The tears of the oppressed

Again I looked and saw all the oppression that was taking place under the sun: I saw the tears of the oppressed – and they have no comforter; power was on the side of their oppressors – and they have no comforter. And I declared that the dead, who had already died, are happier than the living, who are still alive. But better than both is the one who has never been born, who has not seen the evil that is done under the sun. Ecclesiastes 4:1-3

Have you read Ecclesiastes recently?

I wouldn’t blame you if your answer is No, because it’s a strange, distant book that doesn’t exactly hum with joy and positivity, but poses all sorts of thoughts and questions about the ups and down of life without providing clear answers. But it is part of God’s word, and it’s up to us to see what sense we can make of it in the light of scripture as a whole.

I’ve been reflecting recently on chapter 4, and want to start with verses1-3, which are as bleak and negative as any part of the whole book. The Tears of the Oppressed seems an obvious title.

Throughout human history vast numbers of men and women have suffered routinely under the cruel heel of oppression – injustice, war, poverty, persecution – and our daily diet of world news makes clear that nothing much has changed. Very much in the forefront is the plight of Ukraine; but there are many other, and possibly even worse, situations elsewhere.

Twice in verse 1 the writer of Ecclesiastes, seeing “the tears of the oppressed”, repeats the same mournful refrain: “they have no comforter”. How grim is that!

It’s been said that anything in this life is bearable if only we have someone to bear it with us. Well, I wouldn’t know about that, viewing the world as I do from my vantage-point of ease and relative luxury. But I hope of course that it’s true; hope still more that the vast multitudes of the oppressed do indeed have someone to share their suffering with them.

I read this morning in the paper about the large number of unaccompanied children who are seeking asylum in Britain. Unaccompanied children! – the very thought is too appalling to contemplate, especially as I think of my own happy, bouncy  grandchildren. But so, alas, it is. I saw too on the television news last night an elderly bent-over woman standing weeping helplessly in the wreckage of her little home in Ukraine, and could only thank God that somebody seemed to be embracing her. What difference such minimal comfort might make it’s impossible to quantify, but it was good to see.

The writer of Ecclesiastes, having reflected on the wretchedness of the comfortless, goes on to draw two conclusions which may seem rather shocking.

First, it’s better to be dead than alive: “I declared that the dead, who had already died, are happier than the living, who are still alive” (verse 2). There have been times in history when Christians who expressed such a thought would have been regarded as guilty of sin: such ingratitude towards God for the gift of life! Well, we live in kinder, more sympathetic days, and I find it hard to identify with that condemning attitude; God is God, so let him alone be the judge. But I have to admit that I am grateful for the matter-of-fact way that Ecclesiastes 4:2 expresses such a view, right or wrong.

The second conclusion the writer draws - if anything even worse - is that it’s better still never to be born: “better than both is the one who has never been born, who has never seen the evil that is done under the sun” (verse 3). That prompts various dizzy-making thoughts that it’s quite hard to get one’s head round: not least that, of course, if you had never been born, you wouldn’t know that you had never been born, because there wouldn’t be a “you” to do the knowing, would there? Still more, you couldn’t know if the life you might have been born into would have worked out as happy and largely trouble-free. Something else it’s best just to leave to the judgment of God!

But a conversation many years ago with a Christian friend has stuck with me. Her life had been hard, though she was still quite young, and as she reflected on the troubles she had endured, and was indeed still enduring, her conclusion, delivered in the same matter-of-fact manner as Ecclesiastes, was that “Yes, in fact, if I had been given the choice, I think I would have said ‘No thank you’”.

Perhaps I caught her on a bad day, for I knew that there were in fact joys and pleasures in her life as well; but, yet again, that is for God to judge. I personally didn’t feel any inclination to criticise.

Ecclesiastes 4 doesn’t offer anything particularly helpful as it looks sympathetically at the tears of the oppressed (that comes scattered in different parts of the book, especially as we persevere towards the end), so it’s up to us to pose to ourselves the question: How should I respond as I see these things, taking into account the whole span of scripture, and especially of course as I look to Jesus - for who could be said to be oppressed if not him? Such answers as I can suggest are, I’m afraid, terribly obvious and unoriginal, but I’ll offer them for what they’re worth.

