Persistent Realism and Profound Hope

The fact that the Psalms never clearly report a change in external circumstances is one mark of the Bible’s persistent realism. Prayer is not always answered in the terms we expect and long for; the answer may be given in a way that is not even perceptible to someone looking at the situation from the outside. God answered intense prayers for my friend Marty’s healing as she was dying from a brain tumour. During the fifteen months following the operation that confirmed her diagnosis, she was steadily and at last fully healed from a lifelong sickness of sadness. It was a time of growing joy and freedom, a period punctuated by laughter as well as tears, as Marty gradually shed the crippling anxiety she had known for a lifetime. She died on Holy Saturday, and she died confident that she had been delivered.

(Ellen F. Davis, Getting Involved with God)

The God of All Grace (Joy in the Journey)

The pandemic and its fallout are far from over. There is much we have yet to experience. ‘Long-Covid’ will perhaps come to describe not just the ongoing impact of the virus that many suffer from but the multiple effects of all that has happened. We are not at the end, yet.

Peter’s words from the close of his first letter are perfectly suited to where we find ourselves:

“And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. To him be the power for ever and ever. Amen.” (1 Peter 5:10,11)

He is so conscious that those he writes to are “suffering grief in all sorts of trials” (1:6). It’s clear that he feels deeply for them and is doing all he can to help them by what he writes. They stand in great need of all that the Lord can supply to simply keep putting one foot in front of the other. Life is more than tough for them. Each day is a challenge.

Which makes his closing statement so full of the encouragement they need. The one in whose hands their lives are held is “the God of all grace”. There are no limitations with him. His is not help that is limited to those who will help themselves. This is free favour, a divine gift, not conditioned by merit or distinction. All grace - sufficient for our every need, even in the teeth of a pandemic and the ongoing struggle to live wisely and faithfully in a flaccid world.

The presence of God to sustain through present trials is underscored by Peter’s undimmed hope that after “a little while” the Lord will himself restore them, making them to be strong, firm and steadfast. There is an end to their struggles. They won’t be perpetual. They can have a hope for the future that sees them as living vibrant lives of sustained discipleship.

However, that end-point isn’t necessarily just around the corner in their earthly existence. It may well be, of course, and who wouldn’t want for that to be so? But it’s also possible that Peter’s words are intended to turn their eyes to the larger future, the longer days of unbroken fellowship with the Lord in glory.

Peter’s “little while” is then parallel with Paul’s “momentary troubles” (2 Cor. 4:17). Neither apostle is in denial about the struggles and pains of this life but, rather, they see them in truer and fuller perspective, in the light that breaks even now from heaven’s shore.

The consolation ends with Peter acclaiming, “To him be the power”. Peter is acutely aware that he is writing to those who are socially and economically powerless, at the mercy of political forces beyond their reach. And so he reminds them that it is, in truth, God, the God of all grace - their God - who genuinely has power. Power to act for their good and power to make good on all his promises.

We can trust our every day and our ultimate destiny to him.

************

When I survey life's varied scene

Amid the darkest hours,

Sweet rays of comfort shine between,

And thorns are mixed with flowers.

Lord, teach me to adore the hand

Whence all my comforts flow,

And let me in this desert land

A glimpse of Canaan know.

And O, whate'er of earthly bliss

Thy sovereign will denies,

Accepted at Thy throne of grace

Let this petition rise:

Give me a calm, a thankful heart,

From every murmur free;

The blessings of Thy grace impart,

And let me live to Thee.

Let the sweet hope that Thou art mine

My path of life attend,

Thy presence through my journey shine,

And crown my journey's end.

(Anne Steele, 1717-78)

Without wonder

Without wonder, we approach spiritual formation as a self-help project. We employ techniques. We analyse gifts and potentialities. We set goals, We assess progress. Spiritual formation is reduced to cosmetics.

