The simple gospel and profound teaching

The jailer called for lights, rushed in and fell trembling before Paul and Silas. He then brought them out and asked, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved – you and your household”. Acts 16:29-31

But now apart from the law the righteousness of God has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished  -  he did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus. Romans 3:21-26

I once read an article by a prominent New Testament scholar in which they wrote some really quite rude things about the apostle Paul. They accused him in effect of taking the beautifully simple and clear message of Jesus and turning it into “theology”, by which they meant something very theoretical and difficult to grasp.

I think I know what they meant. As a child I used to sing in Sunday School “Tell me the stories of Jesus, I love to hear…” And who could argue with that? - Jesus healing the sick, or raising the dead, or setting free the woman taken in adultery, or calling nasty, greedy Zacchaeus down from the tree… lovely stuff! Don’t we all bask in stories like that? And then we turn to passages like Romans 3 and - let’s be honest - we find ourselves struggling even to just read, never mind fully understand, what Paul is saying.

But we are told that “all scripture is inspired by God” (2 Timothy 3:16), not just the easy bits, so we are committed to wrestling with these more demanding parts. Are we right in this? Yes, I’m sure we are. But I at least, for one, have a smidgeon of sympathy for that disrespectful scholar. I wrote last time about “keeping it simple”, but I can’t pretend I always find scripture straight-forward. I must admit that I was pleased when I first came across the words of the apostle Peter – the human head of the church, no less! – that “our dear brother Paul” wrote some things “which are hard to understand” (2 Peter 3:16). I felt quite relieved!

I’ve put at the top two passages either about or by Paul. In Acts 16 we find him (with Silas) expressing himself in the simplest imaginable way – just like Jesus! And then in Romans 3 we find him giving us great helpings of “theology” – using technical terms like “law” and “righteousness”, “justification” and “faith”, “redemption” and  “atonement”. No wonder if we find ourselves rather at sea.

Of course, there are plenty of places where we find Jesus also saying hard-to-understand things – his ministry was by no means all simplicity and clarity. And Paul was by no means the only New Testament writer to pose challenges of understanding. But I’m sure you will get the point. If our salvation depends essentially on simple, childlike trust in Jesus, what need is there of all these heavy and challenging parts? Can’t we be saved without understanding them?

Yes, I’m sure we can. That’s why my mind went to the dying thief, to the Philippian jailer, to the woman taken in adultery as examples of people who knew literally nothing about “salvation” until that moment when they were brought face to face with Jesus.

Where is this leading us?

For one thing, I think it explains one of the main divisions within the Christian church today.

On the one hand there are those who stress the sheer simplicity of the gospel message: childlike faith is all you need! – and wonderful miracles will come tumbling down on your head! And then on the other hand there are those who stress the profound depth of God’s holy word, and emphasise teaching (followed  by teaching, followed by more teaching, followed by still more teaching…). Cynic that I am, I sometimes wonder if such churches require a written entrance exam before anyone can be admitted to membership: oh, you must be sure to get your doctrine right!

These two Christian “camps”, as we might call them, though they both honour Jesus as Saviour and Lord, can be suspicious of one another. The “happy-clappies”, simple believers, look down their noses at the over-fastidious “reformed” types; and they in turn are a bit contemptuous of these over-emotional “charismatic” types. (At least we can be thankful that today we don’t seek to resolve the issues as in by-gone centuries – by burning one another at the stake.)

Is there a middle way between the two types of Christianity? I think there is.

First, the “charismatic” types may well be open to the criticism of shallowness and of raising unrealistic expectations. I remember a blind lady who was on one occasion surrounded by a group of extremely zealous believers who insisted that if only she had enough faith then her sight would be restored. When that failed to happen she was left feeling guilty and troubled, for she felt she did indeed have true faith, however inadequate it might have been. She needed some wise and balanced words from a mature Christian to be reassured.

On the other hand the more “reformed” types are perhaps open to the criticism of turning faith in Jesus into simply an act of cold obedience – “Sorry, but if you don’t believe in Jesus you can’t be saved!”. (You can almost see a severely wagging finger there.) It comes across as if Christians are inventing a new “work of the law”, not much different from the scribes and Pharisees – faith is something you must devoutly do.

We need to remind ourselves that the word “gospel” means “good news”. The gospel is not a threat: “believe in Jesus or there’s no hope for you”. No, it’s a comforting offer: “you want to be saved? – just believe in Jesus!” There’s a world of difference between the tone of those two statements.

Putting it another way… we believe in justification by faith; we are not justified by faith by believing in justification by faith.

Get the difference?

Father, I thank you for your holy word in scripture, even though I find parts of it hard to understand. Help me simply to rest in Jesus and his cross and resurrection – but also to persevere in seeking deeper understanding of the Bible as a whole. Amen.

Keep it simple!

² At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. ³ The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group ⁴ and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. ⁵ In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” ⁶ They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.

But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. ⁷ When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” ⁸ Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.

⁹ At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. ¹⁰ Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?”

¹¹ “No one, sir,” she said.

“Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”

John 8:2-11

It’s striking how sometimes you read a Bible passage which you have read many times before - and it strikes you as if for the first time. This happened to me recently when our pastor preached from this passage:  “the woman taken in adultery”. I’m sure you know the story…

The religious leaders have made a decision that Jesus, to them a dangerous trouble-maker, must be got rid of. They wait for a moment when he is surrounded by a crowd of people in the temple courtyard in Jerusalem, and then seek to catch him out with a trick question. They have got hold of this woman and they drag her before him. Can you picture it? – I wonder if she put up a fight?

Quoting the Old Testament law (presumably Deuteronomy 22:13-30), they put Jesus on the spot by asking for his reaction to the requirement that she should be stoned to death. Their aim is simple: they expect him to pronounce forgiveness over her, thus in effect condoning sin and showing himself to be in opposition to God’s word. At first it seems he tries to ignore them - he bends down and writes in the sand with his finger. But “they kept on questioning him”, so he decides that he must answer them.

I think the answer he comes out with is simply wonderful: “Let anyone of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her”.

In other words, he doesn’t try to defend her. He could have done just that, of course – he could have pointed out that their use of the Deuteronomy passage was selective, to say the least; and, even more, he could have politely inquired where was the man in the case (adultery, after all, is not a sin a person commits on their own). But no; he keeps it simple, as if to say “All right, no doubt you are quite right in what you say. Go ahead and stone her by all means – oh, but before you start, you will make sure that the first stone-thrower is sinless, won’t you?...”

And what happens? – the questions stop coming, the fingers stop pointing, and one by one his opponents shuffle off, no doubt with their eyes fixed firmly on the ground…

I suspect that while this dramatic scene was playing out, Jesus, outwardly calm and polite, was inwardly seething with fury. The hypocrisy of these people!