But at the moment I’ve run out of space, so please join me again next time…

Father, thank you for the honesty of your word in scripture, even when it sems bleak and hopeless. But may reflecting today on the tears of the oppressed stir up in my heart a deep and Christlike compassion that makes, somehow, a practical difference to those who suffer so cruelly. Amen.

They never knew him...

Salvation is found in no-one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved. Acts 4:11-12

Enoch walked with God. Genesis 5:21-24

My wife and I have a friend who is absolutely adamant that everyone who was born before the time of Jesus must be eternally lost. Why? Because faith in Jesus is the one condition of salvation, and as they had never heard his name they could not put their faith in him. Simple, logical; so, end of story, nothing to discuss.

Simple, yes. But sorry, there is something to discuss. For one thing, it just seems plain unfair – like a schoolteacher telling a class that he is going to set them an exam on a book they have had no opportunity to read. When they protest, he says “Sorry, but that’s the way it is. Tough!”

Far more serious, the Old Testament makes it very clear that many people in its pages were “saved” (though that word is rarely used), in the sense of having a true relationship with God, even though of course they never knew the name of Jesus.

Last time I wrote about Enoch in Genesis 5. In verses 22 and 24 it is stated that he “walked faithfully with God”, implying that he had a deep faith in God as far as he knew about him, and then, intriguingly that a day came when he “was no more, because God took him away”. A similar thing is written about the prophet Elijah in 2 Kings 2, that he “went up to heaven in a whirlwind” (verse 11). He, of course, reappears on the earth centuries later, flanking Jesus along with Moses on the mountain of transfiguration.

Are we to believe that such people, noted for their relationship with God on earth, and even in some mysterious way taken up into the presence of God instead of passing through death, were then (what word shall I use!) dumped, abandoned by this same God? Not to mention saintly people like poor suffering Hannah (1 Samuel 1-2), or the prophets who suffered for God’s sake, or the many psalmists whose names we may not know but whose deep personal faith in God shines through their prayers and poems? All lost, because they had what might seem the sheer bad luck of being born in the wrong phase of history? Surely a little deeper thought is called for!

I’ve put at the top of this blog the words of Acts 4:12, one of many passages I could have chosen to demonstrate that the first followers of Jesus were convinced that he is indeed the one and only Saviour (“no other name…”!). Even simpler is Acts 16:30-31, where the Philippian jailer - trembling with fear as the prison for which he is responsible literally falls around his ears - cries out to Paul and Silas, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”, to receive the wonderful reply, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved…”

So what are we to do? Let’s sum it up… Yes, Jesus is the only way of salvation; yet we do meet men and women who never heard his name but who obviously had had a precious relationship with God. There really is no wriggling out of that dilemma – if indeed it is a dilemma. There’s so much needing to be said! - I’ll limit myself to just two comments…

First, we need to recognise that God’s revelation of himself is progressive in nature. It comes gradually, in stages, spaced out in history.

That progress is reflected in the Bible, and it reaches its peak in both the story of Jesus – his life, his death, his resurrection and his ascension – and in the accompanying teaching about him in the rest of the New Testament. The Old Testament prepares the way, and if the Old Testament (or part of it) is all that godly people have, God gladly accepts that faith in anticipation of everything that will be fulfilled in Jesus.

Putting it another way, the whole of the Old Testament leads up to Jesus, and the whole of the New leads on from him. The pages of the Old Testament contain many clues and pointers which climax in him (Isaiah 53 is perhaps the supreme example), but his name is never mentioned and his identity is not fully disclosed. So when we read of people who “walked with God” or who showed that they clearly trusted God, we can surely assume that they are saved. And if that is so, they can only be saved through the Christ they never knew.

Second, we should never forget that the gospel is good news. 2 Peter 3:9 tells us that “God is not willing that anyone should perish, but wants everyone to come to repentance”, and that is a statement to which we should give full value.