Without wonder, the motivational energies in spiritual formation get dominated by anxiety and guilt. Anxiety and guilt restrict; they close us in on ourselves. They isolate us with feelings of inadequacy and unworthiness; they reduce us to ourselves at our worst. Spiritual formation is distorted into moral workaholism or pious athleticism.

(Eugene Peterson, Living the Resurrection, p.30f)

Submit to God; resist the devil (Joy in the Journey 100)

The letter of James is chock-full of practical, wise advice and instruction. It looks at life under the sun, with all its challenges and perils, and diagnoses gospel-based remedies for its ailments. He speaks plainly, insistently. It’s hard not to be humbled by his words.

In chapter 4, verse 7 there’s something of a summation of what he’s been saying: Submit to God; resist the devil. Both are essential and ultimately indivisible.

Submit to God - to his wisdom, to his loving ordering of all your days and his unbreakable commitment to your final salvation. He is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and will not revoke the promised rescue his Son secured on the cross. We submit to him by taking our struggle with sin seriously, confessing our faults and humbly asking the Lord to renew us in the strength of his grace. We surrender to his love.

As we do so, says James, as we come near to him - into the light of his presence - he will come near to us. Wonderful assurance! We are not rejected on account of our fallibilities, we are not despised because of our ongoing falls. If we humble ourselves before him, owning our all-too-frequent bouts of self-reliance, “he will lift you up.”

While we submit ourselves to God, we resist the devil. That might conjure up all manner of exotic ideas that easily morph into something bizarre. But James’ meaning is as clear as the rest of scripture: resist him by continuing to put God’s Word into practice. Not just listening to it but doing what it says. Keeping a tight rein on your tongue, caring for the vulnerable, being thankful for all God’s good gifts, putting pride to death, worshipping the living God. Resist him by a faith that shows itself to be alive through the deeds it performs.

James’ straightforward comment is that if you resist him in this way “he will flee from you.” Because your life is being lived in the presence of God, in fellowship with him, sweetened by his joy and sustained by his grace. The devil has little hope of influencing those of whom this is true.

Submit to God and he will come near; resist the devil and he will flee. James has stated his case, succinctly and memorably.

And in the maelstrom of the days we're living through, both within the pandemic and beyond it, we need such clarity and conviction. We are saved entirely by the grace of God, through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And when we find ourselves up to our necks in the waters of trial, “he gives us more grace”. We are not left to battle through on our own, even when we're the ones who have put ourselves in harm's way. The Lord himself is our helper - always was and always will be. 

We need to be patient, like the farmer who has sown his crops. The harvest will come. We need to put aside grumbling against each other; none of us are without fault. We need to persevere, learning from the example of Job, confident of what the Lord will finally bring about. Remember, says James, he "is full of compassion and mercy". (James 5:7-11)

In all this we are submitting ourselves to the Father of our spirits and will live. We are resisting the malign temptations of the devil to forsake faith in Christ, to kick over the traces of a life set on perfecting holiness in the fear of God. We are being held by hands of healing, having been washed in the pure waters of sacrificial love.

************

God is my strong salvation;

What foe have I to fear?

In darkness and temptation

My light, my help is near.

Though hosts encamp around me,

Firm to the fight I stand;

What terror can confound me,

With God at my right hand?

Place on the Lord reliance;

My soul, with courage wait;

His truth be thine affiance,

When faint and desolate.

His might thine heart shall strengthen,

His love thy joy increase;

Mercy thy days shall lengthen;

The Lord will give thee peace.

(James Montgomery, 1771-1864)

Afraid of Easter?

Noticing that the word fear is used in Matthew 28 to describe both the reaction of the guards at Jesus' tomb (v.4) and the women who had seen the angel and received the news of their Lord's resurrection (v.8), Eugene Peterson comments that

it's not the same thing. There is a fear that incapacitates us for dealing with God, and there is a fear that pulls us out of our preoccupation with ourselves, our feelings, or our circumstances into a world of wonder. It pulls us out of ourselves into the very action of God.