And it makes you wonder if in our day there are times God looks down on us – all spiritual correctness and respectability, of course – and is grieved that in principle we are no better.

A truly challenging thought. But what particularly struck me in a new way as I listened to that sermon was something rather different: the marvellous simplicity of the good news we call “the gospel”.

Jesus didn’t condone that woman’s sin. He simply took it as a fact, but then he gently made it clear that he had no interest in condemning her. Yes, she must clean up her life, no question about that – “Go now and leave your life of sin” – but he lifted her burden from her. How much she understood of the law and the character of an all-holy God, whether she did indeed embark that day on a new, pure life, we have no way of knowing; but I’m pretty sure that if she walked away with tears rolling down her face they will have been tears of joy more than sorrow.

And I found myself thinking, how complicated we Christians tend to make the gospel! We have divided ourselves into camps, often with labels, and look down on other Christians who identify themselves with other labels, or emphasise different aspects of the truth. We pronounce on which camps may be “sound” and which “unsound”. We invent various rules, perhaps unconsciously – and perhaps even condemn ourselves when we ourselves fail to measure up.

I remember an evangelistic outreach event where one of the “counsellors” (people on hand to advise new converts) was adamant that a conversion wasn’t complete until the person in question had manifested certain specific spiritual gifts. For him it seemed as if simple, humble faith in Jesus wasn’t enough. And then I think of this woman, or of the thief dying on the cross, to whom Jesus said “Today you will be with me in paradise”. So uncomplicated!

I think of the word of Paul to the Philippian jailer who was scared at what might happen to him as his prison crumbled about his ears: “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved”. So uncomplicated! I find myself wondering cynically if there are churches which require would-be members to take a written entrance exam in order to qualify. O Lord, forgive our folly!

Thinking like this does, of course, raise real questions. If it’s all so wonderfully simple, why then has God given us in his word such demanding passages as we find in Paul’s letters or in Hebrews or Revelation or Jude, not to mention large swathes of the Old Testament? Is there no place for the study of detailed “doctrine” or for getting stuck into all those obscure biblical names and events which seem to have no relevance to us?

No! To say that would be wrong. God has given us his word as it is, perhaps particularly to get us to understand the deep Jewish roots of our faith, or for some other reason that we will only grasp after serious and possibly difficult study.

Certainly, the Bible contains a whole lot more than beautiful stories of God’s overflowing mercy and love towards sinners: but the point that hit me that Sunday morning with new freshness as I saw that woman walking away with her head held high was… let us never lose sight of that wonderful, infinitely comforting, simplicity.

Father, your truth is profound and often beyond our understanding. Help us, especially as we wrestle with your word in scripture, to call on the Holy Spirit to give us light. But help us also never to forget the sheer simplicity which is at the heart of the gospel. Amen.

Faith in a time of tears (2)

1:20  At this, Job got up and tore his robe and shaved his head. Then he fell to the ground in worship  and said:

1:21  “Naked I came from my mother’s womb,
    and naked I will depart.
The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away;
    may the name of the Lord be praised.”

1:22  In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing…

 

2:9  His wife said to him, “Are you still maintaining your integrity? Curse God and die!

2:10  He replied, “You are talking like a foolish woman. Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?

In all this, Job did not sin in what he said.

Job1:20-22 and 2:9-10

Last time we thought about the appalling sufferings of Job and the truly impressive response he made to them. I suggested three areas where we can apply his experience to ourselves as God’s people today. First, we too have an enemy, and we need to take him seriously. Second, our enemy is powerful, but his power is limited, as he is ultimately under God’s control. Third, we needn’t be ashamed to vent our emotions in times of trouble, as Job did.

But I never got on to the defiant, faith-filled words of Job especially in 1:21 and 2:10. They are worth focussing on. But first, a short digression…

I have a friend whose wife, tragically, died quite young after prolonged sickness. As part of the lead-up to the inevitable she held what she called “Getting ready for heaven” parties. What did they consist of? Intense periods of prayer? In depth Bible study? A free flow of tears? Well, I never went to one myself – I only heard about them. But I’m pretty sure the answer to teach of those questions is No. Not that prayer wasn’t ever offered, or the Bible never read. Nor that there were never tears. Yes, of course, each of those. But as far as I could gather they were in essence relaxed and even happy occasions where there was plenty of chat and some nice food and drink.

A far cry from the experience of Job, of course! But, like his, essentially positive.

I recently happened to read in the paper about an organisation I had not come across before called Death Café. My, that sounds grim, doesn’t it! - but, on reflection, rather like my friend’s wife’s gatherings. On their web-site the organisers state: “Our objective is to increase awareness of death with a view to helping people make the most of their (finite) lives.” No hint of religious, let alone Christian, input, but I’m sure people of no faith or any faith may participate. But the recognition of a need for mutual support, of a need to look death fairly and squarely in the face rather than turn a blind eye and pretend it’s not going to happen, the need, ultimately, to be positive is key.

What did Job say?

First: “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I shall depart”.

We tend to shy away from such stark realism, but facts are facts. My own father, not at the time a Christian, and not a man prone to opening his heart too freely, received some troubling news from the doctor and expressed a hope that I would look after my mother “in case anything happens to me”. I didn’t need to ask what he meant.

I remember also a woman approaching ninety who was somehow forced to think about death, and responded “Oh, I don’t like to think about things like that”. Well, no, that’s understandable. But “things like that” are exactly what we do have to think about, aren’t they? A woman running a care home greeted me at the desk and told me that the person I had come to visit “had been given her wings”.

Many of us, in effect, try to bury our heads in the sand.

But what is the point? That evocative psalm, Psalm 90 verse 10, tells us that “Our days may come to seventy years, or eighty, if our strength endures”. That’s looking facts in the face, and can only be healthy.

I know there are people – it’s hard not to call them simply crackpots – who are so wedded to this earthly life that they are planning to have their bodies frozen at death so that they can later be resuscitated and have another go at it. Surely, never was the old saying about “people with more money than sense” (such procedures don’t come cheap) more appropriate!

Second: “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised”.

Job here is referring not only to life as a whole, but also to all the possessions and trappings, above all the riches, that we pick up along the way. As we saw last time he was a massively wealthy man, but his faith was robust enough to enable him to say good-bye to it all as and when God saw fit. He knew the truth of the old adage, “You can’t take it with you”, which invites the question, “so why treat it as supremely important?”

Of course “things we pick up along the way”… well, that’s a rather loose and careless expression for me to use because it includes husbands and wives, families and children, work and leisure and other aspects of our experience that have been deeply precious to us (I mean no flippancy). But, whatever Job may have understood about these things, cannot we whose trust is in Christ have a firm confidence that nothing of ultimate value and beauty will be finally lost?

