James 5. 7-20

James insists that Real Faith gets to work and affects real-life issues like money, poverty, social justice, how we speak to each other, handling conflict, dealing with persecution...It's intensely practical, and apparently, not very religious... except that James doesn't recognize the difference between a "religious" part of life, and the other part.  And in fact, neither do we.  I mean, if Jesus isn't in charge of the "ordinary" bits of life, you can be pretty certain he's not really in charge of the religious bits either. Real faith radicalizes both "everyday life" and "religious life"!   Now he finishes off as he starts with his concern for survival in the faith. Real faith, that tugs and pushes how we relate to the real world, also impinges on how we "do religion..."

The Coming Kingdom ...
James speaks to the poor (the mainstay of the New Testament Church!) and says, "Be patient - hang in until Jesus comes back."  Our hope is beyond history. It is about when Jesus comes back to judge the world.  This is what we wait for. We are living in the anticipation of Jesus coming back.  (1Th 4:16f)  Then, all the challenges, and pains that we experience in this age, will be ended.  He is going to make a new heavens and a new earth (Rev 21. 1).  He is going to make everything new and there will be no place for the old order stuff: tears, death, mourning, crying, pain, (Rev 21:4) darkness; nothing unclean or accursed. Isn't that breathtaking? Isn't' that something to look forward to? There is life after this. It's going to be good! That's our hope!

Rainbow At MaraetaiBeach
New Zealand
Image in Public Domain

But that hope isn't just "pie in the sky when you die". It isn't just something to look forward to so that we can get through the trials of life in this world.  Rather, it is a solid hope for the future of the Kingdom - the reign of God - that releases us in anticipation of that coming Kingdom, to live in that Kingdom now.  While waiting for the final harvest, we are also waiting for the rains - that will make that harvest happen. In Israel there is "early rain" in October that softens the soil for sowing the seed; and "later rain" in April or May, which caused the grain to swell up before the harvest. Sending both the early and the late rain is the act of the God who keeps his promises. (Dt. 11. 14)  James brings it home very practically.  

He speaks to "Brothers" - as he does in every chapter of his letter. That sense of relatedness with each other because of our relationship with Jesus, is vital. The Church was never intended to be an institution with a constitution and a mission statement.  It was intended to be a community of people.  These things may help ensure that the community is safe and healthy. But they are not the church.  Under all that, are relationships. People who can call each other "brother."  As we wait for Jesus to come back, part of our discipleship must be calling one another "brother".
We need to be patient with irritating people, and we need to be steadfast in difficult circumstances as we wait for the coming of Jesus.
We need to be honest in all our dealings. Jesus isn't telling us we should refuse to take the oath in a court of law; he is saying we must be scrupulously honest in everything. Every "no" means "No" and every "Yes" means, "Yes"

The Present Kingdom ....
And as we wait for that day to come, James calls us to experience the Kingdom in three ways:

1. The possibility of real healing 
Those who are "Suffering" (v13): meaning generally having bad stuff happen in life, are to pray. (Those who are joyful are to sing praises!)  And those who are ill are to seek healing ministry.
The word "sick" implies something physically wrong that makes a person unable to work. What are poor people to do in that situation? Especially were there is no medicine - or where health services are too expensive for the poor?   The Church needs to rediscover its Jesus-like ministry in this area. There are mistakes to avoid:
(1) Making healing so important that we forget about Heaven and behave as though death was the worst thing that could happen to a Christian!  Death is the final healing!
(2) Making healing a nice thing for Christians to enjoy - when most of the healing Jesus did was in the context of mission.
However, here, James does talk about healing - in the context of what happens within the church community. How does it work?
Call the elders.  A time of illness can be an isolating experience. Don't go it alone; call the elders: formally appointed Church leaders, who because the sick person cannot go to Church, effectively take the Church to him or her. (By the way, God sometimes gives us words of guidance to get us to where we are needed; but we are not to presume. If you don't tell your church leaders you're ill, don't blame them for not knowing!
Anointing with oil: See Mk 6. 13.  "The healing work is done by God's Spirit, offered freely to man's need and appropriated by faith, but material aids may sometimes prepare the way." (Leslie Mitton)  anointing is done "In the name of Jesus" (which means "with the authority of Jesus,") and is accompanied by the prayer of faith.
Diversity in healing. The prayer of faith will save (literally, sozein); God will raise him up (wake from sleep, raise the dead, cause him to stand up); confess your sins and pray that you may be healed (doctored, cured). Physical health is closely linked with spiritual and emotional healing.
Body ministry in healing Confession and prayer is not merely a ministry of elders to members of the body (although they commissioned to minister in this way) but for everyone.

