A, The Fourth Sunday of Advent - Romans 1:1-7 Isaiah 7 "Christ the Head in a Decapitated Society"

The promise of Immanuel that God spoke through the prophet Isaiah comes at a time when the evil of God’s people was feverishly high.  King Ahaz, king of Judah had turned from the Lord to the gods of the nations around him.  He sacrificed his own son as a burnt offering and set up high places of sacrifice on hills and under significant green trees.  Ahaz had priests build a copy of a pagan altar he had seen in Damascus and had it placed in God’s temple in Jerusalem. (read 2 Kings 16, 2 Chronicles 28)

Their sister kingdom of Israel was no better.  They had not had a king who led them in the ways of the Lord, since their split from Jerusalem.  Pekah, the King of Israel, was not a son of the king.  Rather he was the former king of Israel’s captain, who conspired against the king and murdered him in the citadel of the king’s house. (read 2 Kings 15:25) Now he joined forces with Syria to fight against Israel’s sister, Judah.

It was an ugly time in Israel and Judah, as two kingdoms of God became bodies without heads. Two sons, indeed kings, estranged from each other, and their holy head, our Heavenly Father.

The restoration of God’s holy headship comes in the resurrection unity of Jesus Christ.  Saint Paul stands as a servant, set apart as God’s apostle for the gospel of God, and points his Jewish brethren and both grafted Gentiles and Romans to Jesus Christ, “who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations, including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ.” (Romans 1:3–6 ESV)

Jesus now stands as the fulfilment of God’s promise to all nations through Abraham, and to his chosen people of Israel, as the righteous head. He is the faithful head, who perfectly follows the will of the Father, and obediently serves the people of God, for the benefit of all nations, all people.  But disobedient kings lost their heads with vainglorious leadership and led the people of Judah and Israel to do the same and sacrifice God in favour of pagan pleasures.  On the other hand, Jesus didn’t do this, rather, he loved his church, his body, in faithful submission unto death.  The holy head is now restored in the resurrection, with the body of believers who’ve been grafted into his holiness.

But alas, we too live in ugly times.  Times of individualism, that see the pleasures of the heart make people perform as though they have no heads.  Vengeance from leadership, retribution against leadership, people’s payback in shootings and other violent attacks, hatred, gossip and character assassinations reveal the ugliness of our world -  even more, the ugliness of the human condition. 

Since society has dethroned God from being its head in “the Age of Enlightenment” from the late seventeenth century, the Holy Head has continued to be severed from society.  Parents, God’s holy headship on earth, have lost or forsaken their authority. History is treated with suspicion and has now been made subject to the pleasures of the individual, and in recent times we’ve been wooed and now face the woes of individuals rejecting the genetics and gender of their bodies.  Literally, the head now can be severed from the body, and God’s will, by how one feels about their sexuality.

In the nineteen eighties, there was a comedy show, where in a scene four fellows were on a train.  One of these four young ones was rebellious. He saw a sign in the train, warning people not to put their heads out the window of the train.  So, being anti-authority, he disobeyed the sign and put his head out the window and had his head knocked off. 

The next scene shows his headless body walking back along the railway line trying to find its head.  His head sees its body stumbling around without direction and with much abuse and alerts his body to his head.  But his body doesn’t walk up to collect and restore its head.  No! Rather in a continuation of the body’s anti-authority over the head, it kicks the head along the railway line[1].

Never in my wildest dreams did I ever picture this morbid black comedy as anything more than that!  But today this black comedy from the nineteen eighties appears to be a prophetic picture of exactly what society has become — an ugly body disconnected from its head kicking itself along the rails of self-destruction.

Isaiah’s word to the king of Israel and the promise of Immanuel stands as a word of law and gospel to the church today. Israel and Judah stand as a warning to the church, which in the same way is seeking to join society in its quest for separation and headlessness.