Third, “Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?

But back to the reality of our present experience. We often say that in this fallen life of ours there are “ups and downs”. That, of course, is a sad and bitter truth (I’ve just been following news of the forest fires ravaging large areas of Europe), and indeed the expression “ups and downs” doesn’t begin to do it justice. Earthly existence is afflicted with terrible pain and suffering, with war and disease, with unspeakable cruelty and terrible disease.

There is no logical reason to explain the relative joys and sorrows – why one person seems to reach seventy or more years in relative ease and comfort, and another is buffeted throughout life with crisis after crisis. It’s very natural to cry out “It’s not fair!” But there is no answer to that, and that is where our faith in God is vital; he is a just and loving God, and the ultimate test is to cling to him through thick and thin – and to be whatever loving support we can be for those whose way is harder than ours.

Three further quotations…

“In all this, Job did not sin in what he said” (Job 2:10). May that be true also of us.

“I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us” (Romans 8:18). (And Paul, who wrote those words, knew about suffering!)

Jesus answered him (the dying thief), “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43).

Lord God, please help me to cling by faith to the crucified, risen and ascended Christ, until that day comes when I see him face to face. Until that day, help me to bring light and hope to all whom I meet. Amen.

Faith in a time of tears

At this, Job got up and tore his robe and shaved his head. Then he fell to the ground in worship ²¹ and said:

“Naked I came from my mother’s womb,
    and naked I will depart.^[c]
The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away;
    may the name of the Lord be praised.”

²² In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing.

Job 1:20-22

Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.

1 Peter 5:8

I’ve quoted the closing verses of Job 1, that strange Old Testament book that both puzzles and intrigues us. These three verses contain what is, for my money at any rate, one of the most magnificent declarations of faith in God anywhere in the Old Testament. I picture him, this old man upon whom catastrophe after catastrophe has fallen (read the whole chapter for full details), shaking his fist in furious defiance not at God but at the unknown enemy who has caused these things to happen. Truly awesome.

Who was this man Job? Nobody really knows. The opening verses of the chapter tell us he was from “the land of Uz”. But where was Uz? The experts tell us it may well have been in Edom, east of the River Jordan, in which case he may not have been a member of the people of Israel. But he certainly knew the God of Israel as “the Lord”. He was  “blameless and upright”, a man who “feared God and shunned evil”.

He was also phenomenally wealthy, indeed “the greatest man among all the people of the East”. His wife and grown children could sometimes be a cause of difficulty to him. But beyond such clues we know very little. Not that it matters much, because the book as a whole comes across more as a kind of legendary folk-tale than as a factual piece of history – rather as we might think of, say, Robin Hood. Our business is to receive the Job story as it stands and, as they say, to run with it. What can we learn from it?

First, God’s people have an enemy.

We read (verse 6) that the angels of God “came to present themselves before the Lord” – presumably in heaven – and then, rather strangely, that “Satan also came with them”. To us, probably, Satan is simply another name for the devil, so what he was doing in heaven seems puzzling, to say the least. But at this point in Israel’s history the word “satan” simply meant “adversary” or “enemy”. Jesus’ ministry on earth began with a victorious battle with the devil (Matthew 4:1-11), and one of its features was the “casting out of demons”, a ministry that was by no means simple and which on occasions drained him of energy. This makes the identity of Satan far more concrete.

Well, however we understand it, the key question is: do we take seriously the reality of an enemy in our lives? I heard a preacher once say that as Christians we tend to divide into two distinct camps. There are those who see the devil in just about every misfortune and difficulty we have to undergo, even just the normal ups and downs of life; and there are those who, in practice, don’t believe in him at all, rendering them all the more susceptible to him.

I suspect that preacher was right, though I’m not sure which of those two errors is the more serious. I knew a Christian who made it her practice every morning to “put on the whole armour of God” (Ephesians 6:11) through imaginative prayer – to get dressed spiritually, so to speak, to start the day. I couldn’t help but admire her for her seriousness, but the message, surely, is simple: Christian, take the devil seriously, yes of course – but don’t get fixated!

Second, our enemy’s power is real – but it is limited.

According to Job 1, Job’s sufferings happened only because God allowed them. Satan challenges God with the taunt that Job lives a righteous life purely because God has given him his protection, but “now stretch out your hand and strike everything he has, and he will surely curse you to your face” (verse11). To which God, perhaps rather surprisingly, replies, “Very well, then, everything he has is in your power, but on the man himself do not lay a finger”.

From a human perspective it’s not only as if God was testing Job but almost playing a cruel game with him. Certainly, it’s an integral part of Christian experience that God puts us to the test. Isn’t that precisely what the Garden of Eden story is about (remember, Satan was there too in the form of the serpent?). It seems that what God wills is one thing; what he permits is another, and we are not given a clear understanding of why.

But the key thing about the Job story is that Satan, even if he is like a ferocious animal (as the apostle Peter puts it, “like a roaring lion”) he is never off God’s leash: “on the man himself do not lay a finger”, says God. If Satan is indeed our enemy, he is also God’s – and ultimately there is only one winner in that combat! This basic truth may have seemed pretty cold comfort to Job in the light of unfolding events – but he was ultimately vindicated. And so will we be.

Third, the fact that we are Christians doesn’t mean we need feel bad about venting our sorrows.

This is what makes these two verses so striking and challenging: Job didn’t only tolerate his sufferings. No; he looked them fair and square in the face. Certainly, in “tearing his clothes and shaving his head” he was yielding to the conventional gestures of grief at his time. But the fact that they were conventional doesn’t mean he didn’t mean them. As the book unfolds we see that he was a genuinely emotional man; in his time of trouble there was no “stiff upper lip”.

Sometimes Christians have imagined that because we believe in the victory of the resurrection we shouldn’t display grief or sorrow, anger or confusion, in hard times. God has made us as emotional creatures, and there are times when it is not only permissible to give vent to those emotions, but it is in fact a healthy thing to do; bottling them up may only make things worse.

Every time I read about the stoning of Stephen I feel grateful for the little detail that “godly men buried Stephen and mourned deeply for him” (Acts 8:2). Those men would have been in no doubt that Stephen had gone to be with the Lord, but that didn’t stop them weeping over him. And, of course, we must never forget that “Jesus wept”…

What are we to make of the words Job spoke during that terrible time? I’ve run out of space, but they are too important to be skimmed over. Please join me next time…

Father, your word often speaks of sorrow and tears. Thank you for  the example of those men who wept over Stephen, and of your servant Job in his time of trouble. Please fortify our faith and help us to know that through Jesus there is unending joy to come, and that you will wipe every tear from our eyes. Amen.