2. The power of believing prayer.
Elijah foretold the drought that was God's judgment on a people who went away from him, (I Kings 17. 1-2); and he saw the tiny cloud that said the rain would come again three years later. (I Kings 18. 42ff); he prayed the prophesied events into reality.   There is a principal there.  God prophesies and promises.  But we are called to pray.  

I find it impossible to conceive that James could have mentioned the early and late rains in verse 7, and then forgotten about them by verse 17!  As we look towards the future coming of the Kingdom, we need to pray for the present coming of the Kingdom, the early rain and the later rain.  As we look towards the Day of Pentecost and praise God for the coming of the Holy Spirit upon the Church, it would be good to pray "Lord, renew your wonders, as of a new Pentecost".

3. The practice of disciple-making
Finally, James thinks of the ones who look as if they re not surviving and thriving, but drifting from the truth. So he finishes off by saying whoever sees someone heading into spiritual danger, and in love, without giving them a telling off, reaches out to bring them back to the where they should be, will save that soul from death and cover, hide from view a huge pile of sin. Isn't that a lovely, gracious thing to be doing?  That's discipleship. And it's for everyone.  James doesn't actually say, "Whoever does that". He says, "When one of you does it."

As we come to the end of our series on James, the call is for all of us to be one-to-one disciples. It is for all of us to be growing, taking responsibility for our own development as Christians; and for all of us to be taking responsibility for the care of one another.    Every disciple is meant to be making disciples, encouraging other people to grow.  That's part of the Kingdom, now.  It's part of discipleship. It's meant to be part of the everyday life of every Christian.

© Gilmour Lilly April 2012

Luke 24: 36-49 All-age talk

This talk rounded up an all-age service whre we explored the idea of someone or somethign "being there even if invisible" and "how we know something is alive", using a toy rabbit and a live rabbit to illustrate.

Question: Who's got good news to share with us? What special, good, important, things have happened in your life in the past few weeks or months?   How did these special things make you feel?  Excited? Happy?

Jesus' friends had news. As they sat together, some of them shared their news that they had seen Jesus, not dead any more but alive! That ought to have been amazing, exciting. But it wasn't: they were unsure, confused about it.  They didn't know what to think.  And then Jesus himself arrived - although the door was locked, he just walked through it and there he was in the room!

And Jesus friends weren't pleased to see him. They weren't excited. They were still unsure, and now afraid as well.  They thought it was a ghost.  I think, just at that moment they were in a right state!  Then Jesus showed them his hands and feet:. What do you think they would see in his hands and feet?  The marks where the nails had been.  His friends were still not sure: they were happier, but still couldn't really believe it was Jesus. So he asked them if there was any food.

They brought him some fish, and he ate it.  How did we know the rabbit was alive?  It moved, it twitched and squirmed. It could have eaten something.(although ti didn't - it was probably nervous!). So Jesus friends knew he was alive when he ate something.   They knew Jesus was a real person - and he is still a real person - we know he is alive today!  He's not just a story; he's not just a ghost. He's real!

Image by by Jim Sutton
used courtesy of gospelgifs.com

Isn't' that amazing and wonderful?  He said to his friends that "in his name the message about repentance and the forgiveness of sins must be preached to all nations, beginning in Jerusalem."  This message about Jesus is for Jerusalem, and it's for Rosyth. It's for everywhere.  It's for all time.  Jesus is real and he makes a difference today.  We can show people today that Jesus is alive. We can show the difference he makes in out lives, because he promises us power inside us to help us - the Holy Spirit - the life-breath of the risen Jesus - at work inside us!


So we want to know go and to show that Jesus is real.  And we need to wait - to let God keep his promise and pour out his Spirit in our lives.

