Prodigal Hearts

When I asked God this morning, in accordance with Pete Grieg's request on my daily prayer app, for a verse or a story to take with me into 2020, the impression I immediately got was of the parable of the prodigal son. I've not had time to reflect much on it yet, but I wanted to get a few thoughts down as soon as I could, if nothing other than to serve as a reminder or pointer to this story. Something that has been highlighted for me quite a bit recently is just how deep my feelings of abandonment and rejection go. I have carried, and have a propensity for carrying, what John Eldridge would call 'an orphan spirit'.

The story of 'The Prodigal' (although it is actually a story of three characters) contains two approaches to sonship. Before God gave me the story of the prodigal, in my end of year reflections, as disciplines he brought to mind feasting and fasting. Of course within the discipline of feasting is the notion of celebration, which is where the two are tied together and how God bought confirmation to me. I had thought briefly about the need to celebrate more, and then the thought of the celebration at the prodigals return came to me, which took me immediately to the older brother. Just moments before I had been being resentful (If I'm honest) about how under appreciated I have felt in certain aspects of my Christian service. The tragedy of the older brother is that he holds an orphaned spirit although he is in the closest proximity to the father. He is, as the song has it, 'standing knee deep in a river and dying of thirst'.

I fear, at my worst I am the older brother.

And how much better to be the prodigal?

The prodigal is all feasting whilst the older brother is all fasting.

There is much merit in the duty of the older brother, but never without Joy. There is no pleasure in that, for us or for our father.

You are always with me, he tells the older brother, and everything I have is yours. How can we live in that and have no joy?

The challenge, dear son, should you chose to accept it, is to live in the light of that. To celebrate his presence and abundance in all things. To learn to fast and to feast as a loved son.

Yes please.

Thank you Father.

The beginning (1 John 1:1)

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life.

 

I want you to notice that the one who writes this is a man intimately acquainted with your saviour.

Matthew, when you read this, these very words, you are only one step removed from Jesus himself. This man touched Jesus, reclined against him, spoke to him, laughed with him. he gazed in awe as his master healed blind men and lepers. When Jesus cooked on the beach after the resurrection, this man smelt and tasted the fish. He is the man to whom your Lord entrusted the care of his very own mother. This man is someone who was not only in 'The twelve' but was in 'The three' and describes himself as 'The one Jesus loved'. Only one step removed from Jesus himself! How amazing is that? This man is someone you want to listen to, Matthew.

 

And look how convinced John is! This man he hung out with must have been something special. I know you know that, but stop looking through your Christian-eyes, Matthew. Think what that would have been like for a devout Jew like John. What would it take to convince him that this flesh and blood, meat and two veg human that he spent these years with, was the eternal word, pre-existent before creation, giving life to all? When did he realise? Was it only once he had risen from the dead? Think about that. How phenomenal would that have been. The realisation that not only was this a Holy prophet, but that he was God the son, the incarnate one. And he, John, had lived with him for three years, and seen some mind-blowing stuff.

 

This Jesus was from the beginning. As John states in his gospel, he was with God and he was God. Woah. That gives you chills.

I think Matthew you are going to have to listen to what this man has got to say.  Don't skip through it like you usually do. Don't just use it to get affirmation on social media. Linger with this a while. Spend some time in the company of the words of the man who was the disciple Jesus loved. Put your ear to his lips, because those lips proclaim the words his own ears heard from Jesus' lips. And you love him, Matthew. He is the one you love and his words are life.

 

Now settle in. What does John proclaim concerning him?

 

In Quietness and Confidence (a Eulogy)

This morning at 04:00 a man called Ted Ripley passed from death into life.

Ted, I believe, was 90 years old and he'd been ill for the last few weeks with a lung disease.

I shouldn't be shocked. He was of what we often call 'a ripe old age', and although we were warned during the weekend, that he would probably not make it much further, ( I was at least a little mentally prepared) it has come as a real surprise at what an emotional impact it has had, and it came up on me sideways.

