C, Post-Pentecost 5, Proper 10 - Amos 7:7-17 "Dread"

Amos 7:7–17 (ESV) This is what the Lord God showed me: behold, the Lord was standing beside a wall built with a plumb line, with a plumb line in his hand. And the Lord said to me, “Amos, what do you see?” And I said, “A plumb line.” Then the Lord said, “Behold, I am setting a plumb line in the midst of my people Israel; I will never again pass by them; the high places of Isaac shall be made desolate, and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste, and I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword.” Then Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, “Amos has conspired against you in the midst of the house of Israel. The land is not able to bear all his words. For thus Amos has said, “ ‘Jeroboam shall die by the sword, and Israel must go into exile away from his land.’ ” And Amaziah said to Amos, “O seer, go, flee away to the land of Judah, and eat bread there, and prophesy there, but never again prophesy at Bethel, for it is the king’s sanctuary, and it is a temple of the kingdom.” Then Amos answered and said to Amaziah, “I was no prophet, nor a prophet’s son, but I was a herdsman and a dresser of sycamore figs. But the Lord took me from following the flock, and the Lord said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’ Now therefore hear the word of the Lord. “You say, ‘Do not prophesy against Israel, and do not preach against the house of Isaac.’ Therefore thus says the Lord: “ ‘Your wife shall be a prostitute in the city, and your sons and your daughters shall fall by the sword, and your land shall be divided up with a measuring line; you yourself shall die in an unclean land, and Israel shall surely go into exile away from its land.’ ”

Picture yourself in Amos’s sandals.  You’re a sheep farmer and an orchardist and God calls you from your land into a different land.  Then God places before you visions and asks, “What do you see?”  You report what you see, then God calls you to proclaim his Word to others without fear or favour!

What you’re called to say, has occurred through the disobedience of the people, the priests, and the king to whom you’ve been sent.  God calls you to tell them, “God has dropped a dividing line between himself and you.  No longer will God be found in your places of worship, and your holy sanctuaries will lay in waste!”

In Amos’s time, God dropped his plumb line, saying, “Jeroboam shall die by the sword, and Israel must go into exile away from his land.” (Amos 7:11 ESV)

It was God’s “line in the sand” set to cause dread amongst those who heard its proclamation.  Like Amos, having seen God’s vision and then told to tell others what God says, would you obediently report what you’re called to say?  It is a dreadful message to tell!  Who would you dread more; God or those to whom God calls you to proclaim the prophecy?

But it doesn’t end there.  This farmer come prophet from Judah is confronted by the priest of Bethel, Amaziah, who’s reported your prophecy to the king of Israel, and then tells him to get out of Bethel, go home, and prophecy there.  Imagine if God commissioned you to tell the priest, “Your wife shall be a prostitute in the city, and your sons and your daughters shall fall by the sword, and your land shall be divided up with a measuring line; you yourself shall die in an unclean land, and Israel shall surely go into exile away from its land. ” (Amos 7:17 ESV)

Would you dread telling this to the priest, or more so would you dread God, if you didn’t do what you were told to teach?

Like fear, dread has a positive and negative sense.  Today it’s mainly used negatively.  Dread and fear in a positive sense can lead a person in awe of someone to do great things. Like Amos, the prophets, our Lord Jesus Christ, his apostles and martyrs!  Or negatively, dread and fear can be quite awful, inciting panic and terror in those who refuse being rescued, by the likes of the prophets or the apostles, therefore remaining condemned guilty before God.

Two avenues of dread stand before Amos. Dread in reporting God’s Word to God’s people and how they would react to him.  Or not reporting God’s Word to his people and dreading how God would react with him, if he didn’t report what he was called to see and say!

This was the third vision God showed Amos, after stern prophecies were spoken against God’s people and king in Israel.  But it wasn’t to be the last vision or prophecy. 

The first two visions were firstly, locusts devouring at the end of the growing season.  And then secondly, judgement by fire which was to consume everything in the land.  But both times Amos interceded, and God relented.

Twice Amos says “O Lord God, please forgive! How can Jacob stand? He is so small!” (Amos 7:2,5 ESV) And twice, “The Lord relented concerning this: saying, ‘It shall not be’, and ‘this also shall not be.’” (Amos 7:3,6 ESV)

God’s people tested God, and Amos was sent by God to reveal God’s action against his people acting disobediently, the priests of God acting defiantly, and God’s king acting contrarily against God as a rebellious authority.

The plumb line prophecy was the third vision Amos saw, but it was the first of three in which God did not relent.  The first two were set to cause a godly dread and fear to turn God’s people in repentance back to him.  Now the third, fourth, and fifth prophecies were announced through Amos to reveal God’s opposition and cause them dread as they remembered what they defiantly didn’t do.

God showed Amos the fourth vision, and then God says, “‘Amos, what do you see?’ And Amos said, ‘A basket of summer fruit.’ Then the Lord said to him, ‘The end has come upon my people Israel; I will never again pass by them. The songs of the temple shall become wailings in that day,’ declares the Lord God. ‘So many dead bodies!’ ‘They are thrown everywhere!’ ‘Silence!’” (Amos 8:2–3 ESV)

God promises to no longer forgive his people, he will not pass by or over them in judgement. No longer heeding his Word, God would withdraw from the orchard and no longer grace them with his presence.  God’s own people will be separated from him, left to themselves as dead rotten fruit.  There is unanswerable silence, in God’s deadly absence. 

God reveals continuing dread in what they’ve sought for themselves, saying, “‘Behold, the days are coming,’ declares the Lord God, ‘when I will send a famine on the land— not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord.’” (Amos 8:11 ESV)

To this the Psalmist adds, “I said, ‘You are gods, sons of the Most High, all of you; nevertheless, like men you shall die, and fall like any prince.’ Arise, O God, judge the earth; for you shall inherit all the nations!” (Psalm 82:6–8 ESV)

God inherits the nations through death.  In fear and dread people return in repentance to God, through the daily death of self and its pride, or they await dreadful expectations in a death without the Word of the Lord to save them.

