B, Lent 4 - Numbers 21:4-7 "Serpents, Sin, & Salvation"

God is patient.  He takes the long way round.  If he took the path of least resistance, humanity would have long been annihilated.

God is patient with humanity.  In the days of disobedience before the flood, God was patient.  God was patient with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  While the Israelites lived in Egypt, God was patient for four hundred years.  In the wilderness after the Israelites were exiled from Egypt, God continued to be patient.  Today, God continues to be patient with his church, and he continues to be patient with you!

So, what is it with — me, you, the church, the Israelites — all of humanity, that God needs to be patient?  What is it that allows all of humanity to stand as one before God’s patience?

God is patient with our lack of patience.  Our impatience can come from various things, but at its root is our displeasure with suffering.  Therefore, God suffers with our lack of endurance in suffering.

Ultimately, God sent his only begotten Son to suffer in our place!  Yet in this life, you and I will still struggle with suffering.  Nevertheless, God is pleased to be patient with us.  He takes the long way round, he takes the way of patience, the patient path.  And we can be very thankful for that!

When God lifted Israel out of bondage in Egypt, he could have marched them into Canaan in a relatively short amount of time.  But he took the patient path, leading Israel forty years, his way in the Sinai wilderness, the way of suffering that led to salvation in the land of milk and honey.

The bronze serpent story gives us a window into God’s patience and his mega-work of humanity’s salvation.  

The Israelites became impatient with the way of God!  They spoke against God and his servant Moses!  So, God sends fiery serpents amongst them.

Let’s take a moment to take this in!  God sends fiery poisonous serpents to bite his people.  Not only do the serpents look fiery, a bronze coppery colour, they are fiery, wielding the rod of God’s wrath.  Their mouths are fiery, in that their venom inflicts a hellish bite leading to agony and certain death. 

The Israelite’s impatience with God, his providence in the wilderness, and with Moses, was instantly removed by the Israelite’s immediate need for a remedy against the forced death from the fierce fangs of serpents sent by God.

Snakes are animals that cause fear.  Since Satan spoke from a serpent in the garden of Eden, snakes have been feared by humans.  Moses ran from his staff that turned into a serpent when God commanded him to throw it on the ground (Exodus 4:3).   So, there’s no doubt the venomous snakes got their attention.

The wilderness is a place of serpents.  The Israelites would have seen plenty as they walked the way of freedom!  Up until this event, we can assume God would have protected them from serpents, just as he protected them from other dangers as he led them out of Egypt.  So, God patiently works his way to will his people from their impatience.

When it comes to snakes, not many of us are heroes.  The thought of being faced with an infestation of fiery serpents is chilling!  Do you remember Indiana Jones encircled by stirred up serpents?  Or imagine the reality of being buried in a box of snakes, slithering over you in the dark.  As they do on the television show, “I’m a celebrity get me out of here”.  That’s truly the stuff of nightmares!

This is the living nightmare of the Israelites, and we can fully understand their fear!  Not only were the snakes just present in their vicinity, but they were sent by God to discipline their disobedience.

Can you see the people begging Moses?  Remorseful for being impatient!  Penitent for their impatience against God’s providence, saying, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness?  For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this worthless food.” (Numbers 21:5 ESV)

In Ecclesiastes seven verse eight, it is written, “Better is the end of a thing than its beginning, and the patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit.” (Ecclesiastes 7:8 ESV) 

God removed their pride when the serpents began to bite.  They cried out to Moses, for it to end, saying, “We have sinned, for we have spoken against the LORD and against you. Pray to the LORD, that he take away the serpents from us.” (Numbers 21:7 ESV)

Moses prayed but the end of it was not the removal of the serpents.  Instead, God said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.” (Numbers 21:8 ESV)

So, God sends the serpent, and he doesn’t take them away, but rather gets Moses to put the pest up on a pole.   This is the patient path consistent with God’s way.

Imagine if God did remove the snakes!  As soon as they lost sight of the serpents, their impatience and pride would have returned even more so!   But the serpents remained, and God added yet another serpent, calling them to turn and trust God’s way, even in the midst of their suffering. 

Knowing what human nature is like, some would have tested God on this.  The fiery serpent is sent to bite.  It does its job.  The tester is tested.  Do they turn to the serpent up on the stick, or do they stick to their digs and remain in rebellion?   It’s a life-or-death decision.

Now, this might seem like a pretty simple decision to make.  Yet many continue to choose the decision that leads to death.

Jesus says, “…as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up,  that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.” (John 3:14–15 ESV)

Not only are people impatient with God,  but now many also fail to acknowledge God’s existence.   Some think they know God, but they choose to create their own idea of God to suit their way through the wilderness of this world.  But when suffering of death comes, and it always does, crying out to a false god cannot save from death.

God is patient with humanity, but Paul warns God shows no partiality, saying, “…do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?  He will render to each one according to his works:  to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honour and immortality, he will give eternal life;  but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury.”  (Romans 2:4,6–8 ESV)

The serpents of sin and suffering still exist.  This sin and suffering left unattended by God will lead to eternal death.  Yet God is patient, he wants to save, and not condemn. 

The good work of God within us, exposes our sin, wills us into confession, keeps us repentant and enduring in belief of our forgiveness, as well as makes us patient.  This happens through the work of the Holy Spirit despite living in the reality of fiery sin serpents still biting and wounding us, causing suffering. 

However, the good works of repentance and belief in the forgiveness of our deadly sins lets us see God's patient reality!   We see our sin, but we see the Servant of Man saving us from sin, lifted up like the serpent lifted up by Moses in the wilderness.

The irony in all of this is that sin came into the world through the deception of a serpent.  Satan, the old snake, also sought to seduce Jesus to sin in the wilderness but failed.  Then at the cross he thought he had won, seeing Jesus nailed to a cursed sinner’s cross.

But death lost its eternal sting at the cross.  The devil was double-crossed.  The great injustice and evil of the cross became the hallmark of mercy and holy goodness stamped on those who allow the light of God to expose and forgive. 

Jesus steals the serpent from Satan and attaches the sin of humanity to it.  He becomes the sin, the serpent, and is lifted up guiltless for the guilty.  He takes the curse of your sin, exposing it in his broken body and spilt blood, and swaps it with his victory over death, for you!