Imagine you live next to a mountain and when you moved to that area it was a thing of great spectacle. You would often just sit in your garden and look up at what the hymnist refers to as 'lofty grandeur'. You would just drink in the majesty and the beauty of how it off set every weather type, the sun picking out its peaks in the morning, whilst your garden is still in darkness. The way clouds would roll over it, the seasonal change in its greenery, from green to yellow to brown and then almost grey, and the snow capped peaks in some winter weeks, and the way the sun would set behind it every night and etch its silhouette onto your retina by giving it a golden halo.

But human nature being such that although you would always appreciate its beauty and majesty after a decade or so it wouldn't quite take your breath away like it used to. Your appreciation if anything is enhanced but the impact is lost. It is just there. It is always there. You will be long gone into your retirement home and it will be just the same, and it will continue to be the same after you have slept the final sleep.

Now imagine you come out one morning and that mountain is gone.

That is how I feel about Ted. He was always there. He looked the same. He never changed. He wasn't ill. He showed up and he kept showing up. And I never imagined my life without him in it. When I lived in Brighton I felt the same about the sea. When I moved I went to visit it every week. After 5 years that had changed. It was for the most part, enough to know it was there and smile when I occasionally passed it. It orientated me. I knew where it was and where everything was in relation to it.

Now if Ted was a mountain, perhaps he wasn't a particularly spectacular one at fist glance. He was not given to flashness, he didn't dominate conversations or dazzle you with his humour and he didn't suck up the limelight. Ted was dependable, faithful and yes, understated. But don't think for a second this undermines his mountain status. Mountains are built on something. It is their substance rather than their outline that make them count. And so often the best treasures are within the mountain, waiting to be mined.

Anyone who knew Ted will know of his phenomenal commitment to prayer. Ted was faithful. Ted had time for everyone. He was patient and considered, and had a lot of wisdom. He will be deeply missed.

The fellowship I grew up in (and returned to) started at the same time I did. My dad tells me that one of the formative moments in recognising that they were effectively a church (after having left the Baptist church) was during a gathering for prayer at the time of my traumatic birth. I don't know if Ted was at that meeting but as a founder member of our church I think it is very likely that he would have been. About 99% I'd say, like it was about a 99% chance of him being at any church prayer meeting you might deem to turn up to. (Some poetic licence here).

He was there at the beginning and, now I am here at the end of his earthly life, I want to say his faithful, gentle, unobtrusive mountainous presence was something , like the man himself, I never expected to not be there. And we all who knew him are bereft at its absence.

And I have a theory. We honour great speakers and charismatic leaders. We honour bombastic people and successful people, but God honours the faithful. He will not say "Well done good and successful servant". It is the prayer sayers and the tea makers, and the chair stackers that will receive his reward. I know faithfulness has its more glamorous sides but it is the humble who God exalts, not the proud.

1 john 3:2 says 'What we will be has not yet been made known' (But when Jesus appears we shall be like him). and we are told in Romans 8:19 that creation itself  'waits eagerly for the children of God to be revealed'.

 I think when Teds true nature is revealed it will be a thing to behold. That those less showy characteristics of his (which still spoke volumes in their own way) will be shown to have a spiritual glory that is beautiful and breath-taking in the extreme. And all the glory for it will go to God, and that will please Ted no end.

I honestly think there will be platform speakers who would be waiting in line for an audience with Ted. Those who do their deeds to be honoured by others will have already received their reward in that end, but those who seek to honour God have a reward to come which must surpass all the praise of men.

I suppose in the end I am guilty of treating Ted a little like I treated the sea whilst living in Brighton. He was like the Mountain whose presence we come to take for granted, but what I am trying to say is that God sees everything and he sees it as it is. Within our faith community Ted was still held in honour and the sadness and grief at his parting will speak volumes in the coming weeks, I am certain. But the true depth of what made him so sturdy, I believe, are only seen by God and will be truly honoured by him and I believe in our earthly state we would be surprised to see it's depths and heights. Don't get me wrong, Ted was just a down to earth 'normal' guy. But that's just the point.