This is played out in the fifth vision of Amos where he sees God standing beside the altar saying, “Strike the capitals until the thresholds shake, and shatter them on the heads of all the people; and those who are left of them I will kill with the sword; not one of them shall flee away; not one of them shall escape.  All the sinners of my people shall die by the sword, who say, ‘Disaster shall not overtake or meet us.’” (Amos 9:1,10 ESV)

God did not put the plumb line amongst his enemy.  No!  These were his own chosen people, descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  Amos was called by God, to leave his farm in Judah, to followed God north into Israel, to see the visions of God, and to tell them to the people of God.  Did he dread doing this?  To this Amos testifies, “For the Lord God does nothing without revealing his secret to his servants the prophets. The lion has roared; who will not fear? The Lord God has spoken; who can but prophesy?” (Amos 3:7–8 ESV)

God had sent a shepherd, to shepherd Israel, to warn them by sending famine in one place and not another.  Yet, over and over again, God’s people did not dread God’s judgement, causing him to declare, over and over again, “yet you did not return to me.” (Amos 4:6,8,9,10,11 ESV) “Therefore thus I will do to you, O Israel; because I will do this to you, prepare to meet your God, O Israel!” (Amos 4:12 ESV)

God prophecies through Amos, pointing forward to Jesus Christ as the resurrection of David’s rule that’s fallen, saying, “In that day I will raise up the booth of David that is fallen and repair its breaches, and raise up its ruins and rebuild it as in the days of old. I will restore the fortunes of my people Israel, and they shall rebuild the ruined cities and inhabit them… I will plant them on their land, and they shall never again be uprooted out of the land that I have given them,” says the Lord your God.”  (Amos 9:11,14a,15 ESV)

In our church and society today, many believe, “disaster will not overtake or meet us.”  The use of fear and dread are looked down upon as “not loving our neighbour”.  Yet God is still showing his faithful plumb line, a line in the sand in his Son Jesus Christ.  The Holy Spirit continues to open God’s Word to us; in the hope we receive Christ from our neighbours and share Christ with our neighbours.

When the silence of death comes, God will inherit the earth.  When we silence God’s Word of warning and believe “disaster will not overtake or meet us”, we should expect to dread, a death in the domain of darkness and the silencing of our sin.  Yet when we turn and trust in God, who will judge all things, then fear and dread leads us to the cross, to cover our sins with Jesus atoning blood for forgiveness, eternal light and life.  

Killing the prophets, re-crucifying Christ, not allowing the Holy Spirit to make us righteous in God’s Word, is still a current warning to all humanity, including you, regardless of how unpopular it is.  The writer of Hebrews reminds God’s people in Christ of his plumb line, “For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace?” (Hebrews 10:26, 29 ESV)

The saints of God are still being physically and spiritually martyred for their faithfulness.  Where we are shown to be the killers of God, God’s Word and his people, may the dread of this, lead you and me to repentance from the domain of darkness.   So, having been transferred into the kingdom of God’s eternal light, we live in the assurance of God’s forgiveness of our sins. Amen.

Let us pray! Thanks be to God, who still sends out disciples and saints to share God’s Word with their neighbours.  Thank you for pastors who put aside the dread of proclaiming the truth of your Word, so we, your disciples, can be taught and encouraged to proclaim your message of life without fear or favour, without dread or distraction.  Thank you that the death of Jesus Christ saves from the greater dread and fear of eternal death. Amen. 

C, Post-Pentecost 4, Proper 9 - 2 Kings 5:1-14 "The Problem of Being Parochial"

So [Naaman] went down and dipped himself seven times in the Jordan, according to the word of the man of God, and his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child, and he was clean.  (2 Kings 5: 14 ESV)

There’s not a better feeling being clean after one has endured in the stench of a filthy body for some time.  Even better is the peace and tranquillity of health after the churning and trauma of illness.  Picture Naaman standing clean in health after he had suffered at the hand of skin disease.  No more sores, no more oozing, no more itching and stinging, the smell of failing flesh is gone, and so too is the social stigma of being a carrier of leprosy.

But there’s a stigma that’s even worse than the physical ailment seen by all; it’s one not seen by the naked eye of humanity.  Yet it’s more debilitating, and every one of us are long sufferers and loathers of this stigma we bear in the being of our flesh every day.  This is the oozing, rancid, reality of sin.  Like Naaman all of us have a deep-down desperate desire to be rid of the sickly stench of our sinfulness.

However, it’s surprising Naaman even had the opportunity to be cleansed, let alone the cleansing once he was given the advice which would free him from the foulness of his flesh.  We hear…

…Naaman came with his horses and chariots and stood at the door of Elisha’s house.  And Elisha sent a messenger to him, saying, “Go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored, and you shall be clean.”  But Naaman was angry and went away, saying, “Behold, I thought that he would surely come out to me and stand and call upon the name of the Lord his God, and wave his hand over the place and cure the leper.  Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them and be clean?” So he turned and went away in a rage.  (2 Kings 5:9-12)

Now it’s easy for us to understand Naaman’s anger.  Why?  Because each of us bear the same pride as that of Naaman.  This pride manifests itself in his parochial attitude; the same parochial short sightedness as all of us bear.

A little test will demonstrate our bias.  Are you a cat person or a dog person?  What about Ford or Holden?   After all we all know Fords are “Found On Rubbish Dumps”, and Holdens are Holes, Oil Leaks, Dents & Engine Noise.  Perhaps you’re a lover of the green John Deere over the mighty Red of the Case or blue of the New Holland.  How about your political alliance; that always causes the hackles to flair!  And when it comes to the footy, surely we all stand as one!  Dare I even mention the other code and how they hold and kick a football! 

The point of this little, perhaps humorous, exercise demonstrates how our pride leads us away from listening, into opinions which are more or less built on emotive judgments.  It’s more than coincidence when a “one eyed supporter” evokes a war of words, always with another who’s just as opinionated it seems!  Pride always rubs pride up the wrong way!

Naaman expected big things from Elisha.  And Elisha surely delivered, but not as the military man had expected.  No pomp and ceremony, not even a face-to-face meeting, and washing in the waters of the Jordan, that’s just laughable; ludicrous!  Like Naaman, being parochial causes us problems.