Just as God sent serpents, and then placed one on a pole to save the Israelites, God allows us to suffer as a result of our sinful being and its deeds.  God wants us to see our sin, but even more he wants us to see our sin on Jesus, lifted up on the cross. 

Just as the Israelite’s saw and feared the reality of the serpents that bit them, we too see our reality too.  We can allow the Holy Spirit to continue the patient work of peeling the layers back, to expose the greater depths of our sin.  But in the suffering of that exposure, the Spirit will show us the endlessness and patience of God’s love, who takes our sin and makes our sin – crucify Christ on the cross. 

God is patient with you.  God hates your suffering.  Yet despite this he would rather you suffer in short through confession of your evil works, exposing them in the true light of God’s love and suffering on the cross.

We are reminded by Jesus in John three verse twenty-one that, “whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their works have been carried out in God.” 

Let us pray.

Heavenly Father, send your Holy Spirit into our hearts to work in us the good works of confession of our sin in daily repentance and belief in the forgiveness of sins.  Thankyou for sending your Son Jesus Christ to bear the slipperiness of our sinful being and its deeds on the cross, which should have been our cross.  Help us to patiently bear our cross with the help of the Holy Spirit with full expectation of our resurrection to eternal life with you.  Amen.

  

B, The Second Sunday after the Epiphany - 1 Corinthians 6:12-20 "Pleasure"

1 Corinthians 6:12–20 (ESV) “All things are lawful for me,” but not all things are helpful. “All things are lawful for me,” but I will not be dominated by anything.  “Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food”—and God will destroy both one and the other.  The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body.  And God raised the Lord and will also raise us up by his power.  Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ?  Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute?  Never!  Or do you not know that he who is joined to a prostitute becomes one body with her?  For, as it is written, “The two will become one flesh.”  But he who is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with him.  Flee from sexual immorality.  Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body.  Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God?  You are not your own,  for you were bought with a price.  So glorify God in your body.

Saint Paul tells his congregation in Corinth, “All things are lawful for me,” but not all things are helpful. “All things are lawful for me,” but I will not be dominated by anything.” (1 Corinthians 6:12 ESV) 

Paul will not be dominated by anything.  He speaks about food, sexuality, then paints a picture of one joined with a prostitute, breaking the union held with Christ, turning the body from a temple of the Holy Spirit into a temple of sin against oneself.

Corinth was a place of pleasure, and Paul goes to the heart of the believer’s struggle in Corinth by confronting the common practise of those inside and outside the church.

The philosophy of the Greeks at that time, was a false dichotomy, dividing the flesh from the spirit of a person.  The flesh was evil and must be escaped, and the spirit of a person was good if only it could discharge the evils of the flesh. 

From this came two extremes in thought, stoicism, and epicureanism.  Stoicism was a strict practice that sought to live a good life to achieve a good spirit.  Epicureanism, on the other hand, pursued pleasure in all its perverseness.  They believed one could follow whatever aroused the desires of the flesh, knowing that at death the good spirit would depart the evil flesh.

Put simply, these two extremes seek to please the self.  But Paul does not separate flesh and spirit and he points us to what pleases God. 

Paul reintroduces the oneness of a person as flesh and spirit.  When one seeks pleasure and experiences pain, the human spirit and one’s flesh are both affected by the pursuit of pleasure as well as the experience of pain.    Therefore, all people need the holiness of the Holy Spirit in their spirit, and the perfecting of their flesh in Jesus Christ’s perfect flesh, crucified and raised for the atonement of our whole person.

By Paul stating he will not be dominated, or be empowered by anything, he asked the Corinthians, “what are you empowered by?”  God asks the same question of you in this text!

Paul goes straight to the Corinthians being dominated by prostitution.  Why?  Well, Corinth was rife with hedonistic, pleasure-seeking prostitution.  The general practise was a man had his wife to bear children and manage his household, and at the same time had other sexual partners for pleasure.  Either, a mistress or a catamite, a soft young homosexual partner.  This was occurring in the congregation at Corinth since he called them not to practice this in his letter to them.

But he points to prostitution for other reasons too!  He says, “all things are lawful for me”.   Literally in the Greek, all things are from me, for me, but not all things are helpful.  Even though all things come out of him he will not be powered by anything, from within himself or from outside of himself.  That is except God, “who raised the Lord (Jesus Christ) and will also raise us up by his power.” (1 Corinthians 6:14 ESV)

Paul appeals to the power of the Holy Spirit, over against the power of one’s human spirit.  Paul shuts down the pleasure seekers by calling those “bought with a price”, to glorify God in one’s body. 

It might seem Paul is siding with the stoics, by pushing a strict moralistic code, to do good.  But no, stoicism seeks to rid the spiritual self of flesh.  Paul, on the other hand, proclaims the oneness of the spirit and flesh, in the resurrection, and the Holy Spirit dwelling within and sanctifying our human flesh, despite its corruption.

But what does this have to do with us? 

Some of us appear to live good moral lives and some of us know that our morals are far from good or have been good spirited.  Some of us have had relationships with prostitutes, and some of us have not.  But this text delves deeper into us, than just a moralistic check on, who has, or who hasn’t, been with a prostitute.

Although Paul appeals to the Corinthians to stop the practice of pleasing oneself with prostitutes, he calls into question the greater reality of what pleases God.  Prostitution is a relative part of his question to the Corinthians.  But it’s also the overarching extreme of prostitution’s damaging pleasure that demonstrates the full gamut of corrupted pleasure, from the least to the greatest, within the family, the community, and the kingdom of God.

Paul will not be dominated by anything but that which glorifies God in his body, be it food, his stomach, or his sexuality.

When we understand prostitution as the negative complete extreme of pleasure, all degrees of our pleasure seeking are called into question.  Does it glorify God or not?  Here again we can use the glory test on ourselves to test our appetites of pleasure.  Knowing that God will destroy both stomach and food, what is fruitful for your eternal life and what is not?  What is perishable and what is imperishable?

Are the things your senses seek, benefiting you eternally or not? 

You may, or may not, struggle with prostitution.  But many of us struggle with other pleasures that do not please God or benefit us in the long run.  These failed pleasures fall short in the glory test, examined in the light of truth, God’s written Word. 

