A, Trinity Sunday - Genesis 1 A Creation Community

After half a church year today we arrive at Trinity Sunday.  Last week we heard how the Holy Spirit was given at Pentecost; ten days before that the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ; another forty days again and it was Easter Sunday, Good Friday, and Lent.  These days introduced the suffering, death, and resurrection of Jesus after the proclamation of his divinity in Epiphany, his humanity at Christmas, and his coming into the world at Advent, way back in the four weeks of December.

Now from today we focus on the Christian life in God’s fallen creation, redeemed and being redeemed by the blood of Christ who is seated at the right hand of God the Father, together with the Holy Spirit, three persons in one God.

However, there is a tendency for us to believe if Jesus is at the right hand of God, in heaven, he is no longer here with us.  That perhaps we have been left to our own devices to fend for ourselves.  Or we might recognise the presence of the Holy Spirit, who gives us the power to escape this world so we might ascend with our hearts and minds to a place where we see God.  Since he is not attainable by our natural senses anymore!   Right?  Well, no it’s not! God’s written word from Genesis one to Revelation twenty-two tells us otherwise!

In fact, the thought that God is not with us in our creation, is a thematic thread right the way through the bible demonstrating the sinfulness and faithlessness of humanity.  But rather, the Trinity is present in creation, giving us God’s creation, so we might dwell with God in his threefold holy community of being and love.

Atheism and atheists, mock us because of our confession of an unseen Triune God and our hidden communion with him in his creation.  However, these western infidels and scoffers of the Christian faith only exist because of Christianity.  The Romans, who believed in a pantheon of gods, scoffed at the Jews after bursting into their temple in Jerusalem some two-thousand years ago, finding no visual God in the Holy of Holies.  Go to a Hindu or a Buddhist country today and atheism is basically nonexistent. 

Yet in the Christian world where God is hidden and there are no idol images of gods, it’s not a big step to believe there is nothing.   So today the modern cynical atheist claims there is no God and the word of God is just “pie in the sky, for those who are going to die”.

On the other hand, we in the church in the second half of the church year celebrate the victory of Christ in his creation.  However, neither the victory in creation, nor the God of this creation, is seen in the normal sense.  God, Father Son and Holy Spirit, is not seen, and our world still seems to be spiralling out of control into greater and greater turmoil.  Perhaps we might be tempted into the epitome of negativity with the atheist and believe there is no God and therefore lose hope.

 But God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit call us back into his word, and today especially his “word of beginnings”.  His victory calls us to see creation as it was at the beginning and as it will be at the end.  And we’re called to see what it is today with the eyes of faith in a world that would rather look into the misery and darkness of the hopeless self with human reason.

When we look at the creation account in Genesis one, God reminds us he loves us.  He created the heavens and the earth for one purpose; for an environment where we might be with him in a threefold community of peace.  In his creation he created a paradise garden so that he might rest in it with us.  However since the fall, it’s been lost to our sin. But now since the cross, access has been won by Christ’s bloody death and glorious resurrection.  And all creation now rejoices and looks forward in hope to the full restoration of creation.

So for us who believe in Christ’s incarnation, death, resurrection, and ascension; for us who believe the Holy Spirit has been sent to reveal Christ to us in this creation; and for us who believe the Holy Spirit and Jesus Christ exist and work together so we might live in the presence of God the Father in peace — can turn back to the beginning and see the unseen reality of a hidden paradise won for us by Jesus Christ on the tree of life.  Added to this we can examine the last chapters of Revelation and see the exact same reality, and continue in the same hope.

Many get caught out when looking at the creation account by falling into the debate on whether creation is seven literal days or perhaps something different.  This argument only leads one away on a tangent from a correct emphasis on the creation text, regardless of what position one takes. 

For us everything is a distant second from the little phrase in Genesis one, “And God said”.  In fact, in our search for answers to creation, this simple phrase is in danger of being overlooked.  But the whole point of the creation account is to draw our faith to God’s word, in all its power and glory.  God’s word needs not our proofs or reasoning, but rather it demands our trust.  God said it, it happened — do you now believe it?