(Living the Resurrection, p.17)

The songs that probably made me

In the early months of being a Christian, now some 38 years ago, 2 albums provided wonderful company and comfort to me. They were probably formative in ways I didn't recognize at the time - Jim Reeves' We Thank Thee (sadly absent from Spotify) and Make A Joyful Noise Unto The Lord by the incomparable Mahalia Jackson.

I listen to them, now and again, and have the most wonderful memories stirred. Lonely evenings in a Doncaster bedsit illuminated by joyous, defiant faith (Mahalia) and the calm, measured tones of straightforward truth, even when it veers towards cliché (Jim).

A whole new world was opening before me and these albums helped me begin to see some of its contours through the mist.

Enriching the Earth

In his poem, Enriching The Earth, Wendell Berry speaks of his own life's labours as renewing the soil by planting and plowing and stirring back the land's produce, his aim being to mend the earth and increase its fruitfulness. Eventually, his own lifeless body will be offered back into the earth, too, having slowly fallen "into the fund of things".

Pastoral ministry has many similarities, entirely to be expected. The seed-planting, the plowing, the offering back, all with the hope of seeing the yield - the harvest of righteousness - increase and lives mended. With Berry, there is a proper sense of not really knowing or seeing what is being served - there is a hiddenness that, wisely, closes off the possibility of vainglory.

And the offering has to include the whole life of the gospel-farmer, who traces the same arc into the fund of things. Is there to be any consolation in the hope that, after death, something might yet come from the life that was thus lived? By the resurrection of Jesus, yes. When "the most mute is at last raised up into song".

******

Enriching The Earth

To enrich the earth I have sowed clover and grass
to grow and die. I have plowed in the seeds
of winter grains and of various legumes,
their growth to be plowed in to enrich the earth.
I have stirred into the ground the offal
and the decay of the growth of past seasons
and so mended the earth and made its yield increase.
All this serves the dark. I am slowly falling
into the fund of things. And yet to serve the earth,
not knowing what I serve, gives a wideness
and a delight to the air, and my days
do not wholly pass. It is the mind's service,
for when the will fails so do the hands
and one lives at the expense of life.
After death, willing or not, the body serves,
entering the earth. And so what was heaviest
and most mute is at last raised up into song.

(Wendell Berry, from The Peace of Wild Things)

What can I pray for you? (Joy in the Journey 99)

Maybe you’ve asked that question to others and perhaps they’ve asked it of you. All sorts of things will legitimately come to mind - better health, job security, peace of mind - and nothing in this little piece is intended to discourage those particular requests. The LORD is generous and tender in the lives of his children.

But the prayers of Epaphras for his brothers and sisters in the Colossian church add extra substance and ballast to our requests. His friend, the apostle Paul, bears witness to the believers in Colossae that “he is always wrestling in prayer for you, that you may stand firm in all the will of God, mature and fully assured.” (Col. 4:12)

Epaphras knows them well. He is one of them. Knows all the contours of their daily lives. Can picture them in his mind’s eye, their homes, their workplaces. Knows the troubled relationships, knows the empty cupboards. And in the light of all he knows - and no doubt praying about the details, too - he prays as Paul reports.

He isn’t hitting the highlights because he doesn’t know the details. Rather, he is deliberately asking the Lord for what will be most necessary, fundamental and unifying in their experience of the Lord Jesus. And what will then, in turn, most commend the Saviour to others, as they see lives that have been liberated and stabilised and filled with good fruit.

Ephaphras hasn’t taken a route that few others traverse in prayer. Paul himself in the early part of the same letter prays in very similar, expanded terms:

“We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives, so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and giving joyful thanks to the Father…”

Such prayer, for others and also for ourselves, is demanding and often draining. It is about more than words; Epaphras wrestles in prayer for them. He agonises over them, coupling his loving concern with confidence in the Lord and his work.

We fight distractions, always it seems, but we also battle against unseen hindrances, and not only the spiritual constrictions in our own soul. Asking the Lord for this kind of progress in Christian maturity is going toe-to-toe with all that wish to see the Lord’s work collapse and Christians crumble into dust. Praying like this demands the full affection and attention of our hearts and the Spirit’s energies against evil and chaos.