But how did Naaman come to the point where he was commanded to wash in the Jordan seven times?  These are a string of events that break the parochial single mindedness of the most powerful people, and they all start with the capture of a little child.  In the scheme of earthly things, this young girl is a nobody; she amounts to nothing in the big picture of Syro-Israeli relations.  We can be quite confident there wasn’t talk of her capture in the halls of power at Damascus or Samaria.

Yet this is from whom the whole even unfolds!  A captured child of Israel speaks to her mistress, the wife of Naaman, about what Elisha, the prophet in Israel would do.  This little child speaks and cuts through layers of protocol and parochial etiquette.  She could be mistaken as obnoxious for speaking out of turn; after all she is a slave.  But against pride and protocol the wife listens to her, then Naaman listens to his wife, and then the king in Damascus listens to his leprous military leader, and sends word to his enemy, the king of Israel.

And it gets a hostile parochial reception from the Israelite king.  As it would from any of us!  After all this is the enemy king, requesting for his unclean military commander, one who has been very successful in leading battle against Israel, to be healed of an incurable disease.  What would the Israelite king have thought, when confronted with a leprous, Gentile, warlord, breaking all the boundaries of parochial protocol?  Surely, he’s picking a fight with this request!

“Am I God, to kill and to make alive, that this man sends word to me to cure a man of his leprosy? Only consider, and see how he is seeking a quarrel with me.” (2 Kings 5: 7)  Is the king’s conclusion!  The irony in his words names God yet exposes his lack of trust in God but rather trust in his own parochial godliness.

How often do we listen to the parochial god within rather than trust the eternal Father in heaven whose desire it is to free us from the longsuffering stigma of sin which kills and causes our narrow-mindedness?  How quick do we depart from the word of God and trusting in our own limited understanding lose sight of the cross?  And when the going gets tough, how habitually do we fall into the mindset that the tough must get going rather than allowing the Holy Spirit access into our being so we can pray and ponder God’s word, therefore glorifying all that has been done for us?

Like Naaman we get angry; like the king we tear at ourselves fearing the worst and unlike the little Israelite slave girl we hang onto our parochial ways to the detriment of grace, mercy and peace.

 After he is encouraged to listen to the command, I imagine Naaman went down into the Jordan, just to prove a point.  “I’ll show them all how ridiculous is bathing in the Jordan!”  Defiantly he doesn’t even wash, but just dips in the river seven times and is healed.  Now Naaman, the mighty military man from Syria is released from his scourge and like the little slave girl through whom God began the whole process now too carries the same innocent clean smoothness of her flesh and faith.

Surely the events recounting Naaman’s healing are a reminder to us Gentiles to return to Word of God.  To repent and daily trust in the actions of God in his Word, and what he has done for you having been baptised into Jesus’ death and resurrection.  Having had the old parochial sinful self, buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead. (Col 2:12)

Let the Holy Spirit continue leading you from the stigma of all your sin, into the promised peace and holiness of your heavenly home, together with God the Father and Jesus Christ his Son, your Lord and Saviour.  Amen.

C, Post-Pentecost 3, Proper 8 - Galatians 5:1,13-25 "The Divine Dance"

The Apostle Paul writes to the Galatians because they’re in the process of turning their backs on the freedom they have won in Jesus Christ. 

He gets straight to the point in chapter one, saying, “I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.” (Galatians 1:6–9 ESV)

The issue is a group was seeking to reintroduced circumcision as an addition for salvation, and the Galatians were welcoming it.  Circumcision is nothing in itself, but the requirement to be circumcised is righteousness through works, that destroys all the works of God that brings a person to baptism and keeps one in their baptism. 

Saint Paul uses strong language since any works that one adds to God’s works, makes you, me, and the Galatians liable of sinning against the Holy Spirit.   When you and I use freedom to sin against God, you and I are addressed as ill witted Galatians, as Paul brings shame on them, saying, “O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified. Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? Did you suffer so many things in vain—if indeed it was in vain? Does he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law, or by hearing with faith.”  (Galatians 3:1–5 ESV)

The Galatians were on the brink of piling contempt on the work of Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit through their actions of freedom.  To those who were forcing the Galatians back to circumcision, Paul says, “I wish those who unsettle you would emasculate themselves!”  (Galatians 5:12 ESV) In other words, rather than forcing others into works of circumcision, he would rather those who demanded this would amputate everything off themselves, so there was no possibility of circumcision.

However, rather than circumcision or emasculation, that “cuts off”, Paul points out that all have, “put on” Jesus Christ in baptism — both Jew and Gentile, slave or free, man and woman.  All now share in the same discipleship!  Anything one thinks they need to add to this, to be effective, undermines the work of the Holy Spirit and submits one to a yoke of slavery once again.  Anyone who requires someone else to do these additional  works, be it circumcision or any other work, works contrary to Jesus Christ, with a “different or distorted gospel”.   When one seeks or orders this for effective discipleship, Paul says, “Let them be accursed”!  

Emasculation and being accursed are strong words that hopefully move you to consider how you function as a Christian and as Christians.  Or, better said, how you allow the Holy Spirit to give you life!    Paul says to you, “For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.” (Galatians 5:13 ESV)

Today “love” can be a slippery word.  Love is love, the worldly banners proclaim, but the hidden truth, of the world, is all love is not the love the Holy Spirit works in and through us!  Three types of love can be noted here, but there is only one love to which Paul points.

The first two are passions of the flesh.  This is desire from within that is either vulgar evil desires, or seemingly good righteous desires that sees one climb up to God to do the greater good. 

Vulgar evil desires or passions are self-explanatory.  You and I know exactly what they are when one lusts after, or hates, another person in their heart.  But good righteous desires are a little more difficult for us to discern.  These desires subtly deceive the faithful because they seem godly!  But in fact, they’re the same fleshy desires that deliver us ultimately into death. 

Firstly, and foremostly, these good desires were the works of circumcision amongst the Galatians.  But the works can be any works of righteousness that dilute and desecrate the holy work of God the Father, in his Son, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit. 

The problem of climbing up to do the work of greater good, assumes we can climb up to God in the first place.  Even in our minds, if we believe we have ascended to the heights of God, we want to be like God.  Then, like the circumcision party or any other pietistic or self-righteous group, our own law is proclaimed for others to follow.