It’s God’s good pleasure to make you a temple of the Holy Spirit.  It’s God’s good pleasure to lead you from the lies of this world and the father of lies, the devil, into the unhidden truth of his good impartial pleasure.  It’s God’s good pleasure to forgive all sin, from the least to the greatest!

Prostitution is one of the oldest professions in the world.  Adam and Eve prostituted themselves for their own pleasure at Eden.  There they exposed their nakedness and sold themselves into the slavery of sin before God, for a corrupted knowledge of good and evil.

The lie of your corrupted pleasure continues today.  The reality of this lie is your suffering.  People do not willingly seek pain, but everyone experiences pain as a result of seeking pleasure.  The pursuit of pleasure is the parent of all addictions, lawful and unlawful.  All suffering occurs as a result of one seeking pleasure within the temple of the self. 

So, to what is it you prostitute yourself?  What is your god and what diet do you need to feed its addiction?

It might well be sexuality, prostitution, or pornography! 

It might be gluttony of the stomach, food, chocolate, sugar, or the gluttony of amassing wealth! 

Perhaps its alcohol or another substance to stimulate the temple tastes of your human desire. 

Is it excitement in gaming, sport, shopping, or risking chance in the gambling arena that produces the feel-good hormones you need to live? 

Then again you might need to be popular, needing glory, the pleasure of being prevalent in public, or the pleasure of being turned in on oneself in private!   

Maybe it’s an addiction of control,  a perverse pleasure in taking control of the biological God-given self, control of others, an addiction of acquiring assets, controlling other people’s stuff, or controlling the opinions of others by spreading gossip!  To have control by knowing good, knowing evil, or knowing someone else’s business!

By far the worst addiction that’s flooding the world with mental anguish and suffering is addiction to oneself in the reflection of a mobile phone.  It’s a device that serves all of the hedonistic addictions listed above, promising pleasure but causing lifelong pain.

The mobile device together with all these other things allows one to practice spiritual prostitution!  All expose us, showing we have sold ourselves into the slavery of our sin’s lie.  The lie that promises pleasure and life but produces suffering and death.  We are caught in the lie, naked, without the truth before God!

The truth is Jesus Christ!  To know and want the truth one needs to turn from oneself to Jesus Christ.  He is the only truth that glorifies God the Father.  The Holy Spirit is the only true spirit builder, that builds us into the temple of God.

At the start of John’s Gospel, when Andrew and John followed Jesus, Jesus turned and said to them, “What are you seeking?” Jesus was asking, “what do you want, what are you coming to worship?”  And they replied, “Where are you staying!”  Jesus said, “Come and your will see.” (John 1:38-39) 

Like Peter, at the end of John’s Gospel, Jesus askes you, “Do you love me?  Do you want me more than anything else?”  Do you want to come and see Jesus?  Is your greatest pleasure to please God?

God askes of you, “What do you want, what do you seek to worship in your life?”  Is it the pleasure of God, the joy of Jesus Christ, and the holiness of the Holy Spirit?  God wants us to come and see we can only love God by letting him forgive our sin!  This is God’s good pleasure!

The truth is, God the Son totally assumed our humanity, spirit, and flesh.  In his being, both as, the eternal Son of God, and, the resurrected suffering servant and Saviour of humanity, it’s God the Father’s good pleasure to forgive those who are repentant and are being united as one in his heavenly glory by the Holy Spirit.  

“Therefore, …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 12:1b–2 ESV)

Now is time to “come out” as confessional Christians, personally and publicly, one with Jesus Christ! 

May God grant us strength in the Holy Spirit, to not resist his power when he raises up, you, and me, to do so!  Amen.   

A, Post-Pentecost 4 Proper 7 - Matthew 10:24, 38-39 "The Calmness of Christ"

Jesus says, “A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his master.   And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.  Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” (Matthew 10:24, 38-39 ESV)

One can imagine being in the centre of a tornado would be an extraordinarily frightening experience.  Your attention would be drawn to the whirling winds and debris swirling around you, threatening to kill you.  Therefore, one can assume one would not be focusing on the calm eye of the storm.

Unlike a tropical cyclone, a tornado is very narrow!  Many who have experienced a cyclone directly overhead, report of an eery stillness in the eye of the storm, before the other side of the storm arrives with opposing winds.  In a tornado’s eye, being much smaller, one might be still, but your attention would be drawn to the close proximity of the cyclonic danger.

Jesus’ life was like the eye of a cyclonic storm.  Chaos surrounded his calm, disorder around order! In the three years of his ministry leading up to his death, Jesus was the calm eye of the storm.

At the beginning of his ministry after his baptism, the Holy Spirit led him into the wilderness to be tested.  This was the beginning of the storm!  One might imagine it as a brewing tropical storm, a low deepening in depression, becoming a cyclone.

However, at the other end of his ministry, Good Friday had developed into a full-blown tornado.  The chaos intensified as the swirling winds of darkness and death closed in, making his worries in the wilderness, look like a minor inconvenience.

We are going to be tempted by ourselves and the world, as well as receive satanic attention, just as Jesus did in the wilderness through to the cross. 

We are baptised into Jesus’ subordination, into his humility, his cross!  The Holy Spirit is leading you in your wilderness, just as he led Jesus from the wilderness to the cross, and through death.  Jesus relied on the strength of the Holy Spirit and the faithfulness of God the Father!  Now you are called to rely on the Holy Spirit as he leads you in the faithfulness of Jesus Christ!  He continually seeks to place Jesus in you, as you’re called to walk through the valley of the shadow of death.

But as we walk his way of the cross, we’re called to walk in faith rather than fear.  It’s understandable that one might be fearful as they walk.  In his earthliness and humility, Jesus was acutely aware of the fear we face since he bore our flesh and was constantly in the centre of the raging storm of sin against him.

Jesus’ fear, however, was not a negative frightful fear, but rather, a faithful fear that looked not to the chaos around him but to the faithfulness and peace of our Heavenly Father!  Jesus calls you to the same reverent fear he had for our Heavenly Father.

He says of those who seek to distract us from the Father into fear as a result of their cyclonic chaos, “So have no fear of them, for nothing is covered that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known.  And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul.  Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.  Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows.  So everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven,  but whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven.” (Matthew 10:26, 28, 31–33 ESV)

In the cyclone of your life, your Father and your Saviour, Jesus Christ, want you to spread the calm of Christ, making the eye of other people’s storms, the salvation of Jesus Christ. 

