and would
happily de-value the historicity of the Royal family, and relegate them as a
side-show to the main political agenda. The question to ask therefore is whether we believe
that God has sovereignty over our lives?
So when we hear
that God is King, we can reflect on the type of experience that we have of
knowing a king or queen in the country that we live. If we view God in the same
way, we will fail to understand God as our King. If we try to draw comparisons
and make judgements about God’s effectiveness as king, we might feel that he fall’s
short… where is God with all of this suffering going on in the world? If our perception of
earthly kings and queens is of a token monarchy, then we are in danger of
placing God on his throne with similar perceptions. We will have completely
misunderstood what having a King really means, and it may be why we might
question the relevance of God today.
If we believe that God as King is
sovereign, do we believe that the earth he created is his kingdom, and that he
sits on his throne where he is able to deliver justice? Do we believe that God has the
ultimate authority to make judgements about our lives? Are we simply subjects
to a heavenly king?
If we understand
that God is King, we will demonstrate this in our lives and the choices we want
to make… If I believe that God is King in my life, I would follow his
commandments and choose against breaking them. For example, if I know that the
King tells me to avoid lusting after another person because he has told me that
this type of behaviour is un-holy… then if I go ahead and break this rule, my
position dishonours the King whom I serve. It would signal to the King that I
reject his governance of my life and wish to choose to do my own thing. Are we
also like this with God?
If we can begin
to understand who God is as King of our lives, and accept that he needs to be
central to our faith, we can build our confidence in his justice over us, and
have the freedom to live out our lives within his grace and favour. God as King
reveals himself to us through Jesus. I have never met a King, neither have I
even set eyes on the Queen even though I was born in the UK and have lived here
for 42 years! Yet God as King chooses to reveal himself to me. If I was to meet
the Queen, she would expect me to show courtesy by bowing in her presence. As
her subject, I am obligated to recognise her moral authority over my life as
leader of the nation, and bow in her presence. How much more should I be doing for my
God and King?
In the Old
Testament, David knew how to respond when he met King Saul. Knowing Saul had
become jealous of his status as a defender of the people and one who was seen
to have been blessed by Yahweh, he would first bow to the king, then fall
prostrate on the floor in the dust at the feet of his leader. Our response to
God as King in our lives is a window into our hearts and minds as we approach
him. If we use the take-it-or-leave-it approach that UK citizens might have
regarding Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, then we will fail to understand how
blessed we are by God revealing himself to us. Our response should be to fall
prostrate before him… Would we even consider that?
I grew up in the
Anglican Church where it is familiar to kneel in prayer; a reflection of who
Jesus is as King… it’s amazing how quickly we are put off with all the getting
up and sitting down! I was an altar boy whose purpose was to serve the priest
in preparing the sacraments for the Eucharist… the point in the service where
we remember the significance of what Jesus did through his death and
resurrection.
I always feel a kind of quiet reverence in the sanctuary of these
types of churches due to a deep sense of respect in the tradition of the service
that takes place there; the numbers of people who have worshipped in that same
place over the centuries; and in remembering the sacrificial death of the king,
reflecting on my standing as I ponder his presence in the sanctuary, fills me
with wonder and awe.
The Anglican
Church floor-layout models that of details for the Tabernacle found in the Old Testament. In the
Tabernacle, there was an outer courtyard where people could enter to leave
their offering with the priest. There was an inner courtyard that only the
priest could enter, and within that, the Holy of Holies that stored the Ark of
the Covenant. A curtain divided people from the inner sanctuary and the
Holy-of-Holies that contained the Ark of the Covenant, to protect them from the
consequences of their and our sin: death
The Ark of the Covenant contained the treaty that held the law. The law set out the relationship between God the king and his people; Israel. The Law of God – the Ten Commandments, was written on tablets of stone, and given to Moses on the Mountain of Sinai. The Holy of Holies is the place that God dwelt in the Tabernacle, and is symbolized in the sanctuary of the Anglican church design. Jesus reign's as King through his death and resurrection, which we celebrate as we kneel before him at the altar rail. As we take communion, we receive freely, the gift of salvation... Hallelujah!
The Ark of the Covenant contained the treaty that held the law. The law set out the relationship between God the king and his people; Israel. The Law of God – the Ten Commandments, was written on tablets of stone, and given to Moses on the Mountain of Sinai. The Holy of Holies is the place that God dwelt in the Tabernacle, and is symbolized in the sanctuary of the Anglican church design. Jesus reign's as King through his death and resurrection, which we celebrate as we kneel before him at the altar rail. As we take communion, we receive freely, the gift of salvation... Hallelujah!
God was visible
to the people in their understanding of the Law, and by witnessing the acts of
God in the protection of his people. He had already rescued them out of the
slavery of Egypt; and he was about to give the people the land promised to
Abraham. If we go back a bit in history, God first promised the land to Abraham
for his faithful obedience to God. He promised him descendants as numerous as
the stars; and that he will be the father of a Holy nation and a Royal
priesthood. With the Ten Commandments, God tells Moses to instruct the people
in how they should enter this Promised Land as the descendants of Abraham and
as the people of God.