Yes, of course. But so what? Let me explain what I mean. I said earlier that faith in Jesus is the one condition of salvation. But perhaps “condition” isn’t quite the right word; it makes salvation sound a little like an exam you have to pass, and faith is the key idea you have to prove yourself competent in. But that is wrong. Faith in Jesus isn’t so much a condition that we have to fulfil, but simply the God-given means offered to us whereby we can lay hold of salvation.

Putting it another way… the need for faith is not a threat to be delivered with a frown and a bit of finger-wagging: “If you don’t put your faith in Jesus, you can’t be saved” (so you’d better look out!). No, it is an invitation given with a smile: “You want to be saved? Wonderful! Just put your faith in Jesus!” (There’s a big difference between those two!)

God is a gracious and merciful God; may he help us always to keep that note at the forefront of our belief and our evangelising!

Father God, thank you that from all eternity you had a plan of salvation for the fallen human race, a plan which began with your chosen people Israel and reached its climax in the cross. Thank you for your crucified and risen Son, and for the untold multitude of those who, like me, have found forgiveness and reconciliation through him. Amen.

Get walking!

Enoch walked with God… Genesis 5:24

He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8

I don’t imagine that I will ever have an epitaph on a gravestone (nor particularly want one!), but if it ever happened, the glowing words spoken of Enoch, “he walked with God”, though far from deserved, would be all I could wish for.

It’s pretty well impossible for us to imagine what life was like for human beings way back before the flood. Generally speaking the feel of Genesis 1-11 is grim – from the glory of creation (Genesis 1-2), to the wretchedness of the fall (Genesis 3), to the account of the first murder, to the corruption of the ideal of marriage and the beginning of the ill-treatment of women (Genesis 4)… No wonder God decided that a radical cleansing, a very deluge, was needed (Genesis 6-11).

I’ve jumped over Genesis 5, which is mainly a dreary, repetitive account of “Adam’s family line” – a parade of men with strange names and startlingly long life-spans. Nothing much to excite us there.

But wait a minute… Tagged onto the end of chapter 4 we read the intriguing information that after the disgrace of Lamech and his two wives “people began to call on the name of the Lord”. Did they indeed! That begs all sorts of questions: How did they know the name of the Lord, given that the great leaders of the coming period, Abraham and Moses, were still far off in the distant future? How exactly did God communicate with them? How did they communicate with him? Did they set aside particular buildings or places as “sacred” places? Did they have people who they instinctively recognised as prophets or teachers? And if so, what exactly did such people teach? – there was no such thing as the “Bible”, remember. Fascinating questions, to which we have no answers.

But never mind, because in the midst of all this murky greyness there suddenly burns a bright light: a man called Enoch, who “walked with God” (5:25). That choice of words is particularly striking: the writer doesn’t say Enoch trusted God or obeyed God, though no doubt both are true; no, he walked with God, implying intimacy, a close personal relationship.

Walking… For many of us it’s largely a leisure pursuit; for them, of course, it was a necessity; how else would you get from A to B? And there would be at least two reasons why people might choose to share their walking with others. They both shed light on why the Bible takes up this image of walking as a metaphor for the godly life.

First, companionship.

In Enoch’s time it would be natural for friends or families to walk together: they would have interests to share and problems to offload. They would also, one hopes, simply enjoy one another’s company.

This clearly reflects our relationship with God, the privilege of being comfortable in his company. Being “religious” or “Christian” is not a matter of performing rituals or carrying out duties, though these have their place, if carried out in glad obedience. In the same way as Enoch enjoyed intimacy with God we too are invited to enter into a warm and loving relationship with him; indeed, if we have no personal relationship with God, our faith, however strong, is nothing.

I can only try to imagine Enoch starting to pray. It was, according to Genesis 5:21-22, “after he became the father of Methusaleh”, that he started to walk with God. I like to think that perhaps it was as Enoch looked in wonder at the face of his baby son that he felt a first powerful impulse to praise and thank God for this gift, and also to cry out for the love and wisdom he would need in order to be a good father.