Unlike King David, King Ahaz didn’t see God the Father as his head.  So, we hear, “When the house of David was told, ‘Syria is in league with Ephraim (Israel),’ the heart of Ahaz and the heart of his people shook as the trees of the forest shake before the wind.” (Isaiah 7:2 ESV)

However, despite Ahaz’s abominable sins against his son, his kingdom, and God, God calls Isaiah to say to Ahaz, “Be careful, be quiet, do not fear, and do not let your heart be faint… thus says the Lord God: ‘It shall not stand, and it shall not come to pass. For the head of Syria is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rezin. And within sixty-five years Ephraim will be shattered from being a people. And the head of Ephraim is Samaria, and the head of Samaria is the son of Remaliah. If you are not firm in faith, you will not be firm at all.’” (Isaiah 7:4,7-9 ESV)

God sought to be merciful to Judah and sever the heads of Syria and Israel, because of the promises he had made to King David years before.  But King Ahaz continued in faithlessness and his rejection of God’s headship, severing himself from God. We hear, “Again the Lord spoke to Ahaz: ‘Ask a sign of the Lord your God; let it be deep as Sheol or high as heaven.’ But Ahaz said, ‘I will not ask, and I will not put the Lord to the test.’” (Isaiah 7:10–12 ESV)

By saying, “I will not ask, and I will not put the Lord to the test.” King Ahaz was actually putting God to the test.

God promises to be faithful to Ahaz, if Ahaz would bow to his head and ask for a sign, but he doesn’t so God says through his prophet Isaiah, “Hear then, O house of David! Is it too little for you to weary men, that you weary my God also? Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.”  (Isaiah 7:13–14 ESV)

In the midst of such rebellion and ugliness God gives the promise of Immanuel—God with us.  Isaiah then proceeds to tell Ahaz what to expect since he has severed himself from his Heavenly Head.  He says, “The Lord will bring upon you and upon your people and upon your father’s house such days as have not come since the day that Ephraim (Israel) departed from Judah—the king of Assyria!” (Isaiah 7:17 ESV)

In the midst of human ugliness God’s promise of Immanuel still stands as the great beacon of light for society and the church, despite “Assyrian-type” terrors!  God continues, “to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations, including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ.” (Romans 1:3–6 ESV)

This obedience is literally a “calling under” Christ Jesus.  To once again allow God to be the head and all who are baptised into the body of Christ to function as one body under the Head for his sake so the gospel can be spread to all nations.   

The church and its leaders are called to repentance back under the headship of Christ. To be God’s church of the word, but under the eternal word of God.  Rather than conform to the ugliness of the world, we’re called to be agents of reformation and renewal led by the Holy Spirit for the salvation of the world.

The church, its leaders and bishops, indeed, all baptised, can only stand as the body of Christ when the body remains under the headship of Christ.  This means the body remains under the head in submission to its head.  The church is called to remain under the word of God and be led by the headship of Christ rather than being led astray by the whims of the world.  Like King Ahaz, Lutherans and other denominations are sacrificing God’s Son to society, to feed the gods of popularity and pleasure.

Let us not be a church of bishops and people that stands over the word of God, interpreting it or dismissing parts of it for our evil pleasure or popularity.  What kind of love shows itself when we do this?  It’s a love that’s separated from the obedience of faith in God.  It’s a human uprising, a beheading of the faith in a human-spirited revolution!  Human faith in a lost headless body walking away from its Immanuel, who’s calling it back.  

God’s kings of Israel and Judah led God’s people to sin against him.  This word stands as an eternal testimony and reminder that God’s chosen people, the true vine, can be grafted off and destroyed.  Are you prepared to gamble God’s work to save you with your human desires and stance over God’s word?  Interpretation that explains God’s word away for pleasures or popularity’s sake, will only reveal that you’ve decapitated yourself from Immanuel, who is coming again to judge the living and the dead. 

In these ugly times, know that he will remove the headless dead bodies that have kicked him, Immanuel, God with us, to the kerb. Therefore, live in the hope that Jesus, our Immanuel, is coming again to put repentant sinners right with holy, eternal resurrection and restoration. Amen. 

[1] The Young Ones, Series 2, Episode 1, “Bambi” (1984)

C, Post-Pentecost 10, Proper 15 - Hebrews 12:1-2 "The Fruitful Faithful Vine"

Hebrews 12:1–2 (ESV) Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

God the Holy Spirit works faith within the hearing hearts of believers, so we might do the things God wants us to do, to please him.  Doing what God wants is doing the will of God.  God gives faith so we receive what he does for us, and so we listen to him and do what he wants.  It’s God’s will to make you holy, so he can live with us, and so we want to live with him in peace. 

In Hebrews eleven, we hear “By faith” God’s people did this, and “by faith”  they did that.  By the will of God, the people of God were led by the Holy Spirit.  Therefore, despite being human and sinful, they did what pleased God and waited on him with faith.  By his will, God’s  people allowed the Holy Spirit to lead them to trust him, despite deprivation, degradation and death.

