Faith - Sermon at St Matthew-in-the-City

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A New Foundation

Luke 7:1-10

·         An interesting thing about Luke 7 is that it follows Luke 5 and 6 J

·         In Luke 5, as Jesus teaches and demonstrates his inclusive gospel of grace,  it is becoming increasingly clear that the new wine of the gospel can not be contained in the old wineskins of the Jewish religion and all that it has become under the Pharisees, Scribes and Sadducees.

·         Luke 6 starts with tension continuing to rise between Jesus and the Jewish religious leaders – expressed in a dispute over what is lawful on the Sabbath.

·         The fury and plotting against Jesus grows and he responds by spending a whole night in prayer and then selecting and calling the 12 apostles, who are to be the patriarchs or pioneers of a new people of God who would convey his power and his love to the world.

·         He then preaches the Sermon on the Plain (not that kind of plane J), which is a shorter version of the more famous Sermon on the Mount in Matthew. The Sermon is a manifesto for Christian living, a manual for discipleship.

The Sermon on the Plain

·         Those who aspire to be disciples need to love their enemies (6:27-36), and not just in a theoretical or sentimental fashion, but in a practical, radical and sometimes costly way. “Do to others as you would have them do to you”, Jesus tells them.

·         Disciples must not judge or condemn others (6:37-42). Their attitude to the faults of others must be governed by a humble attitude to their own faults and weaknesses. They are to forgive the trespasses of others and to give generously to meet their needs, following the example of their teacher and being fully trained in his ways.

·         Disciples are reminded that the goodness or badness of a tree will be demonstrated by the fruit that it bears (6:43-45). They are called to live in a way that is fruitful, a way which feeds health and spreads goodness, drawing on the good which is in their hearts.

·         Finally Jesus warns the disciples that it is not enough to call him “Lord, Lord”: they need to do what he says (6:46-49). Hearing the words of Jesus and putting them into practice is like being a man who builds his house on a firm foundation of rock. To merely hear his words without obeying them is to build without a foundation and to court disaster.

·         So we come to chapter 7 with the scene set for someone to demonstrate the kind of discipleship that Jesus has been describing. This example is immediately provided, not by Simon Peter or John or any of the 12, but by a most unexpected person; a Roman centurion; an officer in the enemy occupying army.

·         Even Jesus is amazed and encouraged by this man’s faith and applauds him as a wonderful example of the kind of discipleship he has just been calling for!

·         What was so interesting and exemplary about this man? What was it about him that Jesus and Luke found so exciting and encouraging?

The Centurion’s Qualities

·         The first interesting point is that the centurion was already living in pretty much exactly the way Jesus had set out in the Sermon on the Plain:

·         He is loving his enemies. The elders of the Jewish people tell Jesus “he loves our nation and has built our synagogue.” The synagogue referred to is the one in Capernaum, where Jesus had already preached and healed (Luke 4:31-37).

·         His compassion also extends to his household staff, to an unusual degree. When a slave or servant became sick and close to death in Roman society, they would no longer be of value and could expect to be disposed of like a lame animal.

·         This centurion is different. He highly values this slave/servant and is prepared to risk embarrassment in seeking his healing by the charismatic young Jewish rabbi he has been hearing about.

·         In spite of the power and authority of his position, the centurion is also humble, acknowledging his defects and unworthiness in Jewish eyes, not demanding and claiming not to deserve anything from Jesus (7:6).

·         The Jewish Elders (respected senior members of the community) DO think the centurion’s good works qualify him to receive Jesus’s attention “This man deserves to have you do this” (7:4), they tell Jesus.

·         We know that good works do not save us, however Jesus is not dismissive of the centurion’s case. He likes what he has heard about this man and is intrigued and compassionate enough to go along with the request. Perhaps he also senses a teaching opportunity for the Jewish Elders and his own disciples.

Amazing Faith

·         Before Jesus reaches the house, a message is brought to him by the centurion’s friends and it is this message which so impresses and encourages Jesus that he is amazed. It deserves to be read out in full:

·         “Lord, don’t trouble yourself, for I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. That is why I did not even consider myself worthy to come to you. But say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, ‘Go’, and he goes; and that one, ‘Come’, and he comes. I say to my servant, ‘Do this’, and he does it.” (Luke 7:6-8)

·         These are the words, or rather, this is the faith that amazed Jesus. It is a faith he has not found anywhere in Israel. Here is a man who not only calls Jesus ‘Lord’ but puts that belief into practice and recognises Jesus’s authority, not just over people but over sickness and death.

·         The remarkable thing which has happened here is that a new foundation of faith in Jesus, of belief in his saving power and authority, has been added to this man’s qualities – and it is this faith which he is commended for and which brings life instead of death to his servant. It is faith like this which provides a new wineskin fit to contain the new wine of the gospel of grace.

