Pentecost: Acts 2.

The Story
So, Jesus is alive, ascended, triumphant, seated at the Father's right hand in Heaven.  He is the Victor.  What he came to do, he has done!  He has taken our sins.  He has defeated Satan, and death.  He has won the battle that means the Kingdom can and will be established.   We know that, from reading the stories of the resurrection appearances of Jesus.  

The next stage, living the Jesus life and spreading the Good news of the Kingdom, He has entrusted to those who have followed him for the past three years.  He has promised, “you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you shall be my witnesses...” (Acts 1. 8)  So the disciples do what Jesus. tells them to do: they wait.

And now, fifty days after the resurrection, ten days after Jesus was taken away in the clouds, it happens... as they wait and pray, together in an upstairs room somewhere in Jerusalem, they find themselves in the grip of something bigger than themselves, something supernatural... There's a sound like a wind, blowing from heaven, and filling the house they are praying.  The disciples didn't think in English, or even in Greek but in Aramaic or Hebrew.  They heard the sound like a mighty Ruach.  That's the wonderful Hebrew word  that can mean wind, breath and Spirit.  It's the word that is used right back in the beginning, in Genesis 1. 2.  They recognised that the Spirit of God was coming.  And they saw tongues that looked like fire resting on each of them. When God revealed himself to Moses, he “descended n fire” (Ex 19. 18) The they wanted to praise god – at the top of their voices! And the words that came out were not words they had learned;  and as they rushed out into the street, they realised that the people passing by understood: people from all over the Roman empire.  This God experience, the arrival of the promised Holy Spirit, breaks the boundaries, turns Galilean fishermen and Jewish freedom fighters into globe-trotting internationalists!  Amazing!

The point is that God has moved in.  They are breathing a different atmosphere.  There is fire in their souls that they can't keep in.  They are caught up in God's mission; they are seeing the Kingdom of God worked out in their lives. They are making connexions with people they had previously passed by as strangers.  When the spirit comes, eh transforms us.  He gives us a taste of God's Kingdom; he gives us power to engage in mission; he builds community, a sense of connectedness with one another and with people...

But not everyone agrees.  Some in the crowd wonder what it's all about.  Some have an easy answer – they're all drunk!   Always – for some people – this business of God moving in, is too freaky.  It's just weird stuff – evidence of something not quite right in the head... Some of us prefer the predictable.  An hour on Sunday morning; praise, a sermon, Communion.  Serious Bible study, all the bits of the theological jigsaw fitting together.  I was in St John's Primary School on Thursday, talking about the baptist church to the P3 class.  One of the children asked my how I feel when I am preaching: do I feel afraid or nervous?  Answer, “not really...”  because I have been preaching for over 35 years; actually probably over 40 years now.  It's OK.  When I was young my dad used to quote – probably from Ralph Waldo Emerson: “If a man can write a better book, preach a better sermon, or make a better mousetrap than his neighbour, though he build his house in the woods the world will make a beaten path to his door.” We believed good preaching attracted people to churches. My role as  a preacher fitted nicely with the expectation that God would send his Spirit, people would see God at work and get saved. I would love life to be that simple.  But life isn't that simple.   What if the Church no longer needs preaching?  I don't like the idea of ministry in a brave new world where the old certainties no longer work.  It's possible to pay lip-service to the Spirit while depending rather heavily on ones training, well-thought-out strategies, and human devices.  It's possible to look down on “simple faith”.  It's possible to dismiss the Spirit's gifts as just too freaky. 

Peter stands up, and answers all of that:  “These men are not drunk as you suppose...it's only 9 a.m. – the pubs aren't even open yet. This is what god promised...”   There is a healthy, wholesome logic to this. 

Point one. Peter quotes Joel, and Joel's message was focused on a plague of locusts that

Image by Christian Kooyman, in PD

destroyed the harvest. Joel warned of an invading army coming like locusts.  But then he says, "afterwards I will pour out my Spirit on all people ... even these foreigners."  There is an "afterwards": grace and renewal, God's kingdom will come and all nations will receive the Spirit.  And as Pentecost was a harvest festival, it's possible that Joel preached his message at Pentecost when the cupboard was bare.  So now Peter on the day of Pentecost, quotes Joel, to people who felt the cupboard was bare, who felt oppressed by an army of foreigners. There is an afterwards: God's grace, the kingdom comes and all nations receive the Spirit – all barriers of nationality, race, class, gender broken down as everyone receives God's gift.  Peter says that "afterwards" has arrived.  And it has arrived, through Jesus.

So, Pentecost was the fulfilment of prophecy.  It was the next stage in the coming of the kingdom; it was and is the experience that lifts us into the work of messiah, of Christ; it is the experience that makes us community and extends that community to be worldwide, and makes us fully human. It is the fulfilment of why you were made. 

Remember, this what God wants for every human being.  It is not weird.  It doesn’t' matter who yo are, or what you've done, or how you've messed up in your life: God made you in his own image; God made you to be spiritually alive, to have his breath in you.  God made you to receive his Spirit.

And  point two.  What Jesus did in his life, death and resurrection, makes that a possibility.   We can be right with God.  We can be new people.  We can receive the Spirit; we can have God living in our lives.  Because Jesus has won the victory of evil; because Jesus. has done what it takes to deal with the rubbish in our lives...This life, being fully human, welcoming God's spirit, is possible because of Jesus.   Peter was speaking in the city where, less than two months earlier, Jesus had been betrayed and executed.  The whole city had been part of that.  “God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.”  Jesus is central to all this – even if we have sneered and giggled about him, it is to him we must come....