Ted we are grateful to have walked with you. We salute you. We stand on your shoulders.
Thank you for all your faithfulness. Thank you for all your prayers. Thank you for your example.
You once directed me to a book called 'Finishing Strong', saying it had spoken deeply to you. I think you finished strong. And you will go on from strength to strength.

Until we meet in glory.


 "In returning and rest shall ye be saved; in quietness and in confidence shall be your strength"

And The Gate Is Narrow

Some of my readers may be aware that the title of my blog ' Truth Is An Arrow' (that I have written under until now) was taken from the Bob Dylan Song "When He Returns". In the song he sings the line 'truth is an arrow and the gate is narrow, that it passes through'. It resonated with me enough to choose the first half of the line as the erstwhile title of my blog since it's conception. Truth being about uncompromising precision hitting a hard target. It just so happened that I was listening to my copy of 'Slow Train Coming' at the time of setting up my blog page.

I believe the width of the gate in the closing track of that album is an allusion to Jesus' words which can be found in Matthew's gospel (7:13-14) and again in Luke 13:24, where Jesus urges us to take, or to enter through the narrow gate.

"Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction and many enter though it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it."

I'd love to write about these verses and tell you about some amazing insights I've had and blow you all away(hopefully) with my profundity, but I can't.

It's pretty basic really. I have no amazing insights.

Instead I stand at the narrow gate that is a way onto the narrow road, the difficult road (as the NKJV has it), and I know it leads to life, but I can't even see the path properly from here, and I can only imagine what that life that it leads to might look like.

And this narrow gate is always the way back onto this road. It is the gate I started through at the age of 6, when I said a prayer at 'Uncle' Andrew's invitation at Dales bible week, and it is the gate I return to at the age of 46, and it is very familiar. It is a gate I have used so many times over the years and through the miles, after hopping the fence for that wide and easy road and having found that the destruction it leads me to might have started out sweet but is now sickly with a bitter aftertaste.

 It is the gate my parents called to me from, to come and join them on the narrow way, way before 'Uncle Andrew' invited me, and many times after. It was a gate marked out by my heavenly Father as my destiny before even the world was formed. And the difficult road, no matter how far it travels never leaves sight of the gate. It is the gate that will close behind me at the end of the age, the door on which some will bang and beg for an opening, but once shut it will be shut forever.

I am finding this fundamental to the pattern of discipleship to which I am called. You see, wherever a choice to return to the road is hard, wherever it is the narrow gate and not the broad road, there is an opportunity for renewal and transformation. These opportunities, so often in the form of repentance (a word which has the image of an about face change of direction embedded in it's meaning), they prove to be a portal into the life God has for you. But from the outside the perception is that this choice is hard and difficult. Well maybe, but Jesus tells us, It leads to life.

The broad road is inviting, in contrast to the narrow gate which seems foreboding and uninviting. We know the price for entry into the narrow gate will be a hard slog. Jesus does nothing to sugar-coat it. it is the narrow way. The difficult path. In contrast the broad road has broad appeal, the appearance of ease, however: it leads to destruction.
Many walk that way.

Not so the narrow way.

It is the road less travelled.

Few find it.

Those that do find it, however, walk that way, and they are led to life. Dare I venture, life in abundance.

And we see elsewhere in Jesus teaching that what we consider to be a hard yoke, turns out to be an easy one, and what seems to be a heavy burden, turns out to be a light one.

That's because that gate we enter through is Jesus himself. (I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved.~ John 10:9)

 And he is the road too.

We are, especially us evangelicals, very, very familiar with John 14:6. It is one of a handful of verses I could quote to you by being told the reference. Second or third place to John 3:16.