Jesus and the mustard seed

Jesus told them another parable: The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.

Matthew 13:31-32

Imagine catching up with old friends or family members you haven’t seen for some time. They have young children, and you hear yourself stating that most obvious of comments, “Gosh, haven’t they grown!” Your friends could respond, rolling their eyes, “Well, what do you expect? Isn’t that exactly what healthy children do? Why the surprise?” But of course they don’t: no, they smile sweetly and take it as a compliment.

Growth is a wonderful thing. It happens both in us and around us every minute of very day. But we take it so much for granted that we barely notice it until our attention is drawn to it; we certainly don’t notice it actually happening.

Jesus came to his people Israel announcing the coming of the kingdom of God. God, he said, was fulfilling the promises made in bygone centuries to his people – promises declaring a new start, a whole new way of being God’s people, and a new king, the Messiah, who he would claim to be. And he provided vivid, down-to-earth illustrations to make this real for his hearers.

One truth about the new kingdom is that it would grow. I personally haven’t the remotest idea what a mustard seed looks like, but Jesus obviously assumed his hearers would, and that it was extremely tiny. So, he says, see how it grows! – big enough to become a tree, and a big enough tree to provide a home for the birds! What a transformation!

As Christians we hear a lot about “church growth”, by which we usually mean an increase in the numbers of people who identify with some branch of the world-wide church. And that is certainly a part of the picture Jesus is drawing. I don’t know what the latest statistics say, but certainly the first followers of Jesus – that not particularly impressive bunch of twelve Galileans – would have been staggered to fore-see what we see today, in 2026. But the story of growth is by no means simple, and parables like the mustard seed encourage us to use our imaginations to draw out various implications…

One very obvious implication is the matter of time.

Mustard seeds don’t mature into full-grown plants in five minutes. I don’t know how long it takes, but this is one of the miracles of growth: it’s happening all the time, yet much of it we simply don’t see. There are trees in Sherwood Forest which go back literally centuries.

The implication for the kingdom of God? That God’s time-scale is very different from ours; and that therefore we must learn the gift of patience. “Why doesn’t God do something?” we ask in frustration, especially over an issue that is especially acute. That’s understandable. But what only the eye of faith can see is that he is doing something; he is, if I might put it so, “on the case”, and things, hidden things, are happening we know nothing about.

One particular application of this - not explicitly spelled out in the Bible, but surely correct – is the practice of persevering prayer. Jesus encourages his people not just to pray, but to go on praying. The classic text for this is Matthew 7:7-8: “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you…” where (so the scholars tell us) the Greek tense implies a continuous asking, seeking and knocking, not just a one-off request.

I have adopted the habit of praying from lists – not only, of course, but lists that have built up over many years form a large bulk of my daily prayers. You may prefer to pray more spontaneously, and that’s fine, but for me it helps to maintain a discipline which enables me to keep focussed.

Does it sometimes become rather mechanical, even routine? Yes, it does – especially when, having prayed for some situation or some person for what seems like the thousandth time (what may in fact be the thousandth time!) and aware that no tangible sign of change has happened, one can feel discouraged. But just as that mustard seed is changing in the depths of the soil, may not my renewed prayer be slowly germinating in the purposes of God?

Yes, there are times to cull such a list, for whatever reason – and God will make that time clear. But patient perseverance, pursued in faith – why would God neglect such a practice? Christian, see every prayer not only as a strengthening of your relationship with God, but as a seed sown!

Your church is not flourishing as you long to see? Don’t give up, but join with your fellow members in determined prayer. That person in need of healing seems to get no better? Don’t give up, but pray even harder. And as we look around us at our troubled world, things just seem to get worse? Remember, Jesus taught us to pray as a matter of course that God’s will would be done “on earth as in heaven”, so let’s take him up on that. If we don’t model ourselves on “the Lord’s prayer” (Matthew 6: 9-13), how can we claim to be his disciples? God forgive us when we limit our prayers to our own little local bubble. Yes, every time we pray , in however repetitive a manner, something happens, even though we may never see it in this earthly life. Remember, every prayer is a seed…

Father, thank you that there is never a moment when you are not at work in this world that you made and that you love. And thank you that my feeble prayers, even when they seem dull and repetitive, play their part in your work. Give me grace to persevere and faith to believe that I will one day see the completion of your purposes. Amen.

Things God hates

 There are six things the Lord hates,

 seven that are detestable to him:

¹⁷         haughty eyes,
        a lying tongue,
        hands that shed innocent blood,
¹⁸         a heart that devises wicked schemes,
        feet that are quick to rush into evil,
¹⁹         a false witness who pours out lies
        and a person who stirs up conflict in the community.

Proverbs 6:16-19

The writer – a teacher of wisdom – boils down into a  concise list a number of things which are “detestable” in the sight of God.

At first he doesn’t seem sure if there are six or seven. But we don’t need to take his numbers too literally, for surely a perfect, holy God could stretch this list almost to infinity as he surveys the corruption which human sin has wrought upon the beautiful world he created. One commentator suggests that “six things… seven things” is “a way of showing that the list, though specific, is not exhaustive”.

In a group of young men learning to be wise as they sit at  the feet of older men, and seeking to model themselves on King Solomon, putting such principles in an easily memorable, even catchy, form would make good sense.

Whatever… the seven things in verses 16-19 serve as a challenge to anyone who takes holiness seriously, which hopefully includes you and me.

First in the list are “haughty eyes”.

We might say “Eyes…? But what harm does a bad look do? Looks can be deceptive, after all, and may just reflect the natural set of someone’s features. Isn’t it possible that somebody who appears to have ‘ideas above their station’ (as a friend of mine used to say) is in reality a perfectly humble and friendly person?” Yes, of course. But presumably what the writer has in mind is an attitude of arrogance and entitlement that may in fact lie behind that snooty-seeming appearance. People who have met a top sports star or a member of the royal family or a top politician are always delighted when they can report “But he/she was so ordinary, so warm and  down to earth!” Yes! – and why shouldn’t they be? At bottom we are all equal in the eyes of God. Paul in Romans 12:3 tells his readers “not to think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather... with sober judgment”.

Is this a word to some of us who imagine we’re pretty important? We couldn’t imagine a better example than Jesus himself, after all.

Second comes “a lying tongue”.

We might feel that that is stating the obvious, and so it should be. But, sadly, experience suggests that in fact our world is awash with lies. In a survey some years ago a majority of people admitted that if a lie or half-truth was convenient to get them out of an embarrassing situation, well, why not? Everybody does it, after all, don’t they? But Jesus tells us that it is the devil, no less, who is “a liar and the father of lies” – and who claimed, himself, to be “the way, the truth and the life”. Truth matters.