What should we do?   This spirit-filled life is a desirable thing.  It's what we were made for.  It's God's promise to every believer.  It's not just for a special few.  And it’s not weird.  It's not optional, it's part of the package.  What are we to do, if we are not there, today? 

Peter says
1. Repent: “think differently afterwards” to have a change of mind.  Men and women who had shouted “Crucify him” needed to change how the thought about Jesus.  And they needed to change how they thought about the whole of life. 
2. Be baptised – a public, decisive step to declare that you belong to Jesus., and trust him to take the bad stuff out of your life; it's about the forgiveness of sins, knowing that God has dealt with the bad stuff. 
3. Receive.  It's a promise: you shall receive.  But that word “receive” is and active one, that suggests laying hold of something, grabbing it, being determined to have it.  It's not just about sitting waiting for the gift to fall into your lap.  Grasp it.

So how do we enter this Spirit-filled life?  We begin by changing our minds about Jesus.  We need to come to the place where we realise that he is God's son.   We need to determine that he is going to be in charge of our lives.  We publicly declare our commitment to Jesus. and our need of his forgiveness.  If you've never done business with Jesus, you need to start with that change of mind and that public act of trust in him..

If you have put your trust in Jesus. and you feel stuck, on this Holy Spirit question, you need to repent – to change your mind about who's in charge; God isn't interested in giving you an experience for your enjoyment.  You need to accept the forgiveness of your sins. Guilt – feeling unworthy – can make you wonder if God is going to give yo anything at all.  And you need to receive it, to take hold of it.  God wants to give you his Spirit.

© Gilmour Lilly May 2016

Acts 1.1-​11; (Matthew 28. 16-20)

Sunday after Ascension

"Go and make Disciples"

Luke alone describes an Ascension in Bethany (Judea); he is not concerned about the "direction of travel" -- he isn't saying heaven is" up there" -- but stresses the importance of a cutting-off point, a break, a change that prepares the way for the spirit to come. Michael Green observes that all the Gospels look towards a future mission. Matthew finishes his Gospel with an encounter that took place "on a mountain in Galilee"; but he reflects that same sense of a cutting off, the launch of a new stage for Jesus, enthroned as king; and the hand-over of his earthly work to his people.

The starting point: They worshipped but some...

So Jesus meets the Eleven, on a mountain in Galilee. Their response is to worship him. Plain and simple. Our response to the presence of the Risen Jesus, is to worship Him. But among the worshippers were some who were not quite with the rest of them. They were effectively divided between those who were able to worship with unrestrained joy, and those who weren't. They were divided. Not a great place to be starting. But that is the reality: maybe when we get together for worship, not all of us are able to join in with unrestrained joy.

Confusion: Some doubted.

They were unsure: ''in two minds." But is that not where some of us are at? We aren't too sure about things. Maybe not too sure about Jesus. Maybe not too sure about all this new stuff in church . Maybe unsure about the future,. as we all get older and maybe face things that are unpleasant & uncertain. I reckon the disciples were to some extent facing all these areas of doubt and uncertainty.

And there was another layer of confusion. At one point, they were all asking him, “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” There was confusion due to self-interest. Not a great place to be starting at all. You would expect Jesus to give them a slap! To say "Look -- it's me. You guys who are doubting are just a bunch of losers. To everyone else, all power has been given to me. Go and make disciples". Listen, it doesn't matter how much you have messed up or now messed up you feel. We start as worshippers. And it doesn't matter how messed up we are or feel, Jesus has his plan for us and invites us to be involved in what he is doing in his world!

Jesus speaks. All authority has been given to me.

Post Resurrection he is triumphant over death. Post ascension he is seated at the father's right hand, in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority. And God placed all things under his feet. (Eph 1. 20-22) He is the Victor. He has authority: The "right to act". The "right to command". The "right to expect obedience. "

He has authority to choose, touch, send, who he chooses. He is not limited by our failures. He has authority in the context of our inadequacy! And he exercises that authority "for the church" (Eph 1. 22f)

The Commission: "Go and make disciples"

1. go ... the need to get out of our comfort zone. Movement is one of the signs of life, that differentiates between living things and inanimate objects. Jesus says "Go!" How far are we to go? As far as it takes! God is interested in all nations. The very place where Jesus said this was what Isaiah called Galilee of the Gentiles". (cf Matt 4v15f, lsa 9v2) where Jesus shines his light and meets his followers. The same Greek word (ἐθνῶν) means both "Gentiles" and "Nations" .That means all races, classes and attitudes of people, even the ones we think aren't worth bothering about.. God is not just interested in people like us! And all nations -- all races and classes of people -- have the potential to become "Disciples"

We need to"move"towards the lost: to recover the" go" of mission. We "go as a sending church and a giving church -- in our relationships with Andrew & Mania or Peter & Silje; and as a giving Church to compassion or Food Bank. We can all "go" by

• going out of our way to spend time with family members who don't know Jesus
• going to ask a neighbour in for a cup of tea
• going to the shops, or to school, or work, looking out for someone you can bless
• Going to a club that's not part of Church.

2. and make disciples... Discipleship,not just "conversions" is the outcome of mission. Changing the world through changed lives.' not just getting people to make "decisions".