“I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me."

~John 14:6

 

 

We love to quote it to demonstrate (and rightly so) the exclusivity of Jesus, but we often forget the context in to which it was spoken. If I had quoted the whole verse it would have said 'Jesus said to him,“I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me."'

And who is he, the 'him' that Jesus delivered one of his best remembered lines to?

That's right. Good old 'Doubting' Thomas, without whom we may not have had these words, asking questions, as a doubter is want to do, but asking them in all honesty and sincerity, and getting the most direct answers as a result.

“Lord, we do not know where You are going, and how can we know the way?” which he said in response to Jesus' assertion  "And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. ⁴ You know the way to the place where I am going.”

-How can we know the way?
-I AM the way.
There is so much more to unpack here but I don't wish to go there right now.

Jesus is the way in and the way itself.

It is here that I return, again and again and again. That is why, after a hard season of losing my way, I have found myself back at this gate, wanting back in on the life it leads to.
I'm stood at the gate, handing over my entangling sins, my desires, my pretensions and all that is hindering. I need to make room for that easy yoke.

A sinner stood at the gate of the grace I never really left, and realising, it is really this simple. Lay it down and take up your cross once more.

Nothing in my hand I bring.
Simply to thy cross I cling.

And one foot in front of the other , once more.

My Song This Morning

To My Brothers and Sisters:

If I am killed
Will you please still sing
If I am butchered
Still bring your praise to the king
If I am blown up
Please make much of his name
If I should die during worship
If I am slain

Know that my death
Is not in vain
Know that God is still God
And Jesus still reigns
Know that death is still robbed
It's still lost it's sting
He is risen indeed
And our hope is in him

To our adversaries:

Know that while you still kill us
We will yet live
Know that while we forgive you
Only God can forgive
Know that there is still mercy
It's found in the name
Of this Jesus we worship
The one who once came
To die for your sin
And rose from the grave
And he alone is your hope
Only Jesus can Save.

Good Friday (Mark 15)

Good Friday (From Mark 15)

The Soldiers led him out, weary, whipped and bloodied from his beating, the mocking words of their taunt, as they struck the blindfolded man, still ringing in his ears.

“Prophecy who hit you!”

But Pontious Pilates attempt to placate the crowd had failed. He had crumbled to their demand to crucify a man he knew to be innocent and released instead a criminal held for murder and insurrection.

The basis for the charge bought against this Jesus? That he was a rabble rouser.

It now seemed like a joke that he had appeared such a threat to them just minutes ago. His thorny crown was jammed deep into the skin around his skull, slammed in by staff blows from the soldiers, the free flowing blood from his wounds already soaking through the clothes they had hastily thrown back upon him.

He cut a forlorn figure, as he staggered over to the cross that had been waiting for him his whole

life.

There he was forced to bear all the weight of it upon his back, the very thing that would soon bear all of his weight, as he bore the weight of the world, and he staggered and stumbled through the streets, where weeks ago crowds laid palm leaves at his feet, cheering then but, for the most part, jeering now.

Perhaps it was Jesus' sorry state that caused the soldiers to select Simon from the crowds (a man from the African city of Cyrene), on his way home to that place, and to compel him to carry the cross on behalf of the stumbling Messiah. He had just been passing and was in the wrong place at the wrong time, but they made him haul the cross, as the crowd followed, all the way to Golgotha, the place of the skull.

When they arrived at that place Jesus was offered wine mixed with myrrh, supposed to have a narcotic effect to dull the unimaginable pain that he was about to endure.

Jesus refused it.

Then they crucified him there, stretching out his limbs over the cross and hammering nails through his hands and feet as he was laid on top of it, and then hoisting the cross vertically until it violently dropped down, jolting into its slot, Jesus' body weight shifting with it. He was now hanging from those nails.

It was about nine o clock in the morning and the sun was gaining strength.

