Can we change God's mind? (1)

 

⁹ “I have seen these people,” the Lord said to Moses, “and they are a stiff-necked people. ¹⁰ Now leave me alone so that my anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them. Then I will make you into a great nation.”

¹¹ But Moses sought the favour of the Lord his God. “Lord,” he said, “why should your anger burn against your people, whom you brought out of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand? ¹² Why should the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intent that he brought them out, to kill them in the mountains and to wipe them off the face of the earth’? Turn from your fierce anger; relent and do not bring disaster on your people…

¹⁴ Then the Lord relented and did not bring on his people the disaster he had threatened.

Exodus 32:9-14

Can we change God’s mind?

That’s not as simple a question as it might seem. If, as Christians believe, God is perfect and almighty, surely his purposes are established from all eternity? How dare we imagine that sinful creatures like us can do any such thing?

From the early days of the church, indeed, God was held to be “immutable”– that’s just a technical term for “unchangeable” - on the grounds that if something can be changed it can’t have been perfect in the first place: how can you improve on perfection?

All very logical. But if that is the case, what’s the point of praying? “Ah”, says a very spiritually-minded Christian, “but that’s not what prayer is about! It’s not trying to change God’s mind; it’s about growing a deeper relationship with him!” There’s truth in that, to be sure. But also there’s no getting away from the fact that in the Bible God is portrayed as “relenting” (even “repenting”, if we go with the KJV), which is really just another way of saying “changing his mind”.

Exodus 32 is a dramatic example of this.

The people of Israel, delivered from slavery in Egypt under the leadership of Moses, have met with God at Mount Sinai. After receiving the “ten commandments”, God summons Moses up the mountain, where he “enters the cloud” and stays “for forty days and forty nights” (Exodus 24:13-18). Uknown to him, the people down below seem to have virtually panicked at his prolonged absence – and they persuade his brother Aaron to build an idol in the form of a golden calf which they can worship as their god.

God, of course, sees this, and tells Moses to get himself down the mountain while he prepares to destroy his fickle people. But – and this the truly remarkable part - Moses refuses to tamely accept this. There follows a conversation in which you could almost say that Moses calls the shots…

When God says to Moses “Now leave me alone” (verse 10), it’s as if he is telling him to “clear off and stop bothering me, so I can get on with the business of pouring out my anger on the people and destroying them” (putting it in down to earth modern speech). It’s almost as if he – yes, God himself! - is afraid that Moses, the man of prayer, might persuade him to change his mind.

But Moses won’t be put off. He appeals to God to think of his reputation – “If you destroy your own people, who you brought out of the land of Egypt, think what joy that will give to your enemies!” And so we read in verse 14: “Then the Lord relented and did not bring on his people the disaster he had threatened”.

People sometimes speak of the power of prayer. Well, it’s hard to imagine a clearer example than this! What are we today to make of this slightly bizarre story?

A key need is to recognise that the language of the Bible is extremely varied, especially when portraying God. God is infinite, way beyond our grasp or comprehension, so we need to have him described for us in earthy ways, through metaphors and figures of speech.

A simple example is that God has no physical body (he “is spirit”, John 4:24), yet the Bible repeatedly describes him as having hands (which means he does things) or eyes (he sees everything) or a face (he can express both pleasure and displeasure). According to Exodus 19:4 he “carried you on eagles’ wings” which, taken literally, is just not true, but is a graphic way of conveying the glorious manner in which he delivered them from slavery in Egypt.

The same principle applies to the conversation between God and Moses here in Exodus 32. On first reading, it might seem to portray an angry, rather tetchy God who is determined to destroy his wayward people, but who is then persuaded out of it by a human being who manages to hit a raw nerve in his nature. But we instinctively feel that, of course, it is far, far deeper than that - that it is in fact a way of making us tremble at the just anger of God, and then marvel at the power of the pleading of a holy human being.

Did God literally “change his mind” on that occasion? To our human perception the answer is yes. But the deeper meaning is that God has given to us human beings the dignity of playing a significant part in the outworking of his purposes. Yes, our feeble prayers can and do make a difference to the unfolding of history!