The other thing we need to take notice of is the order of creation, and in understanding its order, we soon come to realise its function.

First, we hear, “In the beginning God created…”  To imagine nothing in the beginning, is impossible, and added to it pondering the beginning as an eternal timelessness, will only make you go completely crazy.  We are beings in time and place and have not the capacity to contemplate boundless nothingness.  But having said that, God was there before any of it, and this can only be believed by faith.

At the other end of the creation account, in Genesis 2, after all had been created by the word of God, God now rests in time and space in his creation.  But God created this day of rest for a holy community – us and him together in peace. 

All the events of creation fall between these two events in a very deliberate order, so this community of peace can exist in a perfect paradise with a thrice holy God.  In fact, creation’s order rolls along like a snowball growing, or like an onion having its layers put on one after the other.  In this way the first event of creation, serves the second, and so on until God rests in its completion. 

The second last event God commanded in creation is the making of us, and in seeing the order of creation we learn that God created one thing after the other for you and me, in community.  And at the very last he desires to be present with humanity in peace and perfect joy.

Now we know a lot has happened since God created the heavens and the earth.  But he also calls us to now know that this reality has been restored in Jesus Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. 

So, as we travel through the next half of the church year, we are called to see with the eyes of faith that the Triune God is present, although hidden.  That we are called to peace with God, peace that passes all human understanding, peace that enables us to realise we are already in the arms of a loving God who calls us to rest with him, and trust that an eternity with him has been happening since our baptism and will continue on unto eternity.

We can all take stock from the last words in the bible from Revelation chapter twenty-two, where Jesus assures us that “Yes I am coming soon!”  And we rest in response, “Amen, Come, Lord Jesus come.”  As we trust the ever-present reality of the last verse, “The grace of the Lord Jesus be with God’s people.  Amen.” (Rev 22:20-21)  

A, Pentecost Sunday - Acts: 2:1-21 The Forgotten God: Honouring the Holy Spirit's Work in us

Acts 2:17,18,21 (ESV) “And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh, even on my male servants and female servants in those days I will pour out my Spirit, and they shall prophesy. And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” (Cited from Joel 2:28-32)

Because I am a poor lowly sinner, with a human heart that needs every bit of help it can get, I thank our Heavenly Father, and our Saviour Jesus Christ for sending the Holy Spirit.  Yet because of my nature, the Holy Spirit seems to be relegated to fourth place behind me, God the Father, and Jesus Christ. Whereas in reality I should happily be standing in fifth place behind God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, and everyone else whom God calls me to help.

Throughout the history of Christendom, it seems the Holy Spirit continually has suffered just as much rejection inside the church, as He does outside the church. 

On might expect this outside the church, but inside!  Surely churches who worship the triune God know the Holy Spirit and let Him do what He was sent to do! 

So, what is it that the Holy Spirit does? Why does He need to do it within us!  And are you allowing Him to do, what He does, within you?  We’ll return to these questions in a moment.

Firstly, why was the Holy Spirit sent at Pentecost, fifty days after Jesus’ resurrection from the dead?  Ten days after Jesus ascended to the right hand of the Father the Holy Spirit was given.  We know that Jesus promised the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, to call alongside us to be our help after He was raised. But before all this occurred the Holy Spirit first rested on Jesus at his baptism.  Why, did the Holy Spirit rest on Jesus?  Why did Jesus need the Holy Spirit to rest on Him?

John the Baptist was baptising the Jews with a baptism of repentance, preparing Israel as the last prophet, before Jesus came.  To John Jesus was, “one whose sandals he was not worthy to carry.”  Who would, “baptise with the Holy Spirit and fire.” (Mattew 3:11)  But when Jesus came to the Jordan to be baptised, He demanded of John to be baptised, saying, “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.” (Matthew 3:15 ESV)

John the Baptist was not expecting this, he was expecting to be baptised by Jesus with the Holy Spirit and fire.  Yet Jesus expected John to function in what he was called to do, baptise!  And Jesus was baptised along with all the other Jews who came to the River Jordan.