• Baptising them in the Name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Discipleship begins decisively, with a step of commitment and encounter with The Three-in-One God. This mystery is who God is! The new disciple begins with an encounter with the Triune (implying some knowledge but not necessarily understanding)
• Teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. Disciple-making is an irreplaceable core task of the and needs to be structured into every church's basic formula. (Alan Hirsch, "the forgotten ways" p 24) The mission principles of Matthew 10 still apply (as does the sermon on the Mount!).

To make disciples means we have to be disciples. Another of these signs of life is reproduction: and when we reproduce we pass on our genes: the stuff that makes us what we are. We can only "Make disciples" -- people who are leaning to live as Jesus lived --if we are people who are leaning to live as Jesus lived.

Jesus promises his presence: I am with you always. ...

Jesus promises that his authoritative Person, will be with them by the Power of the Holy Spirit... cf .Luke 24:49 "I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high"; Acts 1. 4- "wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. For John baptised with water, but in a few days you will be baptised with the Holy Spirit...you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."

© Gilmour lilly May 2016

Ephesians 4

Ephesians 4

We have been looking at what it means to be “Easter people”. Easter People are those who are are together encountering Jesus. We are people who in that encounter are moved from confusion, fear, and uncertainty, to peace, the power of the Spirit and to engage in God's mission. I want to look again at what the Risen Jesus wants to do in us by his Spirit, with a look at Ephesians 4.

It is difficult to tell the story of the letter to the Ephesians: Romans has a historical setting: Paul was planning to visit Rome; But there’s no such story for Ephesians: rather we have to try and imagine the kind of conversation that Ephesians is part of. And I can kind of imagine a conversation like this: “Paul, remind us about Jesus; tell us how Jesus affects our lives today, what difference he makes here in Ephesus.”

So Paul writes back, with two aims in mind: Firstly, to strengthen their commitment to the truth about Jesus, and secondly, to stir them to action that is consistent with what they believe. He will answer the question and fire back another question: “What are you going to do about it?”

Maybe there were specific questions: “Where is Jesus?” Seated at the Father’s right hand in glory! Gods power to us is the same as the power he used to raise Jesus from the dead! In Mph 1.19 Paul refers to Gods hyperbolical - extreme - power towards us who believe. Four different "powers" in this verse...dynamis, energies, Kratos, lschos.” Paul piles word upon word to show how extreme and pwoerful God's power is. Andrew Lincoln says that the point is not the difference but  the similarity between these words. In v 20 - which he energised (accomplished seems a weak translation) when he raised Jesus from the dead and seated him at his right hand...   The extent of the power is seen the resurrection of Jesus. Paul, it seems, is not too much bothered about the "gap" between the resurrection and The ascension. For him, what matters is that the Risen Jesus is exalted at the Father's right hand, and has everything under his feet.

“Where is Jesus?” Seated at the Father’s right hand in glory! Hallelujah! All things are under Jesus feet, he is head over all things for the church which is his body... So the So Paul is pressing on from the truth about Jesus, to the practise of life together in him.. The Church, the ekklesia: Paul mentions it 9 times in Ephesians. It's Christ's body (1. 22f); it's there to show God's wisdom and carry Jesus' glory (3. 10, 21); It's Jesus' bride, his girl, under his authority (5. 23f); object of his love (5. 25), focus of his plan (5. 27) and his care (5. 29). Being the Church – the real Church, alive, beautiful, glorious, united, global – is part of what it means to be Easter people.

And I believe that as Christians in Rosyth, as a Church in Rosyth, part of the outworking of what it means to be Easter people, is to be a local expression of that global reality – alive, beautiful glorious, united. The Vision of Jesus is in no sense to build a building or even an institution: it is to build a COMMUNITY! - It is "organic". It is about a "body" in a living connexion with the Head! (Eph 1:22). Throughout Ephesians Paul uses the language of the organic. "Joined"". "bodily growth" ...joints and ligaments.... So Paul teaches about Christian living- growing up into Christ...

“Where is Jesus?” Seated at the Father’s right hand in glory! He descended to the lowest parts of the earth – and has now ascended far above all. From there he has poured out his gifts. (verse 8-11) The gifts God gives to men, come from the risen and ascended Jesus. Paul quotes Ps 68. 18 which was a Pentecost psalm; so he links the exaltation and victory fo Jesus with the coming of the spirit. There is in the Bible a direct time-line, a direct link of cause and effect, running from the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, through the ascension to the coming of the Spirit and receiving his gifts.

The NIV gives a good translation of 4. 11 is “Christ himself gave the Apostles the  prophets,  the Evangelists, the Pastors and Teachers.” 

Does that mean that the rest of us are none of the above, but maybe hewers of wood and drawers of water? That is the trouble with the traditional interpretation of this passage: it identifies a select list of people with “ministry gifts” – one (or more) of which became redundant shortly after the letter was written – while the rest of us just get on and use our ordinary gifts?

There is a strong connexion between what this passage says about gifts and Romans 12. and 1 Cor 12 The language used is very similar. Unity and diversity in the Church are shared themes of all three passages. To each grace was given (v. 7) The idea of a group of people who are "God's gift to the Church", called to equip the saints and do the work of ministry makes sense if Ephesians was written by someone else a generation after Paul, when the church was beginning to fossilize into an"institution" with a structured hierarchy. But it doesn't make sense if the letter was written by Paul or someone close to Paul - who had (as Jesus did) a vision of a "flat", non-hierarchical structure in an organic church. Apostates, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers are expressions of the grace we are all given. God's gift to the church: but not necessarily office-holders or leaders. So, YOU can build up the body.