The writer of Hebrews calls us to take this word to heart and also follow the will of God, just as those who have gone beforehand have done.  But the encouragement goes further than just the witness of what they did in faith.  You and I are called to see that we are surrounded by this great cloud of witnesses. 

They are alive in Christ in the great resurrection of the dead, that has transported them from this deathly existence within time, into life in the eternal now with God.  They have been perfected by faith.  They have allowed the Holy Spirit to give them the desire to wait for a Saviour, who didn’t come during their time, but has now come and redeemed all those who faithfully wait on the will of God.

These are the folk of faith recalled in the book of Hebrews: Abel, considered useless by his parents, but who faithfully offered a pleasing offering to God, then Noah, Abraham, Moses, the nation of Israel who was faithfully led out of Egypt and into the Red Sea, and Rahab the prostitute who faithfully honoured God, over against her trade, by helping Caleb and his crew spy on Canaan.  Plus, others who while struggling in their weakness, faithfully died by the sword, and were considered unworthy and useless, just like Abel was at the beginning.  Together they are witnesses — literally martyrs — pointing to Jesus Christ, who is their foundation and their perfection from sin. 

But these witnesses are alive, they’re not just memories written down, they’re martyrs resurrected with Jesus, willing you through the living written word by God the Holy Spirit.  Together with the whole company of heaven, they’re not dead, they’re living!

Hear it again, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.” (Hebrews 12:1–2 ESV)

In the Old Testament reading and the Psalm we hear how sin clung closely to his chosen people of Israel.  Israel was the vine and vineyard of God. 

In Psalm 80 the psalmist calls God — the Shepherd of Israel — similar to that of the 23^rd Psalm.  A warm and comforting image!  But three times in the Psalm there’s a powerful lament, where Israel faithfully honours God by crying out to him, “Restore us, O God; let your face shine, that we may be saved!” (Psalm 80:3 ESV)

Israel was the vine that God transplanted from Egypt into Canaan.  God was completely faithful to them, despite periods of faithlessness from them.  Through his faithful servants God’s face shone upon Israel, and remembering this, Israel laments to God, “You brought a vine out of Egypt; you drove out the nations and planted it. You cleared the ground for it; it took deep root and filled the land.  Turn again, O God of hosts! Look down from heaven, and see; have regard for this vine, the stock that your right hand planted, and for the son whom you made strong for yourself.” (Psalm 80: 8–9, 14–15 ESV)

In a time of great rebellion, Isaiah sings a love song for God, his beloved, about his vineyard, “My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. He dug it and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vines; …but it yielded wild grapes. And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard. What more was there to do for my vineyard, that I have not done in it? When I looked for it to yield grapes, why did it yield wild grapes? For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are his pleasant planting; and he looked for justice, but behold, bloodshed; for righteousness, but behold, an outcry! (Isaiah 5:1–2a, 3-4, 7 ESV)

This too is a great witness to us.  Prophets like Isaiah suffered to reveal the sin of God’s people.  King David and his entourage of Psalm writers lament, calling God to return, and his people to repent, to stop being wild grapes, sour grapes of God’s vineyard, the poisonous stench that was growing on the vine God rescued from Egypt. 

Let this powerful witness work!  So, you die daily to self, allowing the Holy Spirit to return you and restore you in faith.  To once again see the shining face of God.  To bring you again and again back to the true source of salvation.

Also hidden amongst Israel’s lament at their failures in Psalm Eighty is a powerful promise. We hear, “But let your hand be on the man of your right hand, the son of man whom you have made strong for yourself!  Then we shall not turn back from you; give us life, and we will call upon your name!”  (Psalm 80:17–18 ESV)

This Son of Man, made strong for God, is God’s own Son, Jesus Christ.  He is the fulfilment of Israel, the one who many waited for in faith, while much was going wrong in Israel.  Jesus is the new Israel, that those who endured by faith, were waiting.

Jesus has now come, he has died, and he is risen from the dead.  In faith Israel looked forward to the coming of Christ, and in the same way we too look forward, but to Christ’s second coming!

As we struggle, we are called to cast off “every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith.”  (Hebrews 12:1b–2a ESV)

Jesus continues to send us the Holy Spirit, so we too, live with faith, and die in faith.  But also, we do so with hope, because Jesus is the new Israel, the perfect Israel, and we are grafted into this Holy Vine of Israel and God the Father is the vinedresser. 