There are other examples in the Old Testament of the unchanging God actually… well, seeming to change. A particularly striking one is 2 Kings 20:1-11. Through the prophet Isaiah, God tells the sick King Hezekiah to “put your house in order, because you are going to die”. Hezekiah “weeps bitterly” and prays a heart-broken prayer; whereupon within hours or even minutes he is given a reprieve: “I have heard your prayer and seen your tears: I will heal you”.

Such examples, to be sure, are rare; but surely they are there for a reason?

But back to our earlier question: what are we today to make of the event of Exodus 32? Please join me next time as we try to draw some very practical lessons…

Father, I often struggle in the matter of prayer, especially when I compare my feeble efforts with things I read in your word. Please help me to persevere in faith, so that one day I will see how wonderfully you have answered them. Amen.

Righteous anger? (2)

¹¹ When Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. ¹² For before certain men came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But when they arrived, he began to draw back and separate himself from the Gentiles because he was afraid of those who belonged to the circumcision group. ¹³ The other Jews joined him in his hypocrisy, so that by their hypocrisy even Barnabas was led astray. Galatians 2:11-13

We’ve been focussing on the need to stay united in Christ, as he prayed in John 17. If we must disagree, let’s do it agreeably!

But we saw last time how Jesus himself could be ferociously angry with those who were in opposition to the purposes of God, not least the scribes and Pharisees, the “brood of vipers” (Matthew 23). And Paul too, the very man who pleaded with the Christians of Rome not to fall out with one another (Romans 14), got involved in a furious dispute with no other than Simon Peter – Cephas, the “Rock” appointed by Jesus, the human head of the church – in a way that becomes more and more remarkable every time you look at it.

Just glance through the little passage above…

1.    1. Paul “opposed Cephas to his face” (verse 11), indeed “in front of them all” (verse 14). This, remember, is Paul talking, the new kid on the block, the man who had viciously persecuted the early believers, whereas Peter had been with Jesus from the very start in Galilee. How dared he!

 2.   Paul stated that Peter “stood condemned” (verse 11). That’s a strong word. To many Christians it means something like “eternally lost”, but that surely is inconceivable here. More likely it means simply “in the wrong”, “seriously out of line”; but whatever, it’s not exactly friendly.

 3.   Paul accused Peter of “hypocrisy” (verse 13). It seems that at first Peter was perfectly happy to sit and eat with the Gentile believers who had come into the church in Antioch. And so he should be, of course! - according to Acts 11 God had given him a personal vision to make very clear that in Christ the dividing line between Jew and Gentile was totally wiped out, including the taboo on sitting at the same table; what more could he ask? Yet under pressure from “certain men from James”, otherwise known as “the circumcision group” (verse 12), Peter “drew back and separated himself from the Gentiles”. Well, we know from  the gospels that Peter could be emotional, headstrong – and sometimes downright weak; but this…!

 4.   To make matters even worse, Peter’s bad example had the effect of leading others astray: “other Jews joined him in his hypocrisy”. Peter, remember, was the leader – and leaders, obviously, tend to get followed, that’s what they’re there for. Then Paul adds some words which, I think, are among the saddest in his letters: “… even Barnabas was led astray” (verse 13). Barnabas! Oh, my dear brother Barnabas! my mentor and friend! my missionary travelling companion! my right-hand man at that tense, difficult conference in Jerusalem when these things were thrashed out (Acts 15) - You too? Surely not!... And yet it was so.

Something big was brewing at Antioch, and, as Paul saw it, it could have worked out for either good or bad. If Peter had been unchallenged about his withdrawal from his Gentile fellow-Christians, that would have amounted to a denial of the gospel of God’s free grace available to all, Jews and Gentiles – of what Paul called “justification by faith”, for that was ultimately about the uniting of all men and women in the one church, the body of Christ. Not that Peter wanted or intended any such thing, of course, but he seems to have been timid, and that could have been the effect of his influence.

Precisely who the “certain men from James” were and why they did what they did, and precisely who “the circumcision group” were, isn’t completely clear. No doubt they were true followers of Jesus, but they wanted the new wine of the gospel of justification by faith alone to be poured from wineskins that belonged to the old era of Judaism. Paul’s intervention, together with the big church conference described in Acts 15, ensured that that didn’t happen.

So… where does this episode leave us? I suggest five lessons…

First, respect and love your leaders – but don’t put them on a pedestal.