A simple question arises: Do we, personally, walk with God? An old hymn that began with the words “When we walk with the Lord…” went on to say “Trust and obey, for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus but to trust and obey”. Not the whole truth, no doubt - the Christian life is certainly not non-stop happiness. But a precious truth nonetheless.

The second reason why people - perhaps even strangers who met in an inn and discovered they were heading the same way – might agree to walk together was safety. “There’s safety in numbers”, the saying goes, and while there’s an element of danger in any form of travel, even to this day, there’s surely nobody more at risk than the solitary walker (witness Jesus’ story of the man who “fell among thieves”).

God not only walks with us, but also gives us other believers who we can walk with. (They’re called, collectively, “the church”.) And they need us as we need them.

Every so often you come across Christians who stand apart from the church, presumably feeling that they simply don’t need it. Well, at best they are ignorant or naïve, at worst arrogant. Who are we to reject a means of blessing that God has provided for us? Do we know better than him? We find some of our companions not particularly pleasant or agreeable? Well, tough! Perhaps God is wanting to teach us how to love them? even to learn some precious lessons from them?

A postscript to the story of Enoch: Genesis doesn’t say “he died”, as it does of all the others in the list. It says that “he was no more, because God took him away”. It seems that, in the Bible, just Enoch and Elijah (2 Kings 2), were spared the pangs of death. Not something that we are encouraged to expect, of course. Yet for us too death is a defeated enemy, so that while we may not be plucked direct from earth to heaven, we can expect to be raised from the sleep of death, when we shall “see Jesus as he is” (1 John 3:2). Are you looking forward to that?

I wonder if we may also meet Enoch?

Father, thank you that Enoch, and all the other Old Testament saints, are my brothers and sisters in Christ. Help me day by day to walk with Jesus in close intimacy and assured safety until that day when I shall see him as he is. Amen.

Of tongues and bones (2)

A gentle tongue can break a bone. Proverbs 25:15

 

Last time I suggested ways in which we might make sense of this saying from Proverbs, which on the face of it is slightly puzzling. Two fairly obvious things came to mind: first, that it encourages us to think about the vast range of ways in which we speak or otherwise communicate with other people - above all, making the point that quiet, reasoned words are preferable to loud harangues or angry confrontations; and second, it can alert us to the massive harm done via on line or even phone conversations when we are unable to see the face of the other person.

The basic message was simple: Christian, keep firm control of your tongue, whatever the circumstances! Take seriously the disturbing words of James 3:1-12! Be careful how you use the internet! 

There were a couple of other things that came to mind, both of them very basic, but worth being reminded of, but which I didn’t have space for. So I return to them today.

First, while “a gentle tongue” should be our default mode when communicating with others, we shouldn’t take it as a hard and fast rule for every situation. There are occasions when we may need to use our tongues very firmly indeed, even perhaps raising our voices. I hesitate to say this, having witnessed the horrible spat between Presidents Trump and Zelensky on television the other night, described by some commentators as a slanging-match; but there were times when even Jesus, whose dignified silence before his tormentors I drew attention to, saw fit to shift into distinctly ferocious mode: Matthew 23:13-38, his verbal onslaught on the scribes and Pharisees of his day, doesn’t exactly show him in “gentle tongue” mode, does it!

Someone might say “Yes, but that was Jesus, we’re just, well, us, and we don’t have the same authority.” Quite right, of course. But as long as we are quietly confident that we are in the right, and that our strong words are justified – as long, indeed, that they are spoken in love and humility – such moments may arise. They may be just what’s needed to make somebody sit up and think. But we had better be right…!

Second, it occurred to me that the general drift of verse 25 – that patient perseverance is more effective than loud voices – has a particular application to prayer: isn’t this, as a general rule, how prayers are answered? Certainly, there are times when particular prayers are answered almost immediately, even dramatically, but they are surely the exception rather than the rule? Sometimes, let’s be honest, we may have almost given up praying for a particular matter (we all know, after all, that God’s answer is sometimes “No”) and are taken by surprise  when it is answered pretty much as we had hoped. But this just makes the occasion all the more joyful.

