So you think you're important, do you?

When he noticed how the guests picked the places of honour at the table, he told them this parable: “When someone invites you to a wedding feast, do not take the place of honour, for a person more distinguished than you may have been invited. If so, the host who invited both of you will come and say to you, ‘Give this person your seat.’ Then, humiliated, you will have to take the least important place. But when you are invited, take the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he will say to you, ‘Friend, move up to a better place.’ Then you will be honoured in the presence of all the other guests. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” Luke 14:7-11

I had a friend who described one of her favourite hobbies as “people-watching”. She found pleasure even on holiday in simply sitting and observing the people around her. She wasn’t being nosey; she just had a curious nature.

Usually when we think of Jesus we picture him right at the heart of things – standing to teach before a great crowd of people; or the focal point of a group witnessing a miracle of healing; supremely, of course, at the centre of a terrible death scene, nailed to a cross between two criminals. The centre of things – a fitting place for the one who is to be elevated as Lord of all creation.

But there were also times when he became a people-watcher.

Luke tells us that, attending a high society banquet, “he noticed how the guests picked the places of honour at the table”. I picture him sitting quietly to one side, with a slightly frowny smile on his face, while the guests jostled for the best places at the table. This is foolish, he says. What if someone more distinguished turns up, and you suffer the humiliation of being asked to take a lower place? Is that a risk worth taking?

I’m sure Jesus isn’t wanting to offer advice about the social etiquette of attending a party. No: there is a much bigger message here - about the dangers of pride, of status-seeking, of wanting to be top dog.

I watched a film once where the names of the actors came up at the start in a very strange way. One star’s name appeared first on the left of the empty screen, but halfway down from the top. When that name had faded, the next name appeared, this time on the right of the screen, but at the top. Very odd, I thought. I later learned that this arrangement was the result of hours of fierce negotiations between the representatives of the two stars, by which neither could claim to be the star.

It's easy to smile. But haven’t all of us sometimes felt “put out” because we weren’t given the kind of recognition or status we felt we were  entitled to?

Jesus’ lesson is told in the context of the Pharisees, who had the reputation of being the topmost dogs of all in the religious scene. But it can happen in almost any setting.

John the Baptist was a truly humble man, very happy to fade into insignificance once Jesus had appeared on the scene. But his disciples were rather different. One day they got involved in some kind of squabble about “ceremonial washing”, and took up the cudgels on behalf of their teacher: “Rabbi, that man who was with you on the other side of the Jordan – the one you testified about – look, he is baptising, and everyone is going to him…” (John 3:26). As if to say: This must stop! Master, you were on the scene first – it’s quite wrong that this Jesus should be stealing the limelight.

And John – bless him! – puts them right, and silences them with the final, perfect word on this subject: “He must become greater; I must become less” (John 3:30). Can you imagine a better motto for any follower of Jesus? Is it your motto? Is it mine?

Jesus’ own disciples were no better. Luke tells us that “an argument started among the disciples as to which of them would be the greatest” (Luke 9:46). How petty! How pathetic!

Jesus responds to this not simply with words, but by setting a child in the middle of the group (I wonder if that child remembered this event into adulthood?) and telling them that “it is the one who is least among you all who is the greatest” (verse 48). In the kingdom of God there is, quite simply, no room for status-seeking or ego-trips.

This doesn’t mean that a Christian should never be ambitious; there’s nothing wrong with aiming to be the best we can be in our secular employment, our parenting, our leisure and sporting pursuits, or our use of the many gifts and talents God has put within us. But simply that this success must never be in pursuit of personal self-esteem or the desire for praise.

Nor, of course, is there any room for false humility, a crawling, put-on, Uriah Heep type of lowliness which makes people’s toes curl. No: just a Christlike humility which is content not to be noticed or recognised if that is what’s called for.

One of the greatest things ever written about Jesus is that he “made himself nothing” (literally he “emptied himself”: Philippians 2:7).

The plain fact is that it is by becoming nothing that we become something. That is the way of fulfilment, peace and joy. And there is no other.

Lord Jesus, please drain out of my soul every hint of self-importance and self-love, and to you be all the glory. Amen.

My apology to Martin Luther

I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp. The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendour into it. Revelation 21:22-24

I preached recently on the return of Jesus in glory, and the need for us to be ready for his return. The Bible passage was Matthew 25:1-13, the story of the wise and foolish bridesmaids. It makes the point pretty clearly.