To me, the sheer fallibility of Peter is one of the things I like most about him. (Perhaps I’ve just got so much in common with him!) But Jesus loved him after failure, restored him, and entrusted him with great responsibility.

Second, if we disagree on doctrinal matters, make sure the doctrines in question are the cardinal ones.

Differences over how the Spirit is given, or kinds of water-baptism, or the timing of the second coming of Jesus, or whether every believer should speak in tongues, or whether God created the world in six literal days, or what exactly we mean by “the authority of scripture” - (I could go on, but I won’t) - such differences, ultimately, don’t really matter all that much.

Third, let’s keep in mind, if Peter could lose his way, so might you or I.

None of us are infallible - are we? (Enough said under that heading.)

Fourth, be wise if/when various outside groups infiltrate the church.

We don’t know a lot about “the men from James” or “the circumcision group”, but they clearly carried some weight and wielded real influence. For us, “infiltrators” could be sent by God – yes, don’t automatically rule that possibility out – but they could also be trouble-makers. Be alert; be discerning.

Fifth, take Jesus’ prayer in John 17 seriously.

He didn’t pray these words for fun: “so that they may be one… so that they may be brought to complete unity” (verses 22-23). Unity in Christ isn’t just an optional extra; so far as it depends on us, it’s an absolute must.

Dear Father, you sent Jesus to save us from our sins, to make us new men and women, and to create unity and harmony within your church and wherever we can. Forgive us the ignorance, the failures, the arrogance and the sheer indifference of which we are often guilty, and teach us to love all our brothers and sisters, however different they might be from us. Amen.

Righteous anger?

Jesus said, “You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell?” Matthew 23:33

When Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. Galatians 2:11

To my last two posts I gave the title “Christian, disagree agreeably”, based mainly on Romans 14, where Paul urges his readers not to fall out over “disputable matters” (NIV) or “personal opinions” (GNB). As long as the basic Gospel of Christ crucified and risen again is held in common, don’t let lesser things - “grey areas” - cause friction or division among you.

Good advice, surely – and desperately needed by the church in every generation, not least our own, with its massive multiplication of cults, sects, denominations, movements. Never forget Jesus’ long prayer in John 17!

Fine. But the more I wrote, the more I realised that questions arise if we are to get a fuller picture, and that therefore a further post might be helpful in trying to answer them.

For one thing, isn’t there quite a bit of “disagreeableness” in the Bible? We can’t avoid the fact that Jesus himself was sometimes quite ferociously critical of those he saw as his enemies; for example, he called the Jewish scribes and Pharisees “snakes… brood of vipers”; no mincing of words there! That’s Matthew 23:33, but most of the chapter is something of a tirade against these people: “you hypocrites… blind guides… blind fools… blind men…”

Of course, if anyone was entitled to use such language, it was the sinless Son of God, and we would be arrogant in the extreme if we assumed any right to copy him. But if nothing else it demonstrates that Jesus was not just the “gentle Jesus, meek and mild” of Charles Wesley’s children’s hymn. And it reminds us that, sadly, there are times when a clear confrontation with basic error is called for – a confrontation that may even result in a parting of the ways.

The key to Jesus’ anger is, of course, simple: he, the human embodiment of “the way, the truth, and the life”, is addressing leaders, men given the task of teaching the truth of God. Because of their hypocrisy and blindness they were in fact misleading the people, and this Jesus could not tolerate; such was his love for ordinary people. Remember how he wept over Jerusalem shortly before he died there (Luke 19:41-44): anger for the false teachers, certainly – but nothing but deep compassion for the people as a whole.

Perhaps the most dramatic example of serious and deep division in the New Testament church is described in Galatians 2:11-21. Please picture the scene…

We are in Antioch, a multi-cultural city about 350 miles north of Jerusalem. Something very remarkable has happened here. Up to this point pretty well all the first “Christians” (though that word hadn’t been invented yet) were Jews, like Jesus, who saw their new-found faith as the fulfilment of Jewish Old Testament prophecies - the promised “Messiah” (that is, the “anointed one”) had come, and his name was Jesus of Nazareth!