We cannot expect to emerge from such wrestling unscathed and unmarked. Our resources will, at times, be severely depleted and our hearts spent. There are watershed moments as we intercede for others. But we will bear on our souls something of the imprint of Christ.

And that is entirely appropriate because this kind of praying is what our Lord is seen to do in the Gospels: in wilderness places, in the Upper Room, in the gathered darkness of Gethsemane. And, now, at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven, ever living to pray for us.

May the Lord help us to pray for each other, too.

************

Great Shepherd of Thy people, hear;

Thy presence now display;

As Thou has given a place for prayer,

So give us hearts to pray.

Show us some token of Thy love,

Our fainting hope to raise;

And pour Thy blessing from above,

That we may render praise.

Within these walls let holy peace,

And love and concord dwell;

Here give the troubled conscience ease,

The wounded spirit heal.

May we in faith receive Thy Word,

In faith present our prayers,

And in the presence of our Lord,

Unburden all our cares.

The hearing ear, the seeing eye,

The contrite heart bestow:

And shine upon us from on high,

That we in grace may grow.

(John Newton, 1725-1807)

What do you want me to do for you? (Joy in the Journey 98)

Twice, in a matter of verses, Mark records the Lord Jesus asking the same question to different people. All have sought his attention and his favour and his response is to ask, “What do you want me to do for you?” (Mark 10:35,51)

The first occasion is when James and John approach him with a fairly open-ended request: “We want you to do whatever we ask”. It’s no wonder our Lord wants to know a bit more first! And he is wise to do so: James and John want him to grant to them (and not to others) the honour and the right to sit by his side, one on his left and the other on his right. To have the places of prominence and prestige. To be right at the heart of all that happens, helping to broker his power and basking in reflected glory.

When asked if they can endure what their Saviour will go through, they answer yes. They believe they have what it takes. How foolish and deadly is human pride. Well, they would indeed drink that cup, each in their own way, but certainly not as they had fondly imagined.

If we think they were alone in wanting that kind of position, let’s notice that the other disciples also debated which of them was the greatest. And let’s remember that we, too, can be so full of self-confidence that we don’t even consider and account for the cost of following Jesus.

It’s a very humbling scene.

And one that is quickly followed by a blind beggar, Bartimaeus by name, asking Jesus, the Son of David, to have mercy on him. He, too, is asked, “What do you want me to do for you?” It might seem his need is pretty obvious (a blind man will want to see, of course) but there is wisdom in our Lord’s approach: What does Bartimaeus most value? And does he truly believe that the Son of David can meet his deepest need?

His answer is plain but profound: “Rabbi, I want to see.” Where James and John wanted their faces turned to the adoring crowds, Bartimaeus wants his sight restored with his face turned towards Jesus. There is a huge gulf between them. He will never before have asked anyone else to restore his sight, but he asks Jesus - that tells us something important about his perception of the Lord. Their folly is set in sharp relief by his faith.

How might we answer that same question? There are many legitimate things we can and should ask for and we need have no hesitation in laying those requests before the Lord. There are also many unworthy requests that we might make, to our shame. But the answer given by Bartimaeus is one that ought to accompany us down the years, because it reminds us of the heart of the matter: "I want to see" - I want to see you, Jesus, in all your wonderful glory and in the majesty of the grace that heals completely the sin-sickness of my burdened soul.

It is this great need for inward sight that animates the prayer of the apostle Paul for the Christians in Ephesus:

“I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe.”

What is it that you want Jesus to do for you?

************

I heard the voice of Jesus say,

  “Come unto Me, and rest;

Lay down, thou weary one, lay down

  Thy head upon My breast.”

I came to Jesus as I was,

  Weary, and worn, and sad;

I found in Him a resting-place,

  And He has made me glad.

I heard the voice of Jesus say,

  “Behold, I freely give

The living water: thirsty one,

  Stoop down, and drink, and live.”