The big question, of course, is: What does it actually mean to be “ready”? To which the simple answer is: To get on day by day doing what you have to do, and doing it well, for the glory of God. A quote came to mind which I think goes back to Martin Luther (please correct me here if you know better): “If I knew Jesus was coming back tomorrow I would plant an apple-tree today”.

I understood that as meaning what I have just said: Just get on and do something useful and productive. But I did also dare to question the logic of it: planting an apple-tree is of course a good thing to do, but if it’s never going to grow…? I noticed people in the congregation, their brows furrowed, nodding in agreement. Oh well, we all have our off-days, don’t we, so why shouldn’t that include history-changing religious leaders?

But in the following days I found myself wondering if I had done Luther an injustice. Let me try and explain.

When we think about “the end of the world”, about heaven and hell, about “life after death”, we tend to think in terms of discontinuity: one state is abruptly ended and a new one takes over. It’s like that too with “heaven and “earth” – earth is “down here”, heaven is “up there”, and they are completely separate.

All very simple and clear. But is that in fact what the Bible teaches?

In the book of Revelation John describes a remarkable vision of, among other things, “what will take place later” (Revelation 1:19). Near the end, in chapter 21, he saw “a new heaven and a new earth” - that’s pretty much a direct quote from Isaiah 65:17. It’s interesting that both the Old Testament prophet and the New Testament seer speak about “a new earth”, not just about “heaven”.

This suggests that our final destiny after death and resurrection is not just a matter of “going to heaven”, but also has what we might think now is quite an “earthly” dimension as well. In some sense, admittedly very hard to imagine, heaven and earth become one: there is continuity as well as discontinuity.

What John sees is a “city” – “the holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband” (verse 22). This new Jerusalem is roughly 1400 hundred miles high and wide and long – in other words, it’s a massive cube!

This baffles our imaginations, of course; it is symbolic rather than literal language, so we need to ask what it signifies. Then we remember that the “holy of holies” in the earthly tabernacle and temple, the most sacred place in the Jewish faith, was – a cube. The “new Jerusalem” is the dwelling place of God in a complete and perfect way, as the earthly temple could never be.

There’s one very striking detail that John gives us about this heaven-and-earth-combined city. In verse 24 he tells us that “the nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendour into it”. Even more, in verse 26 he tells us that “the glory and honour of the nations will be brought into it”.

How can this be! The “kings of the earth” and “the nations” are portrayed in Revelation as rebels against God! Certainly, John goes on to make clear that “nothing impure will ever enter” the new Jerusalem (verse 27). And yet, in some manner that defies our understanding, it seems that the kings and the nations will contribute to the glory of God’s dwelling place.

What has all this got to do with Martin Luther’s apple-tree? Well, I can only speculate. But if earthly kings will “bring their splendour” into the new Jerusalem, may not lesser mortals like the rest of us do likewise? Could it be that Luther determined to plant an apple-tree because he believed that while it would never grow on “earth”, it might just be one of those many fruit-trees that John saw growing in “heaven”?

One commentator, Michael Wilcock, says this: “all that is truly good and beautiful in this world will reappear there, purified and enhanced in the perfect setting its Maker intended for it; nothing of real value is lost”.

If that is so, is it wrong to think that even some of our deeds and actions, duly perfected of course, will make their contribution? Could it be that Luther was onto something that I, for one, had never seriously thought about before?

Perhaps we need to rethink our ideas of “heaven”, and what it’s going to be like. Not static, not like a tableau, however awesome, but pulsating with life, truly life in all its glorious variety and vitality. It almost makes you want to be there right now, doesn’t it?

Lord, please help me to live every day of this earthly life in such a way that I, even I, have some little contribution to offer in the heavenly Jerusalem. Amen.

Kindness

Love is patient, love is kind… 1 Corinthians 13:4

I knew a man once who worked as a chaplain at the local hospital. In the children’s ward he was known as “the kind man”.

When I heard that I simply smiled: I couldn’t imagine a more beautiful description for anybody, and I have since come to the conclusion that “kind” is one of the most beautiful words in the English language. It is such a quiet, unpretentious, unassuming word, yet so meaningful too. Oh for more kindness in our angry, arguing, jealous, vengeful, spiteful, hard-hearted world!

It's no accident that this word appears in Paul’s two great lists in the New Testament.