© Gilmour Lilly April 2012

Raised from the Dead. Easter Day 2012

Psalm 16:
Luke 24. 1-12
1 Cor 15. 1-11

"Conversion of St Paul" by Caravaggio
Public Domain

Once there was a young, studious, devout tentmaker called Saul of Tarsus, who hated the very name and teaching of Jesus with a vengeance.  The very idea that Jesus Christ could be the Messiah was to him totally wrong.  The very idea that Jesus Christ could possibly have risen from the dead, was preposterous, an outrageous deception for which his followers deserved all they got.  So he stood and watched with approval as a Church leader called Stephen was stoned to death by the Jews in Jerusalem for his faith in Jesus. Then, inspired by being part of that, and shocked that the Jesus thing was spreading to places like Damascus in Syria, he started his own campaign. He got a warrant from the high priest in Jerusalem and headed for Damascus - but towards the end of his journey, he met Jesus.  A brilliant light surrounded him and felled him like a rotten tree: he heard a voice "Saul, why are you persecuting me?"  He answered, "Well who are you?"  And the Voice said, "I am Jesus, the one whose very name you hate, the one you are giving such a bad time to."  The one he believed to be dead, was talking to him.

That changed everything for Saul. Eventually, even his name.  For the rest of his life he was sold out, helplessly madly obsessed with Jesus. His whole life was about serving this Jesus.  He was passionately convinced that Jesus is alive. He stood with the community of men and women like Peter, James, John, Mary Magdalene and hundreds of others who had been in Jerusalem in the weeks after the resurrection of Jesus, who knew that Jesus is alive, because they had seen him.  Like them, the encounter had made all the difference.  Angels and the empty tomb didn't convince them: what convinced them was encountering Jesus Himself.

What Paul says in 1 Cor 15 is very similar to what Peter says in his first sermon in Acts 2, on the day of Pentecost, the first time he spoke out in public about Jesus.  Listen to what Peter says:
"Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know-- this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it." Act 2:22-24  


It's so matter of fact. It's not first of all a doctrine. It's an event. Something that happened. God raised him up. Paul, Peter, John, and Mary say, "We are witnesses. We saw him."

Like Saul, they weren't expecting it. Despite the Old Testament prophecies (such as Psalm 16 - which Peter quoted in his talk in Acts 2); despite the promises of Jesus himself.  This whole resurrection thing had totally taken them by surprise.  So they tell the story, in the Gospels, with a confused breathless excitement: it's an eyewitness account. And so, when the Holy Spirit has come to them, they tell the story again. "We saw him.  And so Paul, in talking about the resurrection says, "I saw him. He appeared to me..." It was a matter of fact.

It was an essential fact.  Like Peter and the very first believers, the resurrection of Jesus was fundamental to being a follower of Jesus.  It's not negotiable.  Paul says, "If Jesus didn't really rise from the dead, we are the stupidest and most pitiable people on the planet." (1 Cor 15. 17-19)  The resurrection is not negotiable.  It's key to Christianity. It's a core belief.  It's fundamental to faith. What it means to be a Christian is to believe that God raised Jesus from the dead.  Paul says

 "If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved." Rom 10:9   

The most basic Christian creed is this: "Jesus is Lord!"  A Christian is someone who can say, "Jesus is Lord!" A Christian is someone who believes in her heart that Jesus is alive.  We have developed "spiritual laws" and the "way of salvation" to try to sum up what a person needs to accept in order to be saved.  Maybe we over-complicate things. The New Testament's answer is refreshingly simple.  It's just this:  "Believe that God raised Jesus from the dead and you will be saved."

We don't have to understand how the Cross works; we don't need to know what original sin is all about.  We simply need to believe that Jesus is alive and be prepared to say, "Jesus is Lord!" in our own lives.  It's that simple. On the day of Pentecost when Peter had finished preaching and everyone asked him "What should we do about Jesus?" he put it like this "repent and be baptized".  Jesus himself said, "Repent and believe".