Do you have an orientation towards mission? You want to keep bringing us back to this: there's a world out there that needs Jesus; how can we reach the unreached, unchurched? I'm not talking about being an apostle like Paul or Peter. I'm talking about a heart for new ground among the lost.

Do you have a passion to speak out God's word? A heart to know what God is saying to us today, a conviction that God speaks, applies his eternal truth, specifically to each generation.

Do you have a passion to share the good news? Do you have a burning desire to be part of a Church where everyone can articulate what the Good news is, and is irrepressible about sharing that Good news?

Do you have a passion for the sheep? Do you long to see people cared for, led clear of the pitfalls, healed in their times of brokenness, and growing safely into the image of Jesus?

Do you have a heart for teaching? Do have a desire to wrestle with, and to see people knowing and applying the teachings of Scripture?

And the big purpose “to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up”. To understand verses 9 onwards, we need the first part of the chapter. Paul is talking about “living a life worthy of our calling, with humility, patience, bearing with one another, love unity and peace.” It's about how we live our lives.

So the gifts are given so that we can be enabled to live holy lives and to be united. They are about life-change!  And that – holy living, effective mission, spiritual power – is what it means to be an Easter people. That kind of Church life, that kind of mission, that kind of anointing and gifting is the direct result on earth, of the resurrection, exaltation, and victory of Jesus.

© Gilmour Lilly February 2016

John 20. 19-23

Easter 2 - More on encountering the Risen Jesus
Last week we looked at the puzzle at the end of mark's Gospel, and learned that it is in encountering Jesus that we are set free from confusion, fear and uncertainty. Being Easter people, believing in the Resurrection means encountering Jesus today.  And it means being transformed by that encounter.  We are going to look at one of these encounters this morning.  We will try to learn how an encounter with Jesus will transform our lives.

1. Community... They were together (verse 19).  Behind closed doors, but all in the one place.  Jesus loves to reveal himself to us. He reveals himself to us when we are on our own, but he loves to reveal himself to us when we are together (See John 21. 2) to pour out his Spirit when we are together (See Acts 2. 1, 4 24ff), united in prayer, and to join us ever closer by giving us his spirit (Acts 2. 44).

2. Evidence... We see his hands and side (verse 20).  This is not a ghost.  This is the real Jesus, the lamb of God, different yet the same, bearing the wounds of crucifixion, yet fully alive!  A physical body yet able to pass through walls.   Jesus gives evidence that he is really alive, that it is really him, and that God cares about the physical world.

3. Peace... (verse 19, 21) “Shalom” is Jesus' response to their confusion, fear and uncertainty. Our English word peace is more about the absence of conflict.   “Shalom” is bigger than than that. It is about total well-being.  On the Cross he said “it is finished!”, so now he is able to say “Shalom!” and really to impart peace.    Jesus is our peace, so his creative word bestows peace.  We need to hear the word of God, and to receive what he wants to bestow on us  through his word.  What he speaks about, he speaks into our lives.  Shalom.  Total well-being. And shalom is the springboard for mission.  

4. Mission...(verse 21) As the Father has sent me so I am sending you.  How does the Father send us?

• It starts with God.  Not a double mission but an extension of the mission of Jesus.  “One single action, the great movement of the missionary heart of God.”(Milne)  
• it is incarnational.  Jesus was sent physically.  The word became flesh.  As the Father has sent me, so I am sending you.  We are sent incarnationally.  Not just to talk about Jesus as a nice person or a good idea.  But to demonstrate the father’s love and to introduce Jesus as a  real person. 
• It combines submission and authority.  Matthew 28.  18-20 tells us “All authority is given to me..therefore go...” As his messengers we have the authority and dignity of the One who sent us.  But in order to exercise that authority we must live in full submission to him.  The authority to ask “in my Name” (John 16. 23f) is for those who remain joined to Jesus and bear fruit (John 15. 5-8) 
• It is sacrificial.  For Jesus, it was the sacrifice of the cross.  It was being despised and rejected.  In being lifted up form the earth on the cross, people were drawn to him.  We all want to be respected; we all dislike being looked upon as idiots for what we believe.  Now, sometimes we are idiots.  We talk in archaic language and expect people to understand it.  We live in our little religious ghetto that is designed for us, and complain because nobody else wants to come in and join us.  We need to do the best we can in terms of communication, and in terms of understanding and responding to what is going on out there in society.  But once we have sorted that out, we will still find that we are looked on as idiots.   We will still be called narrow-minded, bigoted, out-dated, superstitious. 
  

5. Holy Spirit...(verse 2,2)  Mission is a call to the impossible!  But Jesus breathed on his disciples and said “Receive Holy Spirit!”   Who is the Holy Spirit and what does he come to do in our lives?  Jesus gives an object lesson. The Holy Spirit is breathed into the disciples, just as the breadth of God was breathed into man at the creation.