In our baptism we are given the ability to acknowledge Jesus, having been baptised into his calm over chaos, his order over disorder!  Just as Jesus bore the Holy Spirit, you are given the Holy Spirit who faithfully seeks to reveal the reality of sin, but even more so our worthiness having been baptised into Christ. 

When we acknowledge Jesus, as Lord, we acknowledge our need to be baptised into his death.  Therefore, we acknowledge our sin and the ongoing work of the Holy Spirit, whom Jesus sent.  We do this acknowledging in the reality of the chaos, because despite the chaos of the storm, we have been turned and calmed by Jesus at the centre of our storm.

Your acknowledgement of Jesus to others, spreads his calm, because Jesus is the only peace in every storm that leads to death.   Acknowledgement of Jesus is knowing our cross and death, but even more so our life in him.  We pass on this life when we acknowledge Jesus before others!

Denial of Jesus is a denial of the life he gives through death.  Our denial before others leaves them without life, in eternal death too!  When one leaves the calmness of Jesus Christ, they enter the tornado and chaos of drowning in eternal death and darkness. 

Left in this state, Jesus denies and does not acknowledge the denier before the Father.  Why?  Because in denial one has not considered Christ to be a worthy Saviour.

However, Saint Paul tells young pastor Timothy, a trustworthy saying, “If we have died with him, we will also live with him;  if we endure, we will also reign with him; if we deny him, he also will deny us;  if we are faithless, he remains faithful— for he cannot deny himself.”  (2 Timothy 2:11–13 ESV)

Paul reiterates what Jesus has said!  But proclaiming Jesus after the resurrection he adds,  “if we are faithless, he remains faithful— for he cannot deny himself.” 

Now that Jesus has died, been raised, and ascended, he sends the Holy Spirit in baptism.  If we are faithless, Jesus remains faithful to us.  He knows the Holy Spirit will be faithful within the baptised.  The Holy Spirit will seek to lead the lost back to our Heavenly Father by showing them Jesus’ worth through his word.  He might also give the lost glimpses of death with the experience of suffering to shock and recreate faith.

Although suffering sounds bad, it is actually good news for all who doubt their salvation, their baptism!  Jesus faithfully cannot deny himself!  So, while there is life in someone who has denied their baptism into Jesus’ death and resurrection, the Holy Spirit seeks to kill that which does not believe and give the newness of life in Jesus Christ.

Pauls says to the Romans, “We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.  For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.  Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.”  (Romans 6:4–5, 8 ESV)

What Paul says to Timothy he repeats to the Romans, “Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.  (Romans 6: 8, 2 Timothy 2:11 ESV)

Believing is made possible in us, by the Holy Spirit.  Our suffering and death centres us on the eye of the storm, Jesus Christ.   He is the only one who saves us from the storms of life and places us in the tranquillity of his resurrection, in the peaceful presence of our Heavenly Father.

Jesus also so says, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.” (Matthew 10:34 ESV)

There is chaos yet to come, even within our own households!  This should not surprise us since the chaos comes from within each of us.  However, our knowledge of the cyclonic chaos of our sin, revealed and covered by forgiveness, is what stops a believer becoming conceited, keeping one humble!

Because of your sinfulness, there will always be chaos inside and outside the church.  What keeps order is the calmness of Jesus Christ.  Ironically he does this with a sword.  He keeps calmness in the church with the double-edged sword of his word, saving us from the disorder of human words and ideals.  Jesus’ calming word is the silencing word of Law and Gospel.

The cross reveals the reality of the Law and the Gospel.  One who allow the Holy Spirit to bring them to the calmness of Christ, knows his worth and follows.  The person who joyfully takes up the cross discovers they have this newness of life because of the Holy Spirit.   And therefore, willing allows the loss of the old life, their words, and the spirit of the self. 

Losing one’s life to the cross, in this world for Jesus’ sake, one will also find themselves eternally gathered by the Holy Spirit into the calmness of Jesus’ eternal presence, having been delivered from the storms of this life.

Jesus says, “Whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.  Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” (Matthew 10: 38-39 ESV)

Amen.

A, Post-Pentecost 3 Proper 6 - Matthew 9: 36, 10:5-6, 16a, Romans 5:1–8 "Flayed and Flung"

Romans 5:1–8 (ESV) Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.  Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.  For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die—but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Matthew 9: 36, 10:5-6, 16a (ESV) “When Jesus saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.  These twelve Jesus sent out, instructing them, ‘Go nowhere among the Gentiles and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.  Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves.’”

Jesus paints the picture of sheep without a shepherd.   The sheep are harassed and helpless.  Harassed and helpless are rather tame words here in the English.  The Greek suggests the sheep are flayed and flung without a shepherd.  To be flayed is to be stripped of skin, to be skinned alive!

This picture is much grimmer when we realise the sheep have no protection from the shepherd or even their own skin, dispersed all over the place without the protection of numbers. They were walking meals for every wild beast out there.  That’s not good!  In our English slang we might say they were skint!  But it’s for these, skint, skinless sheep, Jesus has compassion.

It is to the sheep of Israel that Jesus sends his apostles.  They are ones sent to stand in the place of Jesus, having carried his command to “go” and “proclaim as you go that the kingdom of heaven is near”, in Jesus Christ and his word of promise.  The authority he receives from our Heavenly Father, is to send the apostles with authority to clothe the skinless, helpless sheep with his love.  To give them protection, he brings his kingdom into the world with his human presence, and with it, the authority to pass on what he brings from our Father to those he longs to clothe.

The reality is those whom Jesus sends are sheep too!  They are not called to go out with a thick skin, so to speak, but to go to the skint lost sheep of Israel, skint as well.  The only thing they were to take was the word of Jesus.  A word he promises is so powerful in judgement, that if those who heard it were to reject it, they would be in greater peril than Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgement.

Yet, it is to these “sent ones” he also says, you sheep will encounter wolves.  Jesus paints a picture that is far from rosy and romantic.  There is no bait and switch in his word, but rather the unhidden truth of reality.

In the midst of this picture of death, Jesus reassures those he sends, “When they deliver you over, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say, for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour.  For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you.  Brother will deliver brother over to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death,  and you will be hated by all for my name’s sake. But the one who endures to the end will be saved.”  (Matthew 10:19–22 ESV)

As they go, they will suffer pain, hatred, and death, for bearing his name.  Yet here is the opportunity God will create for one to speak with authority the word, given by the Holy Spirit, from Jesus and the Father.