In the second place, the problem of climbing up to do the work of greater good shows contempt for God’s will, his Word of law and gospel, and for God himself, who always comes down, to create and recreate.  We heard on Pentecost Sunday at Babel when the world worked as one to build themselves up to God, God still had to come down.  And once there, he destroyed their collective good, which in reality was not good at all. 

Similarly, any greater good worked in God’s church needs to be enacted by the Holy Spirit, lest it’s only an act of self-righteousness against God’s righteousness.  A work of Divine love always begins with God, and ends with God, and it works in us to work for God.  Any other work just does not work.

When we realise our passions and desires don’t work, the work of God has begun to bring Jew and gentile, slave and free, man and woman, into step with the Holy Spirit.  This is the Holy Spirit, two step, of law and gospel!  This is the place where the Holy Spirit begins to teach you and me how to be one church, in a beautiful dance with our Saviour, Jesus Christ.  The Holy Spirit perfectly aligns us, the body of Christ, and individual members of it, with the Head, our Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ came down to us and allowed the Holy Spirit to choreograph him in his life and ministry.  This is the love of God to which Paul and the Apostles point us in God’s Word.  Now, Jesus and our Father send the Holy Spirit to choreograph us, with the Word, to dance with Jesus in a Divine Dance. 

With this picture we can see how Paul calls us to allow the Spirit to direct us into the fluidity of Christ’s love with him in this Divine Duet.  This is not a dance like a disco, where individuals decide to do “whatever they like”, chaotically bouncing up and immediately falling right back down, crashing into each other, like out-of-control human pogo sticks!

Paul says, “But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.”  (Galatians 5:16–18 ESV)

And so, Paul gives us the first of two lists in which we are called to see ourselves in the reflection of God’s Word.  In showing you the law in the first list, you see the fickle fleshy reality of your dance moves, so the Holy Spirit can move you and lead you, from the disjointed desire for a disco disaster, into the dance that bears all the holy fruit in the second list.

In our dance with Jesus Paul tells us exactly what the work of the Holy Spirit is.  “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” (Galatians 5:24 ESV)

Therefore, “If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit.” (Galatians 5: 25 ESV) Let us let the Holy Spirit keep on crucifying the flesh with its passions and desires. Amen.

Extras for Contemplation

Let’s now look at the lists to hear how the Holy Spirit works to keep us with in step with him, Jesus Christ, and our Father in heaven.

Unhelpful fleshy desired dance moves Paul warns won’t work to inherit the kingdom of God. (Galatians 5:19–21 ESV)

Sexual immorality – the Greek word used here is from where we get the word pornography and includes all sexual vulgar activities in heart or deed outside what God orders in creation.

Impurity – is to not be cleansed, pruned, purged, or expiated by the work of Jesus Christ on the cross.

Sensuality – is to be incontinent or filthy in the sense of lacking self-restraint of emotional actions.

Idolatry – is worship of created images.  An idol is anything that breaks the First Commandment, created physically, spiritually, or mentally.

Sorcery – this is a Greek word from where we get the word pharmacy, and means magic and crafts, including but not limited to, means of medication.  The spells and potions of occultic activity.

Enmity – Hostility, hatred, being contrary or an adversary.

Strife – quarrelling, disputing, wrangling.  

Jealousy – indignation, being offended, to covert.

Fits of Anger – heated impassioned outbursts

Rivalries – Factions that stimulate undermining behaviour.

Dissensions – Disunion that causes two positions or standings.

Divisions – this is often confused with division between people but comes from the Greek word from where we get the English word heresy.  So, it is division or sect against God and his Word.

Envy (and Murder) – Ill will, character assassination, to spoil, to shrivel, to wither, to ruin, (therefore some manuscripts add murder).

Drunkenness – intoxication of various substances.

Orgies, and things like these – Revelry or rioting in various manners, from the Greek to lie outstretched for self-indulgent pleasures of the senses.

Helpful Holy Spirit worked fruit. (Galatians 5:22–23 ESV) The things the Holy Spirit wills to work within those who allow him.

Love – Greek here is agape, love of God that comes down.  Charity, benevolence, compassion, generosity.

Joy – a common delight or cheerfulness.  Greater than happiness.  Where one can be happy in themselves, joy involves more than just an individual.

Peace – from the Greek word “to join”, so rest, quietness, prosperity in the spiritual sense, but comes from being joined to that which gives the qualities of peace.

Patience – long tempered, as in holding one’s heated breath to cool.

Kindness – being useful, employable, easy, to furnish what is needed, to act towards one in a given manner.

Goodness – in all senses, benefit, goods (as in things), wellness, good.

Faithfulness – conviction, belief, reliance upon Christ, unhidden truthfulness, fidelity.

Gentleness – humility, to be mild.

Self-control – power over the self’s desires, and passions.

The Spirit doesn’t demand perfect footwork; He perfects as one yields their steps to Him. Learn trust in the trust-worthy Choreographer.

How does this Spirit-led dance shape the way we receive God and give thanks in the Divine Service?

In what ways did the early church’s gatherings reflect Paul’s call to freedom?

We thank God for Paul and the other Apostle’s determination to put glory in themselves aside so the Holy Spirit could use them in his instruction of the Church’s Divine Dance with Jesus Christ our Saviour.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

C, Holy Trinity - Psalm 8 "God's Majestic Name"

Standing under an evening sky, with no light pollution from cities, is a wonder to behold.  To see the stars in the sky and know that many of them are so large, it would make our sun appear like a speck of dust, if they were alongside each other, makes the mind boggle.  Yet these massive stars join with all the other heavenly beings, to fill the darkened sky as microscopic pinpricks of light in the heavenly curtain of darkness.  As we stand and see their tiny lights radiating towards us, it blows the mind that the light we see now, has been in transit from that star, for years, lightyears. Arriving just now from the era when God created the heavens and the earth. 

But greater than the night sky is God in his magnitude, but also in the minute detail of something so massive and eternal.  We hear that God’s glory is still bigger!  We join with King David, the Psalmist, in contemplating his eternal question, “O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth? You have set your glory above the heavens.” (Psalm 8:1 ESV) David literally says, “O I AM, our ruler!”  The Existing One, is our keeper!  His majesty is immeasurably wide.  But, despite this, David realises we have access to him by simply calling on his name, “Yahweh”, which is “I AM”, I exist!  And furthermore, the glory of his name is greater the heavens!