·         I’m reminded of the Las Arenas shopping mall in Barcelona – formally a bullring, a place of ritualised death as a form of entertainment, which was raised up in a remarkable feat of architecture and engineering and had a new foundation added as part of its transformation into, well, into a shopping mall and entertainment complex (I recognise the limitations of this parallel J).

Lessons for today’s church?

·         Outsiders may be forgiven for thinking the focus of Christianity is on following a set of legalistic rules. It isn’t! The important thing is living faithfully; putting our belief in the Lordship of Jesus into practice in every aspect of life.

·         That is what the Sermon on the Plain was all about and it is what Jesus saw and commended in the centurian.

·         What church can become (and this is how a lot of people see us) is a self righteous bunch of people who are convinced they have correct beliefs and are consequently superior to people who do not share these beliefs.

·         When this attitude prevails there is little priority for engaging with and serving the world in the way Jesus envisaged. Its the kind of religion the Pharisees had developed. An old wineskin which cannot contain the new wine of the gospel.

·         We all want to build a better world and as Christians we want that to be a world like the Kingdom of God, with the values Jesus expressed so passionately in the Sermon on the Plain.

·         And it’s tempting to look at the sorry mess society is in and decide to walk away and build somewhere else. Or to say this will have to be pulled down before we can build something better in its place.

·         But a third option is that we can be inspired by the vision and achievements of Richard Rogers and his team who transformed Las Arenas, and by the example of our centurion who added faith in Jesus to underpin the good life he was already living.

·         Instead of walking away from society or pulling it down we can give it a new foundation, by preaching and demonstrating a gospel of grace, reaching out to all people, including people of goodwill who don’t yet acknowledge the Lordship of Jesus.

·         Together we can lift this place to a new level – one that pleases God, one that is full of faith and one that brings joy and glory to Jesus.

Sermon - Raising the Dead?

Acts 9.32-end

Intro

Imagine a high board diver who has been taught by his coach a new dive including a series of rolls and twists. Would the diver be apprehensive when attempting the dive for the first time? Of course! When you do something new which your teacher/coach has taught you, you take a risk. How much of a risk depends on your confidence and level of trust in the coach/teacher. A great help is if they have actually shown you how to do it. But you still have to take the risk at some stage and jump off the board.

Jesus had promised his disciples that all who had faith in him would do the works he had been doing and even greater works (John 14.12) and in the early chapters of Acts we find Peter and the others putting this into practice, copying and recreating some of Jesus’ greatest miracles of healing. Here in chapter 9 we have two examples, starting with the healing of a paralysed man (similar to Jesus in Luke 5.18ff) and followed even more remarkably by the raising to life of a dead woman (similar to Jesus in Luke 8.41-56).

Features

·         Peter and the other Apostles always direct attention away from themselves. They are clear that it is Jesus who is doing the healings, in his resurrection power (3.6, 12, 15-16, 9.34), by his Holy Spirit. So in the case of the paralysed man Aeneas, Peter says “Jesus Christ heals you.”  In the case of the dead woman Dorcas or Tabitha, he clears the room of mourners then gets down on his knees and prays. In both cases and in every case of healing in Acts it is absolutely clear who is doing the healing.

·         The consequences of each miracle are equally clear. Church growth always follows, every time  – growth in number, yes, but also growth in confidence, growth in maturity and growth in christlikeness amongst the followers of Jesus.

·         These two features are hallmarks or signs of authenticity which we should expect to see in all genuine christian ministry today – and I’m not just talking about healing ministries. More of this later.

A BIG step of faith

Even after all he had seen and experienced to that point, the raising of Tabitha/Dorcas was a huge step of faith for Peter. Even after consciously copying Jesus in telling a paralysed man to take up his bed and walk – and seeing it happen, to raise a dead person back to life is a different ball game. The dead woman seems to have been an especially worthy subject and the people of Joppa who sent for Peter clearly had faith that God would perform a miracle through him. But even so, what a risk he took. How foolish  look if the resuscitation failed to take place. What a setback for the followers of Jesus if their most prominent leader had failed in this way.

Peter did take the risk, prayerfully and being careful not to draw attention to himself, and Tabitha did rise up at Peter’s words “Tabitha get up”, just as Jairus’s daughter had risen up at Jesus’s words “Talitha get up”.

Questions raised

In both of these cases; the healing of the paralysed man and the raising back to life of the dead woman, the command to “Rise up” is given in the name of Jesus and is dramatically answered. Church growth immediately follows, as more and more people put their faith in Jesus and the faith and confidence of all the followers of Jesus is built up.

Now I don’t know about you, but I believe these miracles took place pretty much as the Bible describes, I really do. But this raises questions, like “Why doesn’t this kind of thing happen more often?” Think how attractive christianity would be and how easily doubters, even atheists could be converted if we had this kind of stuff going on at St George’s or out on the streets of Barcelona each week! So why not? Is it because of our lack of faith or is there another explanation?

