C, The Sixth Sunday after Epiphany - Luke 6:17-26 "Word of Comfort"

Jesus is proclaimed from the mountains to the plains.  The comfort of his proclamation is this: “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live.” (John 11:25 ESV) He says these words to Martha whose brother Lazarus had died some days before.

For us who are being saved in these days of death, before us are blessings and curses.  In a nutshell we are told: “Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the Lord.” And, “Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord.” (Jeremiah 17:5&7 ESV)

Psalm One parallels these words of Jeremiah, speaking of the fruit of the blessed, and the wicked or cursed as being chaff, saying “the wicked will not stand in the judgement”! (Psalm 1:5 ESV)

The power of Jesus healed the diseases and touched the hearts of those with unclean spirits, at the “level place”.  What he then preaches is essentially the same he said at the sermon on the mount, recorded in Matthew’s Gospel. 

Matthews Gospel was originally intended to be a catechism for Jewish believers, who would have remembered the proclamation of blessings and curses commanded by Moses, for Joshua and the Israelites to speak the blessings from Mount Gerizim and the curses from Mount Ebal. (Please read Deuteronomy 11:26-29, 27:1-26, Joshua 8:30-35)  So, the Jewish hearers and readers who understood what God was doing through Moses and Joshua would have found great comfort in Matthew’s  Gospel account of Jesus’ “Sermon on the Mount”.  

But at the sermon on the plain here in Luke’s Gospel there’s a wider audience as we’ve heard.  Disciples, Jews from Judea and Jerusalem, and Gentiles from the seacoast of Tyre and Sidon hear Jesus proclaim not just the blessings of the sermon on the mount but also the woes or curses. 

Now in this level place, Jesus levels the playing field between the Jews who knew the Law.  The blessings and curses of God made known on the mountains of God, are now plainly set before Jews and Gentile.  Jesus flatly addresses all the discomforts and comforts to all humanity on level ground from the word of God for the first time.   The word of God has descended from the mountain and the Jews, to the plain for the Gentiles too!

Then, all those troubled by unclean spirits heard him, and those with diseases were healed by him.  But he lifts up his eyes to address his disciples.  These are the twelve disciples whom he had just set apart as apostles, together with many other disciples who followed him.  Also in his hearing are other Jews, but furthermore the Gentile Phoenicians from the coastal areas of Tyre and Sidon hear him too.

But with all these present, it’s to his disciples he says, “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.  Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied. Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh.  Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil, on account of the Son of Man!  Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven; for so their fathers did to the prophets.  But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation.  Woe to you who are full now, for you shall be hungry. “Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.  Woe to you, when all people speak well of you, for so their fathers did to the false prophets.” (Luke 6:20–26 ESV)

Are these comforting words?  How do you see those who were healed receiving these words?  As comfort or discomfort?  How do you think the disciples received them?  Jesus levels the playing field with his word of balance, his word of blessing and woe!

But it’s to you Jesus asks: Are you comforted by being poor, and discomforted by being rich?  Are you satisfied by being hungry, and discomforted by being full?  Are your tears comforting, and your laughter in these days of death discomforting?  Are you comforted by being hated, and treated as evil because you believe Jesus, and his word?  And are you discomforted by those who say nice things about you but hate Jesus’ word?

Are you blessed by your comforts this side of the resurrection, or blessed by the promised comforts coming after the resurrection?  Are you cursed and in despair by your comforts this side of the resurrection, or will you be cursed and in despair afterwards?

Jesus’ Word is the great levelling field!  In fact, Jesus himself is the great leveller!  He gives blessed balance to our existence calling out the comforts that need to be named as idols.  But he also shows us the true comfort we can have in him, despite knowing our existence, now, is broken. 

Your being was never meant to be dying.  Jesus teaches he is the way, the truth, and the life.  The Word of God reveals that human existence begins by being born only to be delivered into death, but through Jesus’ death and resurrection your being can continue forever with life!  Surely that is our comfort in this world of discomfort.

We have just sung: “Comfort, comfort all my people with the comfort of my Word. Speak it tender to my people: All your sins are taken away.”

Our sins are taken away!  That should be a comfort for us!  Why?  Because now we can focus on the true comforts of God’s kingdom.  However, using the forgiveness of sins to carry on in our own comforts that teach us to turn from God to selfishness, and the creation of our own kingdoms of idols to worship instead of God, is not what God intends for us. 