As a child, on the farm, there were times when I would look at the majestic twilight sky and try to imagine the width and length of eternity.  I stared into the orange light, the cloud tails, and the fading into blue darkness with stars beginning to appear.  No matter what distance I could imagine.  I was in awe that my imaginings, were just that imaginings, only the beginnings, insignificant, terribly shortsighted, and childish.

King David reflects, “Out of the mouth of babies and infants, you have established strength because of your foes, to still the enemy and the avenger.” (Psalm 8:2 ESV)

One might think that my childish imaginings are still greater than the cooing and garbled words of babies and infants.  Yet, I am reminded, that before I could imagine and ponder, while I was still an infant totally dependent on my mother, God had set in place strength that stops his enemies or haters, his foes or those who are cramped by him, and the avenger or those who carry a grudge against him.

What is made clear by God to David and us, is that the Almighty, works completely contrary to our intellect and what we imagine to be strength.

It’s at this point David and all of us remember that we’re the babies and infants of Adam.  Imbedded in the way we think, feel, work and reason, is the original sin we’ve inherited from Adam.  This makes me, a child of Adam, ponder the brokenness of my existence in the face of God.  Why would he begin to consider me?  If I am the same as Adam, and the rest of humanity, why shouldn’t his glory write me off and annihilate me?

How often do I regard God as the enemy, when I am suffering, when I don’t get my way, when my actions work against the truth of his word?  Like Adam, I am tempted to see God as the enemy, to see him as a deceiver, and thereby, I am deceived by Satan, the father of lies.  So, standing under the stars, I stand humbly in awe of the privilege of being allowed to live.  My sinful work pales into insignificance compared to the works of God in creation.  I realise how much my sinful being is completely dwarfed by his being, who has created the heavens and the earth, and still preserves everything that exists.

Be it the exquisite minute detail of a flower.  How animals know to migrate at the right time?  The order of the planets revolving around the sun without crashing into each other.  My smallness and my lack of attention to detail is highlighted by God’s extraordinary control of creation.  I am brought back to standing under the stars, not to worship them, but to worship he who made them.

“When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?”  (Psalm 8:3–4 ESV)

Why is God mindful of me?  A child of Adam!  It’s right here at this point where all seems lost, we hear that God cares for the son of man.  He cares for the son of Adam, in spite of our weakness, despite our deadly ungodliness.  Saint Paul reminds us, “For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:6&8 ESV)

The Son of Man is Jesus Christ!  We hear from the author of Hebrews, “Now in putting everything in subjection to him, he left nothing outside his control. At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him. But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honour because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.” (Hebrews 2:8b–9 ESV)

Adam’s disorder, our disorder, has been handed over to Jesus Christ to reorder.  Nothing has been left outside his control.  This Son of Man is the Son of God.  King David says of God, “Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honour.” (Psalm 8:5 ESV)

Indeed, Christ was made low, he was willing to go the opposite way to Adam.  Adam unfaithfully sought to be God.  But Jesus faithfully submitted to God the Father, and although he is God the Son, he was prepared to put aside his Godliness, and became human, for you, for me, for King David. 

This is the love of God the Father and God the Son for humanity.  Jesus Christ became the Son of Man.  He became lower than the heavenly beings, lower than the angels.  He became lower than sinful humanity, to serve and save humanity, because God considers humanity the jewel of his creation.

We were the gold of God’s creation but became fool's gold against God.  But God loves us so much he gave the gold of his divinity in his only Son, who suffer death and broke the crucible of hell.  So, we might have the impurities of foolishness removed from us, so we might be the golden children we were meant to be.

When I stand and look at the stars and know that God is greater than these works of his.  And as I ponder that Jesus who was with the Father in his work of creation, departed his dominion to descend below me to the depts of depravity in my place, then my heart leaps in the knowledge of God’s love for me. 

In knowing God’s love in his forgiveness of you and me, through Jesus’ death, see the greater works of God in his work of salvation!  You and I are his new creation, through Jesus Christ!  You and I are perfectly restored in him!

But the love of God does not end there!  The threefold being of love that God is, is for us.  In Christ we have been grafted into God’s circle of love.  The love of God the Father and God the Son is continued in us with the Holy Spirit who in being sent in love from the Father and the Son, now loves to lead us to the Father and the Son. 

With such love, see that we are restored as the golden pinnacle of God’s creation. 

We hear of God, “You have given him dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes along the paths of the seas.” (Psalm 8:6–8 ESV)

In Jesus Christ our care of creation has been reset, since God has given Jesus’ dominion over the works of his hands. The Holy Spirit now works with us, God’s re-creation, to cover our world with care and prayer in his name.  So that the world knows that Yahweh is the Lord, our Lord, through the majesty, the wideness, of his name in all the earth. Amen. 

C, Pentecost - Acts 2:11b-12, Genesis 11:1-9, John 14:12-14 "What Works"

Acts 2:11b–12 (ESV) “‘We hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God.’  And all were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, ‘What does this mean?’”

The salvation of humanity is about the works of God being heard, accepted, believed and received by humanity.  God has always worked to bring people into common oneness with him.  However, people have not always received the works of God and have sought other ways forward, contrary the work of God in his creation.

However, every person knows within their being, that everything exists and is created for a purpose.  We don’t exist for no reason!  But why we exist is a mystery to many, as God who created the heavens and the earth, is not real, but a myth.  Therefore, the transcendence of God Almighty is reduced to some kind of spiritual force somewhere in the cosmos.  Yet people today are still looking for spiritual meaning.  It has been no different since the beginning of humanity. 

At the first Pentecost after Jesus ascended into heaven, many were gathered for the Jewish harvest festival fifty days after the Passover.  This is the Passover where Jesus was crucified on the cross, buried, and raised from the dead on the third day.  Much had happened in these fifty days since.  We could imagine, if social media was a thing back then, phone screens would have been burning bright with speculation and social memes (short texts, images, or videos) as to what was going on. 