• The Father's work.  The coming of the Spirit is the beginning of the New creation.  “The ruach – wind, Spirit or breath – of God was moving on the face of the deep” Genesis 1. 2.  In breathing the Spirit into them, Jesus was saying that a new beginning was happening, as the the Spirit comes from the Father to make a new creation.  
• The Son's Presence  In breathing on the disciples "Jesus communicates and commits himself to the disciples" (Wm. Temple). When the Spirit comes, Jesus comes! 
• The Spirit's power.  Alive, pulsing with the life of his resurrected humanity, vibrant with his God-life –he breathes on them.  His life, his God-life, imparted to them,breathed into their lungs, entering their bloodstream, energising every muscle in their bodies and every synapse in their brains. That's what the Holy Spirit comes to do.  To distinguish between what happens here and what happens in Acts 2,  is to miss the point. The Holy Spirit wants to fill our lungs and energise of lives.  If you are not experiencing that respiratory work of the Spirit in the whole of your being, then be assured that is what he wants to do. You need to have Jesus breathe upon you afresh and receive Holy Spirit afresh today.
  

6. Grace... (verse  23)  Jesus says “If you forgive anyone’s sins, their sins are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.”  It's tempting to tie that in with mission: those to whom we preach the Gospel are those to whom we give forgiveness. Yes, to withhold the Gospel is to withhold divine forgiveness.  But this ministry is a Holy Spirit ministry, and it is a ministry "given to the body” (William Temple).  The whole of life is about forgiveness and grace – in our dealing with one another as well as in our mission in the world.  Loving one another is not a distraction from mission – it is the essential preparation for mission.  The Spirit comes to make us grace givers.  

"Jesus vision is not of a multitude of inspired individuals" but "a community bound together by...the Spirit, sent forth to gather his 'other sheep'"(Milne)

© Gilmour Lilly April 2016

Mark 16:

So the three women found the stone rolled away from the tomb, met an angel who told them Jesus had risen, and that they were to tell his friends to go to Galilee where they would meet him.  The women ran off in panic and said nothing to anyone – because they were afraid. 

Isn't that a strange way to end a “Gospel”?    After all, a “gospel” is not just a biography: it is “good News” written so that people may believe.  There are four possibilities...

1. Mark didn't know, or wasn't bothered, about what happened next.   That is highly unlikely. Mark gives us a bit of a spoiler in v. 7: “But go, tell his disciples and Peter, “He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.”  There's obviously something else to follow.  Mark had spent time with Peter (we think Peter told the story to Mark and Mark wrote it down) and with Paul.  Peter knew the story and paul was clear hom important that story was (1 C0r 15.1)  So Mark's Gospel needs what the other Gospels have – the actual meeting with Jesus promised in verse 7.
2. Mark wrote more but what he wrote has been lost, perhaps torn off the end of the scroll.  I don't believe that answer either: the first thing you would do if you knew the last page of the book had been damaged, would be to re-write it from memory.
3. Mark wrote the next section that we call verses 9-20.   There is in the AV and in small print in many other Bibles, a “Longer ending” to the Gospel.  It is a good ending in its way – but it's not Mark's original ending. One old manuscript names an author, an elder called Antipas.  I believe it was written by someone – to sum up what the different Gospels say about the resurrection – and then used to fill the obvious gap. Because there is an obvious gap.
4. Mark was prevented from finishing the work fully: wither by sudden death, murder, arrest and imprisonment.  Maybe he was getting the story from Peter, stopped for a break, and Peter was arrested.   That requires a wee bit of imagination. 

There are problems with every possibility suggested. Whatever the reason,  I believe Mark wanted to write more but was prevented for some reason.   And I believe that the ending we have in our footnotes, although not from Mark, is “Scripture”. 

Mark, then, as it stands,  tells a story that ends – yes, ends – with confusion, fear, and uncertainty, and with an uneasy silence about the whole resurrection message.... He knows it has happened. He has heard that from Peter.  He knows it is important – he has learned that from Paul.  But he also knows about doubt and fear.... he has been there.  So it's OK to take a break, stop for the night, have a meal, with the words “For they were afraid” freshly written on the page.  It's OK to pause there and recognise the reality of “Confusion,  Fear, Uncertainty”. These are as much part of an honest telling of the Resurrection story, as are victory, joy, and hope. 

Mark knew it.  He may well have been the young man who ran away naked, leaving his cloak in the hands of the soldier who made a grab at him, in the Garden of Gethsemane.  He certainly ran away again, later, when the going got tough in Pamphylia (Acts 13. 13).

Peter knew it.  Mark records that the angel said to the women “Go and tell my disciples – and Peter...”  Peter had failed so badly by denying Jesus, that he only felt fit to be a fisherman, not a disciple.  He knew about uncertainty, fear, and confusion.  

The Gospel writers all admit the first witnesses to the resurrection didn't believe their eyes and the first people to hear the report didn't believe what they were hearing!  John tells us about Mary crying in the garden, and then he tells us about Thomas.  Matthew tells us the women were “Afraid yet filled with joy”, and that even after meeting with Jesus “”Some doubted”.  Luke tells us the women’s “words seemed to them like nonsense and gives us the story of the two on the road to Emmaus. 

We are like that too. “Confusion,  Fear, Uncertainty”  all too often reflects where the Church is at – resurrection or not.  We are afraid: afraid of being too supernatural; afraid for our reputation; afraid of the future; afraid of change; afraid of our culture.   We are confused: we hear voices questioning what we believe.  Are we sure we believe it? How do we answer?  What does this resurrection imply in our lives?  We want certainty, but “faith is the evidence of things unseen....”  And all so often, our uncertainty, our fear, our confusion, mean we don't feel able to talk about what is really important.  We are silent about the resurrection, about the supernatural, about the power of Jesus to change lives today.   We fail.  We let Jesus down.  Or am I the only one?