You and I are reminded of this in the woes with which Jesus balances the Jews and Gentiles at his sermon on the plain.  As God the Father did with the Jews at Mount Sinai and at Mount Ebal when they entered Canaan.  Jesus continues to balance us with the reality of blessings and woes today, as we’re moved over the mountains of our suffering and across the vast plains of temptation towards our resurrection, being led in the comfort of Jesus’ way, truth, and life.

Yet, we hear the true nature of our existence after Jeremiah tells us we are cursed by trusting ourselves, over against the blessing we receive in trusting God.  He says, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? “I the Lord search the heart and test the mind, to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds.”  (Jeremiah 17:9–10 ESV)

With our hearts being desperately sick, is there any comfort for us, is there any consolation from the blessings we hear and receive from Jesus and the Word of God?  Some might hear Jesus say, “…woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation.” (Luke 6:24 ESV)  And think, “My riches in this existence of suffering and death are the only consolation or comfort I can attain. I just can’t do what Jesus requires of me, even now that my sins are taken away.  Therefore, many are deceived into returning to the comforts of one’s self-seeking pleasures. 

Or, on hearing the blessings of being poor, hungry, weeping, and being hated, they’re too much to add to the suffering and death of our human existence!  So, there’s a temptation to reject these blessings as just nice sentiment.  But sentiment doesn’t have any eternal substance!  One quickly finds themself impatiently returning to pursue the passing pleasures of the heart, believing God’s word insufficient to console and comfort.

If Jesus was to just leave us with his word of comfort, for us to figure out his way, his truth, and his life, without any help, his word would end up being a discomfort to us.  But he doesn’t leave us to our own devices.  Jesus comforts us with a Comforter!

He has led us out of ourselves, and he continues to do so today.  Right from the Early Church era, after Saul became a believer, and became known as Paul, we hear, “…the church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria had peace and was being built up. And walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, it multiplied.”  (Acts 9:31 ESV)

In John fourteen Jesus tells us he has left us the Holy Spirit to be our Comforter; our Helper.  The Holy Spirit helps us in the comfort that, “Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.” (Psalm 124:8 ESV)

Like Simeon who waited his whole life for the consolation of Israel in the birth of the Messiah, now that Jesus has come, has been crucified and has been raised from the dead, we too wait for the consolation of Christianity in the comforting promise of Jesus Christ’s second coming.  

The Holy Spirit comforts us in his work of faith building.  He does this, with ongoing forgiveness, to make us God’s holy people, with the work of Jesus’ death and resurrection, and his word and sacraments.

The Holy Spirit now wages war with the human self within each of us.  He seeks to hinder and stop the old human nature from resurrecting itself and re-creating its idols of comfort and recreation.  He’s sent to comfort and console, and to level us with God’s Word, so we’re easily led to Jesus Christ.   The Holy Spirit works within, so we believe and receive the comforts of Jesus’ Word. 

The Holy Spirit seeks to comfort you with the implanted word that Jesus is the resurrection, but he’s also the re-creation and recreation of life, right now!  That believing in him, although you die, you shall seek, and one day live in, the kingdom of God.  Amen. 

B, Post Pentecost 26 Proper 28 - Mark 13 "Final Day Failure to See Failure"

On January sixteen, two thousand and three, the National Aeronautical and Space Administration in the United States of America, launched space shuttle Columbia into a sixteen-day orbit around the earth for an extensive scientific mission.  It never touched down!  In the sixteenth minute before it was due to land, mission control lost contact with the orbiter as it broke up on re-entry over Texas and Louisiana. 

The greatest fears were confirmed as video from the media was broadcast to the US nation, unbeknown to mission control in Houston, who were still trying to reestablish contact with Columbia.

A chunk of foam, not unlike the expander foam you can buy at a hardware store, just twenty-one to twenty-seven inches long by twelve to eighteen inches wide, that’s about half to three-quarters of a metre by thirty to forty-five centimetres.  It broke off the large propellant tank strapped under the shuttle, just eighty or so seconds after launch, smashing into the reinforced carbon-carbon covering the left wing of the orbiter.

There were concerns over the incident by some at NASA, but it was dismissed because it was unbelievable that foam could damage, let alone, destroy reinforced carbon-carbon on the wing of the Columbia.

The scientific mission of Columbia was ended, ironically,  by a scientific impossibility, as some believed.  However, in the aftermath of the disaster, it was shown through experiment that foam could destroy reinforced carbon-carbon, when it’s travelling at high speed.