At this first Pentecost, after Jesus’ death, resurrection, and ascension, many Jews were gathered in Jerusalem.  Humanity being what it is, we know there would have been the same surge of social intrigue, albeit, without electronic devices!  So, when the Holy Spirit was poured out on the Apostles with the sound of a mighty rushing wind and the gathered people saw the tongues of fire over their heads, this would have only fed the feeding frenzy of gossip already around.

We know when feeding frenzies occur, the babble that occurs can be confused, to say the least.  It was no different at Pentecost in Jerusalem, some were amazed and surprised, some were perplexed and confused, and some were both.   We hear the Jews from different nations question, “What does this mean?” or more widely, the crowd determined to know, “What is this?  What’s going on? How and why is this occurring?”  Imagine if this happened today, everyone would have their phone cameras rolling, and social media would be abuzz!

Long before Abraham, Isaac, and Israel existed; about two thousand years or so before Jesus’ death, resurrection, ascension, and this confusion at Pentecost, humanity was one.  It was the days after the flood and the descendants of Noah were pondering the dispersal from the location of the Ark.  They were also drifting away from God, having been saved from the flood.

We hear from Genesis eleven, “Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there.” (Genesis 11:1–2 ESV)

There was human oneness, many could only dream about today!  They had one will and determination.  Was their will good?  They thought so!

As they moved from the mountains they settled on the plains and said amongst themselves, “Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.” And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth.” (Genesis 11:3–4 ESV)

No one is sure exactly where Noah’s Ark landed.  Nevertheless, why leave a mountainous area, venture onto a plain, and then build a tower?  Why not stay on a mountain and build a tower there? Even if they built a tower as tall as the Twin Towers in New York, it would have been only as lofty as the lowest mountains in the area.

Mountains were the place where people met with God.  Yet, the population moved as one, to the plain, away from God, and built a tower to make a name for themselves.  Why they acted in this way could have been for many reasons.  Did they not trust God, or did they not fear God?  We will never know for sure.   What we do know is, it was a collective act against God’s work and creative call, to multiply and fill all the earth.

It seems today we are still seeking to build these towers to make a name for ourselves, to give us a place to which we can look upon what a cooperative community can do.  Our society needs these towers of oneness, to calm the collective confusion and fear, having turned from the eternal power and pleasure of the Creator, our Father in heaven.

But God the Father is the Creator.  As we look up to our best and biggest efforts, he comes down to see what the children of men build.  Where we praise ourselves for our oneness, looking up to things other than God, he comes down to reveal his contempt for our efforts.

So, having come down at Babel, God sees and does his work amongst humanity.  He sees the acts of humanity, he sees their collective cooperation where they say, “Come, let us make bricks! Come, let us build a tower!”  In reply, God says, “Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another’s speech.” (Genesis 11:7 ESV)

Today, God still sees the acts of the human spirit, both individually and communally, and actively withdraws, leaving the human spirit in confusion and its worldly language in a babble like Babel. 

At Pentecost God consolidates what he confused at Babel.  He sends Jesus to bring humanity back together having come down into its chaos to carry it on the cross.  After Jesus’ ascension, God reinstates oneness through the power of the Holy Spirit, who truly brings people together, by connecting them to Jesus Christ.  But, in a chaotic confused world of Babylonian proportions, how does he do this?

Before Jesus died, he promised the Holy Spirit would come and be humanity’s help.  The Holy Spirit helps God’s work to happen in those who don’t reject the Holy Spirit’s help!  Help to do what?

With the promise of the Holy Spirit Jesus says, “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.”  (John 14:12–14 ESV)

When you believe, “why Jesus had to die for you, why he had to send the Holy Spirit for you, and why he and the Holy Spirit still continually work for you”, he promises, you will not only do the works he did, but do greater works, now that he is with our Father! 

These works you do, are the works of the Holy Spirit, working within you!  They are the acts of the Holy Spirit, the same acts or works of the Apostles, that the Spirit was working through them in the early church. 

Without the Holy Spirit, without the work of God, our acts are just that, an act!  It matters not how loving these deeds look!  It matters not how good the works appear!  It matters not how unified people believe they are in these acts!  Without the Holy Spirit to call, gather, enlighten, and sanctify, those who work without the Holy Spirit, and their works, are just an act!  Many who continue to work their ways and build their Babels, build a Babylonian confusion as high as heaven, to their detriment, and sin against the Holy Spirit. 

Hear what John heard the angel from heaven say, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great! She has become a dwelling place for demons, a haunt for every unclean spirit.” (Revelation 18:2a ESV)

Then John heard another voice from heaven saying, “Come out of her, my people, lest you take part in her sins, lest you share in her plagues; for her sins are heaped high as heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities.”  (Revelation 18:4–5 ESV)

But when the Holy Spirit acts within, you will know your sin!  Therefore, hear and act in his call to repentance, receive forgiveness of sin, be gathered as one believing this forgiveness through Jesus’ work.  Jesus promises you who allow the Holy Spirit to act within, will truly confess, and witness his forgiveness, to the ends of the earth.  This is the working acts of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth.  Amen.

O Lord, how manifold are your works! In wisdom have you made them all; the earth is full of your creatures. (Psalm 104:24 ESV) May the glory of the Lord endure forever; may the Lord rejoice in his works, (Psalm 104:31 ESV) within his creation, within his creatures, within us.  Amen. 

C, Easter 7 - John 17:20-26 "Perfectly One"

John 17:20–26 (ESV) Jesus prays, “I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word,  that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.  The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one,  I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.  Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.  O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know that you have sent me.  I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.”

In the fictional movie, Gladiator, released in 2000, two Roman Senators, Gracchus and Falco, discuss Emperor Commodus’ attempts to win the hearts of his people by staging games that are bloodthirsty and barbaric for our times.

Gracchus comments, “Fear and wonder, a powerful combination!” To which Falco responds, “You really think people are going to be seduced by that?”  Gracchus suspecting what Commodus is up to continues, “I think he knows what Rome is. Rome is the mob. Conjure magic for them and they'll be distracted. Take away their freedom and still they'll roar. The beating heart of Rome is not the marble of the senate, it's the sand of the Colosseum. He'll bring them death - and they will love him for it.”