I came to Jesus, and I drank

  Of that life-giving stream;

My thirst was quenched, my soul revived,

  And now I live in Him.

I heard the voice of Jesus say,

  “I am this dark world’s Light;

Look unto Me, thy morn shall rise,

  And all thy day be bright.”

I looked to Jesus, and I found

  In Him my Star, my Sun;

And in that light of life I’ll walk

  Till travelling days are done.

(Horatius Bonar, 1808-89)

Through the hard things

Tim Keller was recently interviewed about his latest book, Hope in Times of Fear, written as he suffers from pancreatic cancer. He was asked,

After distinguishing between good things, hard things, and best things, you conclude: “The Bible’s teaching is that the road to the best things is not through the good things but usually through the hard things.” How does this difficult message—a prime example of the Bible’s pervasive “Great Reversal” theme—subvert the world’s values? And how can we communicate it in a sensitive and attractive way?

This was his answer:

That contrast between the good things and the hard things comes from an exposition of Luke 6, where Jesus says “blessed” are those who are poor, hungry, grieving, and marginalized; and “woe” (or “curses”) to those who get power, comfort, success (the word for “laugh” in verse 25 means to gloat in victory), and popular recognition.

What can Jesus mean? In light of the rest of the Bible he can’t mean that anyone who is successful (regardless of the state of their heart) is cursed, and anyone who is poor and marginalized is automatically blessed. But read in light of the entire canon it means that, in general, God brings strength out of weakness. He loves to work through the outsiders, the rejected, the unloved. And he so often brings strength, wisdom, and salvation itself into our lives through suffering. This pattern of divine dealing is a reflection of the ultimate accomplishment of glory and power out of suffering and weakness—the cross and resurrection.

The world—and especially our modern Western culture—has no understanding of how suffering and weakness can bring blessing. How do we communicate it in a sensitive and attractive way? I’m not sure there’s a better approach than, first, applying this to our own lives (so we don’t melt down under weakness like so many others in our time) and then, second, just being transparent.

Who then can be saved? (Joy in the Journey 97)

Jesus encounters a rich man who wants to know what he must do to inherit eternal life (Mark 10:17ff). The sticking-point for his untrammelled faith in God is his considerable wealth. That has his heart and his hopes, not the living God. When he leaves, downcast, our Lord tells his disciples, “How hard it so for the rich to enter the kingdom of God” (because the choice to change allegiance from mammon to God is so acutely painful).

This amazes the disciples. But Jesus goes even further. It’s not only hard for such a person to enter God’s kingdom, it’s actually impossible (that’s the point of the camel/eye of a needle comparison). To which, in even greater amazement, the disciples ask, “Who then can be saved?”

Their perspective becomes clear: it is the rich that have God’s approval. If they are outwardly blessed then they must be inwardly so too. Material prosperity is a key marker of a successful life with God. That’s how they saw things. And, so, if the rich cannot be saved then no-one else stands the remotest chance.

This remains deeply significant for us. And not simply in terms of money (but that, too). This mindset - of outward success and comfort being evidence of God’s favour, and perhaps even drawing his favour - is unfalteringly attractive to the human heart.

We look to make sure we have all our ducks in a row, because if they’re absent or if the line is skewed then we’re unlikely to know the presence and goodness of God in our lives and in our churches. The right education - a held-together family - a successful and secure career - bucket-loads of friends - good looks - copious respect. We can keep adding into the list. These, these are what we really and truly need, says a nagging voice of doubt.

And so they capture our trust and our hopes are pinned on them. No fruitful Christian life without them. No thriving church if they’re absent. And all the while we slowly diminish, growing inwardly smaller, our souls wasting away.

The whole account puts our hearts to the test.

But it also contains everything we need to reverse the decline, to halt the fall into a withering waste. When the rich man made his case for eternal life on the basis of his achievements, “Jesus looked at him and loved him.” A look of genuine compassion and concern. He was for the man, wanting him to know true and unmerited blessing, the holy love of God that cannot be bought or sold.