Why would this be?  What was this” all righteousness” that Jesus was fulfilling?  Our answer comes from God’s Word, as the Holy Spirit rests on Jesus and God says, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.” (Matthew 3:17 ESV) The Son of God was baptised to please God.

Whereas the Jews were being baptised in preparation for a saviour, Jesus was baptised into his three-year ministry to be the Saviour and please God the Father. 

Now one might think that since Jesus is the Son of God, sent from the Father to be the Saviour of all people, He should have been able to do this by himself!  Instead, we hear He receives the Holy Spirit.  This was an essential part of God plan since Jesus, born into the flesh of humanity, had to put aside His divinity as the Son of God and live in the flesh as we live in the flesh. (Philippians 2:1-11)

Jesus had to experience all the garbage and filth of sinful humanity and pay the price of that sin, while being without sin to please God the Father.  And the Holy Spirit rested upon Him as He went through all the rot—we face and fail—in His faithful walk to the cross. This pleased God the Father.

Two things need to be highlighted here!  One, this is God the Father’s work of preparing us to receive a helper in the Holy Spirit, and two, through the Son of God receiving the same Holy Spirit as His helper!  Why?

Hear what Paul says to the Philippians encouraging them to be like Jesus who emptied himself to become obedient to death on the cross.  Paul teaches all who want their lives to be worthy of the gospel of Christ, saying, “So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.” (Philippians 2:1-2 ESV)

Paul lists five things here in chapter two, calling the church, the body of Christ, at Philippi into full, “co-spirited love” and “the mind of Jesus Christ”.  The worthiness of the gospel is worked within by the five things that make us the body of Christ, that make us one with Him our holy Head!  But it’s the Holy Spirit that works these five things, the human spirit cannot do it because of its fallen flesh.

The first is encouragement in Christ trusting you and I are being called alongside of Him.  The second is comfort and true realisation of God’s love.  In other words, believing we’re brought alongside God the Father who is steadfast in His compassion and love towards us.  The third is participation in the Holy Spirit, the same fellowship enjoyed amongst the Godhead of the Trinity, in heaven, and on earth during Jesus’ ministry .  This is more than fellowship over a cuppa, although it can happen over a cuppa too, but it’s seeing with the eyes of faith that we too are included in God’s fellowship as the body of Christ, the second member of the Trinitarian fellowship.  Then there is affection or compassion; that is to have a Christ-like desire to help as we have been helped.  And sympathy or the desire to be merciful as you and I have received God’s mercy. 

Here we come back to the initial questions: What is it that the Holy Spirit does?  Why he needs to do it within us!  And, are you allowing him to do what he does within you?

It’s the Holy Spirit that works the five within us, he works any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy.  

If Jesus received the Holy Spirit to continue the Trinitarian fellowship of heaven while He fulfilled his ministry at the cross in “all righteousness”, how much more do I need the Holy Spirit to help me since unlike Jesus I am full of “all unrighteousness”?  As we have just sung in the last hymn, and confessed in Psalm 25:11, “For your name’s sake, O Lord, pardon my guilt, for it is great.” (Psalm 25:11 ESV)

Most of us are flat out remembering our forebears much past our great grandparents.  If we didn’t have photos or pictures of them, we would long forget what they looked like, even when we had opportunity to live at the same time as them.  Yet two thousand years after Jesus ascended into heaven we not only know Him who was seen, but we also know the Father whom we have not seen.

This is not the work of the human spirit; it’s not found in the minds of a faithful humanity!   This is the work of the Holy Spirit who calls, gathers, enlightens, sanctifies and keeps us in the one faith as God’s church and as individuals of it.  Individually or collectively, none of us have the ability or knowhow to do it because of our humanity, sinful that it is in being or doing, nature and deed! 