I believe we need to face the uncertainty, to face the mess inside. It's OK, with Mark, to pause, to put the pen down and reflect, at this point of failure and uncertainty.  Someone very wisely said during Holy Week “You have to mourn to celebrate!”   I don't believe in “re-enacting” the death and resurrection – but I do believe it is hugely helpful to be able to pause, reflect on the two sides to the Passion-tide coin – the death of Christ for our sins and his resurrection – and to “Experience Easter” on the back of having solemnly remembered – called to mind – the suffering of Christ for us. 

And you have to mourn your own sin and failure, to celebrate fully the victory and power of Jesus. 

But you have to move on from there.  Just as it is a mystery why Mark left his Gospel unfinished, is really is a mystery  why we get stuck in our confusion, fear and uncertainty. There are lots of possible answers to do with hurt, lack of knowledge, deliberate disobedience, enemy attack and the fallen state of the world.    How can we get out of that place?

Mark gives the spoiler in verse 7.  The disciples were meant to meet up with Jesus in Galilee.  Antipas's (if that was who wrote verses 9-20) summary of the resurrection appearances points us to the other Gospels, and they are united in this:  it was in meeting with Jesus, in encountering Jesus, that confidence, hope, joy and victory replaced  uncertainty, fear, and confusion.  It was in meeting with Jesus – and in the coming of his Spirit – that John and Peter and Mark and Paul. were transformed.  It was in meeting Jesus that the disciples became a movement, a community, something life-changing. 

 And it is in meeting Jesus, in an encounter with Jesus and a touch from his holy Spirit (which is an encounter with Jesus!) that we are set free from  uncertainty, fear, and confusion today.  We need to seek that encounter at the Lord’s table, in the word, in prayer including silent waiting on God, and in praise and worship.  

Someone recently said “Resurrection is the Christian term for defiance”.  Resurrection was the way Jesus defied death.  Imagine death as a great big hand: all of that hand held Jesus – physically, emotionally, spiritually Jesus as in the grip of death.  But Jesus showed he is bigger, stronger than death itself.  “Death could not keep his prey. He tore the bars away!”  In his resurrection Jesus defied all the powers, political and religious – that had opposed him.

Because of the resurrection, we can be victorious over our sins, over our habits, over our fears.  Because of the resurrection, we can defy the powers that say “the church is finished!”   We can defy the sneering intellectualism that says “there is no god, man is the master of all things, glory to man in the highest.” ut that comes not just from knowign about the resurrection. It come as we meet Jesus.  We need to encounter him today.  

We need to do what Mark clearly intended to do.  We need to return to the narrative, where we are in confusion, fear, uncertainty, pick up the pen,  and write up the truth of our encounter with Jesus. 

© Gilmour Lilly April 2016

 

John 12. 1-19: Palm Sunday

In John's telling of the story, Palm Sunday begins with a dinner the night before. (Verses 1-11).  Just a couple of miles from Jerusalem, in the village called Bethany, six days before the Passover, Jesus turned up.  And some people put on a dinner in his honour.  (Probably a guy called Simon the Leper – who obviously had his owns story to tell – it seems that Matthew 26 and Mark 14 are telling the same story).  Bethany was significant as the place where the Lazarus family lived: Martha, the one who got things done, Mary, the thinker, and Lazarus whom Jesus had raised from the dead. 

And in the more intimate setting of a dinner, what people were comes to the surface.  Lazarus, Mary, Martha, Simon the Leper, Judas, Jesus.  We need to meet closely with people, to be real with them, in order to grow.  We need the small group as well as the larger one.

Jesus loves a good meal with friends – time to share food and relax, celebrate, laugh, talk deeply.  In fact his public ministry had started at a dinner – a wedding feast at which he had turned water into wine – the “First Sign” in John's Gospel.  That was a joyful celebration.

And even ahead of then, before Jesus had started his public work, out in the desert, Satan had tempted him... about food:  “Turn these stones into bread if you are the Son of God”.  The temptation in a fairly poor, rural environment, to provide bread for the hungry, was about being a popular, cheap-grace Messiah who could buy his way into people's hearts and then whip them up into a mob that would proclaim him king (rather in the way Donald Trump is taking America by storm by capitalising on people's frustrations today). That was the danger Jesus faced when he fed the five thousand and probably why he took time, with his disciples away from the situation, to send the crowd away.  Once when the disciples urged Jesus to have something to eat, he answered “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.”  (John 4. 34)

So when Jesus turned up at Bethany,  he was after the real food – doing the Father’s will.  Not getting a  quick fix.  Not pulling a crowd; but being in the centre of Father’s will.  He knew about the dangers. He knew people were plotting against him. But he was there, doing the father's will.  His mind was clearly settled on this. As a  result, this meal was a bit more quiet, reflective and thoughtful.  The passover was coming. Everyone was getting into the frame of mind of mind for a solemn religious feast; and people could see the clouds gathering,  could sense the danger for Jesus.

And at the dinner were Martha, serving as she always seemed to do.  And Lazarus himself.  Just by being there alive, he pointed to Jesus being the Messiah.  (That was why some of the powers that be were out to kill not only Jesus but Lazarus as well!)   It was in the practical things – wine at a wedding, food for hungry crowds, healing the sick and raising the dead, that Jesus the King, demonstrated what his Kingdom was going to be like and showed himself to be the King.  