The resurrection of Jesus is the last piece of the jigsaw puzzle that makes everything else (other Christian ideas) fall into place.  It is the final answer that makes sense of the death of Christ.  Peter says on the day of Pentecost it was not possible for him to be held by it. We sometimes talk about a bull in a china shop.  The point is that when the bull has been in the china shop, there's not much left of the china shop.  When Jesus entered "death", because he is God, and because the sting of death is sin, and he had dealt with sin, he entered death like a bull in a china shop.  That wonderful hymn of Charles Wesley's says, "Christ has burst the gates of hell." Hallelujah!

Coritnth was a Greek port city where everyone tried to be trendy and sophisticated.  Paul becaame awawre that that Christians in Corinth, were picking up trendy but wrong ideas about what happens to us after we die..  He wanted them to have a hope for the Future.  And a correct understanding of the future flows from knowing the Jesus rose from the dead. He says:

"Grape cluster"  by "Dragonflyir"
used under
Creative Commons license

"But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. 21  For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. 22  For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive."  1Co 15:20  

I've conducted two funerals in the last fortnight. The good news is that both Sarah and Rosemary had met with Jesus.  So for both of them, we believe in the resurrection.  We believe that Sarah and Rosemary will be given new bodies; Sarah won't have diabetes. Rosemary won't have cancer. They won't just have patched together remains of their old bodies. They will have brand new bodies. But they won't be ghosts.  They will be themselves: more fully and totally themselves than they have ever been before.

Why do I believe that? Because Christ rose as the "firstfruits" of those who have fallen asleep.  Sometimes people ask me "What will it be like in heaven? Will I recognize uncle Fred?"  The answer is simple. Look at Jesus. His resurrection body was the first fruits, the model for ours.  He was recognizable. People knew it was Jesus. But he was "different". He was not restricted by time and space. He had a real body but it was spiritual.  Not less real. Just less limited.  That is part of our Christian hope for the future.  We shall rise; and we shall meet with all those who have gone before us.

And, knowing that is what lies ahead of us, nothing fazes us. Nothing else can hurt us, because nothing else matters. We know we have met Jesus, the living Jesus. Being a Christian is a life of encounter with the living Jesus. And we know we're going to live for ever. So we want to serve him with everything we have and are.


© Gilmour Lilly April 2012

Luke 19. 11-27 & 20 9-17 PALM SUNDAY Jesus' way: God's Kingdom:

I wonder what Jesus was thinking, as he rode into Jerusalem on the donkey?

Firstly, I imagine he was thinking, "This is all going to plan; amazing! I sent the two of them into a Bethany to get transport; and they went without any ifs or buts or maybes; just faith and obedience. And of course they found it just as I predicted; no surprises there."  It was all part of a plan, this triumphal entry, this big parade in Jerusalem. The two who fetched the donkey were told to say, "The master needs it". Master is "Kurios", Lord. Jesus is the rightful Lord of everything, the true owner of the donkey, the one "owns all the Donuts".

Jesus was saying that he had the right to rule; that he was King; And when people later on started shouting "Hosanna (although Luke writing for Greeks doesn't use the Hebrew word Hosanna), blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord" Jesus doesn't have problem with it; there are right, and if they don't say it, the very stones will cry out.

Secondly, he was thinking that this wasn't his coronation. Lots of people may have thought it was, and lots of people may have hoped it was. They had seen the wonderful things he had done; healings, deliverance, miracles of feeding and calming storms, and the miracle of salvation, people's lives being changed. It was tempting to think that this was it; they'd seen signs of the Kingdom, so now they expected the Kingdom to appear shining intensely. But the signs of the Kingdom, the healings, the miracles, the conversions, don't mean the Kingdom has "appeared".  The big parade doesn't mean the kingdom has appeared.  Actually, the same is true today.  We may see miracles, healing, conversions; we may be able to organize a "big parade", a special event. We did oen yesterday to celebrate Craig and Liza's wedding and it was great!  But these are only signs of he Kingdom.  They don't mean the Kingdom has appeared: there's always something to look forward.

He knew that this big parade was looking ahead: before the final, complete triumph, before his coronation, before the Kingdom could appear in power and victory, some things had to happen. It was like in the story he just told, the parable of the nobleman who went to receive a Kingdom. He told that story because "people thought the Kingdom was about to appear in all its intensity".