Wonderful news. But it was, as they saw it, news for the Jewish people only: a Jewish message about the Jewish Messiah, and therefore to be proclaimed to Jews. People who weren’t Jews – otherwise known as Gentiles or Greeks – didn’t really figure at all.

But something happened that changed the course of history… some Jesus-followers, “men from Cyprus and Cyrene, went to Antioch and began to speak to Greeks also, telling them the good news about the Lord Jesus” and – guess what? – “a great number of people believed and turned to the Lord” (Acts 11:19-21).

Who these people from Cyprus and Cyrene were we don’t know. How and why they came to do what they did we don’t know. All we do know is that the basically Jewish church in Antioch received a large influx of non-Jews - people who spoke different languages, who dressed in different ways, who had totally different customs from the Jewish Jesus-followers.

Many years ago, early in my ministry, our church in Scunthorpe received an influx of - would you believe it – “Hell’s Angels”, complete with their motor-bike leathers, boots, chains, the lot. Putting it mildly, ahem, they rather stood out in our small evening congregation. They were perfectly polite and well-behaved, and we became quite fond of them, but we really weren’t very well-equipped to integrate them. (I suspect they turned up largely out of a slightly mischievous curiosity.) After a few weeks they stopped coming, and that was that - though hopefully one or two seeds were sown.

Well, the church in Antioch faced a similar situation with this out-of-the-blue Gentile infiltration, and they seemed to have handled it far better: so much so that the very label we bear today was coined in Antioch: “The disciples were called Christians first at Antioch” (Acts 11:26).

But, as often happens in churches when God is powerfully at work, the devil also got to work, and something seriously bad happened, so bad that Paul can write in Galatians 2:11: “When Cephas (that is Simon Peter) came to Antich, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned”. What a remarkable confrontation; can you picture these two giants of the early church standing eyeball to eyeball?

Next time we’ll take a look at what led to this history-changing event; please join me then…

Father, please help me always to seek to “maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace”. If ever I feel I must confront and disagree with a fellow-Christian help me to do so with humility and love in my heart. Amen.

Christian, disagree agreeably (2)

Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarrelling over disputable matters. ² One person’s faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. ³ The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them. ⁴ Who are you to judge someone else’s servant? To their own master, servants stand or fall. And they will stand, for the Lord is able to make them stand.

⁵ One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind…

²² So whatever you believe about these things keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who does not condemn himself by what he approves. ²³ But whoever has doubts is condemned if they eat, because their eating is not from faith; and everything that does not come from faith is sin.

Romans 14:1-5, 22-23

Romans 14 is all about what Paul calls “disputable matters”, or “personal opinions” – what are sometimes known in Christian circles as “grey areas”, topics on which we may legitimately differ from one another. The essence of Paul’s advice to the church in Rome is that each individual should be “fully convinced in their own mind” (verse 5) and not just drift into an opinion because that’s the way the majority seem to be going. “Everything that doesn’t come from faith (faith in the sense of conviction) is sin” (verse 23).

So – no “judging” of one another, or “treating them with contempt” (verse 10)! Sadly, Christians can be very intolerant, even downright arrogant, in the way they treat their fellow-believers. And that is wrong. As Paul puts it with refreshing bluntness: “Who are you to judge someone else’s servant?” (verse 4). Who indeed? There are times to mind your own business.

That’s the basic principle. But it leaves various other questions crying out for an answer, and last time I ran out of space before I could get on to them. The most vital, I think, is, “Yes, but how do we distinguish between these grey areas and the things that really matter?” Some of us may tend towards being too strict, others towards being too slack – well, how do we know who is right?

The question can be put under two main headings: matters of (a) doctrine, and of (b) what we might call morality.

(aMatters of doctrine. 

T To me this seems by far the easiest to tackle. The Gospel is, in essence, beautifully simple. “What must I do to be saved?” asked the jailer in Philippi (Acts 16:30); and back came the answer, quick as a flash, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved”.

True, the jailer may have meant by “saved” something rather different from what Paul and Silas meant, and so a bit of teaching was called for (verse 32) - and he ended up with something far more wonderful than he hoped for! But when we as Christians think about essential, non-negotiable issues, it really is as simple as that: Jesus the Son of God, crucified for our sins, risen from the dead, and one day coming back in glory.