Jesus is the only human who has done it and He did it perfectly!  Even so, He still did it with the fellowship of the Holy Spirit as a man who put aside his Godly divinity!  Therefore, no one can say, “Jesus is not like us because He relied on his divinity to be the perfect man.”  No!  Rather we hear in Hebrews chapter two, “ He [Jesus] had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.” (Hebrews 2:17 ESV)

So, the Holy Spirit calls, gathers, enlightens, sanctifies and keeps Christ’s church in the faith.  His work is one of giving us encouragement in Christ; bringing us alongside Jesus. He gives us comfort in receiving God’s love.  The Holy Spirit gives us the eyes of faith, so we see our fellowship or participation in the oneness in Christ with His hidden church on earth and His church in heaven where the angels, archangels, and the whole company of heaven worship around the throne of God.  And the Holy Spirit works outward affection and sympathy that otherwise would be forgetful, cold, and heartless.

So let us worship the Holy Spirit whose is sent from the Father and the Son, by allowing Him to do his work of bringing us before the Father and the Son, to receive and believe the forgiveness of our sins.  The Holy Spirit works within to make us holy when we hear his Holy Word preached and when we repentantly receive the Holy Sacraments as the holy body of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen.

A, The Sixth Sunday of Easter - John 14:15-21 "The Help of the Holy Spirit"

John 14:15–21 (ESV) “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. Yet a little while and the world will see me no more, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him.”

When a child calls out in the night, it’s usually mum who responds.  If it’s not mum and it’s dad who responds, it’s most likely still mum who hears the cry and digs dad in the ribs to get out of bed and go and help the child.

Most mums are the primary caregivers in the household; they help the children, and they help the husband, before they help themselves.

Today is Mother’s Day.  How do you remember your mother?  Some of our mums are living some have departed this life.  Some cherish the relationship they had with their mother, and some not so much.  Some mothers help us and some hinder us.

Despite today being Mother’s Day, the day is not so much about our mothers but our Father in heaven who gave us our mother and our father through whom we have life.  God gave us parents to help us.  We might harshly judge the help they give us as being overbearing or absent.  We might be tempted to worship them more than God himself, if we see them as the be all and end all of our existence in this life.  Even so, we’re called to recognise them as the primary representatives of God’s authority on this earth, regardless of how good or how bad their parenting might seem.

It should be obvious to us why we need our mother’s and father’s help.  As babies we are helpless and need the nurturing of a mother and a father’s protection.  Those who have lost their parents, receive this help through agencies and people that stand in the place of parents, under the authority that God gives to parents.  Such as governments, law enforcement, welfare agencies, and other social structures.

Although we might understand why we need parental help from mums and dads, today Jesus tells us that God the Father sends us another helper, the Holy Spirit. If the Holy Spirit is another helper, who  is our original help?  Are our parents­—our mums and dads—the original help?  And why do we need another helper in the Holy Spirit?

The first we hear of a helper in Scripture is in the Garden of Eden.  God creates Eve from Adam to be a helper fit for Adam. Eve was created to complement Adam.  They were created to be one flesh in each other since Eve was taken from Adam’s flesh.  Adam and Eve are our primal parents.

Adam was created in the likeness of the image of God, and Eve was taken from the flesh of Adam to stand opposite Adam—face to face—as a helper fit for him.  But in what way was Eve to help Adam?  Eve was to encourage Adam in being face to face with God in the garden.  Likewise, Adam was to lead the other half of his flesh in the goodness of God’s Garden of Eden, to Sabbath face to face with God in his holiness.

However, both Adam and Eve succumbed to the temptation of the serpent.  Instead of being a help to each other in their worship of God in the goodness of his garden, created to celebrate the life he gave them, in the likeness of himself, to have face to face fellowship with him. Their complementary relationship became opposition to each other.