From that starting-point - that we are loved by the living God - the crowning statement of our Lord to his disciples paves the way for a response of humbled faith: “All things are possible with God.” What is sheer impossibility for crippled humanity, completely defective in how we determine true value, is more than viable to the one whose words can bring life out of nothing.

‘All things’ includes your life taken up into the powerful grace of God, even in the midst of the most trying circumstances (Jesus doesn’t hide the fact that eternal life now comes with troubles - v.30). Your life flourishing and fruitful in the faithfulness of the Saviour. And churches having their life deepened and their testimony to the beauty of Jesus clarified and strengthened.

These happen not through any resources we have hoarded, nor by wedding ourselves to our society’s values and basis of approval. We are entirely in the Lord’s hands - the hands of unbreakable covenant love. To him we turn, eagerly and expectantly, in the unearned joy of eternal life.

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Give to the winds thy fears;

Hope, and be undismayed:

God hears thy sighs, and counts thy tears;

God shall lift up thy head.

Through waves, and clouds, and storms

He gently clears thy way;

Wait thou His time, so shall this night

Soon end in joyous day.

Leave to His sovereign sway

To choose and to command;

So shalt thou wondering own His way,

How wise, how strong His hand.

Far, far above thy thought

His counsel shall appear,

When fully He the work hath wrought

That caused thy needless fear.

Thou seest our weakness, Lord;

Our hearts are known to Thee:

O lift Thou up the sinking hand,

Confirm the feeble knee!

Let us in life, in death,

Thy steadfast truth declare,

And publish with our latest breath

Thy love and guardian care.

(Paul Gerhardt, 1607-76;

tr. John Wesley 1703-91)

In jars of clay (Joy in the Journey 96)

Between the solidity of God's promises and our experience of life in the here and now, there are ambiguities. Not because his promises are provisional, nor because they claim too much and cannot be truly kept. The ambiguity is down to where we’re situated, where we find ourselves: in the overlap of the ages, in the now-but-not-yet. The time of the first-fruits but still awaiting the full harvest.

Navigating that tension is one of the key challenges for wisdom and one of the true markers of our maturing as Christians. Get things out of perspective and we're easily knocked off balance. Either driven to distrust the Lord who has loved us and to doubt the justice of his reign, or forced into a pretence that all is as well as it ever could be, that we don’t struggle, not in the slightest.

The Bible encourages us to face the reality of the 'not yet' in our own experiences. We struggle, still, with sin. We feel pain as we empathise with those who carry the weightiest burdens. Along with this fractured creation we grieve and we groan. We agonise, asking who will finally be able to deliver from this collective body of death?

At the same time, by faith, “we do see Jesus, who was made lower than the angels for a little while, now crowned with glory and honour.” He is our hope, in its entirety. The forerunner, the champion, who has gone on ahead of us, clearing all the obstacles of sin “by tasting death, the death deserved by us.” The resurrection of our Saviour was the first ray of light in the birthing of a new creation.

And it is this Lord Jesus who says to us, as he did to the church in Pergamum, “I know where you live.” Knows that we’re in the tension of the in-between time, in a world where evil still exists and continues to disrupt and distort. Feels with us and for us as we gather our perplexities before him in prayer, lamenting even as we rejoice.

This was graphically portrayed in the life of the apostle Paul. His testimony to the Corinthian church remains the most acute portrayal of the Christian life in this fast-fading age:

“We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.” (2 Cor. 4:8,9)

Not denying the hardships and their pain but, along with them, knowing the vital reality of the risen life of the crucified Saviour, with and among his people. It is the Lord Jesus who is the key to every “but not” spoken by Paul.

And this contradictory experience, this wrestling on towards heaven that has both light and shade, is held within a gospel purpose that sustains our own hope:

“We have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us…(2 Cor. 4:7)

We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body.” (2 Cor. 4:10)

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Far off I see the goal

    O Saviour, guide me;

I feel my strength is small;

    Be thou beside me:

With vision ever clear,

With love that conquers fear,

And grace to persevere,

    O Lord, provide me.