Other issues quickly come queuing up behind – the person and work of the Holy Spirit, the doctrine of the trinity, the details and timing of Jesus’ return, the precise nature of the authority of scripture, the different roles of the sexes in the life of the church, the correct form of water-baptism – all these are obvious examples. But if I meet someone who claims to believe in Jesus in the way I have outlined, then I think it would be arrogant and unwarranted of me to regard them as not a true Christian.

Yes, they may be wrong, even seriously wrong, in various other things, but – well, I have a little catchphrase which you might just possibly find helpful: a teaspoonful of vital truth outweighs a lorry-load of error. Doctrine is important, no doubt about that; but there are, and always have been, differences of interpretation, and our business, in humility, is to recognise that we could be the ones who are in the wrong, and to treat those who see things differently with respect.

(bMatters of morality.

This is where things can get tricky.

Take war as an example… some Christians are pacifist, others say that war may sometimes be a sad necessity. Regarding alcohol, some are strictly teetotal, others see wine as a God-given pleasure, so enjoy it! Are there ever grounds for abortion? Or same-sex relations? What about assisted suicide? Or divorce? The list is endless.

Some areas of disagreement seem to be dealt with very clearly in the Bible, but that then might raise the question of how the Bible is to be interpreted in our massively changed world. War, again, for example… one person will point out that the Old Testament is full of them – indeed, including wars commanded by God himself; and Jesus, of course, regarded war as a fact of life, bound always to blight human history. So they must be justified. But wait a minute; weapons have changed, from days when they killed relatively few, and were wielded only by professional soldiers, whereas now we live in a world of truly horrible “weapons of mass destruction” which don’t distinguish between a soldier and a new-born baby.

“Just give me a plain, simple answer to my question”, people sometimes say. But that is unrealistic: not all questions are simple, so not all questions have simple answers. Even more naïve is the person who says, “Well sorry, but I just don’t have any time for all this stuff about ‘interpretation’. I just take the Bible in its simple, straightforward sense”. But what about those many passages which just don’t have a simple, straightforward sense? Even the most obvious-seeming Bible passages are capable of various interpretations.

It seems that we have no choice but to live with the fact that, until the day we die, there will be scope for disagreement. But we need to notice that what Paul wants in this chapter is that we put the sensitivities of the other person before our own.

You have a strong, robust conscience that isn’t easily wobbled by your brother or sister’s qualms of conscience? Fine; that’s good. But don’t therefore look down on that brother or sister for being a spiritual weakling!

Or you are, perhaps, fairly new to faith in Christ and still feeling your way around this minefield? That’s perfectly all right as well. But don’t therefore be intimidated by that “stronger” Christian or made to feel inferior. Just be sure that your own conscience is at peace with God.

And to both the strong and the weak, the same principle applies: If we must disagree, do so agreeably!

Dear Father, my desire is to be in harmony with all my brothers and sisters in Christ, but I know that that will not always be possible. So I ask that when times come that I find myself in disagreement, I will disagree with humility, open to the possibility that I could be the one who is mistaken, and so that I will do all I can to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Amen.

Christian, disagree agreeably

Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarrelling over disputable matters. ² One person’s faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. ³ The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them. ⁴ Who are you to judge someone else’s servant? To their own master, servants stand or fall. And they will stand, for the Lord is able to make them stand.

⁵ One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind…

²² So whatever you believe about these things keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who does not condemn himself by what he approves. ²³ But whoever has doubts is condemned if they eat, because their eating is not from faith; and everything that does not come from faith is sin.

Romans 14:1-5, 22-23

Did you watch last Sunday’s England v Spain Euro-final? I haven’t seen the official viewing statistics, but I’ve no doubt that they ran into many millions.

Another question: Did you feel a touch guilty about watching the game? It was Sunday, after all. And doesn’t the Bible tell us to “honour the sabbath day and keep it holy”?

I ask because I couldn’t help reflecting on how things have changed over the decades. I became a Christian as a teenager in the 1960s, and in the church where I was converted we were not taught it was wrong to watch television on a Sunday – not taught, because it was just taken for granted, something that simply wasn’t done. There were various unwritten rules like that: you were expected to dress smartly for church; no shopping on Sundays; no work on Sundays; and of course you wouldn’t smoke or drink alcohol on any day of the week. Everything was very black and white, and you just accepted it without really giving it any thought. (I was only fifteen, after all.)