I have known people who don’t just tell lies, but who live a lie: their very lives are an attempt to appear something they aren’t. Quite apart from the massive strain that introduces into their day-to-day existence they would be wise to recognise the old saying that “truth will out”. (Oh… No sooner have I written that than I realise that I have spoken very easily of “they” and “them”… But I need to be careful! Have I never, in some form or other, been guilty of deception?)

The next three things that God “hates” seem to form a natural little trio: “hands that shed innocent blood”, “a heart that devises wicked schemes” and “feet that are quick to rush into evil”.

The writer here seems to be talking about overt, blatant wickedness, the sort of thing most ordinary, “decent” people instinctively shrink from. But that isn’t because we’re naturally good, but because we have been “well brought up”, in some cases because we’re good actors. We are all sinners, and sin is something that lurks in the depths of our hearts. We remember how Jesus, in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:21-30), taught that mere anger or hatred (if “mere” is the right word here) are tantamount to murder, and lustful thoughts to adultery.

Number six in the list goes back to the theme of honesty: “a false witness who pours out lies”. If everyday, casual lies are hateful to God, how much more those told in a court of law? Putting it in a positive light, happy is that society or nation that has a scrupulously honest system of law. In a country like Britain Christian people may well be called to serve in the judiciary. It strikes me that we routinely pray for Christian nurses and doctors, perhaps also teachers; well, how about Christian lawyers too?

And so to the last in the list: “a person who stirs up trouble in the community”.

Such a person goes by many names. There’s the gossip, who just doesn’t know how to keep their mouth shut. There’s the busybody, who loves to know what’s going on in other people’s lives. There’s the hint-dropper, who wouldn’t dream of plainly stating those juicy bits of information, but has a talent for saying just enough to leave you feeling uncomfortable, uneasy and faintly defiled.

What about the “whistleblower”, who draws attention to some deep-rooted corruption in the hierarchy of which he or she is a part? They could of course be people of great integrity and indeed courage, risking their very employment in the interests of truth and justice. Or - do they just like to be in the limelight? Well, God alone knows the inner workings and true motives of every heart, so we need to tread carefully. The old adage about always thinking the best rather than the worst of the other person if you possibly can comes into play here…

There’s much more that could said about people who “stir up conflict in the community”. But if nothing else it reminds us that communities matter, relationships matter, so woe to us if we in any way poison them.

Perhaps the place to end is to recommend a re-read of the no-nonsense words of James the brother of Jesus: yes, take a few minutes to ponder James 3:3-12…

Father, please help me to hate what you hate, and to love what you love, that my thoughts, my words and my actions will reflect the beauty of Jesus. Amen.

Search me, O God...

Jesus said: “You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘You shall not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.’ But I tell you that anyone who is angry with a brother or sister will be subject to judgment. Again, anyone who says to a brother or sister, ‘Raca,’ is answerable to the court. And anyone who says, ‘You fool!’ will be in danger of the fire of hell. Matthew 5:21-22

Here’s a question that calls for a brutally honest answer: Christian, do you ever doubt your salvation?

If we know our Bibles well we immediately reply: No! Salvation is a gift of God’s free grace which I have received by faith. My eternal destiny is secure, thanks to Jesus’ death and resurrection. Doesn’t Paul tell us that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1)? And doesn’t that include me?

Quite right, of course.

But wait a minute. Let’s take a few moments to read our way through Matthew 5:21-47. I’ve put just the first two verses of the passage at the top, but the whole section taken together has the effect of puncturing our confidence somewhat – all this talk of “judgment”, of “the fire of hell”, of being “thrown into prison” and not getting out until you’ve “paid the last penny”, of “gouging out an eye” or “chopping off a hand”. However robust our faith may be, it’s only human to start feeling slightly uncomfortable.

We need to keep in mind that when God chose to come to earth as a man he did so as a member of the Jewish people: the “King of kings and Lord of lords” was first “the King of the Jews”. He spoke as a Jew and thought as a Jew; his mind was soaked in Jewish culture and history, which was vividly colourful and often provocative.

This is part of why we find these strange threats hard to understand. “Raca”, for example, is often described by Bible-commentators as a general term of contempt (though “blockhead!” doesn’t quite do it in modern English!) and such an attitude might land you up in front of the local synagogue court because it reflects such an ugly, destructive attitude. But Jesus goes even further and says that saying “you fool!” (have you ever caught yourself sneering at someone you think is somehow beneath you? – that’s the sort of thing implied here) is even worse and puts you in danger of the fires of Gehenna, that is, hell. Gehenna? This originally referred to the Valley of Hinnom in Jerusalem, where the city’s waste was burnt by fires which were never allowed to go out. Jesus is, as it were, laying it on thick in order to make his point: that a holy God is eternally opposed to any kind of evil.

And the point of the whole thing? Very simply, to get us to see that what goes on in your heart matters far more than anything you actually say or do. Unjustified anger, for example (there is, of course, a kind of anger that is justified, even necessary), is tantamount to murder, and lustful thoughts are tantamount  to adultery.

These are sobering thoughts, calculated to get us stop and think about who we really are.

Anyone can put on a show. Oh yes, we can all learn how to be outwardly correct and respectable, how to be polite. But what is going on in the depths of our hearts? Contempt?… anger?… pride?… uncleanness of various types?... spite?... animosity?… However assured we may be of our eternal destiny, we have, as they say, some serious thinking to do.

My wife and I were reading recently the story of “the woman taken in adultery” (John 8:2-11). The religious leaders publicly display this woman for condemnation by stoning, quoting the law of Moses in justification, and asking Jesus’ opinion on the matter. They think they have “got” him, for how can he defend her without condoning sin? But, marvellously, that’s exactly what he does. He starts by ignoring them, as if hoping they will just go away, but “when they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them ‘Let any of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her’.” And what happens? Her accusers melt away, one by one. What a scene!

Yes, he didn’t ignore the fact that she had done wrong: “Neither do I condemn you” he tells her. But then he plainly tells her to “leave your life of sin”. How wonderfully he succeeds in blending no condemnation with no condoning.

I’ve just had a brain scan. It’s extraordinary what the experts can do these days, isn’t it, probing inside our very skulls? But… suppose there were a device which could scan not my brain but the true state of my soul, the real me inside? I’m not sure I would want anybody, especially God himself, to have a look at that! But God is in fact the only one who knows me to the very core of my being. The Psalmist prays “Search me, O God, and know my heart” (Psalm 139:23), a humble prayer, but not strictly necessary in the case of any of us. And it’s that serious truth that Jesus is wanting to press home in Matthew 5.