In his celebration of love (1 Corinthians 13) it’s right there at the start: “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonour others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs…”

And there it is again in his catalogue of the “fruit”, or harvest, of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-24): “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control”.

How can we define kindness?

One way is to look at all the things Paul says love isn’t in 1 Corinthians 13: it’s not jealous, boastful or arrogant; not contemptuous of others or self-seeking, not easily angered, no harbourer of grudges…

Putting it positively, you could just tip various qualities such as gentleness, consideration, thoughtfulness, humility, helpfulness, good humour, pleasantness, good-heartedness, into a big pot, stir thoroughly, and - hey presto, there you have kindness. Kindness is all the things you instinctively like other people to be, even when you fall short yourself. It may not be easy to pin it down precisely, but you know it when you see it – oh, how you know it when you see it!

You could also, of course, reflect on stories of kindness in the Bible: Joseph was kind to his brothers (Genesis 50:21), Boaz to Ruth (Ruth 2-3), the Roman centurion Julius to the prisoner Paul (Acts 27:3).These examples show that being kind is more than just “being a nice person”; real resolve and sacrifice may be required.

And when it comes to Jesus – well, where do you start? He reached out his hands to touch people with leprosy; he wept at the tomb of Lazarus and over the doomed city of Jerusalem; he stopped a funeral procession and restored a dead man to his weeping mother (“his heart went out to her”, Luke 7:13); he prayed on the cross for those who were torturing him to death.

Never mind where you start – where do you stop!

Dictionaries of quotations can yield rich fruit. I’ve been rummaging about, and here are a few results. They may not all be absolutely true, but they have certainly given me things to think about, which I hope might make me a better person. I hope you might find them thought-provoking too…

Kind words are the music of the world. They have a power which seems to be beyond natural causes, as though they were some angel’s song which had lost its way and come to earth.

Kindness has converted more sinners than zeal, eloquence and learning. (Both F W Faber)

Kindness spoken here. (Sign in a shop window)

Be kind; everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle. (John Watson)

That best portion of a good man’s life - /His little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and love. (William Wordsworth)

All worldly joys go less/ To the one joy of doing kindnesses. (Gorge Herbert)

Getting money is not all a man’s business: to cultivate kindness is a valuable part of the business of life.

Kindness is in our power, but fondness is not. (Both Samuel Johnson)

Hey, am I getting sentimental! I hope not (if you know me you will know that that would be against my nature)!

No, we must of course recognise that being a true follower of Jesus requires us to face up to, and sometimes confront, ugly and hard things. Kindness isn’t mushy and gloopy, fronted by a plastic smile. But a reminder of the call to be kind can do most of us, I suspect, little harm.

Lady Macbeth rebuked her husband for being “too full o’ the milk of human kindness”. Mmm. Is that possible, do you think? Can you ever have too much of such a beautiful thing as kindness? I rather doubt it.

And if we aren’t sure about that, well, we know what happened to Lady Macbeth, don’t we? (Don’t we?)

Gracious Father, take away from me all hardness and indifference, and fill me with the lovely kindness of Jesus. Amen.

God has no grandchildren

Eli’s sons were scoundrels; they had no regard for the Lord. I Samuel 2:12

Samuel’s sons did not follow his ways. They turned aside after dishonest gain and accepted bribes and perverted justice. 1 Samuel 8:3

Oh, what bliss it is when, reading through the Old Testament, you get to the end of Judges and move on to Ruth and the start of 1 Samuel.

Judges is full of horrible stuff, climaxing in the loutish Samson, the idolatrous Micah, and the unnamed Levite who ends up chopping his concubine into pieces to serve as a call to arms against the depraved Benjaminites. Ugh!

God’s word, yes. But it simply shows how remorselessly honest the Bible is when it comes to portraying the depths to which human nature can sink, even among God’s chosen people. Nothing should ever surprise us – not when a situation develops where “everyone does as they see fit”, neglectful of God (Judges 21:25). We have been warned…

But then we find ourselves in the luminous little book of Ruth, where suddenly… everybody acts well! - Elimelech and Naomi, though their lives are shadowed by premature death; their daughters-in-law Ruth and Orpah, both widowed young; and the honourable older man Boaz, who marries Ruth, and eventually figures in the family line of Jesus. A beautiful story.