In Romans chapter eight, Saint Paul asks the church in Rome, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?  As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”  No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.” (Romans 8:35–37 ESV)

One would assume that with the promise of being flayed and flung, that not many would accept the call to carry Christ, out into the world of wolves.  Yet, the history of the church, tells us otherwise, demonstrating over and over again the power of the Holy Spirit is greater than that of the human being.

The fear of suffering is real, we all know it and feel it!  Self-preservation kicks in!  We, in our natural state, will do anything to flee a fight, especially knowing we are not thick skinned.  But rather, are helplessly skinless, flayed and flung out into the wilds of the world without protection.  Such is our default human nature!

Paul speaks of Abram’s hope against hope to the Romans.  He says, “In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations.’” (Romans 4:18a ESV)

However, we struggle with a fear and a hope that leaves us hopeless like sheep without a shepherd.  Our sinful nature tells us the love of Christ will separate us from the comfort in which we clothe ourselves.  Everything against the kingdom of God, tells us being killed for Christ, being regarded as sheep to be slaughtered, makes us conquered, not more than conquerors!

In our hopelessness we are tempted to believe against hope.  The opposite of Abram.  And in doing so we seek to clothe ourselves with the righteousness of the world.  These clothes of comfort might seem to be appealing but they are not clothes of endurance character or hope.  Rather they cover one’s flayed helplessness and provide no security or salvation.

Paul makes the claim that we who are in Christ, “stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God”.  (Romans 5:2b ESV)   This is the hope in which Jesus called the apostles to stand and rejoice, despite the wolves, and it is the hope in which we are called to stand and rejoice too! 

These are the clothes of Christ put on by the Holy Spirit for helpless flayed and flung sheep, to be righteous and joyful as we face death all day long, knowing we are more than conquerors in the clothes of Christ’s righteousness.

Not only do we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God, but we also rejoice in our suffering.  How can this be?

In an age that’s so focused on pleasure, suffering is to be avoided at all costs.  In fact, ridding our lives of suffering, and not accepting suffering as an event that makes us mature as humans, has blinded people as they pursue pleasure and comfort.

Saint Paul says, “we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance,  and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.  For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.” (Romans 5:3–6 ESV)

If we have no suffering, we have little to no endurance.  When we have no endurance, we have no character, and without character we have no hope.  Without suffering and the understanding of suffering’s function in the world, one sets themselves up for hopelessness!

Seeking self-comfort in the things of this world, while avoiding suffering, does not lead one in hope to Christ.  When we see ourselves with strength because of worldly comforts, our spirit might seem secure.  But when these comforts no longer give us comfort, or when they die, our hope too proves to be hopeless.  Rather than being, more than conquerors, we are more than conquered, we are flayed and flung, skint and skimped of salvation, helpless sheep without a shepherd. 

So, suffering allows one to grow to maturity.  This happens in a worldly sense, but also in a spiritual sense. 

Where suffering in a worldly sense makes us harden up, suffering in a spiritual sense softens us with the love of Jesus Christ, to be comforted, and to comfort, with forgiveness.  His love is why we rejoice in our suffering, suffering both physically and spiritually as believers and receivers of his love.

This love is a new skin!    For our peace with God the Father, the Spirit puts on the good news garment of grace in Christ.  This outfit bears the fabrics of faith and forgiveness.  We can hope to not only have our own sin conquered, but the wolves in sheep’s clothing will know their weakness and are given opportunity to receive forgiveness too.

In fact, the wolves are flayed sheep!  In their hopelessness, they look threatening, hidden in sheep’s clothing.  But in reality, they are sheepish and ashamed wolves, flayed and flung, skint and skimped of salvation too.

Because you are covered in the clothes of Christ’s righteousness, as the saved sheep of Israel, the Holy Spirit allows you to know that suffering produces endurance, endurance character, and character hope. 

The Holy Spirit encourages us, as he does all he sends out, to put on the garments of suffering, endurance, character, and hope.  A covering that does not end in shame.  Instead, these four coverings you wear, and bear, are the clothes of Christ’s love.   

The picture of us as flayed and flung sheep is not as grim as we would expect.  Now knowing we wear ,so to speak, the eternal skin of Christ, we awake and wear this bright new reality every day. 

Death no longer has power over Jesus Christ, whose skin bears the marks of death but has risen in power over death.  So too with us!  We are conquerors of death, the devil, and the wolves of the world, with the covering of Christ.  No one can flay from us the flesh of Christ!  Nor can we be flung from the kingdom of heaven, while the Holy Spirit leads us, in, with, and under, the forgiven body and blood of Jesus Christ!  Amen. 

A, Good Shepherd Sunday, Easter 4 - John 10:7,9 "Identity Under The Good Shepherd"

John 10:7,9 (ESV) “Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep.  If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture.”

Good Shepherd Sunday is full of rich language of a shepherd faithfully leading his sheep and his sheep, having heard his voice, willingly following.

In Acts two we hear the consequences of the Holy Spirit coming at Pentecost, after Peter preaches a sermon of Law and Gospel that brings three thousand to baptism and faith.  After which, the newly baptised into Christ, persevere and endure under the Apostles’ teaching, holy fellowship, breaking of bread (as both, Holy Communion, and as sharing their earthly gifts), and to prayers.

These were special times and those who believed, full of the Holy Spirit, lived to praise God for what the ascended Jesus had done.

We also hear of the providence our Heavenly Father, likened to a shepherd, in Psalm twenty-three.  King David, the shepherd made king of Israel, knew that to lead he needed to be led by our Father in Heaven.

He identified within himself the need to be cut off from trusting in himself, which was without trust and fear in God, living to writhe in its own desire for pleasure.  Left with himself he was acutely aware of his weak human spirit.  He knew he needed the Holy Spirit to give him a new spirit.  His experience in life was that of the enemy of the self within, aligning itself with the external enemy without.

In a strange irony, the enemies he fought against, were his sinful nature’s greatest allies within, leading him into worry and doubt, then therefore, misusing his authority to pleasure himself as his own god.