I started by asking the question: Christian, do you ever doubt your salvation? That wasn’t in order to raise questions about our assurance given as a gracious gift of God. Perhaps the main value of the question is to remind us that life is a deeply serious business as we live out our Christian faith in a tragically shallow and trivial environment. Yes, our salvation is assured; thanks be to God for that. But that doesn’t alter the fact that we must all stand before the judgment seat of Christ (2 Timothy 4:1). The question is not designed to raise doubts or to put the frighteners on us, as we might say. But just to remind us that we are called in Christ to be nothing but the best. If nothing else, it offers a sobering safeguard against any danger of complacency or arrogant entitlement.

Father, thank you for the high calling to which you have called me. Help me daily to match your great grace with a serious intention to be perfect, as you are perfect. Amen.

God and mammon

After this, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector by the name of Levi sitting at his tax booth. “Follow me,” Jesus said to him, and Levi got up, left everything and followed him.

Then Levi held a great banquet for Jesus at his house, and a large crowd of tax collectors and others were eating with them. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?”

Jesus answered them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” Luke 5:27-32

Jesus said: “You cannot serve both God and Money”. Matthew 6:24

You sometimes hear it said that somebody “just jumped up and chucked it all in”, or words to that effect. Something about their job had become unbearable and they decided enough was enough. (Nice for them that that was something they could afford to do!)

It takes the Gospel-writer Luke just two verses to describe the moment when Levi the tax-collector (also known as Matthew) decided to leave his job and follow Jesus. Blink and you miss it – but in reality it must have been a highly dramatic moment: Jesus saw him, looked him in the eye, said “Follow me” and he “got up, left everything and followed him”. End of story.

Of course the gospel-writers give us only a summary of the events they describe, so there’s a lot we don’t know. But I think we’re justified in speculating that Levi’s decision was pretty impulsive.

Jews like Levi who worked for the Roman authorities in such jobs as tax-collecting were likely to be treated as outcasts by their fellow-Jews: “unclean” was the word to describe them. And they were also likely to be very well off in comparison with them, which likewise wouldn’t exactly make them popular. I can’t help wondering if perhaps Levi had just been on the receiving end of a mouthful of abuse from someone paying their dues, and, especially if he had been doing the job for a lengthy period, had what’s become known as a lightbulb moment: “That’s enough! It’s time I packed this in!”

Whatever, it was at that moment that Jesus just “happened” to pass his tax booth (some coincidence!). No doubt Jesus had started to cause a stir by his preaching, so Levi would quite possibly have heard about him. But… that this man Jesus should actually stop, read his situation, and direct to him those two simple words “Follow me” – well, Levi found that call irresistible.

I can’t help comparing the experience of Levi with that of another man we meet in the Gospels, often referred to as  “the rich young ruler”. Levi, as far as we know, had never seen Jesus before, yet he responded to his out-of-the-blue call in a flash. The young ruler, on the other hand, made the first move, so it seems he knew a fair bit more - he was all enthusiasm and sincerity. Mark 10:17 tells us that he “fell on his knees” before Jesus and asked the key question: “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” After a short discussion Jesus sees that, however sincere he might be, his wealth is a stumbling block, and he makes what seems an impossible request: “go, sell everything you have and give to the poor”. At which “his face fell and he went away sad, because he had great wealth”.

What a contrast!

If Levi’s action was indeed impulsive, it was also dangerous. To serve the Roman authorities must have given him a nice little earner, as we might say today, but the unpopularity he would have earned as well would have made him unemployable among his own people. So what would become of him if the decision to throw in his lot with Jesus proved a disaster? (It reminds me of the old saying: “the word ’faith’ is spelled r-i-s-k”.) But that is exactly what he did. Judging by Luke’s punchy account he was completely decisive: he “got up, left everything, and followed him”. (I feel like adding the words “…and blow the consequences”).

And what did he do next? Answer: he “held a great banquet for Jesus at his house”. This was a time for celebration! A crushing burden had been  lifted from his shoulders, and his life would never be the same again.

Beyond that, we know next to nothing about Levi/Matthew. And that’s certainly also the case with the rich young ruler. Mark tells us (according to the NIV translation) that “his face fell and he went away sad” and we never meet him again. Can you see his droopy shoulders as he trudges off? – he really did want to become a follower of Jesus, but Jesus doesn’t engage in bargaining: with him it’s a case of all or nothing at all. I like to think that perhaps he had later second thoughts and did in fact come back to Jesus, but there’s no evidence that he did.

Where does this lead us?

For one thing, it reminds us what a slave-master money can be.

1 Timothy 6:10 tells us that “the love of money (note: not money itself) is a root of all kinds of evil”. Are any of us too concerned about money – even to the point of becoming enslaved by it? Is it time for a Levi-moment? Time to throw off the shackles? I think it’s rather wonderful that Jesus made no such request of Levi, but that… well, he just did it anyway. And then threw a party. That says everything.

A second thing: we never know the heart of another person.

To the casual acquaintance Levi may have seemed perfectly satisfied with his lot in life. Certainly, a bit of a nasty, greedy individual, but who cares about that? Well, it seems he cared!

Which raises the question: is there somebody in our lives who is struggling with a deep unhappiness over some inner battle (not necessarily money)? O Lord, give us the eyes to see, the love to care, the courage to act, and the words to speak!

And what about ourselves? Is there some habit in my life and attitudes which keeps me at a distance from God? Even a Christian might be in need of a Levi-moment… Remember Demas (2 Timothy 4:10).

Lord and Father, please open my eyes to the things of this world which act as a stumbling block in my walk with you. Amen.

Only the best!

Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize. 1 Corinthians 9:24-27

I’ve never been too keen on vigorous physical exercise. When I was at school we played football in the winter and cricket in the summer, and that was about it. As an adult I have belonged to both a table-tennis club and a badminton club, though never much good at either, and even taught myself to sort-of swim. But as for an hour in a gym, or serious jogging – er, no thanks.

But I certainly respect people who keep fit by putting their bodies under extreme pressure: the kind of people Paul is talking about in 1 Corinthians 9 who “compete in the games” and who “go into strict training” in order to succeed.

In the Roman world, of course, there was no football or cricket or the many other sports and athletic activities that we take for granted; but there certainly was “the games”. Exactly what they consisted of I don’t really know – my knowledge is based purely on films or books, in which they generally look pretty cruel and bloody – but from what Paul says it seems as if running and boxing were staple ingredients. (I wonder if Paul actually attended the games himself. Can you picture him sitting in the crowds? If he did it enables us to see him – this great missionary, preacher, teacher, letter-writer - in an interesting new light, I think.)