We have a young friend who, some ten years ago, became quite seriously ill. Though her condition wasn’t lethal, it caused her great pain and seriously affected her life. But just quite recently she felt that after a time of focussed prayer she had been healed. I haven’t the slightest doubt that over those ten years she had been prayed for by both her family and her Christian friends on a regular, indeed daily, basis. I’m sure too that there were days when those who prayed for her had little appetite or enthusiasm for prayer but persevered out of a sense of duty (and love, of course) rather than a red-hot faith. Why healing should have been given precisely when it was rather than several years earlier we cannot know; our business is simply to be thankful on her behalf and to trust that the patient perseverance implied in Proverbs 25:15 has borne fruit.

Do you give up easily when it comes to prayer? Here are the words of Jesus in 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…” The experts tell us that the original Greek might be better translated, “Ask and go on asking and it will be given to you; seek and go on seeking and you will find; knock and go on knocking and the door will be opened to you…” And the words of the Lord’s Prayer – “Give us today our daily bread” – suggest a prayer to be offered on a regular, routine basis.

How good are we at persevering in prayer? Yes, there are times when it can seem repetitive and mechanical. But the effectiveness of our prayers doesn’t depend on the emotion or warmth with which we come to God – it depends on the love and grace of God, who knows and understands our inmost hearts. Christian, don’t give up!

If, like me, you find it helpful to pray from a list, it’s true that a time may come when you feel it right to remove a name or a topic from that list (though if you’re anything like me that can be a very hard thing to do!). But make sure that’s a serious, Spirit-led decision, not just a giving up or a disillusioned case of not bothering. We may never hear the literal sound of a bone cracking, but we will know the joy of seeing wonderful answers to prayer!

Father, I don’t really begin to understand the mystery of prayer or to fathom the power of the tongue. But I pray that whether by direct spoken words or by some more sophisticated means of communication, you will give me grace to achieve only what is good and wholesome, so bringing your joy, hope and peace into the lives of others. Amen. 

Of tongues and bones

A gentle tongue can break a bone. Proverbs 25:15

“Pardon?”

“A gentle tongue can break a bone – that’s what it says in Proverbs 25.”

“All right, I see that. But what does it mean? I’d better be careful not to go round licking people – the local accident and emergency department are under enough pressure as it is without adding to the queue.”

“I’m not sure you’re quite getting the point.”

“No? I think you’d better explain it to me then…”

An unlikely conversation. But it’s one of the delights of the Bible, especially the “wisdom” books, when you come across a saying that, for a moment, leaves you a bit puzzled, and then makes you smile. Woe betide the strict literalist who insists that metaphors and figures of speech must always be taken absolutely as they stand!

Many of the verses in Proverbs consist of two short lines which, when taken together, balance each other. Here, the line I have quoted is the second of the two; the first reads “Through patience a ruler can be persuaded”. Ah! We immediately (I hope) realise that the writer is in fact not talking about togues and bones at all but about the best way to win an argument: softly, softly.

The Good News Bible drops completely the nonsense talk about breaking bones and spells out the actual meaning intended: “Patient persuasion can break down the strongest resistance and even convince rulers”. The Message has: “Patient persistence pierces through indifference; gentle speech breaks down rigid defences”. Both correct, I’m sure – but rather lacking the “smile” factor, don’t you think, a bit pedantic? (Often, in life in general, a bit of obvious nonsense causes us to think more deeply and so to appreciate the point a bit better: ask any good teacher.)

So I’m sure everyone reading this will have grasped the point of Proverbs 25:15 without needing to have it explained: if you need to persuade someone in authority, especially if they are cold and indifferent, it’s not a good idea to go in with all guns blazing – you’ll just put their backs up. Patiently and quietly making your point is much more likely to be effective.

But, given that most of us are (thankfully) not in the position of needing to persuade somebody in authority, it’s perfectly sensible of us to ask how else we might apply what the writer is getting at. I can think of various different applications…

First, it raises a whole cluster of questions about how we use our tongues.