This is the promise:  “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser.  Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love.” (John 15:1, 3-5, 7–9 ESV)

Jesus is our true vine, and we are his branches.  We bear the will of God because we are grafted into the resurrected Israel of God.  We are fruitful and faithful because the Holy Spirit wills us to look to Jesus, our founder and perfecter of faith!  Amen.

C, Post-Pentecost 2, Proper 7 - Luke 8:38–39 "Making a Gentile Gentle"

Luke 8:38–39 (ESV) “The man from whom the demons had gone begged that he might be with him, but Jesus sent him away, saying, “Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you.” And he went away, proclaiming throughout the whole city how much Jesus had done for him.”

The encounter between Jesus and Legion, the man possessed by a legion of demons, is a strange event in the ears of twenty-first century hearers. Who is this man confronted by Jesus on the gentile side of Lake Galilee?

He is a man portrayed as one in the depths of depravity.  The unclean of all unclean gentiles, living in the spiritual and physical uncleanness of death.  In his unclean state, he sees no need for the bondage of clothing, and when he is bound with chains and shackles for his own good and for the protection of those around him, his demonic possession is so powerful, he breaks free and withdraws to the wilderness, to the known dwelling of demons, in the desert.

Where no one else could bind this legion of demons within the man, Jesus is the only one to bind the sin and free the sinner.  At the sight of this gentile made gentle and clothed sitting at Jesus’ feet, fear strikes the hearts of the other Gerasene gentiles, and they ask Jesus to leave.  It seems the devil they know is better than the unexpected salvation they don’t! 

This is not the only extreme picture God’s word gives us today.  In the Old Testament, King Ahab and Jezebel, are arguably the most abhorrent people from amongst God’s chosen people.  So much so God uses Jezebel’s name in Jesus’ warning to the church in Thyatira, in Revelation, as a vengeful person or personification of those who lead others into immorality and idolatry against God.

Jezebel and King Ahab seek to kill Elijah, after he slaughters Baal prophets on Mount Carmel.  As Elijah is pursued, he is broken and desires death from God, rather than from the vengeful two.  From Mount Carmel he flees and is sent forty days to another, the mountain of God.  To where Moses first, saw the burning bush, and from where he received God’s word of Law, the Ten Commandments.  From here, Elijah is sent back to anoint Hazael, a gentile king in Syria, and Elisha, a prophet, to continue in his position.

These events all seem foreign to us.  Burning bushes, naked demon possessed tomb dwellers, and a prophet pursued by a rogue king and his evil queen seeking revenge.

From these two readings in God’s word, we’re called to hear that regardless of being an Israelite or gentile, God calls all people, and he does not let the demonic or death defeat him.  But that he seeks to defeat death and depravity in both his chosen ones, and those whom he calls to testify of his works.

These biblical accounts are extreme events.  How are we to picture ourselves in them? 

First, despite these biblical accounts reporting the greatest of abominations, we do well to see ourselves included in them!  We’re to view them as accounts that include everyone, leaving no one unaccountable.   Second, we do even better to see ourselves as the characters in these real stories, so we know what is really in store for us, in relation to how we respond to God’s actions.

We have opportunity to search ourselves to see if we’re a Jezebel or an Ahab type of character, unrepentant and unforgiving, on one hand!   Or, whether we’re like Legion.  Whether we receive and proclaim God or reject him and act with rebellion and revenge!

When the locals saw what happened to demons, to the pigs, and to the man from whom the demons departed, they were seized with great fear!  The people were more fearful that the demon possessed man was now not possessed.  If this Jesus is so powerful he can cast out demons from him who is the epitome of demon possession, how powerful is he to cleanse me of my seemingly well behaved publicly pleasing happy demons and my supposedly inoffensive idols?   

Or on hearing what happened to Ahab and Jezebel, we’re not called to think, that won’t happen to me because I’m not like them!  Rather, if God can do that to his chosen people, what can happen to me when I conduct my life without repentance and forgiveness, and in its place work with revenge and murderous thoughts!

The reality is we’re not all that different to Legion, whom Jesus delivered from death and destruction from within himself.  And furthermore, it takes very little for us to return to the ways of Jezebel and Ahab, when we take the kingship of Christ, implanted in us for granted.