His purpose in these verses is simple. He is tossing to the Christians of Corinth a challenge about how seriously they take their living out of this wonderful Christian life. Are they prepared, as we might say today, to bust a gut in order to succeed; or are they content to stroll along with a minimum of effort?

It’s a challenge we all need to direct at ourselves from time to time, so let me spell it out: just how serious am I about following Jesus? The young man who led me to faith as a 15-year old used to speak of being “on fire for Christ”, a description which certainly fitted him, though I doubt if he would lay claim to it. That’s the kind of person, in my mind’s eye, that Paul is talking about.

Various questions come to mind…

First: why should I be serious about my walk with God?

The most basic answer is that anything that is worthwhile in this life is worth taking seriously. You might have a gift for tiddlywinks and long for its inclusion in the Olympics so that you can one day win a medal. Well, good for you - though rather you than me! But you won’t make any progress if you don’t devote hours every day to tiddlywinks practice. As for playing the piano or writing books or gaining a job qualification – well, no comment is necessary.

There are people who devote themselves whole-heartedly to things which, in the context of eternity, are trivial, like accumulating large sums of money (you can’t take it with you when you die, after all), or gaining positions of power (what will you do with it when you get it?), or getting access to every conceivable pleasure under the sun (what happens when it all goes stale and no longer yields satisfaction?).

Just comparing our allegiance to Jesus with such examples is well-nigh blasphemous. But it makes the point. He is the epitome of love, compassion and power. He gave his very life for us by dying an agonising death. What aspiration in this earthly life could be higher or greater than the desire to be like him? Who or what could be worth more? We only live on this earth once, so what emptiness it must mean to get near the end and look back shaking our heads and thinking “What a waste!”

Second: What does Paul mean in practice by these athletic-like exertions? It all seems very hard work!

I’m sure professional athletes gain real satisfaction from a training session satisfactorily completed – but they won’t necessarily have enjoyed every minute. And the same thing is true for our building of the Christian life. Much of what is involved – and required – seems like pretty bread-and-butter stuff - commitment to, and involvement in, an ordinary local church; nourishing our spiritual appetite day by day on the reading of scripture and the practice of prayer; offering such gifts and talents as we have to some form of social service or even Christian ministry.

Sometimes that kind of commitment can seem like sheer slog. Times when the last thing we feel like doing is praying or reading that next chapter of Leviticus. And when going to church on Sunday holds little or no appeal. What at first seemed exciting and fresh every day seems to have palled and lost its appeal.

Is this because we have taken our eyes off Jesus and lost our way spiritually? Well, yes, it may be so  – and our task then is to search our hearts with complete honesty and start again. But not necessarily: even the finest Christians testify to “dry times” when spiritual realities, and even God himself, seem far, far away.

This is when that note of discipline comes to our rescue. All right, we might read the Bible out of duty, but who ever said that was wrong? We may pray from a list of known needs that has slowly built up over many years, rather than spontaneously, but who ever said that was wrong? Let’s just ensure that our duty is a loving, willing duty.

We need to remind ourselves that duties undertaken with little relish can, in time, wonderfully blossom into joys.

Father, forgive me for those times when I fail you and settle for second or third best, or even worse. Please help me to be ruthless with sin and to show my love for Jesus through glad and whole-hearted devotion. Amen.

Lord, my heart’s desire unto Thine is bent./ I aspire to a full consent. Amen. George Herbert (1593-1633)

In praise of compromise?

Jesus said, No-one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other… Matthew 6:24

You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world means enmity with God? James 4:4

Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common?... 2 Corinthians 6:14

We often think of “compromise” as a largely negative word. It conjures up ideas of weakness, lack of principle, spinelessness. We usually know instinctively what’s right and what’s wrong, so when we fail to live up to it, we are left with a vaguely troubled conscience which we hope will fade with time. And so indeed it may; but deep down we are not really happy. We know we have compromised.

The word itself doesn’t figure in the NIV Bible, but the idea is often found. And in reality it isn’t quite as simple as we might think. In a word, to compromise may sometimes be the right thing to do, not wrong at all. The Bible gives us examples of both right and wrong.

First, when compromise is wrong…

The obvious example, as the Bible verses above make clear, is denying or watering down our allegiance to Jesus. Do you ever find yourself “taking the line of least resistance” or “keeping my head under the parapet” – and then feeling bad about it? That suggests you’ve compromised; pangs of conscience are a pretty clear pointer.

That’s when we need to remember Simon Peter. At the trial of Jesus, he denied three times that he knew him (Matthw 26:69-75): that’s even worse than mere compromise, isn’t it? He lost his head completely, it would seem, even “calling down curses” and swearing “I don’t know the man”. But it didn’t take him long to feel guilty – when the cock crowed, as predicted by Jesus, “he went outside and wept bitterly”. Can you see him?

The story of Peter is wonderfully heartening, for we know from John 21:15-19 that after Jesus was raised from the dead he restored him and even gave him a key role in the life of the infant church. And in Acts 2 we see him – this poor, pathetic, sobbing failure of a man – powerfully preaching the first “Christian” sermon. True, on later occasions he could rather lose his way (Galatians 2:11-21 for example), but there is no suggestion that he sinned himself out of the grace of God.

Is this a reassurance you need today? As long as our regret is heart-felt we can be assured of God’s loving hand upon us. Yes, compromise in this most basic of senses is a serious thing. But it is not unforgivable.

Second, When may compromise be right, indeed necessary and good?

This may be where we find ourselves swimming in rather murky waters. The same Paul we have quoted about “not being yoked together with unbelievers” sounds like an arch compromiser in 1 Corinthians 9, especially verse 22: “I have become all things to all people…”. (That sounds almost like a defence of hypocrisy!) In 2 Corinthians 8 he talks about “food sacrificed to idols”, and whether or not Christians should eat it. Apparently different options are possible for Christians, depending on circumstances. In Romans 14, especially verses 19-23, he is concerned about the need for the mature but sensitive Christian to moderate his or her behaviour for the sake of the less confident believer. Compromise? Well, yes. But surely justified.

Perhaps his key statement is Romans 14:1, about the mistake of  quarrelling over disputable matters”. Ah! – so there are such things as “disputable matters” (what today we might call “grey areas”).

At risk of exaggeration you could say that one of the tragedies of Christian history is that too often we have kept our mouths shut when we should have opened them, for the heart of the gospel is at stake - but then gone tooth and nail at one another over “disputable matters”.

This can apply to matters of doctrine. Does it really matter whether you’re a premillennialist, a postmillennialist or even (gasp!) an amillennialist? Is the exact meaning of “baptism in the Holy Spirit” something to fall out over? Oh yes, be as convinced as you can by all means of the rightness of your view; but aren’t such questions matters for healthy compromise, for respectful discussion, not for tearing one another apart?