As he hung there the soldiers, in plain sight, cast lots for his clothes. Whatever their reasons for wanting them, the message was clear to all. He wouldn't be needing them again.

Above the head of the bloodied and stripped-down saviour was written the charge against him

“The King of the Jews”

They also crucified two rebels on either side of him. The people who passed hurled insults at him. They shook their heads in disdain and said,

‘So! You who are going to destroy the temple and build it in three days, come down from the cross and save yourself!’

and It wasn't just the crowds who mocked him. The chief priests and the teachers of the law wanted their chance too. Gleefully mocking him among themselves they said

‘He saved others,but he can’t save himself! Let this Messiah, this king of Israel, come down now from the cross, that we may see and believe.’

And to add even more insult to the indignity he was suffering, even those crucified with him initially began to join in with the insults against him.

After three hours, at mid-day, the Sun arriving at its zenith, a darkness came over the whole land for a further three more hours, and then Jesus in spite of his ordeal and the respiratory torture his body was under, cried out in a loud voice.

"Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?" (which means ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’)

Some people in the crowd mistakenly thought he was calling for the Prophet Elijah. One man hurried to the foot of the cross with a sponge that he had filled with sour wine, and hoisted it on a stick for Jesus to drink. The wine was offered as a thirst quenching drink, in an attempt to keep him conscious a little longer. Having refused the drugged wine earlier, this wine he took.

The man then revealed his motive when he then said,

“ Now leave him alone. Let’s see if Elijah comes to take him down,”

 

But Elijah did not come.

Instead, there was a loud cry.

They saw the silhouette of the suffering saviour bow his head. Jesus had breathed his last.

In the temple the curtain, at least 45 feet high and 4 inches thick, was torn in two, from top to bottom.

The Centurion who was stood in front of the cross, a veteran of many crucifixions, seeing how Jesus had died said,

“Surely this man was the Son of God!”

Please Please Me Now

Just a reflection on some quiet time revelation.

I find myself yearning again for transformation. This yearning that is the reason for my current series on renewal of the mind. BE TRANSFORMED by the renewing of the mind (Rom 12:2).

I suppose it was God that asked me, during some earnest prayer, why is it that I want this so much? Why is it that I am not satisfied without it? And the answer came to me that it is worthiness that I seek. And worth is very much at the heart of that word. My sense of worth cannot come (I speak as myself and not in the name of truth) from simple acceptance. I am not good enough and I want to earn it.

But the answer to this, as to everything, is in Jesus.

God made it very clear to me, and especially this morning, that I am acceptable in his sight because he looks on Jesus' worthiness and transfers it to my account. I am not only accepted through Jesus, but I am acceptable in him.

But my first gut response to this is far from holy. It is, I am ashamed to say, an affront to my pride. I find this so hard to accept. On paper, in theory, academically and intellectually I 'agree', I almost acquiesce to it, but when I view this in place of my personal sense of needing approval, it doesn't quite cut the mustard. There is something buried deep in me, possibly from childhood, that tells me it must be deserved. And God knows I don't deserve it.

There is this thing. This thing is in me that yearns for approval and recoils from disapproval. I honestly don't know which of those is more powerful in my life, but I guess they are two sides of the same coin.

I would describe myself largely as a people pleaser. Not a particularly effective one, but none the less it forms a large part of my motivation. As a result I often agree to things I shouldn't and shy away from fights I should have. It's a fear based way of being that only offers the fruit of destruction and ironically pleases very few people, myself included.

When I prayed this morning and God asked me about my motivation, my verbal response was, in essence, that I wanted to be pleasing to him.

And then The Holy Spirit and I began to unpack that a little. The result of which was that a subtle difference in motivation was highlighted which changes everything. I wanted to be pleasing to him, but I wasn't seeking his pleasure. I was seeking his approval. To be pleasing rather than to please.