Rather than eating the fruit of fellowship, the fruit they ate finished their fellowship and they hid from God.  The perfect three-way community between God, man, and woman was desecrated.  Man desired to be like God!  Woman desired to be like God!  God’s first family, his first son and daughter, helped themselves to his knowledge of good and evil; to be like God rather than knowing and trusting in the love of God.

Mother’s Day falls on the second Sunday in May.  We give thanks to God for the help of our mothers and fathers.  Ironically though our primal mother and father became helpless when they should have helped each other to worship face to face with God.  We can see Adam as the original pastor who gives Eve instruction to join him in worshipping God in the garden.  Yet Eve didn’t receive this leadership from Adam when it counted most. 

So, we come back to the promise of Jesus who says, “I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth.” (John 14:16-17a ESV)

This “another helper” is the Holy Spirit but the original helpers are not our primal parents, Adam and Eve, nor our mum and dad.  The function of the helper Jesus speaks of is one who is “called alongside”.  The Greek word is Paraclete (paracletos).  This word is found only in the writings of John’s Gospel and  First Epistle.  Here in John 14 to16 the Paraclete is the Holy Spirit.  Jesus promises the coming of the Holy Spirit because he is going to the Father. 

We hear in John’s First Epistle, “My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.”  (1 John 2:1 ESV) Here paraclete is translated in English as advocate—one who defends or speaks on behalf of someone.  Jesus has now ascended to the right hand of the Father; he’s called alongside the Father to advocate for us through his righteousness. 

So, we have received the Holy Spirit to be our helper, our paraclete on earth, and at the same time Jesus is our helper, our paraclete, before the Father in heaven preparing a place for us there. It’s a comfort to know that in our helplessness we have a helper here and a helper there.  With these two helpers we are called out of ourselves and into God’s Word where, “Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.” (Psalm 124:8 ESV) Rather than hide from God we can walk in the light of his Word and do what God now commands us to do in Christ. 

Therefore, whenever we cry out in the darkness of our sin, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit are here to help us to receive and believe the Word of God.  So, when we confess our sins, “he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:9 ESV)  Now that we have the Holy Spirit as our helper, Jesus promises us when we do the greater works of confessing sin and asking for forgiveness, he will do it and cleanse us!  (John 14:12-14)

God calls us to thank him for our mothers today regardless of them being a help to us, or a hindrance.  We also thank God that Jesus is the New Adam—the Holy bridegroom­—and he awaits the coming of his bride.  As his holy church we thank God that Jesus sends the Holy Spirit to be our helper who guides his church in the works of peace on our way down the aisle towards the heavenly wedding breakfast in God’s eternal garden of paradise.   We are his holy body who receives help from the Holy Spirit who calls, gathers, enlightens, and who makes us—his church and bride—holy in the righteous robes of Jesus Christ our bridegroom. Amen.

*****

Sermon Summary

The sermon begins with the familiar image of a child crying in the night and a parent—often a mother—responding. This everyday experience highlights the deep human need for help, care, and presence. On Mother’s Day, we rightly give thanks for our mothers and the help they provide, yet the sermon reminds us that the day ultimately points beyond earthly parents to God the Father, who gives us life through them.

Human parents—whether helpful or flawed—serve as representatives of God’s authority and care. But they are not our ultimate helpers. Scripture shows that even the first parents, Adam and Eve, failed in their calling to help one another remain face to face with God. Their fall broke the perfect fellowship between God, man, and woman.

Into this brokenness, Jesus speaks a promise: the Father will send “another Helper,” the Holy Spirit (John 14:15–21). The Greek word Paraclete means “one called alongside”—a helper, advocate, comforter. Jesus himself is also our Paraclete, now advocating for us before the Father in heaven (1 John 2:1). So we have a helper on earth—the Holy Spirit—and a helper in heaven—Jesus Christ.

These divine helpers call us out of hiding and into the light of God’s Word. When we cry out in the darkness of sin, the Spirit leads us to confession, and Jesus cleanses us from all unrighteousness. Through this ongoing help, we are drawn into the life of God, empowered to keep Christ’s commandments, and prepared as the Bride of Christ for the heavenly wedding feast.