Well, those days are well gone! I sat down to watch the game without any qualms, and I couldn’t help thinking what a journey I have travelled over those fifty-odd years (and I can’t remember the last time I wore a tie for church).

But one thought nags at me. How have I made that journey? Prayerfully? Thoughtfully? Can I say that I made a conscious, thought-through decision that my earlier conviction was unnecessarily strict, and so abandoned it with a clear conscience? Or did I just drift unthinkingly into my new practice, “going with the flow”, as the saying goes? Mmm… that question leaves me a little uncomfortable.

In Romans 14 Paul is tackling the question of how we as Christians should handle what he calls “disputable matters” (NIV) or “personal opinions” (GNB) (verse 1). He picks out two topics which, presumably, were causing some division in the church at Rome. First, are Christians expected to be vegetarian (verses 1-3)? Second, are they expected to regard various days, especially no doubt the “sabbath”, as specially sacred (verse 5)?

And his answer is simple and clear. Such questions are matters of personal conscience, and nobody’s business but that of the individual involved. So - he says in effect - back off! “Who are you to judge someone else’s servant?” (verse 4).

Jesus didn’t come to give his church a whole new set of rules: he came to bring the mercy and grace of God in the free forgiveness offered through the sacrifice of the cross. “Disputable matters”? – well, I was going to say you can just snap your fingers at them, but, putting it a little more elegantly, they are not worth falling out over; indeed, it is actually sinful to be unduly dogmatic, it is arrogant and judgmental. All that matters is that each of us should be “fully convinced in our own mind” (verse 5).

Various other comments are worth making as we explore Romans 15.

First, it teaches us something about how to use the Bible.

In essence… the Bible is not a text book to be ransacked so that we can quote occasional verses and apply them, out of context, to any given situation we might choose. I quoted earlier the words of the ten commandments about “honouring the sabbath day and keeping it holy”. But of course that command, in context, was given to the ancient people of Israel (Exodus 20), and the sabbath day was Saturday, not our Sunday, or “the Lord’s Day”. So when Christians gather to worship Sunday by Sunday, they could be accused of sabbath-breaking, because the New Testament never contains any command to regard Sunday as a new holy day. No doubt that’s still a good thing to do, but exactly how is another matter.

I spent some weeks a few years ago in a country where the day of worship for all religious traditions was set by the secular government: Friday, I think it was. It was a country with many such traditions, and this was considered useful in terms of social harmony. Should the church have risen up in protest, demanding to be allowed to worship on Sunday? If so, they failed to do so; and who could say they were wrong, and on what grounds? “Tradition”? Surely not!

My wife and I also had devout friends who belonged to the Seventh Day Adventist church, which holds on to Saturday as their chosen “holy day”. You couldn’t wish for finer Christian people, and while we obviously disagreed with one another, we were able to treat one another with cheerful, mutual respect. I think the Paul who wrote Romans 14 would have approved of that.

I think that sums up the essence of Romans 14. But the chapter raises various other questions… How, for example, should we distinguish between “disputable matters” and those which really are important? Is Paul in effect adopting an “anything-goes-as-long-as-you’re-sincere” approach to things like same-sex relations? Are there no absolute rights and wrongs for Christians?

But I find I have run out of space. So, if you are interested, please join me next time…

Father, we live in a world where any given topic attracts a multitude of different opinions, and there are times when we are confused about rights and wrongs. Please help us, by your Spirit, to know when we should stand our ground, and when we should be flexible; above all, when we find that we disagree, to disagree agreeably. Amen.

Seeing the unseen

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and exalted, seated on a throne; and the train of his robe filled the temple. ² Above him were seraphim, each with six wings: with two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. ³ And they were calling to one another: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory.”⁴ At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke.

⁵ “Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.”

⁶ Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. ⁷ With it he touched my mouth and said, “See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.”

⁸ Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I. Send me!”

Isaiah 6:1-8

Do you ever think how wonderful it must be to have a vision of God, or to witness a miracle or some other supernatural event? Yes? Well, be careful! If that were to happen, it might not be quite what you expected.