The fracturing of foam was known to NASA.  Yet people at NASA control still kept sending astronauts into orbit knowing brittle bits of foam were being dislodged.  Some of which earlier had caused damage to one of the Atlantis shuttle’s solid fuel rockets without catastrophe, since these are ejected after launch, not needed for re-entry. 

However, the damage to the Columbia space shuttle orbiter proved fatal on re-entry, due to catastrophic destruction of the left wing’s protection from the foam collision on take-off.  Therefore, without this protection, the super heating that occurs on re-entry, opened the vehicle for destruction, and the crew was lost.

The great pleasure in NASA,  and the accomplishment of a successful mission dissolved into NASA’s and the United States’ realisation of their greatest fears. What they had marvelled over as their greatest achievement brought about their greatest fears, destruction and death!

The disciples marvelled at the stones and the buildings of the Jerusalem temple, to which Jesus replied, “Do you see these great buildings? There will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.” (Mark 13:2 ESV)

This was not the first temple but the second.  Solomon’s temple had long been sacked, and in its wake, Herod set about to construct the second temple.  Last week we heard in Solomon’s Psalm one hundred and twenty-seven, “Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labour in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain. It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil.” (Psalm 127:1–2a ESV)

However, the Jews didn’t take heed of God’s Word, nor the four hundred years of events that led to Jesus’ coming.  Rather, they vainly trusted in themselves and their deeds, forgetting what led to Israel’s and Judah’s destruction and desolation.  Hear the unbelief of the people when God sought to call their vanity to account through Jeremiah…

“Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Amend your ways and your deeds, and I will let you dwell in this place. Do not trust in these deceptive words: ‘This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord.’ Behold, you trust in deceptive words to no avail. Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, make offerings to Baal, and go after other gods that you have not known, and then come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, ‘We are delivered!’—only to go on doing all these abominations? Has this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your eyes? Behold, I myself have seen it, declares the Lord.”  (Jeremiah 7:3-4, 8–11 ESV)

From Mark’s Gospel we hear Jesus prophesy the reality of Jerusalem and its temple in the end times.  After the destruction and desolation, that saw their forefathers exiled to Babylon and beyond, having not remained under the warnings from God in his Word, they continued refusing to listen to Jesus, the Son of God, and sought their own desires causing desolation and destruction.  

In these last days, in which we have been since Jesus’ resurrection and ascension, the church continues to test God with its opposition to his Word, and fails to heed its warnings, as it seeks to place its trust in culture and the authority of the mob.

Our General Pastors’ Conference and General Convention of Synod, like NASA, like the Jews, has not listened to God and his Word, nor the advice of previous synods, nor two thousand years of Christ sustaining his church from desolation and destruction. 

At best, what is done has occurred through apathy, as a deception of the “abomination of desolation standing where here ought not be” (Mark 13:14)  That is, evil in the place of Christ, masked as an angel of light, working through mischief to lead the apathetic into a unity of ignorance that’s false and leads to destruction.

At worst, like those who lead others into deception, some are acting with deliberate disobedience before God and his Word, by placing themselves over the Word of God in seeking to conform the church to the catastrophic cultural corruption all around us.   

So, like NASA and the pressure upon it to be popular and positive, the church is led into negatives that lead to the worst.  Without addressing the issue that was the worst, the worst occurred at NASA.  Nothing was learnt from the “sins of the past”.  Nothing was done about the foam breakage issues, until it was too late.

The greatest fear in front of us in God’s church, is that we become lost to our baptismal salvation, like the crew and vehicle of Columbia.  In ignorance, we trust in the word of others, rather than God’s Word, and tempt finding ourselves on the wrong side of God’s judgement.  

We can lose control and burn up so close to salvation, through apathy and deception, or active wilful disobedience.

Don’t let what others say, “is a harmless little piece of foam”, when it can destroy your baptismal faith!  Don’t allow your faith to become a piece of foam that destroys you.  Don’t let that which is meant to protect you become dislodged so that it destroys you!  If you think this can’t happen to you, I invite you to open God’s Word and allow the Holy Spirit to show you that it can, and has, to God’s chosen people, who had “the temple of the Lord”, that ultimately, he allowed to be destroyed in 70AD.