Do we, when disagreement rears its head, rely on quiet, reasoned argument, or do we resort to anger, bluster, sarcasm? I knew a man once - a pastor, no less - who was capable of reducing people to tears just by the way he talked. Who of us (myself certainly included) can claim never to have caused hurt and pain to others, just determined to “win the argument”? Proverbs 15:1 offers us a companion verse to the one we’re focussed on: “A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger”.

Let’s remember that when the authorities were abusing Jesus, telling lies about him and pouring out their bile on him, he “remained silent” (Matthew 26:63). Can you picture that? What calm! what beautiful dignity! And let’s not forget the advice given by James in James 3:1-12, where he describes the tongue as “a fire, a world of evil… a restless evil, full of deadly poison”, coming straight from hell. From childhood days I remember a rhyme we used to chant when our “enemies” insulted us: “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me”. I early learned that there was just one thing wrong with that: it simply wasn’t true; unkind words can cut deep and cruel.

A question, therefore, for each of us to ask ourselves: Am I in control of my tongue?

Second, there is a particular application of Proverbs 25:15 in our world of near instant but distant communication.

How easy it is vent our poison by ugly, stupid comments under the cloak of anonymity. Let me be personal for a moment. A particular weakness of mine is to run short of patience more easily when I can’t see the other person’s face. I may just be on the end of a telephone queue, and I suddenly find myself talking to a live human being. Because I can’t see them, nor they me, it’s easy for the normal courtesies of life to go right out of the window. Little do I think of that unknown stranger going home at the end of their day drained and exhausted from having to be polite to unseen people like me.

The internet and all the other ways of “speaking” instantly and anonymously is, no doubt, often a wonderful thing. Most of us are deeply grateful for it, and can think of situations where it has saved us from some kind of disaster. But it can also be a horrible poison, spewing out lies and vitriol quicker than used to be imaginable. We are regularly reminded of the way things are available to quite young children that can only do damage which it’s impossible to measure. In all our communications with others it’s our business, especially if we claim to be Christians, to observe three golden rules (as taught to me as a small boy): “Before speaking, ask yourself three questions about what you are intending to say: Is it true? Is it kind? Is it necessary?” If it isn’t all three, then it’s best to keep our mouths firmly shut, our text message unwritten.

There are a couple of other things which Proverbs 25:15 put into my mind, but I’ve run out of space. I hope you might join me next time. But at the very least I hope my reflections today will do us good in reminding us that the tongue is a frighteningly powerful instrument – for good or ill.

Heavenly Father, please keep me always mindful that my words, spoken and written, can do good or ill way beyond anything I can imagine. Amen.

Taste and see...

Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the one who takes refuge in him. Psalm 34:8

Only once have I ever eaten oysters. It was in my student days, and I was hitch-hiking in France. The person who picked me up was friendly and generous, and he insisted that I must sample this famous delicacy. Well, I can’t pretend I particularly enjoyed it – I ended up thinking, “No, not really my thing, thanks very much”. But I was glad I’d given it a try; a box ticked, so to speak.

Taste is a vital human sense, and enormously varied. There’s sweet and there’s sour, there’s mustard and there’s honey, there’s salt and there’s sugar, and there’s a million variations in between. How infinite is God’s creativity!

No wonder meals figure so prominently in the Bible, including the sacred ones we call “communion” or “the eucharist” or “the Lord’s Supper”, where Christians remember the meaning of Jesus’ death for his people. He also made a point of sharing meals with the poor and those who might be despised by more “respectable” people. The fact is that people - whether family, friends or strangers - grouped around a table and sharing a meal (however basic and ordinary) is a beautiful symbol of human togetherness.

Psalm 34, one of the most glowingly reassuring in the whole book, starts as a testimony psalm. The writer (David, according to tradition) has come through a desperate time, but is able to testify that “I sought the Lord, and he answered me; he delivered me from all my fears” (verse 4). That’s wonderful to know. But for me, the psalm reaches its climax in verse 8, which is essentially an invitation: he encourages his readers to “taste and see that the Lord is good”.