So, at the end of his earthly ministry they put on a dinner in his honour – friends, people who had reason to thank him for his ministry.   Marys and Marthas and Lazaruses and Simons:  those whose lives had been changed by his teaching; people whose lives had been changed by the power of God at work in him. They could all recognise him as Messiah, Son of God. 

And Mary came and did her bit, too: that involved a bottle of perfume, Nard, from a plant that grows in the Himalayas, worth a year's wages.  This wasn’t' something Mary had picked up cheap from the Avon lady!  Judas starts to get picky and say “What a waste – all that money could have gone to the poor” (as he looked after Jesus' poor relief fund it would have gone to him). So Jesus said that in advance, Mary had anointed him for his burial.  And in anointing him for his burial, she was in a way anointing him as victorious King. 

She may not have fully understood all of this; she simply wanted to say “thank you” – but Jesus says “it was intended” by God.  Sometimes our actions have bigger, deeper significance, than we are aware of.  We want to say “thank you” but how we say it does something in the heavenlies.  

So much comes together here, at this meal: Jesus' sense of purpose and surrender.  His identity as Lord, God and Messiah; his Kingship and the Kingdom he came to bring; and his sufferings as the pathway to glory.  The King is going to be enthroned. The Son is going to be glorified....   It's all been said, quietly, reverently at the dinner table.  The anointing at Bethany expresses the royal dignity of Jesus in preparation for his triumphal entry. It is as king that he enters (not merely a pretender).    John knows that Jesus, at a meal, with friends, is anointed King.

So the next day, the King, anointed as David was by Samuel, steps out, heads for Jerusalem – and is immediately recognised by the crowds.  It's Jesus, the miracle worker; the guy who raises the dead.  Jerusalem was full of people.  There could have been up to two million people in the city at Passover.  They grabbed palm branches – which were symbols of the Jewish nation – and began waving them like flags – exactly like flags.  The begin to sing and shout “Hosanna –  O God, save!  Blessed is he who comes I the name of the Lord”  They were quoting from Psalm 118. 25-27.  For many of them is was just a reminder of their history and a hope of a King who would set them free from the Romans.  But the Psalm is about a person who struggles and is victorious over death itself.  Good words for Jesus, who came to bring a Kingdom that was bigger the the Jewish nation, that was for the nations; Good words for Jesus whose Kingdom was going to triumph through is humiliation and death.   Good words for Jesus who would be able to say “The Lord has chastened me severely, but he has not given me over to death. (Ps 118. 18)

Jesus fulfils the OT promises.  HE knows he is heading from his anointign to his coronation...  he is going to be glorified. 

For John, what happens on the road into Jerusalem is the public celebration of what had already been sealed in the house in Bethany.  So John misses out some for the detail that the synoptic gospels describe.  Instead he talks about the way the disciples (himself included) didn't get it at that point. After he has been glorified, the disciples will understand. Describing things after the event, John talks about Jesus being glorified.  He knows that glory is where all this difficult path leads to.  Palm Sunday brings together Jesus' surrender and suffering; his divinity , Kingship and Kingdom; his suffering and his glory.

At the end of the story, as at the end of the anointing story, John reminds us of Lazarus, the living evidence of who Jesus is.  The Lazarus story is spreading around the city, even as the Pharisees, the priests and powerful people are plotting to get rid of Jesus.  It looks like they can't win.   The Pharisees say to one another “See, this is getting us nowhere. Look how the whole world has gone after him!”  John, with the benefit of hindsight, drops that in.  Palm Sunday, the last supper, the cross, are going to lead to glory.  People are going to be drawn to Jesus.  Lifted up from the earth, people from every nation are going to be drawn to him.  The enemy can’t win.  He is defeated.  Jesus is the victor.  He is glorified.  He becomes King through this process of emptying himself, dying on a cross and rising again.  Golgotha is his Westminster Abbey.  Holy Week is his coronation. 

And John, in the context of a suffering church,  drops that in. After the resurrection and yet living through the struggles of the early Church,  Jesus is the victor.  The enemy can't win. 

And still the Church goes through its struggles, makes its mistakes; it loses the heart of the Western world, (church attendance n Scotland fell by 13.5% in the last decade: half a million people gave up on church); it experiences persecution (More people were martyred for their faith in the twentieth century than in any other century since the Church began.  The figure is 200 million.)  But like  John, we need to say “The enemy can't win.  He is defeated. Jesus is the victor.”  

© Gilmour Lilly March 2016

Love won another

Leviticus 19. 17-18, 33-34; John 13. 31-38

We have been thinking about our love for God – in response to the majesty of who he is, and to God's love for us. We finished last time by realising that to respond with love to God, always involves loving people as well. We are going to look a bit closer at that today.

So we can sum up the commands in two: Love the Lord with heart, soul and strength (Deut 6. 4-5); and love your neighbour as yourself (Leviticus 19. 17-18). Neighbour in Leviticus is a wide-ranging word. “All our duties to our fellow men summed up in these words. Jesus and Paul agree about that. (Matt 22.39f Rom 13.9)

But then, Leviticus (chapter 19 verses 33-34) goes on to say “The foreigner living among you must be treated as one born among you. Love him as yourself”. The foreigner or stranger is the person who is travelling through, the person who has just arrived, the person who has no rights. And God's word says “Love his as yourself; love him the same as any other neighbour.”