Speaking of NASA and the disaster, a shuttle chief engineer said, “I feel ashamed!  So, who’s guilty? I’m not just going to say the program managers are. We’re all guilty. If you don’t speak up for your own system and you’re victims of this environment, we’re guilty too!” (Rodney Rocha – NASA Shuttle Chief Engineer, Series 1 Episode 3, The Space Shuttle That Fell To Earth, ABC Television)

How do we galvanise ourselves against our greatest fear, eternal death and destruction?  On judgement day it’s no good saying to God, “I believed in Pastor Heath!  I believed in the bishops!  I believed in the LCANZ!  I believed in what I felt, in what “I” thought about God.  We have to believe “the Word of God”!  To open it!  Read it!  Pray for understanding, worked in you by the Holy Spirit, so you stand in submission under Jesus Christ and his Word!  God calls you to “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” (Philippians 2:12–13 ESV)

Jesus says to you who desire to fear and love God, who fear eternal death over earthly death, “See that no one leads you astray. Many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am he!’ and they will lead many astray.” (Mark 13:5–6 ESV)

The seemingly harmless pleasures, “the pieces of foam”, within each of us, within our congregation, parish, district, and synod, can destroy us and bring eternal desolation.  Therefore, be strengthened in the Word of God to be on guard against your sinful self; the evil within.  Be strengthened against the cultures of chaos working through others; the evil from without!   Be strengthened against the abomination of desolation standing where he ought not be; that is, the devil, the evil one, inside and outside the church!

Since Christ ascended into heaven, the commonwealth of God’s holy church has always been tempted into becoming common by losing the holiness of its wealth.  Two thousand years into the end times, some have lost sight of what makes us holy, that sets us apart from the world, as God’s children, as his commonwealth. 

This commonwealth community of God is a republic of repentance.  Our eternal wealth is built on the knowledge of our failures having been forgiven.  The Holy Spirit leads us as a republic of repentant sinners constantly being forgiven in Jesus Christ.  The fragility that fractures this faith, is your human spirited apathy or wilful disobedience to participate in the Holy Spirit’s republic of repentance. We’re being made one as the Holy Spirit works common repentance, reviving us as God’s renewed public property, a holy commonwealth in Christ.

Your fear of failure needs you to understand your weakness and ability to fail!  If you don’t, you will place your faith in yourself; the very thing that causes your failure.  Failure to repent, to know you need to repent, is catastrophic!  

An accident investigator of the Columbia tragedy said, “This was a known failure. But I think failure to imagine being wrong, the failure to imagine the consequences of failure, are catastrophic.  And I think it’s this whole notion of the failure, to imagine failure.” (Patrick Goodman – Accident Investigator, Series 1 Episode 3, The Space Shuttle That Fell To Earth, ABC Television)

Like NASA, the Jews failed to recognise their failure to follow God’s Law and their failure by trusting in the temple the Lord gave them, rather than his Word.  When we fail to recognise our failure and the forgiveness offered because of our failure, and place faith in what fails us, we become like those who believe in the temple, rather than God who gave the temple.  And like those who believed a cheap piece of foam couldn’t harm reinforced carbon-carbon.

The only safe ship that will deliver you through the atmosphere of failure and death into eternity, is the eternally enduring coverings of Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh!  Amen.

B, Ash Wednesday - Genesis 3:14-19 "You are Dust, and to Dust you shall Return"

Genesis 3:14–19 (ESV) “The LORD God said to the serpent, ‘Because you have done this, cursed are you above all livestock and above all beasts of the field; on your belly you shall go, and dust you shall eat all the days of your life.  I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.’  To the woman he said, ‘I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be contrary to your husband, but he shall rule over you.’  And to Adam he said, ‘Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life;  thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field.  By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.’”

Air, water, and fire, return all things back to natural elements.  From the moment we create things on this earth, they are returning to what they once were.  The houses people have built since time began have returned, and are returning, to the earth, through exposure to air, water, or fire. 

The goods we place in our homes will also return to primary elements.  Some quickly, some slowly, but nevertheless they are returning.  Even plastics, glass, and porcelain return having been produced with fire, return with the help of fire and pressure over time!

All metals eventually revert to their mineral compounds through the process of corrosion and rust, so that they become dust once again.  Having this in mind we travel in vehicles not putting too much trust in our means of transport.  A very sobering thought to contemplate when we’re at thirty-eight thousand feet, looking at a metal wing, slowly returning to the ore of the earth, keeping us aloft.   Or, sailing on a metal ship, in a salty brine knowing that eventually rust, must make metal, into mush!

It’s not just things we create, that are reduced to rust, dust, a mushy mash, or blackened ash.  All things given to us in this creation will die and return to he who created it with his Word.  

Following a garden and kitchen waste recycling truck yesterday, it became obvious to the nose that air and water were working on returning things, we live on in creation, back into compost and dirt.  Another sobering thought occurred to me, as I drove behind that truck, that I too, in the fullness of God’s time, will be returned from flesh, blood, and bone, back into air, water, and dust.