Four such visions in the Bible spring immediately to my mind. There’s Moses at the burning bush (Exodus 3), where Moses “hid his face because he was afraid to look at God”. There’s Peter, James and John on the mountain of transfiguration (Matthew 17), where “they fell face down to the ground, terrified”. And then there’s John on the island of Patmos (Revelation 1), where he “fell at the feet” of the risen Christ, “as though dead”.

And then, of course, there’s the passage above, where the prophet Isaiah “saw the Lord, high and exalted, seated on a throne” – and where he seems to have been reduced to a quivering wreck.

Perhaps our feeling about having a vision of God begins to take on a new complexion…? Perhaps the bread-and-butter nature of the ordinary  Christian life suddenly seems not so unattractive after all?

Focussing particularly on Isaiah 6, certain things particularly strike me…

First, such experiences in the Bible are actually quite rare, so it would be unrealistic to wish for them in our day-to-day lives. They mustn’t be ruled out, of course, not at all; there is no limit to what God might do. But Paul tells us, after all, that “we walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7).

Some Christians imagine that every day of the week they should be experiencing high-octane excitement – if not visions or miracles, then at least remarkable answers to prayer. Reading the Bible fairly superficially can indeed give the impression that that’s the norm – drama on every other page! - but of course the biblical writers wouldn’t have felt any need to record the run-of-the-mill stuff.

The fact is that for most Christians most of the time life was – and is - probably pretty ordinary, with God’s presence being discerned largely through the eye of faith. One day, according to John, we shall “see Jesus as he is" (1 John 3:2), so most of us must simply be content to wait until that day comes, and not chafe for too much too soon.

Second, it seems that such experiences generally were quite frightening. Moses, aware that he was standing “on holy ground”, “hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God”. Isaiah, made acutely conscious of his sinfulness, let out a cry of sorrow – “I am ruined, for I am a man of unclean lips…” John, lying in a heap on the ground, didn’t know what to do with himself. These were experiences where that much over-used word “awesome” might well be used.

Any notion that a vision of God might be simply comforting would seem well wide of the mark. After all… to see some representation of the one holy and perfect God himself is no small matter.

It’s true that to both John on Patmos and the disciples on the mountain Jesus did indeed speak precious words of comfort, “Don’t be afraid”; and to Isaiah in the temple was given the forgiveness of his sins. But let no-one remotely imagine that these were cosy chats. Anything but! As I said at the beginning, if you allow yourself to hanker after such an experience, well, let’s just say that you might end up getting more than you bargained for…

Third, in three of the examples we find that the encounter ends with a new commission: God gives the individuals concerned a new job to do.

Moses is to lead the people of Israel out of slavery in Egypt, a truly momentous task (Exodus 3:10). Isaiah is to preach a message of what is at first bad news, before he gets to the good news (Isaiah 6:9-13). John is to write letters to the seven neighbouring churches, and they contain some messages that will not be at all popular (Revelation 1:10-11).

So if we ever feel that we would like to “enjoy” a vision of God, perhaps we need to ask ourselves what new job we might be willing like to take on. The Lord asked Isaiah, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” To which Isaiah responded, “Here am I. Send me”. A wonderful willingness! But would we be so willing?

If these visionary experiences are written down for us to learn from, what exactly might the lessons be? If not to whet our appetites for remarkable spiritual “highs” – then why?

If nothing else, the answer must surely be to remind us of the purity, power and awesomeness of our God. We live in times when the “fashion” in worship is often very casual and informal – our language, our dress, our manner. I don’t say there’s necessarily anything wrong with that. But it must also be right to bow humbly before him, if only metaphorically.

We have seen how John on Patmos “fell at Jesus’ feet as though dead”. And how did Jesus reply? We are told “he placed his right hand on me and said: ‘Do not be afraid…’” The various visions may inspire, challenge and nourish us for years to come; but ultimately those gentle, loving words of the risen Christ are what we most need to hear.

Loving Father, my faith is feeble, and my grasp of your majesty and holiness falls far short of your true greatness. Please help me to see you day by day with the eye of childlike faith, and to anticipate that day when I will see Jesus in all his glory. Amen.