1 Samuel, likewise, starts heart-warmingly, with the story of Hannah and her hapless but loving husband Elkanah. They become the parents of the central figure in the book, the boy Samuel: innocent, open to God, and in time used by him as his mouthpiece to Israel. (I love the description of Samuel’s ministry: “The Lord… let none of Samuel’s words fall to the ground” (1 Samuel 3:19). Oh for such preachers today!)

Even poor old Eli, blind, broken and burnt-out, God’s priest but the father of two wicked sons, stirs some sympathy in us: well-meaning but weak pretty well sums him up. (Could that be a description of any of us?)

And so we are launched into the long ministry of Samuel, as judge and prophet in Israel - and the one who ultimately anoints the boy David as Israel’s king. A towering figure.

Why am I re-telling this story? My reason is simple – and sad. The fact is that Samuel’s life, which started so beautifully, ended in what might even be called failure. True, when he died “all Israel assembled and mourned for him” (1 Samuel 25:1). But all was not well.

For one thing, his two sons turned out to be worthless, just as Eli’s had: “they turned aside after dishonest gain and accepted bribes and perverted justice”.

And this led to something even worse: because of their failure, Israel asked Samuel for a king, “such as all the other nations have”.

God’s ideal for Israel was that he alone should be their King, so this request was tantamount to a rejection of God himself: “… the Lord told Samuel: Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king”. (The story is told in 1 Samuel 8, one of the saddest chapters in the Bible.)

And so we arrive at the miserable episode of King Saul, anointed by Samuel with great reluctance. What telling words are found in verse 20: the people said, “…then we shall be like all the other nations…” It’s truly a sorry state of affairs when the people of God, whether Israel in Old Testament days or we Christians today, want nothing more than to be, in effect, like everybody else. Are any of us, deep down, rather like that?

What prompted these thoughts was a chat I had recently with a friend. He was talking about his two daughters, young adults, one of whom was solidly Christian, while the other had turned away. We mulled over the fact that this is a common experience in family life: godly parents don’t automatically produce godly children. As it has been said, God has no grandchildren – we can’t automatically pass our faith on along with our genes. It was this that led me to think of the spiritual giant Samuel, not to mention Eli.

So… what?

A word of comfort, perhaps: Those of us who are parents of unbelieving children, while of course we will be sad, should not condemn ourselves too harshly. None of us have been perfect parents, that goes without saying, but that doesn’t mean we need to shoulder all the blame (if blame is the right word, which it probably isn’t). Given his very special travelling ministry, Samuel must often have been an absentee father, and Eli – well, we’ve already noticed his spiritual feebleness. But that doesn’t excuse their sons’ waywardness.

And a word of warning: Starting well is good, of course: but what really matters is keeping going right to the end. It’s not for us to judge Eli and Samuel, but – well, their stories are worth reflecting on, let's just say that.

But also a word of hope: We never know when someone may come to faith. “Death-bed conversions” are often questioned or mocked as insincere, and that may sometimes be the case (though how can we judge?).

But God alone knows the heart of each one of us. And he is compassionate and merciful. Who knows when a seed we sowed a whole lifetime ago may blossom, secretly, into flower?

Keep praying!

Thank you, Father, for the rigorous honesty of your Word, reflecting your perfect holiness. Help me to take this seriously, obeying you and trusting you till the day I die. Amen.

Is your religion a blessing or a burden?

Bel bows down, Nebo stoops low; their idols are borne by beasts of burden. The images that are carried about are burdensome, a burden for the weary. They stoop and bow down together; unable to rescue the burden, they themselves go off into captivity.

Listen to me, you descendants of Jacob, all the remnant of the people of Israel, you whom I have upheld since your birth, and have carried since you were born. Even to your old age and grey hairs I am he, I am he who will sustain you. I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you. Isaiah 46:1-4

Jesus said, My yoke is easy and my burden is light. Matthew 11:30

Some years ago I witnessed a noisy religious celebration in the centre of Kathmandu in Nepal. A pillar a bit like a smaller Nelson’s Column was being carried through the centre of the city amid great excitement. It looked rather wobbly, and I feared that it might topple over and fall on the worshippers below. But that didn’t happen, and everybody seemed very excited. I didn’t find out for sure, but I think the pillar represented one of the Hindu gods.

Ecclesiastes 1:9 tells us that “there is nothing new under the sun”. And that is certainly borne out when we read these graphic words from Isaiah 46.