I’m not sure, but here are some possible answers:

·         First, an observation: Aeneas and Tabitha are no longer alive. The paralysed man who had been bedridden for 8 years was raised up to live a more active life for a time, showing his gratitude to Jesus and encouraging faith in others, but sooner or later he died, of some cause or another.

·         The same withTabitha. She was raised back to life and presumably went back to making clothes and caring for the poor, for a time. But then she died again (believe me, if she was still alive on earth today we’d have heard about it J).

·         Their healings can not have been intended  by God to be permanent, or they would have been permanent. So perhaps instead these healings were a sign pointing towards a completely new life, a new kind of life – call it ‘life from above’ or ‘eternal life’ -  which the resurrection of Jesus has opened up for everybody, not just extreme cases like these.

·         Secondly, we have to think about what kind of world God is building through his church. Is it a world in which all deaths – whatever the cause - are simply reversed, and all diseases or disabilities are simply and instantaneously cured? Maybe in the age to come, but in this age, if we take the teaching and example of Jesus seriously, what God is building is more complex and hard won. Perhaps it is more worthwhile too.

·         The world God is building is one in which people forgo their own pleasure and comfort and safety in order to serve and to rescue other people, inspired by the example of Jesus and filled with his power.

·         It is a world in which people voluntarily turn away from the easy road and follow the hard road of living in accordance with the values of the kingdom of God, painstakingly working for justice and peace, protecting the vulnerable, forgiving their enemies, breaking out of cycles of retaliation and revenge.

·         This is the kind of world the disciples were building and which followers of Jesus – whether or not they see themselves or are seen by others as part of the church – are continuing to build, taking risks every day, demonstrating the resurrection life and the untiring love of Jesus to all.

So however tempting it is to look for instant solutions and however exciting it is when we do from time to time see some miraculous breakthrough, may we rise up and encourage one another in the unglamourous hard work of building God’s kingdom. As we do so may we celebrate the risen life of the one who heals and saves, the one who has defeated sin and evil and death bringing glory to his name and hope to the world.

Sermon - Matthew 25.1-13

Matthew 25.1-13 The Ten Virgins

Mountain Rescue

·        

E    Every year, mountain rescue teams have to rescue hundreds of walkers, many of whom had ventured out without even the basic essential equipment and supplies to complete their route safely. Other people have to put their own lives at risk to carry out these rescues. The cost can be very high and sometimes the rescuers don’t get there in time.

·         Quote from Lake District Search and Mountain Rescue Association chairman last year: “Many, if not all of these alerts could have been avoided for the sake of a map, compass and torch plus a little knowledge on how to use them.”

Judgement Parables

·        

         These parables, mostly clustered at the end of Matthew’s gospel, are usually neglected because (a) we think they are concerned with events in the distant future which we can do nothing about and (b) we believe the warnings they contain are addressed to other people (unbelievers) rather than us.

·         However the judgement parable we are looking at today is addressed to believers and is very much concerned with life in the here and now.

·         All ten virgins/ young women/bridesmaids in the parable are believers in Jesus (represented by the bridegroom). Their lamps are lit and they have been invited to the wedding banquet.

·         However only 5 are wise and the other 5 are foolish. The foolish arrive late and – at least initially – are not allowed to enter the feast. Instead, they hear the voice of Jesus saying “Who are you? Where have you been? What have you been doing? I don’t know you.”

·         Jesus is challenging the believers who hear the parable to be wise rather than foolish. But what makes the difference?

Lessons for Believers

·        

A      A popular saying … “If you fail to prepare, prepare to fail…”

·         All of us will meet Jesus face to face, either at his return or after our own death. At that point we do not want to hear him saying “Who are you, I don’t know you.”

·         So the first lesson is to make sure we know and are known by Jesus in this life. This means more than just saying the right prayer of commitment or going through the right baptism or confirmation ceremony. It means doing the things which are necessary to build and strengthen our relationship with Jesus throughout our lives. A passive and unthinking faith leaves us ineffective and vulnerable. An active, nurtured faith helps us grow stronger and more useful to God.

·         The next key lesson from the parable is that we need to prepare for the long haul. Christian life is more like a marathon than a sprint, more like a mountain climb than a stroll in the park. So we need to plan ahead and obtain and develop the equipment and resources needed for the whole journey. The foolish virgins ran out of oil and the oil they needed was not instantly available on tap.

·         In a similar way some of the most important resources Christians need need to be developed over a period of time. A Christian who has a terminal illness needs deep faith and strength of character if they are to cope. But it is no good saying to God “Give me deep faith and strength of character now” because these are qualities which take years to build up, years of patient walking with God, talking with God, listening to God.