In our baptism all have been made disciples of Jesus Christ.  All who remain in Jesus and his word are offspring of Abraham, bearing the faith that makes us righteous, just as Abraham was deemed to be righteous by trusting, not in himself, but God.  We are gentiles joined as one as God’s people, having been grafted into God through his Son Jesus Christ.  Just as Legion was made a gentle gentile we too have been made gentle gentiles in our baptism into Christ.  We are made disciples, disciplined in repentance and forgiveness, by Jesus Christ, the Light of the Nations, the gentiles.

In baptism we are God’s children.  In Galatians, Saint Paul says, “For as many of you as were baptised into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”  (Galatians 3:27–28 ESV)  

Baptism has cleansed and saved you, remaining in that baptism continues to cleanse and save you, in baptism all baptised people have been given the gifts like Legion, to “Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you.” (Luke 8:39a ESV)

Jesus did not allow Legion to come in the boat with him and the disciples he was to send out as apostles.  Instead, he commissioned him to declare in faith what God did for him.  And he did, “And he went away, proclaiming throughout the whole city how much Jesus had done for him.” (Luke 8:39b ESV)

The one who formerly bore the demons and declared, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me.” (Luke 8:28 ESV) Now goes and declares Jesus, as the Son of God, who saved him from depravity.

This is how God the Holy Spirit wants you to see yourself in his word, being cleansed and being forgiven.  Indeed, Paul wants you to see as he saw himself grafted into Jesus Christ, who though he was a Jew was in danger of being pruned from the Holy Vine of God.  Just as God told Elijah that there was a remnant in Israel, there is also a remnant of his people in Christendom, chosen by grace.

You have been chosen by grace in your baptism; this is a baptism where the Holy Spirit gives faith.  God’s Spirit leads us away from faith in the self, like the faith of Jezebel and Ahab, which saw them separated from God.  Therefore, they died in the most debased way possible. 

As Paul warns, “They were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast through faith. So do not become proud, but fear. For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you. Note then the kindness and the severity of God: severity toward those who have fallen, but God’s kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness. Otherwise you too will be cut off.” (Romans 11:20–22 ESV)

In faith, through repentance and the forgiveness of sins, you stand grafted into Christ as one legion of sinner-saints.  In the kindness of God, the Holy Spirit motivates you to tell others of the mighty works of God in Jesus Christ our Lord who has delivered you from the depravity of eternal death and clothed you in his righteousness. Amen.

B, Easter 5 - John 15:1–5, 1 John 4:11–17 "Branches of God's Love"

John 15:1–5 (ESV) “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser.  Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.  Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you.  Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.  I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. 

1 John 4:11–17 (ESV) Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.  No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.  By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.  And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Saviour of the world.  Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.  So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.  By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is so also are we in this world.

*****

Getting liquid into cells with thick membranes can be near impossible if the membranes are too tough.  Even if one finds a way to get the liquid in, if the membrane is not pliable enough to grow, the membrane can break, and the life-liquid within is lost.

The science of cells receiving liquid is known as osmosis.  A cell with a thick solution within, naturally attracts a thinner solution through its outer membrane to dilute the thicker within.  The results of this dissolution, the breaking up of the thicker solution, is the hydration of the cell.  Plant and animal cells work this way by containing a thicker salty solution, and water is the solvent that breaks down the salt and hydrates the cells in the object.

If the source of the hydration is hindered, the life of the branches suffers.  If the membranes of the cells become thick and clogged, the cells choke themselves.   If the source stops providing, everything downstream dies.  If the nutrient supply is changed at the source, then the cells can be poisoned.  And if an external action physically separates a branch from the source, then understandably what is cut cannot live.

Jesus calls himself the vine, and our Father as the vinedresser.  God is our gardener, and we are the branches of Jesus Christ.  Elsewhere in God’s word we’re told we have been grafted into God through Jesus Christ. 

“For if you were cut from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and grafted, contrary to nature, into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, the natural branches, (the Israelites) be grafted back into their own olive tree.” (Romans 11:24 ESV)

Jesus Christ is now the vine shoot from the stump into which God’s branches are grafted.  Both us and the Israelites get spiritual growth from the new Israel, our Saviour Jesus Christ.  Apart from Jesus Christ we can do nothing; we cannot grow or bear any fruit! 

Remaining in Christ, abiding in him, we produce fruit!  What is this fruit?  What does your fruit look like?  Does it look like Jesus Christ?  Does it point to him or to something else?  How do I remain in Christ, so that his solvent can work its dissolution of sin within every cell of my being? 