Although Gladiator is far from a correct portrayal of Roman history, Gracchus’ monologue, we’ve just heard, pretty much sums up the hearts of humanity then and now.  The seduction of the human heart through fear and wonder, is as real today as it was back then when people gathered at the Colosseum.  Rather, today the mob is wowed and wooed at coliseums like the MCG (the Melbourne Cricket Ground), the State of Origin at Lang Park, the Olympics, a theatre of some kind, perhaps even a large church gathering.  Wherever the mob masses, there will be someone there, to capitalise from the gathered crowd.

It seems sound, that as the masses gather around a central belief, they are one.  Their oneness draws others in.  The popularity of the gathering brings out desires in others, individuals want to join the group, to be a part of an ideology, to feel a part of something, to fill the hole of loneliness in the heart, to be accepted by others, to be one.

Others see the masses gathering and use the opportunity to ingratiate themselves to them.  So, having become popular with the mob, the mob makes them masters of the mob.    In Roman society the two senators realise democracy, the rule of the people, can be manipulated by the pleasures of the Colosseum, albeit bloodthirsty and brutal.  Democracy, the rule of the people, can easily be “corruption of the people, by the people”.

If a crowd is corrupt, those who want to adhere to it, cannot continue uncorrupted if they want unity with it.  To remain unspoiled and untouched by the ideology of the masses means sticking out in the crowd as one being at odds with the crowd.  Those who stood their ground against the mob, usually became the deadly entertainment for the Colosseum crowd. Life is defined by the mob, and death is delivered by the mob.  Or, is the mob delivering itself over to death through its own desire?

Our society, today, doesn’t have a coliseum, that hands over those at odds with the mob, to death!  Or, does it?  Perhaps the advancement of our society over the Romans, is that, at the moment, we have many more subtle ways of assassinating those who stand at odds with the mob.  Hidden coliseums where the sports of gossip, slander, half-truths, and the good of the whole are carried out!

This oneness is far from the perfect oneness to which Jesus calls you and me.  Unfortunately, our sinful human nature tries to incorporate democracy, the rule of the people, with the perfect oneness of God, the rule of God.  

However, the oneness of God does not grow out of the mob, or popularity. It starts with one and it ends with one.  Jesus is the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end!  When Jesus prays to our Father in heaven, he prays as one man.  He did not ingratiate himself to the mob.  In fact, he didn’t suck up to the mob that welcomed him into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday.  Rather, the mob wanted to make him the leader he was never meant to be.  Once the mob realised this, the unbelieving Jews used popularity to turn the mob on him, to crucify him.

Knowing all this was about to happen to him Jesus prayed for those who were given to him.  Not only was this prayer for the apostles and disciples!  It was for the many who would not see but would still believe the apostolic witness, throughout time.  It was for those for whom Jesus prays, who died in many ways, at the hands of the mob, defending the perfect oneness of Jesus and his holy body.  It’s for those today whose witness of Jesus Christ puts them at odds with the common defilement of the masses.  And to be clear, the biblical Greek word for “witness” is “martyr”. 

“But we don’t martyr witnesses of Jesus Christ, in our society today”, you might say!  But the words of the Roman Senator in the fictitious Gladiator movie reveals the truth of our society just as much now, as it did, then!  As magic is conjured we’re distracted. Take away the freedoms given by God and still we roar! Bring us death - and the mob will love their leaders for it.

The only problem is the death we’re brought to is our own. Our fear and wonder, for the mob, distracts us from fearing and loving God.  Jesus did not fear the mob, your opinion nor mine, but out of fear and love for God, he loved the masses, you and me, by becoming the spectacle of death for which we, the mob, so desperately thirst.

Starting from one, Jesus was raised by our Father and the Holy Spirit from death and calls you and me out of the mob that has brought death on itself.  The mob is dying.  The ideals of the mob are dying.  Jesus is coming soon!  But until he comes the Holy Spirit and the “one true church” says, “come”!

In Jesus’ day the mob were the Jews, God’s very own people.  Those who followed Jesus, were called from the mob.  Many were martyred, for their departure from the mob, and for their witness of Jesus’ perfect oneness, with our Father and the Holy Spirit. But they were united in Jesus’ perfect oneness, together with the Triune God, in one accord, as his body, his bride, his church.

At the Reformation, Luther and the reformers were accused of departing the one catholic church which had gone the way of the Jewish mob.  Instead of being catholic, gathered as one in the oneness of Jesus Christ, the church prided itself in being Roman Catholic and became the mob from which the Lutheran Church left.

Many of our forefathers and mothers, came to this country and other countries when oneness was forced upon them in Germany.  A oneness that had nothing to do with the oneness of Jesus Christ, rather a political oneness from a German mob. 

Powerful fear and wonder to generate the mob, persists today in a seemingly new world order, distracting people in so many different ways, to a worldly oneness, away from the oneness of Jesus Christ.  Fear is created by those who want to control the mob, and great wonder is attributed to institutions that emphasise this unity.

But the unity of the cross begins with one and calls us to be one with our Lord.  Each day this unity calls for the death of self, institutions, ideologies, and mob rule.  Anything that takes the place of the perfect oneness that Jesus won for us in his death and resurrection by the will of our Father, and the work of the Holy Spirit, needs to daily die.

We are known by God and made known to those whom God leads us, as we die to self, and become known witnesses or martyrs to the masses—witnesses of God’s glory in Jesus Christ his only Son, our Lord.   Like Jesus, and many before us, the Holy Spirit seeks to lead you from the mob, to witness to the mob, the perfect holy oneness of God in Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. 

In God’s way, the mob will then know that we’re being made perfectly one, in, by, and with Jesus, so that the world might know that God sent Jesus to them, the masses, in the same way that the Father loves Jesus Christ his Son, our Lord.  Amen.

Dear Heavenly Father, the world does not know us, but we are known by you.  Send your Holy Spirit into our hearts so we can make Jesus Christ known to our mob, here in Australia, surrounding our congregation gathered in the oneness of our Lord, Jesus Christ.  Amen.

C, Easter 6 - John 14:27 "God's Holy Peace"

John 14:27 (ESV) Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.