Soaking up evil

Jesus said, “You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye and tooth for tooth’. But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also…” Matthew 5:38-39

The high priest stood up and said to Jesus, ‘Are you not going to answer? What is this testimony that these men are bringing against you?’ But Jesus remained silent. Matthew 26:62-63

Then they led Jesus away to crucify him. Matthew 27:31

Christ committed no sin , and no deceit was found in his mouth. When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats… 1 Peter 2:22-23

Here are some words worth focussing on…

“If anyone attacks me, I will be as meek as a lamb. If anyone attacks the church, I will be as brave as a lion. If this is from the Lord, I will not open my mouth... Only by being obedient when arrested could I let all see that I was truly motivated by love.”

Brave, brave words; and, I think, massively impressive. They are reported as written by Pastor Wang Yi after his conviction and imprisonment on false charges by a court in China in 2018. His sentence was nine years. His wife was allowed to visit him for the first time in 2021. It is now 2024. We need to let those figures sink in.

A lot must have happened since 2018, of course. I don’t know if his radiant, Christlike spirit may have been blunted or even, God forbid, broken. But I can only shake my head and deeply admire that spirit.

I used the word “Christlike” to describe Wang Yi’s response to the evil done to him; I think that’s justified as we look at the little collection of verses I’ve put together at the top, taken from Matthew’s Gospel. But it’s a phrase from the 1 Peter verse that perhaps sums it up best: “he did not retaliate”.

Retaliation… How different our troubled world would be if we all refrained from it! It seems so simple in theory – no wars, no petty jealousies and rivalries, but simply the Christlike dignity of refusing to hit back, whether in personal or in national terms. But of course it is in fact far from simple. A nation that perpetrates an atrocity on an enemy clearly should be brought to some kind of justice; likewise somebody who deliberately kills or injures another person. Even relatively trivial wrongs shouldn’t just be brushed under the carpet as if they don’t matter.

But that’s for another day. What matters for most of us is to work out what non-retaliation means in practice for us individually. For, let’s be honest, we are all prone to want to “get our own back” when we feel we have been wronged. Anger is very natural, and sometimes justified; but we need to decide prayerfully how to deal with it, for it can so easily curdle into hatred and a desire for revenge.

I recently read this in a book by a Christian writer: “Retaliation wins a victory for wrongdoing, by recruiting the victim into the army of hatred and violence”. In other words, when I hit back at that person I’m angry with, I just keep the poison of animosity alive; it remains, so to speak, in circulation and ready to do still more damage. Indeed, it increases in intensity.

That writer went on: “Wrong propagates itself by chain-reaction, and can be stopped in its career only by someone who absorbs it and lets it go no further”. Perfectly put!... “someone who absorbs it and lets it go no further”. And I have to ask myself: am I such a “someone”? For isn’t that act of absorption exactly and precisely what Jesus was doing before the high priest when he remained silent? - indeed, exactly and precisely what was going on on the cross? Evil being patiently absorbed, not viciously bounced back: that’s non-retaliation.

I’ve never seen the inside of a boxing-gym, but somehow the image of a punch-bag comes to mind. Boxers need to develop the ability to punch with ferocious force; but if they practiced that with human opponents no doubt there would be regular deaths. But they can batter to their heart’s content that padded bag which is designed to soak up whatever force is directed against it.

Well, no-one likes the thought of being reduced to a mere punch-bag! Yet in reality isn’t that exactly what Jesus allowed himself to become on Calvary?

Our world is full of evil. The question to face up to is: Am I adding to it or reducing it? Am I bouncing it back into ever-wider circulation, or am I soaking it up and thus reducing its impact?

Never hit back: that’s the basic message. But the Bible offers us something even more - it is always positive, never merely negative. Here is Paul in Romans 12:21: “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good”. To not retaliate is a great thing – but how much greater it is to respond to evil not only by soaking it up but also by answering it with love and kindness!

Jesus teaches us not only to tolerate, or ignore, or put up with our enemies, but to love them and pray for them (Matthew 5:43-48).… Yes, really.

Father, we pray for Pastor Wang Yi and his family, and for the countless others in various parts of the world who are suffering unjustly and cruelly. Please give them grace to persevere, and the comfort of knowing that you love them and that your eye is upon them. Amen.

I was angry with my friend;/ I told my wrath, my wrath did end./ I was angry with my foe;/ I told it not;/ My wrath did grow…

William Blake (1757-1827)