Therefore, against this, David claims the Lord as his shepherd.  He has no want.  He lacks nothing in having the Lord as his shepherd.  He does not fear the evil within, nor the evil without, over which he has no control.

In fact, King David’s Lord, his Shepherd, makes him lie down in green pastures, beside peaceful waters!  He knows the Shepherd’s goodness and steadfast love and mercy is constantly hunting him down to bestow upon him common life together with God.  Joyfully returning him to the house of the Lord repeatedly, then eternally, despite the dangers David and others, present to himself.

This  is a picture of restored paradise.  The house of the Lord on earth, even this church, is an image of the eternal, despite all its shortcomings, and its eventual destruction, just as the temple in Jerusalem was destroyed.

But Jesus is our true temple in which we now have access into the Father’s presence.  The curtain  has been torn asunder and through his suffering and death we have common life together with God our Father. 

In the Gospel reading for Good Shepherd Sunday, Jesus tells us, he is the door, through which one enters into God’s presence.  No one comes to God the Father except through this door.  Jesus Christ is the way, the exodus; the truth, the unhidden reality; the life, the revolving door of faith.  Having been brought to Jesus by the Holy Spirit, one’s sin is uncovered and nailed to the cross.  Those who retain this faith, walk in and out this door on the way of eternal life.

This is the same goodness and steadfast love to which King David refers in the Twenty-third psalm.  This is the same faithfulness with which God is pursuing you, so you might share in the common life of peace and holiness, having been led on the exodus from the self, into the community of God’s pleasure.

Jesus is the Good Shepherd as well as the door to salvation.  Many doubt this though and need encouragement as a result of suffering and the hopelessness that comes from being seduced by the spirit of this age. 

God the Father’s church gathered by the Holy Spirit into Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection, the family, historical tradition from the democracy of those who’ve died, all these forms of authority, are looked on with suspicion by society today.  This feeds one’s doubt and disbelief! 

Unfortunately, with this suspicion of all authority, the spirit of the age is believed, and one is encouraged to seek happiness within the self.  But once there, seeing the ugly reality of the unhidden self, the mirage of happiness just seems to move further away.

Like King David, our inner sinful self, our human spirit, allies itself with the spirit of the society in which we live, even though we know it’s completely corrupt.

Those in Peter’s day struggled under persecution and hopelessness of that age as well.  He proclaims, “By his wounds you have been healed.  For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.”  (1 Peter 2:24b–25 ESV)

Our Good Shepherd watches over all who have been baptised, he has underwritten the assurance of our salvation with his own resurrected life.  The resurrection of Jesus is the hope that surpasses all other hopes because all other hopes lead to hopelessness!

The essence of this Good Shepherd comes from God the Father, and from the Father together with the Son, the shepherding of our souls continues today, as the Holy Spirit is sent to shepherd those who identify as the Good Shepherd’s sheep.

Jesus, as the Lamb of God, committed no sin, spoke without hiddenness or trickery, did not abuse or repay abuse, and bore pain without revenge. 

We his sheep know we need this Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, because of our sin!    Isaiah proclaims the unhidden truth of Jesus, when he says, “We all like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” (Isaiah 53:6)

Peter picks up Isaiah’s thought from Scripture, and from his witness adds, “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.  By his wounds you have been healed.”  (1 Peter 2:24 ESV)

Like King David, Peter knew by experience that he needed the Good Shepherd to bring him to the door of salvation.  Peter knew his sinfulness conspired with the sinfulness of all others to put Jesus on the cross.  It was Jesus alone who walked the way of the cross, who bore the unhidden truth of every person’s inner self on the cross, and lived the life that pleased our heavenly Father, despite the cross.

We now have the door open to confession, where we can have the deathliness of our sin, daily nailed to the cross, without costing us eternal death.  This is the true door that is Jesus Christ.

We steal and plunder God of his goodness by seeking to enter God’s kingdom through any other works, either good or evil.  But those who enter by the door that is Jesus Christ, have done so by the Good Shepherd.  He leads with the word of his rod, this is the Law, and his saving staff, which is the Gospel.   

Therefore, having been unhidden by his word of Law, are cleansed in his blood, through the work of the Holy Spirit who gives us the holy identity as God’s own Son. 

This cleansing is good news for those who believe it and receive it.  This is the Gospel of salvation for those who identify under the Sonship and subordination of Jesus Christ!

Jesus says to you, “Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep.  If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture.” (John 10:7,9 ESV)

Let us pray: Triune God you are three Shepherds, but one loving God.  Because you lead us, because you became one of us, and because you gather us, surely goodness and mercy will follow us all the days of our life, because you dwell here within the temple of our body, your body, so we might live with you forever in the paradise of your pleasures, your eternal body.  Amen.

A, The Second Sunday of Advent - Romans 15:1-7,13 "Advent Pleasure"

God has placed you and me, on this earth, at this time, and in this place, we know as Australia.  Living in Australia, along with the rest of the western world, we are privileged to experience a lifestyle that many in the world don’t get to experience.  We have been blessed with prosperity that gives way to pleasures, people in other parts of the world would not even be able to begin to imagine.

At this time and in this place, with this privileged prosperity and its pleasure, people are experiencing suffering at a level never experienced before.  The pleasure, privilege and prosperity that is our expectation from life, takes the prosperity, the privilege, and the pleasure for granted, rather than receiving these things as a gift with thanksgiving to God. 

At this time and place we find our pleasure no longer gives pleasure, our privilege reveals selfish partiality, and our prosperity exposes our poverty.  We suffer at the hands of our pleasures to such a degree, people in other parts of the world would not even be able to begin to imagine.

Advent is the season for hope and peace, joy and love.  A season for waiting.  A season of patience.  A season to depart from the darkness and be delivered into the light of new life.  And a season of expectation to receive and pass on the gift of forgiveness.

John the Baptist came baptising with a baptism for repentance.  There was expectation the Messiah, was coming.  Israel and the Jews had not experienced any revelation from God, for approximately four hundred years.

There was hope, and where there’s hope one prepares oneself for what one is waiting.  Expectation of the Messiah meant many were flocking to the Jordan River, where John was baptising with a baptism of repentance. 

Over the course of one thousand years, the Israelites lived in prosperity, privilege, and pleasure, given by God through King David and others.  But in the time and place of John the Baptist this was all just a distant memory.