In a short time, you will receive the mark of the cross on the forehead with ash and hear the words, “you are dust and to dust you shall return.” 

These words are the words of God to Adam, who having listened to Eve and Satan disguised as a serpent, did not heed God’s call not to eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. 

As a result, not only does Adam return to dust; Eve does too!   All animals that carry the breath of life from God, return to the earth.  All of creation groans as a result of humanity’s pleasure.  And so, all the things in which we seek pleasure, are being tested by air, water, and fire.

The ash we receive on the forehead reminds us of this!  The ash used is the ash of palm fronds.  Traditionally the palm branches used on Palm Sunday, are returned to ash with air and fire, to use on Ash Wednesday.  The Ash adheres to the moisture on the skin of the forehead.  Moisture that is continually leaving the body, which one day will work with air to make us compostable material in the earth.  If not, some will return to ash and dust through cremation’s fire.  Either way, “you are dust and to dust you shall return.”

Palm Sunday begins Holy Week.  The ash of the Sunday palm branch not only leads us to remember our mortality, but that of the man Jesus Christ.  He is the New Adam!  The immortal Son of God born into his own creation as a mortal, the Son of Man. 

From Ash Wednesday we look forward to Holy Week, to see what Jesus put aside as the Son of God, and what he endured as the Son of Man.  We see our pleasures, in the face of Adam and Eve’s pleasure, in gaining a knowledge of good and evil.  And we realise the suffering we endure as a result of treasuring the pleasures of what we seek and know, more than the pleasure of knowing God and being known by God.

But we also look to Holy Week and see Jesus’ good pleasure in being led to the cross amid the pain and suffering promised to Adam and Eve from their original sin, and all the sins that followed.  Right the way to today to the deceptions of your pleasures within, and all those around you tempting you because you are without!

We look to Jesus’ death, burial, and descent into hell.  Where, having been pierced by the sword on the cross, water and blood flowed from his flesh!  Where, in the grave, air did not take effect on Jesus’ flesh.   And, where in hell, fire was not fatal for the Son of Man, the Son of God.

We look to Easter Sunday, to the resurrection of Jesus from the grave, trusting that it is the Father’s, the Son’s, and the Holy Spirit’s good pleasure, to work their holiness for you in the events of Holy Week, and Easter.

We also look forward from Ash Wednesday to the day of our death, to our burial or cremation.  Hearing the fulfilment of God’s word, “you are dust, and to dust you shall return”!   And we remember our sin!  The sins we have done, and the sins from which we struggle to be undone.  We see our being, in need of renewal and resurrection, our mortality in need of immortality!

God calls us to look beneath the temporary decaying clothing God gave Adam and Eve to cover their sinfulness, saying, “‘Yet even now,’ declares the LORD, ‘return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning;  and rend your hearts and not your garments.’ Return to the LORD your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love; and he relents over disaster.”  (Joel 2:12–13 ESV)

During Lent some find it healthy to forgo some of the pleasures of this life to focus on the pleasures of God and what was done to save us from the decay caused by our pleasures.  This is a rendering of one’s heart, through fasting, hearing God’s word, and meditating on it. 

Going without in the forty days of Lent, leads one to be tested, and having been tested, produces repentance, as one quickly sees in our failures, Jesus’ being tested for forty days without sin.

Ash Wednesday calls us to see Jesus raised from the dead, victorious over sin, death, and the devil.  In Jesus we see flesh without failure, without fatigue, and our flesh in the future.  We see our mortality made immortal through Jesus’ pleasure to fulfil our Father’s will!

On Ash Wednesday we see the only way is Jesus’ way.  In him the Holy Spirit opens our eyes to pleasure’s temptation of good and evil.   This leads us to turn back to God our Father in repentance and thanksgiving. 

Ash Wednesday helps us to remember and return to the Lord our God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love.

In Jesus’ suffering, death, and resurrection, our Father in heaven promises to relent and repent over all your evils!  Amen.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

But what does this have to do with us? 

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

It might well be sexuality, prostitution, or pornography! 

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

A, Pentecost Sunday - 1 Corinthians 12:1-13 "God Works Good Works"

1 Corinthians 12:1–13 (ESV) Now concerning spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be uninformed.  You know that when you were pagans you were led astray to mute idols, however you were led.  Therefore, I want you to understand that no one speaking in the Spirit of God ever says “Jesus is accursed!” and no one can say “Jesus is Lord” except in the Holy Spirit.  Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone.  To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.  For to one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues.  All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.  For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ.  For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit.