The prophet is foretelling a day when the powerful Babylonians will be brought to nothing by God. He pictures their gods Bel and Nebo (their names are reflected in kings such as Belshazzar and Nebuchadnezzar) being carried off on pack animals, presumably strapped on their sides. They are burdens that have to be carried, though not now to a place of worship, as would usually be the case, but into captivity.

Isaiah then goes on to compare the one true God with Bel and Nebo. They are gods that have to be carted around like so much luggage, he says, but Jehovah God is a God who carries you. “I have carried you since you were born… I have made you and I will carry you…”

God here is addressing the nation of Judah as a whole, but he puts it in personal, even tender, terms, for what is true of the nation is true also of individuals: God watches over his people “since your birth”, into adulthood, and then “even to your old age and grey hairs I am he… who will sustain you”.

(Let that, by the way, be a comfort and a blessing to those of us who are feeling the weight of the years! You’re never too old to be loved by God – or to be used by him, come to that. God is as tender as the most perfect mother or father.)

Isaiah’s picture raises a challenging question: Is my religion a burden to me rather than a blessing? (Notice that that word “burden” crops up four times in the first two verses.)

We may be inclined to look down on the worshippers of Babylon as their gods go bumping up and down on the backs of asses or donkeys. We may be inclined (I admit I was) to look down on those Hindus in Nepal as that pillar was hauled through their streets.

But wait a minute – let’s be very careful. We may pay lip service to the belief that our God tenderly cares for us; but is that something that we know and feel in everyday experience? Do we really have that kind of relationship with him?

Earlier I referred to our religion, a word I dislike and do my best to avoid. But there are times when there is no alternative. And there are times when “practicing our religion” (another expression that makes me squirm) can seem terribly burdensome, a weight that we are carrying rather than an inner energy that makes us soar.

The devil whispers in our ear… Have you prayed enough? - as if prayer is nothing but a duty. Do you really have to go to that church meeting later this week? Must you agree to serve on that boring rota? Do you really have to go on being patient with that tiresome person? Can you afford to maintain your financial support for the church or that missionary organization? Isn’t being a Christian really an awful lot of hard work?

Of dear – it all seems so… well, burdensome. We might very well borrow the words of the great hymn-writer William Cowper: Where is the blessedness I knew/ When first I saw the Lord? / Where is the soul-refreshing view/ Of Jesus and his word? Where, indeed!

Let’s have no pretending that this is easy! Following Jesus does involve various duties and responsibilities. And the flame of our faith can burn low and God can sometimes seem far off.

The key is to keep firmly in our minds that precious word relationship. We are children of God, tenderly loved by him. We are followers of Jesus his Son who “walks with us and talks with us along life’s narrow way”.

There may be times to give ourselves a rest from responsibilities which are grinding us down – and that may even include a rest from our normal discipline of prayer or service. God loves to be surrounded by happy children, not miserable, clapped-out servants.

Yes, following Jesus does entail burdens we must carry – that much is clear from Matthew 11:30. But let’s never forget his promise in that verse: his yoke is easy and his burden is light.

Is it time you prayed, very simply…?

Lord God, I’m thankful that you’re not a God who needs to be carried. Please help me to rest now and let myself be carried by you. Amen.

Weasel words - and true feelings

At that time Marduk-Baladan son of Baladan king of Babylon sent Hezekiah letters and a gift, because he had heard of his illness and recovery. Hezekiah received the envoys gladly and showed them what was in his storehouses—the silver, the gold, the spices, the fine olive oil—his entire armoury and everything found among his treasures. There was nothing in his palace or in all his kingdom that Hezekiah did not show them.

Then Isaiah the prophet went to King Hezekiah and asked, “What did those men say, and where did they come from?” “From a distant land,” Hezekiah replied. “They came to me from Babylon.” The prophet asked, “What did they see in your palace?” “They saw everything in my palace,” Hezekiah said. “There is nothing among my treasures that I did not show them.”

Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, “Hear the word of the Lord Almighty: The time will surely come when everything in your palace, and all that your predecessors have stored up until this day, will be carried off to Babylon. Nothing will be left, says the Lord. And some of your descendants, your own flesh and blood who will be born to you, will be taken away, and they will become eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.”

“The word of the Lord you have spoken is good,” Hezekiah replied. For he thought, “There will be peace and security in my lifetime.” Isaiah 39

We had some friends whose front door-mat bore a message. It wasn’t Welcome to our home! or Home, sweet home or anything schmaltzy like that. It was Oh no, not you again.