The pleasures of Israel no longer gave them pleasure.  The privilege given to the people of God was lost.  And the prosperity of God’s chosen nation, was taken and tossed about between the powers that overran them.

In this time and in this place, you and I suffer at the hand of pleasures that no longer please, you and I suffer at the hands of prosperity that no longer prospers, and you and I suffer at the hands of privileges that enslave.

Perhaps like the Israelites it’s time to turn from what’s within to that which we have been without!  What is it that you have been without?  Hope?  Peace?  Joy?  Love?

Instead of hope, our society today promotes, wanting without the waiting.   Patient expectation through endurance and encouragement, waiting for the fullness of time, where a community wills one in its group to grow and mature, is impatiently shoved out of the way.  Growth and development are trampled, along with fellowship and community building, in favour of instant gratification. 

The problem being since what is wanted is easily gotten, easy come - easy go, the mirage of desire moves and something else is wanted.  Impatience prematurely gets what it wants and wastes unripe fruit.  Without waiting, one does not learn to be satisfied with what one has been given, by God.

Instead of peace, our society today promotes a peace that builds walls.  When these walls are built by us in the name of peace, fellowship is broken, and individualism ends up oppressing us.  One ends up locking oneself in on oneself.   We become slaves to the darkness within, and stuck there, find a whole bunch of loneliness and despair. 

Instead of joy, our society today promotes, sickly sweet happiness.  In one’s impatience we can’t wait for the fullness of time.  We eat unripe fruit, and it sours the second it hits our palette.  So, we go looking for artificial happiness.

Happiness is different to joy.  Joy is built by people in community creating fellowship, while happiness can be celebrated by an individual without any outside influence.  Artificial happiness is saccharine and extreme and it’s usually found to be a cover for loneliness and despair.

Instead of love, our society today promotes unleashed desire.  Rights revealing what is wrong with us and our society, while our wrongs are recognised as right.   Love is no longer about sacrificed and service, but rather about satisfaction of feelings. 

However, two things are experienced when love is centred on the self.  First, confusion and chaos rules as each person’s love competes for supremacy.  Second, people seek satisfaction that’s never fulfilled.   The more one desires this kind of love, the more allusive love proves to be!

In the season of Advent, in this time and place in history, we find ourselves between two competing realities.  The hope, peace, joy and love of Christ’s coming has been departed from and  forgotten in favour of the advent of new and renewed human ideals. 

So, what have we found there?  The advent of new and renewed ways of suffering!         

Now we might think this is a terrible thing.  It might be, if it continues to deliver us into the darkness of ourselves.  However, this is also the time and place of great opportunity for true hope, peace, joy, and love, in its advent through Jesus Christ.   Jesus says, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock.”  (Revelation 3:20a ESV)

Every day and in every place, Jesus, through the power of the Holy Spirit, meets you in the suffering of those in our society.  Jesus makes his Advent to them through you, allowing the Holy Spirit to bring sufferers to the Advent of Jesus’ suffering and death for true hope, peace, joy, and love!

Saint Paul describes Jesus’ Advent of knocking and waiting in this way, “We who are strong have an obligation to bear with the failings of the weak, and not to please ourselves.  Let each of us please his neighbour for his good, to build him up.  For Christ did not please himself, but as it is written, ‘The reproaches of those who reproached you fell on me’”.  (Romans 15:1–3 ESV)

While we please ourselves, we follow the ways of the world, in the same way as did the Israelites.  One’s suffering at the hands of seeking these pleasures, is a reminder Jesus continually sends the Holy Spirit knocking on our doors.  To enter and forgive.  To restore and return us through Jesus’ suffering and victory on the cross.  To see in our forgiveness, the pleasure of God to forgive those who have not the will nor the way to turn to the Saviour who suffered for humanity.

Just as those waited for the coming of a messiah in the time and place of John the Baptist, we continually wait for the final Advent of the Messiah, Jesus Christ.  As we wait for this final most glorious and treasured advent, like those in John’s day, we allow ourselves to be prepared for Jesus’ final victorious Advent.  

The Holy Spirit prepares us by leading us from our sinful suffering into the Word of God, where we endure and are encouraged.  This is also the place and the time in which Jesus makes his Advent through us.  He returns us to his first Advent where he saved us through our baptism into his death and resurrection.   

As we rightly suffer reproaches for being in Christ, know the reproaches of those who reproach you fall on Jesus.  Paul points us to God and his word, “For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.  May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.  Therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.” (Romans 15:4–7 ESV)

The strange thing that occurs when God leads us from our suffering as a result of seeking our pleasures to suffering for the things that please God, we find ourselves waiting in hope, living in peace with joy and love, for those who suffer at the hands of seeking their pleasure, as well as with those who suffer seeking to please God.

As puzzling and paradoxical as it might seem in this Advent, this is the profound prosperity, privilege, and pleasure God seeks for all who suffer within, without him!

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.  (Romans 15:13 ESV)

Amen.

C, Post-Pentecost 23 Proper 28 - Luke 21:5-19 "Endurance and Opportunity"

Luke 21:5–19 (ESV)  And while some were speaking of the temple, how it was adorned with noble stones and offerings, he said,  “As for these things that you see, the days will come when there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.”  And they asked him, “Teacher, when will these things be, and what will be the sign when these things are about to take place?”  And he said, “See that you are not led astray. For many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am he!’ and, ‘The time is at hand!’ Do not go after them.  And when you hear of wars and tumults, do not be terrified, for these things must first take place, but the end will not be at once.”  Then he said to them, “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.  There will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and pestilences. And there will be terrors and great signs from heaven.  But before all this they will lay their hands on you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors for my name’s sake.  This will be your opportunity to bear witness.  Settle it therefore in your minds not to meditate beforehand how to answer,  for I will give you a mouth and wisdom, which none of your adversaries will be able to withstand or contradict.  You will be delivered up even by parents and brothers and relatives and friends, and some of you they will put to death.  You will be hated by all for my name’s sake.  But not a hair of your head will perish.  By your endurance you will gain your lives.

People spoke with great pleasure about the appearance of the temple,  in the presence of Jesus.  Yet Jesus taught that all would be thrown down.  Jesus said the temple would not endure, and in seventy AD it was destroyed by the Romans. 