Lutherans are people of the Word.  Our forefathers led us away from placing our trust in others telling us what to believe about the Word of God, by taking out submission to a middleman and directly placing ourselves at Jesus’ feet to hear, digest, and have his Word enacted in our lives.

However, for many today, being people of the Word amounts to reading a devotion, which begins with a bible text, then a few thoughts from the author, and a brief prayer to end the devotion.  Once that is done then the box has been ticked for us to go off and do something else.  

How often is the devotion done in haste?  As if God’s Word and a prayer is a legal warrant or a gate through which to get, so you can do, perhaps something, “more interesting or important”!

Don’t get me wrong.  There’s nothing wrong with this type of devotion, but it’s meant to lead to something more than the “set and forget” practice we’ve made it!  God calls his believing children to be keepers of his Word, to be kept in his Word.  He wants us to take hold of it and let it do things within us.  We dwell in the Word, so it abides or remains in us.  So, it can change our thinking and our ways, into God’s thinking and God’s way.  After reading a devotion, God wants you to take his Word with you into your day. So, his love can work, in your work, throughout your day.

We are told by Jesus, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. And the word that you hear is not mine but the Father’s who sent me.” (John 14:23–24 ESV)

First, we hear, “If anyone loves me…”  This “If” contains the law and gospel of God’s Word.  If you love me, you will keep my word, if you don’t you won’t keep my Word.  And he says, “by the way, my Word is God’s Word, I am sent by him to speak his Word, and the Father and I will come and live with the keeper’s of my Word.”

When we hear this, it will do one or more of the following:  Having heard Jesus I might ponder to myself “Yeah, I keep God’s Word. I read my devotion; I tick the box.  It’s all good!”  To those who do this, Jesus looks at in loves and says, “You lack one thing: go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” (Mark 10:21 ESV)

Then there are the scoffers of God’s Word.  Authorities unto themselves they don’t believe they need to sit under God’s Word, they don’t need to keep God’s word, nor do they have to love or be loved by God.

However, most of us I suspect, will be challenged by Jesus in his Word.  You wrestle with thoughts like, “I want to love God, I want to keep his Word!  But reading it is one thing!  Keeping it is another!  And allowing it to work within me, within my day, is a struggle, in which I fear I’m failing!

This is not bad news!  This is how God’s Word of Law is meant to function in those who know the reality of sin that leads to death.  The challenge of Jesus may be uncomfortable, but it’s for a good reason.  It’s the same reason he said to his disciples, “If you loved me, you would have rejoiced, because I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. And now I have told you before it takes place, so that when it does take place you may believe.” (John 14:28b–29 ESV)

The disciples did not believe nor rejoice because they too did not know how to love God, they did not know how to keep Jesus’ Word, let alone understand it and pass it onto others, as Jesus knew they were going to after his ascension.

This is why he promises his disciples, of which we are his disciples too, saying, “These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you.  But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.” (John 14:25-26 ESV)

All of us, beginning with the disciples, need to be helped by the Holy Spirit.  Without the Holy Spirit the ways of destruction are wide and varied through which the narrowness of your heart is deceived for disaster and demolition within the world. 

The Holy Spirit takes the truth and love of God in his Word and funnels it into each of us, so we can be conduits of God’s Word in the world.  We are God’s tubes attached to a funnel, and the funnel is the Holy Spirit, who selectively takes God’s, truth and love, filling our being and flushing out our worldly ways.  So, as Jesus promises, we can be brought to remembrance and taught by the Word he has spoken and lived.

People think they are attacking Christians when they say we are narrow minded, but they unwittingly are testifying to the truth of our faith, which guided by the Holy Spirit’s narrow way in God’s Word alone, leads to life. 

Jesus says, “Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.” (Matthew 7:13–14 ESV)

Those who find the narrow way, find it only by the Holy Spirit.  The gift of the Holy Spirit, the gift of faith that he gives, is just as much the gospel gift as Jesus’ death and resurrection.  In fact, it’s all a package deal from God the Father to us and it’s the gift of peace he gives to believers who want to love him and be kept in his Word.  The Holy Spirit calls us by the Word of God.  He gathers us in God’s Word, he enlightens us in God’s Word, and he makes us holy in God’s Word.  The Holy Spirit is sent by Jesus and the Father, to keep us in Jesus; the living, risen, Word of God.

Therefore, the Holy Spirit funnels the Word of Law and Gospel into and through us.  With the Law, he convicts us to keep the Word of God, to be kept by the Word of God, to love God, to be loved by God.  But the Holy Spirit also nurtures and assists us, by reminding and teaching us with the Word of God to remain in it, giving us faith to be loved by God, and the desire to love God.  This is all part of Jesus’ gospel plan that gives us peace.  

Jesus says, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.” (John 14:27 ESV)

With the wideness of the world, we all know in our heart of hearts, there’s no peace to be found.  The easy way the world promotes—what the mob wants—ends in trouble and fear, riots and destruction.  The well-worn path of believers is well worn because it’s narrow, not because it’s easy or traversed by many.  In fact, the easy path without obstacles is desolate, and proves itself to be a desert in which the devil dwells.  

But for those carried by the Holy Spirit, we are shown God’s glorious heaven where his church lives with God in peace, this is the heavenly city shown to John in his Revelation.

We hear, “And he (the angelic messenger) carried me away in the Spirit to a great, high mountain, and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God, having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal. But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s book of life.” (Revelation 21:10–11, 22 ESV)

You with the disciples who need the Holy Spirit to believe, to remain in the Word of God, to love God and be loved by God are a part of this holy Jerusalem congregation.  Even though we believe, yet know we are sinners and still struggle with sin, we have peace because Jesus has given us a holy helper in the Holy Spirit, who gives us the will and the way to hold onto God’s Word; to know we are loved by God through his Word of Law and Gospel.  So, we can love God and each other. Amen.

Let us pray. Spirit of our God, descending, fill our hearts with heavenly joy. The Father’s love, the love of Jesus Christ, your holy love, transcends all things.  Your love is holy pleasure that never becomes sickening nor sour.  Holy Spirit, with you provided, we are pardoned and guided.  Nothing can your peace­­­­—our peace—destroy. Amen.