Whene’er Thy way seems strange,

    Go Thou before me;

And, lest my heart should change,

    O Lord, watch o’er me;

But should my faith prove frail,

And I through blindness fail,

O let Thy grace prevail,

    And still restore me.

Should earthly pleasures wane,

    And joy forsake me,

If lonely hours of pain

    At length o’ertake me,

My hand in Thine hold fast

Till sorrow be o’erpast,

And gentle death at last

    For heaven awake me.

There with the ransomed throng

    Who praise for ever

The love that made them strong

    To serve forever,

I too would see Thy face,

Thy finished work retrace,

And magnify Thy grace,

    Redeemed forever.

(Robert Rowland Roberts, 1865-1945)

The lifter of my head (Joy in the Journey 95)

Do you have days when you feel you’re facing overwhelming odds? You have torrents of troubles and sorrows that sheet down like rain. There are people who choose to be at odds with you, who seemingly want to negate your life. Legitimate opportunities are closed off and your contribution is annulled and labelled worthless?

Welcome to Psalm 3. As it opens, David is expressing his own version of that kind of experience. The problems and the problem people are many. It’s unrelenting. They just never give up.

And from there he speaks words that are ours to take hold of with the hungriest of hearts:

    But you, O LORD, are a shield around me,
    My glory, the One who lifts my head high.
    I call out to the LORD,
    And he answers me from his holy mountain.

The living God, the eternal One, is David’s protector, his shield, his defender and provider. His refuge against the onslaught. There are no gaps in his defences, no weak links in the chain of his loving commitment. His guardian care is invincible.

Those who stand against David hold him in derision and scorn. They pour shame like water upon his head, they trash his reputation with fierce falsehoods. This is his downfall, the end of his career, the termination of his tenure. He’s at their mercy and they will show him none.

But David’s head is lifted high, in honour. He belongs to the Holy One and is vindicated by him. He is David’s glory - the One who stands up for him, who is unashamed to be fully aligned with him. The One who shares his own status with David, gives him his name and covers him with his own royal robes.

Our Lord Jesus willingly associates himself with us, declares that we are his and defends us as his own beloved people. He will not allow us to suffer final shame.

And the raising of our heads that takes away all our disgrace and dishonour, lifting us into living hope, is the action of the One who bowed his head and gave up his spirit, under the enormous load of sin’s desolation. The one whose sacrifice saves us from all the bitter fruit of our fallenness and cleanses the squalid, fetid ground of our hearts.

David calls to the LORD and is answered from his holy hill - from the temple itself, the very centre of God’s presence on earth. This is no incidental assistance. But another ‘holy mountain’ would in time draw our eyes and fill our hearts with astonishment, the hill just outside the city walls where our Lord Jesus offered himself for us. From that hill comes the Lord’s answer: “It is finished.” From there he speaks words of full forgiveness, words that promise not simply paradise but life with the Lord, in his eternal presence.

His intervention on our behalf is not our just desserts; it is entirely by his gracious resolve. And so it is certain, the only sure foundation when we are overwhelmed.

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For ever here my rest shall be,

    Close to Thy bleeding side;

This all my hope, and all my plea,

    For me the Saviour died!

My dying Saviour, and my God,

    Fountain for guilt and sin,

Sprinkle me ever with Thy blood,

    And cleanse, and keep me clean.

Wash me, and make me thus Thine own,

    Wash me, and mine Thou art,

Wash me, but not my feet alone,

    My hands, my head, my heart.

The atonement of Thy blood apply,

    Till faith to sight improve,

Till hope in full fruition die,

    And all my soul be love.

(Charles Wesley, 1707-88)

Keep yourselves in the love of God (Joy in the Journey 94)

Love is a choice, however much we might feel we’ve been swept up by it. And God’s love of us is a choice, a choice he made before the foundation of the earth. Which means his love is not generated by our actions nor can it be lost through them. To be loved by the living God is the most sure and certain reality we could ever know. Love that was written on the pages of history by the blood that was shed upon the cross.