On Mother’s Day, we thank God for our mothers, but even more, we thank him for the new Adam, Jesus Christ, and for the Holy Spirit who calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the Church—Christ’s holy Bride—on our journey toward eternal life.

Reflection Questions

1. About Help and Dependence

•      When you think of the word “helper,” who comes to mind first—your parents, a friend, or God?

•      In what ways do you still try to “help yourself” spiritually instead of relying on the Holy Spirit?

 2. About the Holy Spirit

•      How does understanding the Holy Spirit as “one called alongside” change the way you think about his presence in your daily life?

•      Where have you recently sensed the Spirit calling you into deeper obedience or trust?

3. About Jesus as Advocate

•      What comfort do you find in knowing that Jesus is advocating for you before the Father right now?

•      How does this truth shape the way you approach confession and forgiveness?

4. About Family and Mother’s Day

•      How has your experience with your own mother shaped your understanding of God’s care—positively or negatively?

•      What does it mean to honour your parents while recognising that God is your ultimate helper?

5. About the Church as Bride

•      What does it mean for you personally to be part of the Bride of Christ?

•      How is the Holy Spirit preparing you—and the Church—for the “wedding feast” to come?   

A, The Third Sunday of Easter - Psalm 116 "Resurrection from the Self"

Psalm 116:1–19 (ESV) I love the Lord, because he has heard my voice and my pleas for mercy. Because he inclined his ear to me, therefore I will call on him as long as I live. The snares of death encompassed me; the pangs of Sheol laid hold on me; I suffered distress and anguish. Then I called on the name of the Lord: “O Lord, I pray, deliver my soul!” Gracious is the Lord, and righteous; our God is merciful. The Lord preserves the simple; when I was brought low, he saved me. Return, O my soul, to your rest; for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you. For you have delivered my soul from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling; I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living. I believed, even when I spoke: “I am greatly afflicted”; I said in my alarm, “All mankind are liars.” What shall I render to the Lord for all his benefits to me? I will lift up the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord, I will pay my vows to the Lord in the presence of all his people. Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints. O Lord, I am your servant; I am your servant, the son of your maidservant. You have loosed my bonds. I will offer to you the sacrifice of thanksgiving and call on the name of the Lord. I will pay my vows to the Lord in the presence of all his people, in the courts of the house of the Lord, in your midst, O Jerusalem. Praise the Lord!

The picture of two disciples, Cleopas and the other unnamed, standing on the road to Emmaus discussing the Resurrection Day’s events is a good picture of our human condition. These two men are completely turned in on themselves. They are completely puzzled by the reports of Jesus’ resurrection in the wake of his crucifixion three days earlier.

Their hopes seemed dashed as they report to the unrecognised, resurrected Jesus.  This Jesus was to be the redeemer of Israel, they lament, and now there’s a confusing report from the women who say they saw two angels at the tomb and that Jesus was alive.

The two on the road to Emmaus go over and over the events, round and round in circles much like us today when something has happened and the airways, social media, influencers, and commentators fill one’s ears with information built on, truths, half-truths, gossip, and Chinese whispers.  The longer the story is out there moving from mouth to mouth, the greater the embellishments, the greater the speculation, the greater the misinformation!

Notice that the discussion between the two left them looking sad.  Their conversation left them without hope.  So turned in on themselves, they were kept from recognising Jesus.  I reckon Jesus could walk past me most of the time and I would not notice him.  It’s not that Jesus is unnoticeable, but rather it’s my inability to notice anything much other than my own self-centredness.

Like the two on the road to Emmaus, humanity in the presence of God, has the uncanny ability to make it all about the self, so curved in on ourselves that we are!  It was not so much that Jesus had died, that there were angels at the empty tomb, but how hearing these things turned them in on themselves!  The meeting on the road to Emmaus shows us how much we need God to daily bring us out of ourselves, from our thoughts, words and worries within, to be outward looking in the place where God has put each of us!