God honours his
promise as protector of the people for obedience in following the Law. The King
himself will protect the nation from all of its enemies, bringing peace to the
land, and all who follow him.
Let me say that
again: Moses instructs the people in how to worship God as King; and in response to
that, the King will honour the people by keeping his promise to Abraham. When
was the last time you considered a King honouring his subjects? In the UK, the
Queen honours people who have served the nation with a variety of medals of
honour such as the OBE or a knighthood. In Jesus we are not only honoured, but
are co-heirs through our faithful obedience in doing his will. However, Jesus came to
fulfil the law because the law in itself was not enough:
"Don't
misunderstand why I have come. I did not come to abolish the Law of Moses or
the writings of the prophets. No, I came to accomplish their purpose. I
tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not even the smallest
detail of God's law will disappear until its purpose is achieved. So if
you ignore the least commandment and teach others to do the same, you will be
called the least in the Kingdom of Heaven. But anyone who obeys God's laws and
teaches them will be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven.”(Matthew 5:
17)
Humanity is unable to keep the whole
law as is evident through the historical writings of the people of Israel. The
people simply kept forgetting that Yahweh was King; every time they forgot;
they broke the treaty between God and his people, so he was unable to protect
them from their enemies… This isn’t because God was negligent or unloving, but
because perfect love cannot allow sin to corrupt that which is pure. Parent’s
discipline their children in the same way today… they offer unconditional love
to their children knowing they will make mistakes. It’s how we deal with the
punishment and overcome these failures that define us.
As children, we accept our parent’s
correction because we know they want the best for us and that they are our
greatest supporters. God through his spirit gently reminds me of my sin because
he loves me and wants me to be rid of it! I am aware that he knows what is
harmful to me because it was God who wrote the law on the tablets of stone, and
it was God who instructed Moses on what the law should contain in the first
place!
The writer of 1 John 4:17 can say it
far better than I can:
And as we live in God, our love grows more
perfect. So we will not be afraid on the Day of Judgment, but we can face him
with confidence because we live like Jesus here in this world. Such love has no
fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of
punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love.
As we share in
the ‘Lords Supper’, we remember what God through his Son Jesus, has done for
each one of us. The High Priests in worshiping Yahweh in the Tabernacle at the
time of Moses, encountered God through making offerings to Yahweh as King. As
Christ is King, we now echo that worship with our very lives. We know that our
King Jesus became the ultimate and final sacrifice to end all other sacrifices
for our redemption, or to put it more simply, the payment of the ransom that
had been placed on my head as a result of my sin was paid by Jesus in full.
Jesus as King has
authority to dispense justice, and to pardon sin. He forgives us for the wrong
that we are accountable for because he paid for it by his own blood. By owning
up and confessing our sin, in repentance, we turn away from our selfish life to
become selfless for him. Only Jesus can remove the punishment associated with
that sin, by showing us his Grace and his favour. Isn’t that awesome!
But Christ has rescued us from the curse
pronounced by the law. When he was hung on the cross, he took upon himself the
curse for our wrongdoing. For it is written in the Scriptures, "Cursed is
everyone who is hung on a tree." (Galatians
3:13)
When we are
asking the question, where is God today, we need to be looking not at the world
and all of its problems, nor should we even make judgements about God for not
meeting our expectations. But rather, we should recognise that our feelings towards
God are tempered by our mistrust of who he is. God is powerfully and actively
at work in his world. I have seen it. Some cannot handle the truth about God
and squirm this way-and-that to avoid the gaze of the King. Yet in our rejection
of him, he is still reaching out. Some underestimate the power of our
supernatural God through the work of the Holy Spirit. This is his world; he
made it; and has made a covenant to bless it through Abraham. Some try to
rationalise their view of how God works through what they believe is possible,
perceiving God to be powerless today. We only need to look to Jesus to see the
untruth of these world views.
If we choose to
put other things in our lives in place of God, then we will not have a full
relationship with God as we tend to worship what we place our interests in. If
we live in-the-moment and crave the experiential, pursuing the feeling we get
from following after the next new ‘trend’, then we will never settle. We will
condition our minds and characters to only recognise contentment through short
term ‘fixes’ that have no depth or sense of purpose. When these transient things
fail, we can be so determined in our resolve to re-boot these experience’s that
we can lose our sense of our immediate reality because it is ‘kind-of boring’.
When things such
as our career or the pursuit of money or social standing distracts us from
serving the King, we develop a take-it-or leave-it mentality: “I’m not feeling
God right now”, “I’m not getting much out of the church services” or “I’m not
sure what direction my life is going in right now”, or “I’m still trying to understand
where God fits in to all of this…” we lose sight of the reality that God has
for us, in favour of our own sense of purpose; we forget the inheritance that
we will receive as co-heirs with Christ the King.
God is not at all
like this. He established 10 simple laws that help us set our moral compass to
ready… ready to do God’s will and not to follow the desire of our own heart. If
we recognise God at work in us, our ‘will’ will be reconciled to his, and we
will be one with God in both our sense of purpose and in our outlook.