He reminded me in his grace that I am approved of, in Christ, that his delight is in me, that he is rooting for me, willing for me to succeed, but it is not necessary for his approval. I already have that. He rejoices over me with singing.

What I do I should do for love and not for pay. The wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life. We don't work for wages, but our response is to be one of loving and life giving gratitude for the gift he has already bestowed on us. His pleasure should please us.

I am reminded of the Olympic runner Eric Liddell, about whom the film 'Chariots of Fire' was made. He said, of his sport, 'When I run I feel his pleasure'. In a kingdom sense, his pleasure should please us, and ours him. Which leads me, with synergy, back to Romans 12:2.

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will.

We should hear that. At least I certainly should. His perfect will is good and pleasing. That's good, pleasing and perfect to and for us by the way!

Jesus said,

 ‘Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.’~Matt 11:28-30

I believe now that pleasing him is an easy yoke, and a light burden. That doesn't mean it wont mean work, but you are assured of the Father that whatever you do from love of him will bring him pleasure, and, I suspect, it should bring you some too.

Renewing The Mind (Part three): Playing Catch-Up

I have recently bought a flat. I've only been in since December. A week or so after I moved in, the previous owners, who had just moved a few miles across to the other side of town, contacted me with a text to say that one of their cats had escaped from his confinement and 'could I let them know if he turned up at my flat'. He answers, they said, to the name of Marmite.

I had all but forgotten about their text when 2 months later the cat flap that I thought I had locked on arrival was batted open with a mighty thwack, at about 11pm and nearly caused me to have a heart attack. It was dark at the time and I didn't mange to identify the culprit. I think my scream had scared him off quite effectively. It was not even until the next day that I thought that it might have been 'Marmite'.

Over the next few days though, the culprit paid several more visits. Though he wouldn't let me near him I took a picture and sent a text to the previous owner:

It was indeed Marmite. They came round to look for him but he had disappeared.

Eventually, a day or so later, armed specially with ham and Chicken Dreamies, I managed to coax Marmite into my house where he duly freaked out and did a Tasmanian Devil impression. In the next hour while I waited for his owners to arrive (presumably with heavy duty gloves, Catch Pole and/or Tranquillisers) I saw a quiet and gradual meat induced transformation take place in Marmite's mood. By the time they arrived he was sitting on my lap and taking treats directly from my hand.

I was especially pleased about Marmite being reunited with his family not least because they had 2 little girls who had been very upset at his disappearance. I had even prayed about it on their behalf because I know how hard these early experiences of loss can hit kids. And after 2 months, through all the snow we had as well, his return really felt miraculous.


Marmite's address had changed. He just hadn't learnt that yet.

And I know how easy it is to forget your new address.

On the day I moved in, I drove to the estate agents to collect my keys, and then, on pure auto pilot, I started to drive back to my old house. My address had changed too, but I hadn't learnt that yet. Fortunately it didn't take me as long as it took Marmite!


This demonstrates to me so clearly the need for renewing of the mind.

Billy Graham used to love to use a quote that he adapted from  D. L. Moody:

Someday you will read or hear that Billy Graham is dead. Don’t you believe a word of it. I shall be more alive than I am now. I will just have changed my address. I will have gone into the presence of God.

And I love that quote too. But, you see, the reality is that, in a sense that we sometimes struggle to comprehend, this address change, in some senses, has already taken place:

Because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions-it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus~ Eph 2:4-6 

Paul is very aware that we seem to experience some cognitive dissonance on this front. So much so that He asks in his epistle to the Colossians, 'Since you died with Christ to the elemental spiritual forces of this world, why, as though you still belonged to the world, do you submit to its rules'. In other words 'why are you behaving as though you haven't died with Christ, as though you weren't raised with him?'

In an attempt to redress the balance he tells them in Chapter 3:

Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.  Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.  For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.  When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.~ Col 3:1-4

In other words, you are a citizen of heaven. You live there now! Get that into your head. Start thinking in a heavenly way and desiring heavenly things.