King Archelaus - 16th Century
artist's impression in Public Domain

Amazingly, but not for the first time, Jesus daringly uses an illustration involving an unsavoury dodgy character, because that's what people were familiar with. The all knew about Herod Archelaus going to Rome to have his Kingdom confirmed by the Emperor, and how he massacred three thousand people (Pharisees!) who didn't want him as king. Archelaus was such a bad guy that his own brother sent messages to the Emperor saying "Don't make this guy king".

Jesus knew that before he would be confirmed as King, there would be a journey, an absence. Before he can rule completely, he must receive that kingdom from his father. He must leave this earth, in order to return again as King. And while he is absent, during that gap period, he gives everyone of his servants a share in his own resources, so that they can carry on his business.

So I wonder if he looked around at his disciples, and asked himself how well they would do; would they trade profitably with the resources he would leave with them, or would they simply wrap them up in the hope of preserving them for posterity? It was down to each individual disciple, and it still is today.   So if you are today a follower of Jesus, he has invested something in you, he has given you his Holy Spirit, his power, his gifts, and effectively has said "see what you can gain with this, for my Kingdom, until I return." How much Jesus has invested in us, and how important it is that we are "profitable servants ".

As with Herod Archelaus, there were those who wouldn't accept Jesus' reign. Whether the Jewish leaders of Jesus' own day, the Romans who insisted, "Caesar is Lord!" or the thousands who still want to rule their own lives, there have always been those who "will not have this man to reign over us." When he comes back, he will come back to judge, and to reign. He will judge his servants, for what they have done with his resources, how they have traded, how are prepared to take risks, in a difficult world.  And he will judge those who have refused to let him rule their lives. That judgment may seem harsh to us, but Jesus wanted to show his hearers the seriousness of their position." As Jesus rode into Jerusalem, I imagine him thinking about what would happen while he was "in a far country," and what will happen when he returns.

But thirdly he was also thinking ahead, to something much closer. What would those who did not want him to reign over them do? He was fully aware of that too. A day or two later Jesus was going to teach in the temple, and some of the Jewish leaders would come right up and ask him what right he had to do the things he was doing. That would prompt Jesus to tell another story: this time it was about a farmer who planted a vineyard, and went on a journey, renting his vineyard out to tenants.  At harvest time he sent a messenger to collect the rent, but every one was beaten up and sent back empty-handed. Eventually, the owner decided "I'll send my son; surely they will respect him."  But they killed the Son, hoping to claim his vineyard for themselves.  What will the owner do? He'll kill the offenders and rent the vineyard out to better tenants. In fact the Jewish leaders recognised that Jesus was telling us parable about them, and were so angry that they were ready to do exactly what the tenants in the parable did to the Son: they wanted to arrest Jesus there and then in the temple.  Before the triumph and judgement, Jesus knows that he, the Son, will be put to death.  This "journey to a far country" will be through his own death.  Jealousy, greed, narrow-mindedness, will conspire to put Jesus on a Cross. He knows that. Even as he rides into Jerusalem, he's looking forward to that.

He knew that like the Son in the parable, he would be taken out side, not just the vineyard, but also the City, and killed. And although he knew that those who were responsible, especially the Jewish leaders, would answer to God for their actions, he still knew that he must face his own death, before the Kingdom could triumph.

Jesus knew that the cross had to happen. He about those who "didn't want to pay the rent". those who however religious they claimed to be, still refused to let God his due. He knew they would arrange his death. But he knew that through the Cross, he would save people from their sins. It was all working to plan. The enemy was not going to triumph; God could use even the most evil circumstances, to bring about his purposes. Jesus' looked forward to his suffering and death, and also to his vindication, his triumph, his victory, his rule.

What was Jesus thinking about as he rode into Jerusalem? He was thinking of people. He was thinking of you and me.  Subjects, servants, tenants; through his death he has triumphed. He has earned the right to rule in our lives. We're all subjects and tenants. It's time to pay the rent; it's time to stop saying "We will not have this man to rule over us."   And if you've already let Jesus in, it's time use the gifts he's given you, for his Kingdom.  He'll be back.

© Gilmour Lilly April 2012