We need Jesus Christ to bring us out of ourselves into an outward looking posture that sees both him and the people we are called to serve in his name.  Unless this occurs and continues to daily occur, we become no different to the Emmaus men before Jesus opened the word of God to them and revealed himself in the breaking of the bread.

Unless Jesus does this work of resurrecting us from ourselves, we act in just the same way as the Jews did throughout the history of God meeting with them in the temple.  Israel became fixated on the temple rather than on him who gave them the temple through his word.  They became more concerned about keeping the law than about the access gained to God’s mercy through the rituals of the law.

What is the purpose of being a Christian?  If you had to make a defence for your faith, what would you say?

Now stop! I want you to notice what just happened in you when you heard these questions?  When someone asks you why you are a Christian, or why you go to church on a Sunday, how do you respond? Do you respond?  Or do you just freeze up, go blank, and don’t know what to say?  How much worse is it when someone sets out to prove your Christianity wrong, or tries to ridicule you or shame you for your Christian beliefs? Does your defence of the faith fall short?

If it does it’s because you’re like the two on the road to Emmaus.  You’re looking within for the faith to answer or understand.  And looking within fails every time!  Just as the Jews failed to find God even when God was present in the temple,  just as we do today when we know the bible as a book of biblical facts, without letting it function as the sole source of faith.  In other words, Christianity just becomes a transaction to make the individual impersonal, cold and clinical. 

Some might claim that faith is personal, having undergone a lifetime of conditioning by the copout that “Jesus is my personal saviour!”  Yes!  What Jesus did for you was very personal for him, but it was a very public act for you and me!  Many hide behind Jesus as a personal saviour, that Jesus died on the cross, rather than allowing him to function as the public Saviour, who died on the cross, “for me”!

It’s when we come to testifying that Jesus died on the cross, for me, that we begin to arrive at the need to allow true Christianity to take effect within.  It changes us from being like the two disciples on the road to Emmaus to the Apostles who stood with Peter at Pentecost to publicly declare Jesus Christ risen from the dead, in the face of the Jews who put him to death. 

Jesus challenges you just as he did the two on the road to Emmaus, saying, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken!” (Luke 24:25 ESV) He leads us from within ourselves and the confusion and quickness of the world to his word when we allow the Holy Spirit to help me, for me!

God sent Jesus to resurrect the Jew from themselves.  Jesus became the new Adam to save humanity from itself­—to resurrect you from yourself!  Why?  It’s not to cleanse the slate so we become good people; it’s much more than that!  It’s to make us holy so we can be with God forever. 

The reality of Christianity, the reality of the cross, the reality of God’s word is best summed up in Revelation chapter twenty-one verse three, “And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.’”(Revelation 21:3 ESV)

Psalm 116 set down for today, the Third Sunday in Easter, is the reality of those who tarry here in this existence of life and death.  As is heard at a funeral service, “in the midst of life we are in death”, but the greater reality proclaimed by the Psalmist is: “In the midst of death we are in life!”

We who look inwardly to ourselves remain in death, but those whose eyes are  opened to the reality of dwelling with God, covered with the blood of Jesus’ death and resurrection, live face to face in the midst of life eternal, face to face worshipping God in his glory.  That’s what being a Christian is all about!  That’s what the gospel of Jesus’ death and resurrection is all about!  That’s what the temple in the Old Testament was all about!  God with man was broken at Eden but was put right by Jesus our Immanuel (God with us). Indeed, our humanity is continuing to be put right in the calling, gathering, enlightening, and sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit, who brings us into holy fellowship with God and each other through the blood of Jesus.

Psalm 116 speaks of our human reality but does not leave us in it.  Instead, it reveals the reality of our salvation despite affliction and the knowledge that I with all humankind, are liars; that is, we are full of deception, disappointments, and cannot make good with God.  But Jesus has made good what we never could. 