The first law of
the King involves our worship of the one true God… the King of kings and Lord
of lords. If we have installed other ‘gods’ in our lives, then we need to learn
that as King, God wants to have ALL of us. If our God is indeed too
small in our world view, then we need to re-evaluate our perspective. The 10
commandments set out the covenant that God has made with us. They teach us how
God understands our nature, but more importantly how as King, he will make
judgements against us.
2 “I am the Lord your God who rescued you from the land of Egypt, the place of your
slavery.
3 “You must not have
any other god but me.
4 “You must not make
for yourself an idol of any kind or an image of anything in the heavens or on
the earth or in the sea. 5 You must not bow down to
them or worship them, for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God who will not tolerate your affection for
any other gods. I lay the sins of the parents upon their children; the entire
family is affected—even children in the third and fourth generations of those
who reject me. 6 But I lavish
unfailing love for a thousand generations on those who love me and obey my commands.
7 “You must not misuse
the name of the Lord your God. The Lord will not let you go unpunished if you misuse his name.
8 “Remember to observe
the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9 You have six days each week
for your ordinary work, 10 but the seventh day
is a Sabbath day of rest dedicated to the Lord your God. On that
day no one in your household may do any work. This includes you, your sons and
daughters, your male and female servants, your livestock, and any foreigners
living among you. 11 For in six days the Lord made the heavens, the earth, the sea, and everything in them; but
on the seventh day he rested. That is why the Lord blessed the Sabbath
day and set it apart as holy.
12 “Honour your father
and mother. Then you will live a long, full life in the land the Lord your God is giving you.
13 “You must not
murder.
14 “You must not commit
adultery.
15 “You must not steal.
16 “You must not testify falsely against your neighbour.
16 “You must not testify falsely against your neighbour.
17 “You
must not covet your neighbour’s house. You must not covet your neighbour’s
wife, male or female servant, ox or donkey, or anything else that belongs to
your neighbour.”
As Christian men
and women, we are held accountable to these laws so that we reveal the glory of
God to all of the nations and all of the people within them that would otherwise
reject God as King. If the world held to these 10 simple rules, then society
would be a different place. Advertising for example, depends completely on us
breaking the command in verse 17: “You must not covet your
neighbour’s house. You must not covet your neighbour’s wife, male or female
servant, ox or donkey, or anything else that belongs to your neighbour.” It’s because we covet new possessions and aspire to new experiences,
that some people develop a deep dissatisfaction with the world, and seek to
gain what they don’t have or can’t have through illicit means. Or maybe like me, who has two phone contracts because I wanted a particular design of handset, we stretch our resources, either financially, physically, socially, emotionally or spiritually further than we should.
It is our responsibility to seek the heart of God, as set out in
the earlier commandments: to worship him only; to have no idol’s in our lives
that takes our attention from God; to declare the name of God as Holy and to be
careful with our language; and to keep the Sabbath day Holy so that we can rest
and seek God in that time. Then we have the standards that govern our conduct
in life: Don’t disrespect you family; don’t murder or steal (murder steals a
life and robs people of their relationships born out of the fruit of the life
lived); do not take anything that doesn’t belong to you, be it a person’s wife
or their possession’s; and don’t even spend time dreaming about owning what
isn’t yours as this can corrupt your mind.
My grand-dad used
to have a barometer on his wall. It is a simple device for measuring
air-pressure. You could determine the weather pattern for the day based on the
part of the dial the pointer points to. The dial had been calibrated to
identify that high pressure can lead to clear skies and low pressure results in
cloud and rain. When you first look at the dial, it will read what the weather
‘used’ to be, rather than what it actually was that day. A good tap on the
glass would adjust the needle to the correct reading. You would then look
outside the window and check the reading with the weather you were experiencing.
It helped to confirm the information you had, so that you could take part in
that great British tradition, talking about the weather! More importantly, by
checking the weather, you could check whether you could go out in shorts, or whether
you need an umbrella.
When we have
become distant from what God intended for us… we might feel that God is absent
from us when in fact, it is us that has moved into the shallow water; out of
the depths of his love. Sometimes when we do an audit like this on our lives, we
can find that we’ve backed the wrong horse… we may have been certain of the
odds at one time or another, or even spread our bets to make certain that we
might get some winnings at least, but time can reveal that we never made the
correct bet in the first place.
I appeal to you today to turn about
and see the Christ for who he really is:
The people who walk in darkness will see a great light.
For those who live in a land of deep darkness, a light will shine.
You will enlarge the nation of Israel, and its people will rejoice.
They will rejoice before you as people rejoice at the harvest and
like warriors dividing the plunder. For you will break the yoke of their
slavery and lift the heavy burden from their shoulders. You will break the
oppressor’s rod, just as you did when you destroyed the army of Midian. The
boots of the warrior and the uniforms blood-stained by war will all be burned.
They will be fuel for the fire.
For a child is born to us, a son is given to us. The government
will rest on his shoulders. And he will be called: Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace. His government and its peace will
never end.
He will rule with fairness and justice from the throne of his
ancestor David for all eternity.
(Isaiah 9: 2-7)
Put King Jesus at
the centre of your life, and you will never be the same person again.
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