Ask yourself, “If God can cut out the cultivated olive branch, what can he do to me, a wild olive branch that’s been grafted into him?”

So, what is it that allows a person to remain grafted into him?    In what do I trust?  Does it allow God to abide in me, so I can receive the holiness and cleanliness of God?   Despite the dirtiness of my deeds and desires that hardens my being to his cleanliness and holiness!

Ponder how this looks to God!   If you were God, how would you deal with one who hardens itself to the faithful softening nutrients of forgiveness?

Well, this is how God deals with it!  God places an electrolyte within our being, to draw in the nutrients from his word and his sacraments.  Without this electrolyte the cells of our spirituality would become so hardened, from the salinity of the self’s desires, that we would lose the energy we need to exist and eventually self-destruct.  We would spiritually collapse and die.  

This electrolyte is the activity of the Holy Spirit!  It comes from nutrients in God’s word and sacraments, and it draws God’s word and sacraments through the branches of the vine, into every living cell of our being.

This activity, of the Holy Spirit within us, gives us spiritual growth.  This electrolyte seasons us with the salt of salvation, and it creates a new desire within us.  This is the desire to be loved by God. 

However, the electrolyte of the Holy Spirit working within us, is already God’s love working.  We desire the love of God because God has been loving us with his word and sacraments.  The spiritual growth occurring here does a number of things.

First, the Holy Spirit reveals to us the hardness of our being and our resistance to God’s electrolytes of love.  We’re shown how our desires of love to love, negates our need to be loved by God, in the way that he needs to love us.

We hear the great love text of the bible, such as the first John text today and Jesus’ summary of the Old Testament, on how to inherit eternal life, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbour as yourself.” (Luke 10:27 ESV)

We learn very quickly the way God so loved the world, is so different to the way, we so love the world.  Jesus says, “Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.” (John 12:25 ESV)

Secondly, the Spirit having revealed this leads us to cry out, “How do I love the Lord my God with all my heart and with all my strength and with all my mind, and my neighbour as myself?”  

Thirdly, one of three scenarios then occurs!  Only one grows us with the electrolytes of God’s love in the Holy Spirit.  The other two continue to shut out the love of God with the hardness of the human spirit of love.

In these other two scenarios, one cries out “How do I love?” and then decides to climb up to God and love him with one’s good works and obedience.  Unfortunately, these works are filthy rags in the sight of God, because they disobey God and his word. 

The other of these two scenarios, one sees the hopelessness of their spiritual health, knowing that no amount of their works will fix their failure to love God, and they walk away from God, usually hating God, or hating themselves, or both!

In both of these ways, climbing up to God or walking away from him, the effects of humanity’s negative spiritual electrolytes are working within, hardening us to the will of God. 

But the third scenario is God’s way.  In crying out, “How does one love God?” One learns in God’s word, it’s God’s love that has carried them so far!  Therefore, it will be God’s love that continues to energise them with all his gifts of love for salvation and eternal life!

It may not be immediately obvious, but God’s word and sacraments have been flowing from the vine into the branches to give life and vitality.  Our love for God and others is revealed in events we would usually deem ordinary rather than extraordinary!  

These are in desires like: Being still and letting God be God in our circumstances.  Waiting on God with patience.  Opening one’s heart to God’s word to reveal sin, to willingly repent and believe our forgiveness.  One is also shown in their enemies a need for God’s grafting gift, so there’s a willing desire to forgive as one has been forgiven. 

So, in summary, first the Holy Spirit shows us our shortfall.  Second, the Holy Spirit elicits the desire to cry out to God for help.  And third, we are quietened with a revelation of God’s work in and through his word and sacraments, where we continue to abide in these works of love, to confess sin, and live in peace with God and those with whom God has placed us.

Knowing that God’s love flows to us through the vine that is Jesus Christ, and our life now comes from the work of the Holy Spirit within, we know we ought to love one another.  With this debt to love, our faith returns us to the cycle of life where we continue to receive nutrient from Jesus Christ, our vine,  in the electrolytic empowering work of the Holy Spirit, given in and through God’s word and sacraments.

God the Father is the vinedresser, Jesus Christ is the vine, and the Holy Spirit seeks to hydrate the health of every spiritual cell in the vine’s branches, which is God’s church! 

Let God abide and remain within, so his love can be perfected in us and keep us healthy in Jesus Christ.  Amen.