The point where things can get decidedly tricky may not be strictly “doctrinal”. What if you have a child you really love, and in their teenage years they come to tell you that they are gay? Do you turn them out of the home? If, in time, they enter a same-sex relationship and invite you to the “wedding”, do you go?

Something less acute but real nonetheless… You’re invited to the office Christmas party and you really would prefer not to go, knowing that the atmosphere will get unpleasant with drunkenness and ugly behaviour. Is it a wrong type of compromise to decide that “at least I can show my face for an hour”? Or would that be an example of mature discipleship?

And what about “assisted dying”? Many Christians instinctively recoil against the idea – but others are more open to it. Is one entirely right and the other entirely wrong?

I could go on; the possible examples are limitless, and not every situation is reflected clearly in the Bible. Given certain possible scenarios, how do I know when I’m “standing firmly for the truth” (no compromise!) and when I’ve tippled over into sheer bigotry (oh no, failed again!)?

Christians in disagreement sometimes get impatient with reasoned discussion: “All I want is a simple answer to a simple question!” they cry. But… what if there is no “simple” answer? What then?

It may seem rather unsatisfactory, but if it teaches us to discuss with one another thoughtfully and respectfully, actually listening to one another rather than talking past one another or shouting each other down, well, that at least is something, isn’t it? Let’s at least learn to disagree agreeably. Or is that asking too much?

Father, my desire is to be rock-solid in my allegiance to Jesus, but also infinitely adaptable when it comes to disputed grey areas. Please help me not only to know the difference, but also to live daily in the light of it! Amen.

Faith without expectancy?

It was about this time that King Herod arrested some who belonged to the church, intending to persecute them. ² He had James, the brother of John, put to death with the sword. ³ When he saw that this met with approval among the Jews, he proceeded to seize Peter also. This happened during the Festival of Unleavened Bread. ⁴ After arresting him, he put him in prison, handing him over to be guarded by four squads of four soldiers each. Herod intended to bring him out for public trial after the Passover.

⁵ So Peter was kept in prison, but the church was earnestly praying to God for him.

⁶ The night before Herod was to bring him to trial, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains, and sentries stood guard at the entrance. ⁷ Suddenly an angel of the Lord appeared and a light shone in the cell. He struck Peter on the side and woke him up. “Quick, get up!” he said, and the chains fell off Peter’s wrists…

¹² When this had dawned on him, he went to the house of Mary the mother of John, also called Mark, where many people had gathered and were praying. ¹³ Peter knocked at the outer entrance, and a servant named Rhoda came to answer the door. ¹⁴ When she recognized Peter’s voice, she was so overjoyed she ran back without opening it and exclaimed, “Peter is at the door!”

¹⁵ “You’re out of your mind,” they told her. When she kept insisting that it was so, they said, “It must be his angel.”

¹⁶ But Peter kept on knocking, and when they opened the door and saw him, they were astonished… Acts 12:1-15

There aren’t many passages in the Bible that raise a smile. That’s no criticism, of course, just a fact. But I think Acts 12 does just that.

The story summed up…

Simon Peter has been imprisoned by King Herod. The believers “pray earnestly” for him, whereupon he is miraculously set free by an angel. He goes to the house of Mary, the mother of John Mark, where “many people had gathered and were praying”. A servant girl called Rhoda comes to answer his knocking at the door, but on hearing his voice she is so discombobulated that instead of opening it she runs back inside and  – guess what? – they don’t believe her: “You’re out of your mind” they tell her. When she insists, they change their minds: “It must be his angel”. (Meanwhile poor Peter is still outside in the cold, wondering what’s going on…)

Not very funny for Peter. But hopefully we can see the comical side, if only because – let’s be honest – we see a little too much of ourselves in that group of praying Christians. They were, I am sure, very strong in their faith, “praying earnestly for him”, and confident that God could, and sometimes did, work extraordinary miracles. Yet when they were told by Rhoda that Peter was knocking on the door they simply didn’t believe her (did some of them roll their eyes and shake their heads, muttering, “That silly girl Rhoda”?). They have been praying for the very thing Rhoda announces! How could they be so foolish?

But are we any better? Our prayers can become dutiful and formulaic, so much so that if we had today what we might call a “Rhoda moment” we would be as sceptical as that group gathered in the home of John Mark’s mother.

It’s possible, it seems, to have genuine faith - but also to lack expectation.

I find this, in a back to front kind of way, quite encouraging. These people, after all, were living in the near-aftermath of Christ’s resurrection and the coming of the Holy Spirit. We’re not! I won’t say that miracles were a daily event in their experience – that would be going too far - but certainly they seem to have happened on a pretty regular basis: Luke tells us, for example, that “The apostles performed many signs and wonders among the people” (Acts 5:12). Given that it seems the meeting had gathered for the precise purpose of praying for Peter, might we not feel entitled to expect something a bit better than plain unbelief! So when we are inclined (as I often am) to accuse myself of lack of expectation, is it wrong of me to console myself with the thought “Well, apparently the first believers were no better!”?

Still more: I know we mustn’t make excuses for ourselves for lack of expectation, but it’s a fact that much of our praying is likely to be what you might call “long-term” praying, where we rightly emphasise the need for perseverance in our prayers, whereas the praying we read about in this passage is red-hot up to date.

Jesus tells his people in Matthew 7:7-8 to “ask (and go on asking), seek (and go on seeking), knock (and go on knocking) and the door will be opened to you”. I heard this described once as “soaking” prayer, and while, yes, there may be times when we feel that God has given us a “No” answer, and therefore stop praying for a particular topic or person (see Paul’s experience in 2 Corinthians 12:8-9), the “norm” is simply to keep persevering.

If you’ve been a Christian for any length of time I wouldn’t be surprised if there are people and situations for whom you have been praying regularly for years. And under those circumstances it’s virtually impossible to maintain that red-hot expectation with which we began – while trusting, of course, that God is, if I may put it so, “on the case” in ways we cannot see.

The point being… If we are talking about “excuses” for lack of expectation in prayer (which of course we’re not), are we not in a better situation than those people so long ago in Jerusalem whose need was indeed red-hot? Their need that day was fresh and urgent; ours, usually, is unavoidably routine to the point of seeming humdrum. (And, of course, there must be no attempt to artificially whip the emotions up!)

Where does this lead us? Perhaps to some such prayer as this…

Dear Father, please keep my faith strong, positive and expectant. But at those times when prayer seems dull and repetitive, please keep me strong in sheer trusting perseverance. Amen.