The most vital truth conveyed by that invitation is that God is a God to be experienced, not simply believed in.

The question arises: what does it mean to “taste and see that the Lord is good”? The psalmist is urging his readers to do something, but what might that something be? I ask because there could be people reading this blog for whom this is the most urgent question you need to face up to. You feel an inner emptiness; you know that there is something missing at the very core of your life. You may be “religious” in the conventional sense of that word – you may go regularly to church and even pray – but it doesn’t yield any kind of satisfaction.

That’s very different from the psalmist. He starts his psalm revelling in the reality of God. Just look at some of the verbs he uses in the first few verses: he “extols” God, he “praises” him, he “glories” in him, he wants to “exalt his name together with” his readers (good things are always worth sharing, aren’t they?). Do you find yourself envying the joy, peace and fulfilment that such words conjure up; do you feel yourself shut out from something very precious?

What then must you do? Well, let’s look at one or two other words which he uses to describe his own experience…

First, he sought the Lord (verse 4).

That means he looked for God with serious intent. It wasn’t a case of vaguely thinking: “I really must get to grips with this God business when I’ve got a bit more time…” No, it had risen to the top of his priorities. This will certainly have involved heart-felt prayer, prayer that welled up from the depths of his heart.

We sometimes say of somebody that they “mean business” about something they’re focussed on, they’re “not messing”. Are any of us, if we’re truly honest, really not serious? It’s a foolish and dangerous thing to mess with God.

Second, he called (verse 6) or cried out (verse 17). That makes me think of somebody in danger of drowning or threatened by a violent attack. For many of us, the thought of literally shouting out to God seems alien; it just isn’t something we do in our culture (and we may even be guilty of looking down on those who do). But then many of us have never been in literal fear of our lives.

Third, he came with deep humility. He describes himself rather pathetically as this poor man (verse 6), aware that he has no claims on God’s mercy but is in the position of a beggar. But isn’t that true, ultimately, of all of us? Our very lives are given to us by God, and he has power to withdraw life as and when he chooses.

All this means that the psalmist has found himself forced to get to grips with the deepest realities of life – something that many of us are very reluctant to do, turning a blind eye in the forlorn hope that they might just somehow “go away “ (they won’t).

There is so much we can learn from this psalmist. Of course, he was writing many years before the coming of Christ, whereas we are privileged and fortunate to know the full story of which he knew only the first part in prophetic glimpses; we know about Christ’s birth, life, death and rising again. Putting our faith in him is the biggest turning-point in our lives; it changes everything and makes us fit for a whole new world. That doesn’t mean all will immediately be easy and comfortable. But it does mean that a day will come when even our poor, pathetic faces will be “radiant” (verse 5).

So… “Taste and see that the Lord is good”. Is it time you took advantage of that loving invitation?

Father, I have known about you most of my life, but I realise that I have never actually come to know you personally. Please receive me now as I cry out to you with serious and determined intent, putting my trust in Jesus; may I indeed taste and see that you are good. Amen.

When the church becomes a clique

“Teacher”, said John, “we saw someone driving out demons in your name, and we told him to stop, because he was not one of us”. “Do not stop him,” Jesus said. “For no one who does a miracle in my name can in the next moment say anything bad about me, for whoever is not against us is for us. Truly I tell you, anyone who gives you a cup of water in my name because you belong to the Messiah will certainly not lose their reward”. Mark 9:39-41

It was the annual harvest festival service in the village chapel, and the place was packed. Bill, who had been a church member for longer than anyone could remember, stood watching the congregation as they got ready to leave. Mary noticed him taking it all in and said, “Ay, Bill, it’s good to see the place full, isn’t it?” Bill slightly shook his head and said, “Ay, I suppose so. But I must admit I prefer it when it’s just us”.

I prefer it when it’s just us… Sad, sad words! I can’t vouch for the truth of that story, but, however sad, I fear it could well be true. For we Christians can be terribly possessive and mean-spirited when it comes to our attitude to Jesus and the outside world. He’s our Jesus! he belongs to us! – and we turn the church, or our little bit of it, into a kind of holy club, an in-crowd, the only one which has everything right.