·         It is these qualities, these fruits of the Spirit if you like, which are the oil to keep our lamp burning in the darkest night. We need these qualities and perhaps more importantly, the world needs us to develop and to use these powerful Christian resources.

·         The parable also teaches that we cannot beg steal or borrow these Christian qualities from other people. Of course we can help each other to learn and to grow, but we can’t always rely on someone else’s faith, someone else’s courage, someone else’s deep prayer life and understanding of the Bible – we need to develop our own.

·         If we are climbing a mountain and it turns foggy and I am separated from my companions it will be no use to me that they have a map and compass and torch and food in their rucksack. It is only what is in my own rucksack (if anything) which can save me.

·         And it is not just about my survival and saving my own skin. I need to be ready to respond to emergencies and address the physical and spiritual needs of others. Like the wise virgins in the parable, I need to be ready to seize the day, when the opportunity to serve arises. I need in fact to be a mountain rescue team member/leader – not like some ill prepared tourist.

Practical Examples

·         Let’s look at some practical examples of what each of us can do to ensure we are an “oil filled”, well prepared Christian disciple. Here’s a quick list of 30 suggestions:

Practical Suggestions for developing as ‘oil-filled’ Christians:

1. Prayer partners – meet once a week/fortnight
2. Prayer journaling
3. Read bible regularly:
1. Bible in a year or 2 years
2. Receive bible notes online e.g. Word for Today
3. or hard copies e.g. Jeff Lucas ‘Life Every Day’
4. Join home group or bible study groups
4. Monitor your viewing/reading – are you ‘polluting’ your mind?
1. Avoid internet porn and other violent or unhealthy material
5. Write reviews of books from our Christian book stall – share what you have learned with others
6. Join in when we do 24-7 prayer events
7. Join in when we organise church trips away, retreats and family days
8. Serve others alongside other Churches e.g. Sant’Egidio, Zona Roja
9. Examine your shopping habits:
1. Are you over-consuming? Too materialistic?  Too influenced by advertising?
2. Could you buy ‘fair trade’ products
3. Do you buy ‘environmentally friendly’ goods?
10. Share what you have:
1. A spare room, and someone in church has a need for it?
2. A skill you can offer someone else?
3. Hospitality & friendship – so many people IN OUR OWN CHURCH are lonely
4. Give someone a lift
5. Translate/help someone through Spanish paperwork
11. Could you be a mentor to  a teenager you know
12. Tithing  - are you giving God the first and best of your “crop”?
13. Write to political leaders to protest against injustice
14. Recycle more and waste less. Think about your impact on God’s creation.
15. Treat old/disabled/marginalised people with dignity – give them time, listen to and talk with them.
16. Support efforts of others who are trying to do things for other people or for our church
17. Take the opportunity this Christmas to tell someone why Christmas is important and more than just about presents and eating too much
18. Practise random acts of kindness, anonymously blessing others
19. Offer to pray for someone when they tell you their worries but most importantly give them time, listen to them
20. Look at yourself in the mirror:
1. What image do you present to others?
2. Do you see God’s image in you?
3. Love yourself – God made you in His image
21. Make sure you have a day of rest, spend it with your loved ones
22. Thank God for your blessings, don’t let your prayers be like a shopping list
23. Study christian discipleship online e.g, foundations 21
24. Identify a daily habit/act you have e.g. washing up, opening your laptop, walking to work – make this a trigger of a short prayer
25. Ring up someone who you know you should ring – today!
26. Use post-its to remind you of things to give thanks for – when you brush your teeth, have post-its round the mirror with the names of people you love and are thankful that they’re in your life
27. Identify 3 texts from scripture that really mean something to you, print them out and use them as bookmarks, read them aloud at least once a week and think about why you chose them
28. Cut down on your daily commitments – perhaps you give up watching a particular TV programme – so that you have time to meet the needs of others or to spend time with God in prayer and meditation
29. Build a friendship with someone outside your usual circle of contacts
30. LISTEN to others, LISTEN  to God – perhaps one will lead you to the other without you knowing?

Conclusions

·         These are just a few suggestions and you may be able to come up with better ones.

·         But just to clarify – it is not about activism, as though we could justify ourselves to God by showing him a list of all the great Christian works we have done.

·         It is about developing good habits, Christlike character and the experience which will enable us to save ourselves and others from a futile, pointless and unworthy life.

·         Rest, recreation and sleep are also important and remember all 10 virgins in the parable fell asleep before the bridegroom arrived. But there is a world of difference between the peaceful sleep of the wise, the well-prepared and the restless, uneasy “have I forgotten something” sleep of the foolish.

·         Take a look in your rucksack tonight. Ask yourself what’s missing and think about how your friends at St George’s can help you be better equipped disciples with oil to spare.