William Temple says, “My neighbour is anyone with whom I have anything at all to do even by accident and even though he's the kind of person that I naturally hate or despise”.

And both neighbour and stranger, we are to love as ourselves. That is something we struggle with.

Some of us – self included – are not very brilliant at loving ourselves. We are taught to be “Self-effacing, self-denying” But I believe the Lord wants us to have proper sense of love for ourselves. Talking about marriage and Jesus' love for us, Paul says “no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church...” Eph 5. 29

I think we would all agree that self-harming is a symptom of something being wrong. Substance abuse, self mutilation (cutting, hair-pulling), eating disorders, and habitual overwork are all forms of self-harm. As Bible-believing Christians we tend to be more down on alcoholics than workaholics, so we need to be consistent. God doesn't want us to be self-harming. He wants us to live emotionally healthy lives, loving ourselves in the right way. The markers of love are:

• Esteem, and we need a right self-esteem. Secular psychotherapy says “You have to big people up. There are no moral absolutes. Nobody's a sinner: that's bad for your self-esteem.” But Christianity says “Jesus loves me and died for me: that's good for my self-esteem!”
• Enjoyment. Not to enjoy our own company so much we don't mix with other people, or to admire ourselves in the mirror for hours. But to enjoy being the people God made us to be.
• Extravagance. Perhaps that's not quite the right word for ourselves: it's not all about spending on ourselves, treating ourselves. But we need to be able to be kind to ourselves. We need to be able to receive.
• Expectancy. We need to believe in ourselves; to have goals,targets, an aim in life. That doesn't need to be crazy, unrealistic stuff or materialistic ambition; but we need to aim to be the best we can be, and to make the best of each day's opportunities and to be a blessing to other people. That rescues “Self-love” from being simply an exercise in self indulgence.

And loving my neighbour as myself means “I am to care as much of his interest as for my own.” (William Temple) That means loving our neighbours with esteem: we value something in their lives; with enjoyment (we learn to enjoy being with people); with extravagance and generosity; and with expectancy as we believe that whoever they are they can grow and develop and find faith in Jesus. We need to treat ourselves, our neighbours and our natural enemies with equal love.

In John, Jesus gives us a “New Commandment!”: “Love one another as I have loved you!”

This is what Archbishop Ussher called the eleventh commandment. It adds something to “Love your neighbour as yourself”. What is new about the “New Commandment”?

To answer that, let's note where and when Jesus said these words: in the upper room, after washing the disciples' feet and breaking bread with them. And before he goes on to talk about the future: the long-term hope of heaven “Do not let your hearts be troubled” (John 14. 1) the coming of the Spirit (John 14. 16) the call to fruitful service (John 15)

• It sets a new standard. It takes us way beyond “love your neighbour as yourself. Jesus says this after he washes the disciples feet, and says “You must wash the feet of one another. He says it after he takes bread and says, “This is my body, broken for you.” “As I have loved you” means “to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” (John 15. 13). That is a tough call. Where the Esteem disappears and the enjoyment cools, love continues to be extravagant, sacrificial. It takes us back to loving with all our strength.
• It needs s new power. William Temple says this new commandment is “The impossible thing. [Jesus] himself will make it possible but till then it is not possible.” Jesus promises the Holy Spirit to come and live inside his people. We need the Spirit's power to love as Christ loved us.
• It is based on a new covenant. The commandment is new because it is the law of the new covenant which Jesus is to establish to his death.
• It is for a new people. The new commandment is for the messianic community living between the advents of the Messiah.
• It is based on a new relationship with Jesus. In John 15. 10-12, Jesus says “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love... My command is this: love each other as I have loved you.”

The other thing “ new” thing troubles some people: it seems to have narrowed the focus down to “Love one another.” Is Jesus telling us to become a big, “holy huddle” when he tells us to “Love one another”? The answer is “No!”, a great big “No!” for a number of reasons.

Firstly, Leviticus – and Jesus – say “Love your neighbour as yourself.” And when a clever-clogs asked Jesus “Who is my neighbour” Jesus told a story about an outsider – a Samaritan – who showed love when cream of the insiders – priests and Levites – failed to do so. (Luke 10. 25-37) God's heart is always for the outsiders. Remember, “love your neighbour as yourself – even if he is a stranger.

Secondly, Jesus says “Everyone will know you are my disciples if you love one another.” How does that work?

• Loving one another makes the Church a wee, working model of the Trinity. We keep Christ's commands and love one another as Jesus keeps the Father's commands and loves the Father. What a wonderful privilege to be involved in the things of god!
• Loving community proves that the Good news of Jesus has changed our lives. Francis Schaeffer calls love “The final apologetic.” In the second century the pagans said "behold how these Christians love each other! How ready they are to die for each other. "
• To love like Jesus is to love inclusively indiscriminately and universally. Jesus loved us sacrificially, so the point of dying for us, before we were his people. So we need to love people, before they are our brothers in Christ.
• As we learn to love one another – with Esteem, enjoyment, extravagance and expectation, we gain the skill to love or neighbours – even if they are strangers, with Esteem, Enjoyment, Extravagance and Expectancy.

Jesus doesn't want us to love one another like a holy huddle. He wants us to love one another as a springboard to loving service that can win other people to him. Mother Teresa had a prayer as she ministered to the destitute and dying in Calcutta: “Jesus, my patient, how sweet it is to serve you.”

© Gilmour Lilly March 2016