Jesus’ first disciples showed exactly the same kind of mentality. They happened across a man who was “driving out demons”. Well, that wasn’t all that unusual in the world of that time: wandering preachers, miracle-workers and exorcists were a regular sight, using a variety of methods and wordings. Perhaps the disciples just shrugged their shoulders and heaved a sigh.

But as they got closer their ears perked up – Hey! The name this man was using to drive out demons was that of Jesus – their Jesus! How dare he? This must be stopped! And so: “we told him to stop, because he was not one of us”.

Did he stop? Mark doesn’t tell us, nor Luke in his parallel passage (9:49-50). But it seems that the incident rattled the disciples enough for them to report it back to Jesus, perhaps with a misplaced pride in their loyalty to him, or just genuine puzzlement.

What does Jesus do? Simple: he tells them they got this wrong: “Do not stop him… for whoever is not against us is for us…”

“Whoever is not against us is for us”. Is that statement one that some of us have never really taken seriously? Are we too quick to dismiss people who, even though they may call themselves Christians, don’t for some reason identify with us? People, perhaps, who sing different hymns and songs? Who use a different Bible translation? Whose style of prayer or worship is different from what we’re used to? Who belong to a different denomination or movement? Who hold some item of doctrine that we believe is mistaken? – regarding the person and working of the Holy Spirit, perhaps? or the authority of scripture? or the truth of creation? or the right system of church government?

We know nothing about that man (“the strange exorcist”, the scholars call him) who the disciples felt needed to be put right. But we can imagine…

Suppose he had stood one day in the large crowd that came to listen to Jesus? Suppose he had been gripped by this new prophet’s electrifying words and wonderful deeds? Suppose his heart had been set on fire? Suppose he knew that his life could never be the same again? Suppose that, in a rush of enthusiasm, he had started telling everybody he met what had happened to him? Suppose that, having witnessed an act of “exorcism” – Jesus expelling demons from somebody – he had taken it upon himself to attempt the same thing in Jesus’ name?

What then? All right, that’s purely speculation, but it’s perfectly possible. Whatever, the fact is that Jesus (who at that point will not have known the truth about the man) spoke those words of loving rebuke: “Do not stop him… Whoever is not against us if for us”. And the question arises: is Jesus directing the same words to us? to me? But we’re just not hearing?

Of course, we need to take care. There is no shortage of false teachers, of would-be miracle-mongers, even exorcists, around today, just as in Jesus’ day. Religious charlatans abound! Jesus warned his disciples about them (eg Matthew 7:15-23), as did John (probably the very same John as the one who figures in this story: eg 1 John 2:18-27). We need to be discerning; truth matters. Indeed, according to Matthew 12:30, Jesus himself, in very different circumstances, made a statement to his disciples which on the surface directly contradicts what he says here: “Whoever is not with me is against me”. (You don’t have to think very hard, taking note of the context in which he was speaking, to see that there is no contradiction at all.)

Here are a couple of passages in Acts which, I think, throw light on all this. First, Acts18:24-26, where Priscilla and Aquila show how the disciples might have treated the strange exorcist more graciously and more humbly than they did: “Come and have a meal with us; there are a few things we would love to share with you…”

And then Acts 19:13-16, the dramatic episode of “the seven sons of Sceva” who “went around driving out evil spirits” and who “tried to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus…” Well, they tried, but thy didn’t get very far! In fact, they got far more than they bargained for – and it wasn’t nice…

Was this God’s way of urging his followers to relax, as if to say, “If somebody chooses to try and exploit my Son’s name, just leave it to me to sort them out. Your interference may be well-meaning, but I can do whatever’s necessary, thank you very much”.

Christian, be discerning, yes, of course; but be generous, be welcoming, be affirming too; not mean-minded, arrogant, not too sure of yourself…

Father, thank you for the open and generous heart of Jesus, happy to think the best and not the worst of outsiders. Give me such a heart, as well as a discerning and understanding mind. Amen.