We live in an instant society.  If we want something we can get it immediately.  There is no need to wait for the time or season in a global community.  We can get it frozen or canned in the supermarket. 

When we want information, once one went to a book or a learned person.  Today, one goes to Google.  Letters no longer go through the post.  There is no six-month wait for the boat to arrive with mail from the other side of the world.  Instead, letters are emailed from one side of the planet to the other, instantaneously, with the click of a button.  One doesn’t even need to wait to go to a computer to send a message.  Email is even being superseded by quicker mobile communications; texting, video calls, Twitter tweets, and Tik Tok.

With all this immediacy comes an expectation of pleasure now, without waiting.  When the expectation is not immediately met, frustration floods in to fill the void made by the lack of instant gratification.

It’s no different in the church today!  We are all part of modern society and its pursuit of immediate pleasure.  We all love the feeling of immediate gratification!  It’s the modern addiction behind all the addictions one can imagine!

When one thinks of addiction, one tends to think of the things that are socially unacceptable, like substance, sexual, and alcohol abuse, tending not to associate addiction with pleasure.  But even simple seemingly innocent pleasures can lead one into addiction without even realising it.  Behind them all is the “expectation” for pleasure.

As with society outside the church, inside the church we struggle with the same frustrations.  When frustration occurs as a result of our expectation for pleasure, there is a very real desire to “get on with it” and “do what needs to be done”.

Paul wrestles with the Church in Corinth who, “wants to get on with it!”  Their expectation was driving them to work contrary to the Spirit of God.  This is because their expectation was their mute idol. 

He says to them in first Corinthians twelve, “Now concerning spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be uninformed.  You know that when you were pagans you were led astray to mute idols, however you were led.  Therefore I want you to understand that no one speaking in the Spirit of God ever says “Jesus is accursed!” and no one can say “Jesus is Lord” except in the Holy Spirit.” (1 Corinthians 12:1–3 ESV)

Here Paul, first makes the point that one being led by the Holy Spirit is not going to speak against and curse Jesus Christ, but rather is going to believe and confess Jesus as Lord.

After making the point, that the Holy Spirit open’s one’s mouth to speak, Paul goes on to teach, that in the same way, the Holy Spirit wills one to work. 

Without the Holy Spirit doing the work through the worker, the work will fail.  The worker will not glorify God the Father or the work of Jesus Christ.  Therefore, the worker will glorify themselves and their own spirit of goodness, and the work done will be followed by ever-increasing confusion and chaos.

This is why there is so much confusion and chaos inside and outside the church today.  In our frustration and desire for instancy, there is no waiting for each other, let alone waiting for God!  Instead of waiting for God the Holy Spirit, a plethora of pleasures takes over and these spirits, competing for pleasure, battle for supremacy inside and outside the church.

At Pentecost, God the Father and God the Son sent the promised Holy Spirit.  The apostles, the other disciples, and the women were hiding in fear of what might happen to them.  But after Jesus’ resurrection he breathed the Holy Spirit into them.  God’s peace was with them, allowing them to wait, allowing them to act with one accord, and allowing them to be the one body of Jesus Christ.

They came out of hiding to boldly proclaim Christ, without fear, with one voice, calling for repentance.  The mega works of the Holy Spirit were done in and through them as they breathed forgiveness over sinners. 

As one they could stand together under Jesus Christ, reject rejoicing in sin by naming it, confess their own sin and call others to repent as well, ask for forgiveness as encouragement before others to do the same, and live as one under the breath of Jesus’ forgiveness.

Paul seeks to return the Church in Corinth to the oneness of the Holy Spirit and the pleasure of God from the confusion of spirits seeking pleasures in an evolving exacerbation of expectations.  Their expectations, and the confusion of human spirited desires that came from them, were mute idols made active and chaotic, only by the work of those who worshipped them.

Paul shows the people of Corinth that doing the work of God by their own effort without the Holy Spirit is as impossible as saying, “Jesus is Lord”, without the Holy Spirit!   In fact, without the Spirit of God their human spirited’ work was accusing and cursing the work of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and destroying the body of Christ in Corinth.

Paul says, “For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ.  For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit.”  (1 Corinthians 12:12-13 ESV)

In our baptism we are being resurrected into the one body or church of Christ!  Just as Jesus put aside his divinity and lived by the Holy Spirit while he walked to the cross, we too are called to put off our human spirits and walk as one in Jesus Christ, by the Holy Spirit’s power.  Just as Jesus lived by the Holy Spirit and the Word of God while he walked to the cross. 