The rest of the chapter talks about what the outworking of that looks like.

The Cat when it is moved (and they don't naturally move) must have a period of confinement. It is an immersive treatment used to readjust their thinking about where their territory is. If this time doesn't take place they are prone to attempt to go back to their old abode. Sound familiar? It is, in a sense, a time for the cat's mind to be 'renewed'.

I don't know what your experience is, but the time when I first came to Christ was very similar to 'cat camp', in that I was immersed in scripture and teaching and church life. I was reshaping my thinking all over the place because so much of it conflicted with Christ. I think this time has set me in good stead. But it is not a complete work. Not yet.

We need to continually retrain our brains so we know where we live and who we are now. We are encouraged to delight in God's words and meditate on them day and night. Why? So we are immersed in the truth, and the truth sets us free. And so we do not forget, where we live, or who we are, or, more importantly, who HE is. We must understand these truths, that are objective and indisputable; that they are truth, but that our minds, just like Marmite's, need to play a little catch-up.

 

Renewing The Mind (Part Two) - Retrain Your Brain

Earlier this week I was listening to a cultural arts program on BBC Radio 4 where the theme was 'the purpose of controversial theatre'.

One of the guests, himself a producer of such plays, said that he saw the role of the theatre as the opposite to that of the church. In church, he said, you have come to have your beliefs reaffirmed, whereas a theatre was a place you go to have your assumed beliefs challenged.

It made me think. Is that really what church is like?

Perhaps this producer of plays needs his assumed beliefs about church to be challenged?

Now to be fair there is some part truth in what he says. I think some of the purpose of church gathering together is to affirm truth where we find it in the Word and reflected in each other. It also lets us know that we're not alone in our apparent lunacy.

But what seems to be neglected in this view is that we are also coming together to be challenged and changed under the truth of the word of God. There seems to be an assumption in the instruction to renew our minds that we will all have mindsets and approaches that are based not on the truth but on our own understanding of the world, wherever that has come from, inevitably tainted by sin.

We are told by Paul that

The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel that displays the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.~ 2 Cor 4:4

It would be foolish to assume that when we come to believe in Christ that all of our 'darkened thinking' is instantly changed into illuminated truth. The truth does set us free, but getting to grips with the truth (becoming free indeed) is often a process that takes time.
Sometimes the cell is unlocked, but we like to sit there a while before we get up and leave. And sometimes even prisons can make us feel secure in their familiarity. But the devil we know is surely not better than the God who beckons us to know him,  to receive new minds and hearts.

Part of the reason I believe Paul tells us not to give up meeting together is because we rely on one another for growth. And, when I say growth, that can often mean pruning. Firstly, to walk with other believers will almost definitely throw us against each other, causing us to have some rough edges knocked off (if we approach it with the a right heart). This is part of the process of iron sharpening iron (as the scripture has it). And so as well as being affirmed in the truth, we can also be challenged by our fellow believers. Sometimes by their understanding and sometimes by their behaviour. In both cases we should be rebounding from these encounters onto the Word of God, returning there to 'judge our hearts' and to receive instruction.

 For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. ¹³ Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.~Heb 4:12-13

We come to church not just for the fellowship and worship, but also to sit under the word. For those not versed in the jargon, that means to listen to the preaching and to submit ourselves to the authority of the words of God found in the scriptures. This is why it is so integral to attend a church where the preaching is based on and bedded in the bible.

The word of God is called 'The Sword of the Spirit' in Ephesians 6, the famous passage on the armour of God. The Sword of the Spirit seems to me to have two implied meanings. Firstly that it is our Sword for fighting the enemy with, (and it is a spiritual weapon).

But the other meaning of that title is that it is the sword belonging to The Spirit. In other words the Word of God is the sword that the Holy Spirit himself wields as a weapon. He also uses it for surgery, as we have seen in the Hebrews text. Penetrating and dividing soul and spirit, judging our hearts.