In the first century, after Jesus’ ascension, many believed he would return.  Still today we wait for his triumphant return.  And as those who gushed over the temple, still today we are tempted to glorify the goodness of the church’s buildings, denominations, and organisations.

In recent years denominations have become hated for the abuse that’s been revealed in its ranks.  Sexual misconduct and its coverup to protect the “good name” of the denomination has led to a royal commission and safe place policy being enforced in a bit to stop sexual misconduct within the denominations of Christendom.

Pleasure seeking in denominations has been a temptation and led denominations away from the centrality of enduring in Christ. 

It’s no different in the LCANZ either.  Our misguided pleasure is also having an impact on us too. 

However, unlike some denominations that have hidden their clergy to protect the good name of the denomination and its institution, we have gone to the other extreme to protect the “good name” of the LCANZ when allegations of sexual misconduct occur.

The temptation to which we’ve succumb is to throw clergy and parishioners out of Christ’s presence as soon as an allegation is made.  Pastors and parishioners are being delivered up guilty, hated, and considered as dead. 

In doing so we, the LCANZ, stand in contradiction to Jesus Christ, unable to give the forgiveness of sins to those who have sinned in this way, or be forgiven by those restored for wrongly being accused and thrown out into the darkness.

Where Jesus’ love should be coming to light in the forgiveness of sin as we walk with sinners in their accountability under the Law of the land, the love that comes to life is self-interested and cold; governed by the pleasure to preserve insurance policy law, the protection of the polity of the LCANZ, and uphold the popularity of the institution in the world.

The pleasure of the LCANZ in presenting itself to the world as one with the world, continues to reveal a terrifying truth amongst us that our church is no better than any other, and like the temple in Jerusalem, must die with all other denominations, must crumble with all of creation, for Jesus Christ to endure with us to eternity.

In recent years we have seen the world become increasingly polarised — morally, politically, and socially.  Fear has increased and so too has suffering.  The more we humans run after our pleasures the more we suffer from the pain of doing so!

Those of us who remain in Jesus Christ and endure in his love, don’t go searching for pain or pleasure.  Both find us as they did for our Lord Jesus Christ when he walked in the reality of his death and destruction, pain and suffering, and the reality of resurrection and ascension to the right hand of the Father.

Jesus did not need to go looking for suffering.  In his incarnation, he was born into a suffering world.  Nor did he need to seek pleasure.  He came to please his Father, to do his will, to forgive and bear the sin of the world.

In the midst of death and destruction, pain and suffering, righteousness and resurrection, Jesus had opportunity to bring peace between us and God the Father.  This peace surpasses our understanding, and it sustains us throughout the ages as worldly chaos continues to grow.  This peace, and the opportunity Jesus took to secure our peace, pleases God the Father who freely sustains all who endure in Jesus Christ.

In the LCANZ, things are becoming progressively worse, regardless of the best light one attempts to shine on the situation.  It is no surprise as we seek to progress with the world.  Practically progression with the world means living more by sight than faith. 

When we look for beauty in the superficial structures of the church rather than our One True Eternal Structure of the church, our Triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we will find an increase in our suffering, as God withdraws and hands us over to our desires.

Theologically this progression is not progressive but deteriorating regression.   Faith in the institution of our denomination, its numbers, its finances, its pastors, its buildings, or its history, are all idolatries and a regression of faith.  Nevertheless, God tells us it will be this way as creation continues to crumble into chaos.

How do you respond to this increased chaos? 

There is temptation to panic, worry, and doubt God.  However, Jesus tells us of the reality to prepare us, so we are not surprised as it occurs.  He gives us future truths, not so we plan protection for ourselves, but so we remain in him for our eternal protection and endurance.

We will not need to seek pain and suffering as Christians, but we can expect it!  It’s promised by Jesus here in his word. 

Nor do we need to seek to make the church a place of pleasure.  This will only bring suffering on us as a result of being sinfully disobedient.

However, God has already made the church a place of pleasure through the forgiveness of sins.  The many deaths and resurrections the Holy Spirit leads us through, to the final resurrection to eternal life, is also God’s pleasure in which we joyfully live in faith, hope, and love.

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)

Even as we enter deeper and deeper into the last days of deception and disarray, may the Holy Spirit polarise you in Christ’s love.  Just as Jesus shone his light in the midst of darkness and his death,  may you let the Holy Spirit reflect the brightness of Christ’s forgiveness, more and more, despite the darkness of our days. 

In the future, greater things will occur, despite worse and worse things happening.  Jesus promises greater opportunity to let God’s light shine bright as the darkness of corruption and chaos gets worse inside and outside the church.  For you who endure in Jesus Christ, he will endure within you, despite confusion and deception.

The prophet Malachi says of those under God, “But for you who fear my name, the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings.”  (Malachi 4: 2a ESV) 

Just as Jesus endured and died to bring us peace in the face of death and destruction, we too are called to see and allow God to work in us as agents of peace and proclamation, even as things seem to become progressively more impossible in the LCANZ.  Don’t be surprised the greatest tribulations any Christian will face in the future, will be from within denominations seeking fulfilment in their own pleasure.

Jesus promises, “…they will lay their hands on you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors for my name’s sake.”  (Luke 21:12 ESV)

But in the centre of the confusion and trouble we will face as Christians, just as Jesus endured trial and tribulation, he will be with us, and just as he bore witness to the truth, “This will be your opportunity to bear witness.”  (Luke 21:12–13 ESV)

Our endurance and opportunity won’t come from our meditation on our own sufferings or pleasures, but from Jesus himself who promises, “for I will give you a mouth and wisdom, which none of your adversaries will be able to withstand or contradict.”  (Luke 21:15 ESV)

Your great pleasure is Jesus’ faithfulness and love toward you!  Jesus Christ and our Heavenly Father joyfully send the Holy Spirit to bring you to him and the Father, to endure, despite the greater descent of creation into depravity and coming destruction.

However, your destination is sealed by Jesus’ death and resurrection.  When you are tempted to join in with the hatred of those who oppose Jesus Christ, inside and outside the church, in the name of what pleases, cast yourself on Christ’s pleasure to forgive.

When you endure in Jesus, the Holy Spirit gives you the words of Christ to testify to your sin, confess his forgiveness of your sin, and give your accusers and haters opportunity to confess their sin and Jesus to work his pleasure of forgiving their sin too.  Amen.