Jesus put aside his divinity when he walked without sin to the cross.  But the difference for us is, we put off the sinfulness of our human spirit, that is, not trust ourselves.  But rather, trust the Holy Spirit, to give us, our activities, our ability to serve, our empowerment, and our works, as he chooses to apportion to each of us.

As Paul says, “Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities (works), but it is the same God who empowers (works) them all in everyone.  To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.  All these are empowered (worked) by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.” (1 Corinthians 12:4–7,11 ESV)

The idols of pleasure are real in everyone’s lives today.  The spirit of this age is one of individualism.  Therefore, a multiplicity of spirits swirl in confusion, seeking a plethora of pleasures, only to produce pain!  The reality of the evolving ever-increasing confusion and chaos in our society, demonstrates the need for us as church to wait on the Holy Spirit, allowing the Word of God to be worked in those who wait in the Word of God, for the work of God.

God works good works, in those who allow God the pleasure to work in them, putting to death the idols and works of the human spirit in favour of the life-giving gifts and work of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

How do you respond to this increased chaos? 

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

C, Post-Pentecost 11 Proper 16 - Isaiah 58:9b,13–14 Hebrews 12:22-25 "Pleasure"

Isaiah 58:9b,13–14 (ESV) If you take away the yoke from your midst, the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness.  If you turn back your foot from the Sabbath, from doing your pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight and the holy day of the LORD honourable; if you honour it, not going your own ways, or seeking your own pleasure, or talking idly;  then you shall take delight in the LORD, and I will make you ride on the heights of the earth; I will feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father, for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”

Tina Arena wrote and released a song called, It’s time to go to church, on  April 30, 2021[1].  In it she sings, “I forgive you for everything.  For all the nights I couldn't sleep.  I forgive you for surfacing.  When I was looking for what I need.  Now I tell you everything.  Now I know my worth.  It's time to go to church.  It's time to go to church.”

Being a listener of her music, I must say I was surprised by her song when it came out.  After all, she sings, it’s time to go to church.  And being a pastor in a church, thought, “Okay!  That’s a pretty good thing to sing!”  I was tempted to justify it as a wholesome song.  But the lyrics are vague and unclear.  Who is she addressing in the lines of the song, and what is the church to which she believes it’s time to go?

Don’t get me wrong, I like the song very much.  But because I do, there’s a strong desire within me seeking to justify the ambiguity, as I like both the song and the artist.

She sings on, “Love forgive me for not listening.  To myself and to my truth.  I forgive you for questioning.  I'm still breathing, that's my proof.  Now I tell you everything.  Now I know my worth.  It's time to go to church.  It's time to go to church.”

The “you” she addresses in this verse reveals itself as “love”.  She asks love to forgives her for everything.  Tina forgives love for the nights she couldn’t sleep, for surfacing, for questioning, and now tells love everything.  Because of love she now sings, “I know my worth.  It’s time to go to church.”

What is one’s church?  If you are thinking of a building or a denomination, yes, these are what you could consider as a church!  However, I invite you to think broader of what church can be in one’s experience as well as what kind of church God is seeking to bring you into.

In Tina Arena’s song, she addresses love.  Love here is still ambiguous, and I believe it is most likely unclear for a deliberate reason.  To make it pleasing to the ear, love is vague so the listener can make love anything they want.  Love could be a person, an object, an animal, or even the self.

Love in our age is left unclear so we can love whatever or wherever we find pleasure.  One can go to a church, a creation within, for worship of what one loves.  Or, what pleases the person.

On any given Sunday one can drive around and see people attending to activities of pleasure.  These activities of love don’t just happen on a Sunday, but over the years have invaded our lives.  Sundays have become increasingly busy, diverting people from coming to rest in God’s presence, in his church.

All people find time to go to church!  However, the church most seek, and most attend is the place of their pleasures.  This actively involves turning one’s back on God because it requires one’s pleasure to be above God.

One could say they, “find church in themselves”.  They stimulate their feelings of pleasure by gathering around themselves things that give them pleasure.  

The problem is these things kill.  Whereas, trusting God, letting him serve you and bind himself to you, gives life.  All other pleasures in which we put our trust become yokes, burdening, and binding us to unhappiness and uncertainty.  They make us anxious and eventually they lead to death.  