If the Word is preached faithfully then metaphorically the carpets of our churches (If you attend a church whose building has them) should resemble the floor of a butchers, or a surgeons bin. As God dissects our hearts and reconstructs them closer to his own.

My First point is this, that renewing of minds must take place in the context of Jesus centred community.
The kind of growth that takes place without accountability and encouragement is largely not the growth that the gospel gives. Your first step to a renewed mind, once you have believed in the Lord Jesus and repented of your sins, is to get yourself planted in a bible believing, Jesus centred, loving community. If you have these three elements you cant go far wrong. But you need them all (and they are all intrinsic to each other).

And come humbly to learn and to unlearn, and ask God to show you where your thinking needs to change.

Free your mind and your behind will hopefully follow.

 

 

 

Renewing The Mind (Part One) - Do Something.

I have been thinking a lot about transformation recently, and how it is achieved.

A few years ago I was talking to another Christian, then in his 80s about sanctification; the on-going process of becoming more holy. Scripture seeming to suggest that we would go 'from glory to glory'. Myself then approaching 40 (or possibly having not long reached it) I was beginning to despair of ever seeing any of the transformation that I had sincerely expected to see in my Christian walk back when I was in my early 20's.

I asked this gentleman, a man I had long looked up to because of his commitment and devotion and general apparent Godliness, what his experience of sanctification was in his 80s, hoping to hear that it does indeed get better!

His answer quite staggered me. (Though it really shouldn't have).

He said, 'To be honest, I've completely given up'.

I felt a little winded by that, I have to say. But by my own experience and lack of progress in this area, I can see why at his age he had probably abandoned hope of being changed from glory to glory, until he was actually IN GLORY.

I can tell you that the brother in question, a little while after this did actually experience some major renewal, and that gave me hope again but I never forgot how flat that conversation left me.

But I have to say that my hope of sanctification was really no hope. Because without meaning to, it was really based on the premise that I didn't have to work at it. I just sort of expected God to change me.

He certainly has changed me but I am coming to believe that he has put much of the agency for that change in my own hands.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm a good reformed boy and I certainly do not believe in a sanctification by works but I am coming to believe that, as he allows us and draws us by his grace, he is calling us  to partner with him in our transformation. Why else all that instruction about sowing to the Spirit there in Galatians?

What we sow, we reap. If I sow only to the sinful nature I reap from that nature destruction....but if I sow to the Spirit, I will reap the fruit of the Spirit; Love, joy peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control.

Now to take you to the verse that is the starting point for this series. Romans 12:1-2

Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God – this is your true and proper worship. ² Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is – his good, pleasing and perfect will.

There are two instructions. A negative and a positive.

1. Do Not Conform

The default setting is conformity, whether we like it or not. If we conform and go along unquestioningly with the crowd, following this world and it's aspirations and philosophies and indulgent life style, transformation for us is never-never land. It's pie in the sky when you die. But you'll never become what God has called you to be here and now. It counteracts our very own prayers when we ask God 'your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is heaven'. We shouldn't just pray that and then act as if we didn't belong to him. If you conform you die. Because you are sowing to the sinful nature that loves an easy life and avoids challenge at all costs. And you will reap from that nature destruction. I know because I am largely describing myself.

2. Be Transformed.

There is an implicit understanding that you are the curator of your own transformation here, as you join with the Holy Spirit (sowing into what he is doing in and around and through you. And as a result he brings about fruit in your life. How can we be commanded to be transformed if it was not possible to do so. And even better than that, he tells us how. By the renewing of your mind.

In this series I want to explore what it means for us to renew our minds, and to have renewed minds. But I think we can be hugely encouraged that there is something we can do about it. It's tough and it's going to take a lot of work and a certain amount of discipline (and no discipline is pleasant at the time but later on, if learnt from, produces a harvest of righteousness for those who have been trained by it) but we can do it with the help and the grace of God.