They were in fact a lovely family and very welcoming, so we enjoyed their joke. But it did raise a serious point…

Do you ever say one thing while thinking something completely different? Perhaps I greet my neighbour Harry with a sunny smile and a friendly “How are you?”, but inside I’m thinking, “But Harry is such a crashing bore! Do I really have to be nice to him?” Does that mean I’m a hypocrite?

When I first started reading the Bible seriously Hezekiah became one of my earliest Bible heroes: a good and righteous king under whom Judah prospered. But Isaiah 39 tells a story about him and the prophet Isaiah - and when I discovered it I felt a real sense of let-down. (You can read his story in 2 Kings 18-20 or 2 Chronicles 29-32.)

Put briefly, Hezekiah has been careless and really pretty stupid in allowing a delegation from Babylon to have a thorough look around his kingdom. When Isaiah learns about this, he comes along and gives him a ticking off. In verses 5-7 he tells him in no uncertain terms that the day will come when Judah will suffer for this.

For me, reading about Hezekiah’s folly was bad enough. But the real killer verse was his response to Isaiah’s rebuke (verse 8). He sounds very “spiritual”, even devout: “The word of the Lord you have spoken is good”. But the writer goes on to tell us what he was really thinking: “There will be peace and security in my lifetime”. In other words, “I’m all right, Jack”, or, in the words (of some French king?), “Après moi le deluge”.

My hero suddenly seemed diminished, just ordinary rather than special.

(Mind you, perhaps I learned an important lesson that day: of course, by all means respect, admire, indeed love people who have truly blessed you; but don’t be shocked if/when the day comes that they let you down! Only Christ will never do that. Even the finest and most admirable Christians will, at some point, turn out to have feet of clay.)

I asked earlier the question: does saying one thing and thinking another make you a hypocrite?

Very often, no doubt, it does, if we are deliberately play-acting in order to deceive others or to vaunt ourselves.

But we need to be careful; a lot may depend on motivation.

Go back to Harry. True, he may not be the easiest person to have an interesting conversation with, so it may be a real effort of will to greet him and give him a few minutes of my amazingly precious time. But… if I truly want to be kind and friendly – if I genuinely want to be a kind and friendly person in my overall character – then taking the trouble to act that way may be the best way of learning to actually be kind and friendly. (I think that makes sense!)

In life in general, many of the things we force ourselves to do because we honestly want to become better people are hard work when we start out, but become second nature with practice. That applies to kindness, honesty, generosity, also to courage, humility, patience and good humour. The person who regularly loses his temper and shrugs it off with, “Well, sorry, but that’s just the way I am”, needs to start accepting responsibility – even if that means doing a bit of “acting”.

Of course, only God can judge Hezekiah for his behaviour that day. But surely he would have done better to look Isaiah in the face and say, “Yes, I am sorry! I was stupid in what I did. But those Babylonians were so friendly! and the message from King Marduk-Baladan was so sympathetic about my illness! And he sent a gift too! But I know that I have no excuse. Please pray, Isaiah, that what you have predicted won’t happen…” Wouldn’t that have been better than a mealy-mouthed pious-sounding platitude?

I write knowing that I have no right to judge Hezekiah. When you reach your seventies, as I have, it’s very easy to look at the world’s sorrows – wars and rumours of wars, rampant wickedness, immorality and corruption, widespread disease, floods and fires, poverty, persecution, you name it – and think, “Oh well, I’ve not had it so bad, and I’ll be dead soon and with the Lord, so all that’s no real concern of mine”.

Wrong! It is still a concern of mine. Until the day I die I am called to be active in the service of God. True, I may not live to see the grim things of twenty or thirty years hence, but does that mean I shouldn’t care any more?

Oh, and another thing occurs to me. Could it be that in fact boring old Harry has far more to teach me than I have to teach him?

Father, please protect me from the sin of hypocritical play-acting. But help me too to cultivate habits of holiness by self-willed, Spirit-led and cheerful discipline. Amen.

A man, an angel, and a new destiny

The angel of the Lord came and sat down under the oak in Ophrah that belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, where his son Gideon was threshing wheat in a winepress to keep it from the Midianites. When the angel of the Lord appeared to Gideon, he said, “The Lord is with you, mighty warrior.”

“Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but if the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonders that our ancestors told us about when they said, ‘Did not the Lord bring us up out of Egypt?’ But now the Lord has abandoned us and given us into the hand of Midian.” The Lord turned to him and said, “Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian’s hand. Am I not sending you?”

“Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but how can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family.” The Lord answered, “I will be with you, and you will strike down all the Midianites, leaving none alive.” Judges 6:11-16

There are times when reading the Bible makes me smile – even when I’m not quite sure it’s meant to be funny. Here’s a case in point…

Israel is in deep trouble at the hand of the powerful Midianites. And here is Gideon, a man of no importance, pathetically trying to thresh out wheat, not in an open space where the wind can carry the chaff away, but in a winepress, would you believe, “to keep it from the Midianites”.

While he is doing this he notices a man - who turns out to be “the angel of the Lord” or simply “the Lord” - sitting watching. The stranger starts a conversation: not “Yes, these are bad days, aren’t they, Gideon?” or “You’ve got quite a job on your hands, haven’t you?” or even “Can I give you a hand?”, but “The Lord is with you, mighty warrior”.

Gideon may have thought that there was something slightly mad about this man, that he could say such an odd thing: that “God is with him”! that he is a “mighty warrior”! But he somehow senses that he needs to take him seriously.

So twice he questions these strange statements: “Pardon me, Lord…” (more polite than “Do me a favour, will you!” or “You must be joking!”). And back comes the answer: “I will be with you, and you will strike down the Midianites…”

The rest, as they say, is history, and you can follow up the story in Judges 6-8 to see how the angel’s words came true.

There are several lessons we can learn from this story. Let me pick out three, and then finish with a question.

First, God can turn things round.

Israel’s fortunes were about as low as they could possibly be. Many people must have been tempted to despair. And yet, what the angel predicted did in fact happen.

This is a recurring theme in Judges, a book which records the dark ages of God’s people; repeatedly we read that they fell away from the Lord, then cried out to him in prayer, and then received a deliverer such as Gideon.

As you read this, are you perhaps on the brink of despair? It may be to do with your personal circumstances, or to do with the sorry state of our world – or anywhere in between. But things look grim.

Well, the Gideon story holds out the message: dear child, hold on! Trust in God even through gritted teeth; after all we never know what infinite resources he has up his sleeve. He is a God of hope, and will, sooner or later, make all things right.

Second, God uses the most unlikely means.

Gideon was a nobody: yet God chose him. That really says it all.

This is often his method. Moses was a murderer, yet God made him  Israel’s hero and law-giver… David was a shepherd boy at the tail end of a queue of brothers, also a killer and an adulterer, yet God made him Israel’s greatest king… Mary was an unknown country girl, yet God made her the mother of Jesus… The original twelve apostles, several of them fishermen, were “unschooled, ordinary men” (Acts 4:13), yet God used them to “turn the world upside down” (Acts 17:6).

Fact: God loves to take and use those the world despises.

And why shouldn’t that include you and me? The great thing is that God sees not just what we are, but what we can be and what we might be. Even, dare I say it, what we should be… And the key promise is the wonderful, simple words: “I will be with you” (verse 16). If we know that, do we need to know any more?

Third, God is wonderfully patient.

Reading on through Judges 6 we find that on two occasions God props up Gideon’s faltering faith by sending him spectacular signs. It reminds us of the experience of Moses in Exodus 4, when he stretches God’s patience to the very limit – even to the point where “God’s anger burned against him” - yet is still used by God.

We need to be careful here, for Jesus expressly condemns people who “ask for a sign”: they are “a wicked and adulterous generation” (Matthew 12:39). But the examples of Gideon and Moses remind us that as long as our hearts are humble and sincere we need not fear to press God a little. Remember Job.

Finally, the question: Is it possible that you and I are limiting God by failing to respond in faith to his call? Like Gideon, we have got used to our humdrum lives and simply never imagine that he has something else in store for us.

Not, of course, that there is anything wrong with living a humdrum life, so long as we live it in the power of the Holy Spirit and for the glory of God. But, well, just wondering…

God said, in effect, to Gideon: “You see what you are, but I see what you can be”. Is he saying a similar thing to you today?

Father, I recognise that in the world’s eyes I am, like Gideon, little more than a non-entity. But I glory in the fact that you love me as your child and that you can make me an instrument for your use. And I glory too that the day will come when, by your grace, I will be all that you intend for me to be. Thank you! Amen.