Look what happens in humanity’s first worship event without God, when they seek not to rest with him, in his pleasure. 

“…when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.  Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked.  And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.”  (Genesis 3:6–7 ESV)

In these two verses from Genesis three, we see the extremes of desire and shame.  Knowledge of good and evil in the one event!  What appeared to be good was also evil!

Eve sees the fruit is good, it delights her, and the promise of wisdom also stimulates desire.  Did it taste good?  We’re not told!  However, immediately there is knowledge, and a wisdom that leads to shame of their nakedness. 

Over the years humans have continued to worship without God.  In these times our worship of the self, plays out in the same theatre of good and evil.  This is not without effect on our conscience as conscience literally means, “with knowledge” or “knowing within”.

Like Eve, we look and delight in what we see.  A feel-good chemical is released, and we want more.  Ironically one of the devices used to get the feel-good release is called an apple device.  But it’s not smart phones that are the issue.  No, it’s the yoked and bound individual who can’t let go of the electronic apple.  Why?  Because it gives the feel-good hormone, leading one on the path of least resistance to pleasure.

It’s not just the phone that yokes us in addiction to pleasure.  We get something new – we get the feel-good kick.  We eat chocolate or something else we like – we get the feel-good kick.  Receive a phone or snap chat notification – there’s the feel-good kick.  Coveting in the catalogue – O, it feels so good.  Look at porn or lust after someone you’ve seen in the street – and there’s an injection of feel-good hormone that gives pleasure.

Tina Arena sings, “Something within places I've been.  Blood running thin, I'm sorry.  Somewhere between Heaven and sin.”

So, the chocolate becomes guilty weight.  The pleasure of porn turns to shame and hatred of self.  The joy of the app, computer game success, the social media message, a Facebook like, or a product purchase; they don’t last, they don’t give the pleasure we sort from them.  To get that feel-good buzz.  You want more, more, more! 

These things all act like drugs because they produce a natural drug within you, called the dopamine hormone.   Eventually you’re yoked and addicted to the feeling this pleasure hormone gives, becoming no longer an isolated want, but a need you can’t do without.  Your worth is now reliant on the thing you love, and one must worship what they love, even when one hates it and dislikes what it’s doing.

The Israelites were God’s chosen people and yet they, like Adam and Eve, and us, were always being drawn away from God to other pleasures, and Isaiah was sent to proclaim God’s word to them.

He says, “If you take away the yoke from your midst, the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness.  If you turn back your foot from the Sabbath, from doing your pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight and the holy day of the LORD honourable; if you honour it, not going your own ways, or seeking your own pleasure, or talking idly;  then you shall take delight in the LORD, and I will make you ride on the heights of the earth; I will feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father, for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.” ( Isaiah 58:9b,13–14 ESV)

We live in a time when the pleasures of this age have drawn our children away from God’s church.  Also, many who are brought into God’s church, resist, because they’re under the bondage of the pleasures to which they are yoked for the other six days and eleven hours of the week. 

How am I to break freed from this bondage?  How can my children be freed too?  How can we look on God once again as the one and only true God?

We need to let our brains and our bodies rest with God from busying ourselves from the pleasures we’ve become addicted to.  We need put aside our pride and no longer be the rulers of our synagogues of sin, the creators of our own churches, and let the Holy Spirit and Jesus Christ deliver us into the holiness of God’s Church.  This only happens when the Holy Spirit can lead you to the stillness of Jesus on the cross.

There is hope only in your Lord Jesus Christ.  It was his pleasure to endure the cross for your victory.  There too is forgiveness, when you have perverted God’s church into a church of selfish pleasure as did the ruler of the synagogue. 

If Jesus can heal a woman bound by Satan for eighteen years, Jesus can make you straight by the power of the Holy Spirit and through the support of others whom he is healing too.

Are you coming to church but not allowing the church of God to come to you.  Are the things you worship so powerful they are rewiring your brain, away from resting in God, being busied pursuing pleasure and its deadly trap?

You have a pastor that struggles to rest in God too.  He along with all of us are products of the fallen world in which we live.  He will not condemn you in your struggle or confession.  But, in love for the Lord and you, he will name God’s forgiveness in your confession and assist you to keep your eyes on Jesus and what the Holy Spirit brings you into when you come to God’s church.

“…you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering,  and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect,  and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.  See that you do not refuse him who is speaking.  For if they did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, much less will we escape if we reject him who warns from heaven.  (Hebrews 12:22–25 ESV)

Amen.

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[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJ9Y7jif1C8