Therefore, despite the deadliness of my humanity, the death of his saints, is precious in the sight of the Lord!

God has saved you and me so we can be with him in his holy presence.  Jesus has been raised from the dead, so like the two on the road to Emmaus, we too might be resurrected in his resurrection.

Therefore, call on the name of the Lord; pray that he continues to deliver your soul!  Call on the name of the Lord; life up the cup of his salvation!  Call on the name of the Lord; offer to him the sacrifice of thanksgiving! 

We are in God’s presence, he hears your voice and your pleas for mercy, therefore, continue to call on him as long as you live, Amen.

BIBLE STUDY: Resurrection from the Self
Psalm 116 & The Road to Emmaus
“From Inward Curvature to Resurrected Living”

 INTRODUCTION

Psalm 116 and the Emmaus story (Luke 24:13–35) both reveal the deep emotional reality of life with God. They show us people who are distressed, confused, inward‑curved, and overwhelmed — and a God who hears, draws near, delivers, and opens eyes.

This study invites us to notice our own inwardness, to see God’s outward rescue, and to walk in the resurrected life the Holy Spirit gives through Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection.

1. OBSERVATION — What do you see?

Read Psalm 116 and Luke 24:13–35.

1.     What emotions does the psalmist express in Psalm 116?

2.     Which emotions dominate the first half of the psalm?
What words or phrases show this?

3.     Which emotions dominate the second half of the psalm?
How does the tone shift?

4.     In Luke 24, what emotions do the two disciples show on the road to Emmaus?

5.     What emotional similarities do you see between the psalmist and the Emmaus disciples?

6.     What emotional differences do you see?

7. What do you notice about how God responds to these emotions in both passages?

 2. INTERPRETATION — What does God seek to do with you through his Word?

1.     What does the psalmist’s distress, anguish, and fear reveal about the human condition?

2.     What does God’s response — hearing, inclining His ear, delivering — reveal about His character?

3.     How does the emotional shift from distress → rest reflect the movement from death → life?

4.     What does the sadness and confusion of the Emmaus disciples reveal about how easily we become inward‑focused?

5.     Why do you think the disciples could not recognise Jesus at first?

6.     What does Jesus’ response — drawing near, listening, opening Scripture — reveal about how God meets people in confusion?

7.     How do both passages show that God must act first before we can see clearly or respond faithfully?

8. What does this teach us about the nature of faith — especially the difference between “looking within” and “receiving from God”?

 3. APPLICATION — What’s the Holy Spirit teaching about yourself and God?

1.     Where do you see yourself in the emotions of Psalm 116 or the Emmaus disciples?

2.     When you face distress or confusion, what is your usual instinct — to look inward or to call on the Lord?

3.     Psalm 116 shows a God who is present, who hears, inclines His ear, and delivers. How does this challenge or comfort you?  Your current prayer life?

4.     Where might self‑absorption or inward focus keep you from noticing Christ’s presence?

5.     Jesus opened the Scriptures before He opened their eyes.
What does this teach you about how God forms faith in you?

6.     The psalmist responds with thanksgiving, vows, and public worship. What might a concrete response of thanksgiving look like in your life this week?

7.     Today’s sermon emphasised that Christianity is not merely personal but public. Where, or how, might God be calling you to speak or act publicly in faith?

8. What is one inward‑curved habit God may be calling you to release? What is one outward‑looking practice He may be calling you to begin?

 CLOSING PRAYER

Lord Jesus Christ, you draw near to us in our confusion, our distress, and our inwardness. You open the Scriptures, open our eyes, and open our hearts. You have given us the Holy Spirit to deliver us from ourselves. Let your Holy Spirit turn us outward to see You, to love others, and to walk in the land of the living. Fill us with your Holy Spirit to teach us to call on Your name, to lift the cup of salvation, and to offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving. Remind us that we are in Your holy presence all our days. Amen.