We cannot make God love us more (nor less). But we can affect our own conscious enjoyment of that love. Jude gives his readers helpful instruction on how to do just that:

But you, dear friends, by building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in God’s love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to bring you to eternal life. (v.20,21)

Build yourselves up in your most holy faith - take whatever steps you can to enlarge your grasp of who God is and all that he has done for you in his Son. This is the faith that was “once for all entrusted to the saints” (v.3). A treasure beyond words that has its origins in the heart of God. The story of redeeming love, of the beloved Son of God riding forth to rescue the lost, those who chose the broad road that leads to destruction.

Fill your hearts and minds, Jude is saying, with the details as well as the big picture. Soak yourselves in it. Be drenched in steams of living water. Feast upon your Saviour. Whatever opportunities you have, take them with both hands. And if can create more then do.

And do this personally and together. Jude doesn’t suggest it’s an either/or; it’s so clearly a both/and. You and I and we, building ourselves up in this faith, enlarging our hearts and minds; tasting, seeing and embracing this most holy faith.

All the while “praying in the Holy Spirit”. Ok…but what does that mean, what does it involve? Far from being an abstract experience that is big on mystery and mystique, this is a call to pray in conscious awareness of the work of God’s Spirit. And so it means praying

• in the secure knowledge that we are the children of God, adopted by grace (he is the Spirit of adoption)
• in the wonder of the Father’s love (which is shed abroad in our hearts by the Spirit).
• with a reliance upon the finished work of Jesus and delighting in such a Saviour (he is the Spirit of Jesus).
• with an honesty about our sin and a hunger for righteousness to mark all our days (he is the Holy Spirit)

Building ourselves up in the faith and praying out of it is key to a continued enjoyment of the love of God for us. Jude is making that connection clear. We keep ourselves right there as we make these choices.

And all this while we “wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to bring [us] to eternal life.” The road may be long or short but its end is certain: eternal life. Unending and unbroken fellowship with God as our intimate knowledge of him grows deeper each moment of the timeless sea of eternity.

Our arrival there is entirely due to “the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ”. It isn’t guaranteed by how much we enjoy his love now. The matter is out of our hands and in his nail-pierced ones. But Jude is anxious that his readers should know as much as is possible in this life of the captivating love of God. A love that transforms and sweetens every aspect of our lives and our characters. A love that becomes visible to others as we bathe our own souls in its light.

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I have not seen Thy face, O Lord,

Yet with my heart I love Thee;

For Thou hast plucked each tender cord

With pleasing touch of mercy.

O Saviour, Lord, my King and Friend,

I worship Thee with gladness;

And by Thy grace I will defend

The Name that brought me kindness.

I have not known Thee here on earth,

Yet with my soul I trust Thee;

For Thou hast stirred my thought to birth

Of God and heaven and glory.

O precious Saviour, hear my praise

With songs of joy and wonder;

For Thou hast taught my lips to raise

A theme of words so tender.

Now I have seen Thy glorious face,

With eyes of faith unveiling

The splendour of the theme of grace,

All to my mind revealing.

Such bliss and happiness is mine

To know the God of glory;

For who could call the Lord divine

But for Thy grace and mercy?

(William Vernon Higham, 1926-2016)

Trying to take charge of Jesus

The contrast could not be more stark: one group has come to take charge of Jesus, the other sits at his feet, devotedly learning. The real shock is that the former are Jesus’ mother and brothers, while the latter are some of the people of the town (Mk. 3:20-35).

It’s a scene that holds profound challenges for us.

If ever any group could claim the inside track on Jesus and have what they believed to be a legitimate claim upon him it was his mother and brothers. And that sense of privilege and position leads them here to attempt to control him, calling him out from the house. They believe that he’s out of his mind, a short journey away from the full-on unbelief and rejection of the teachers of the law who believe that “he is possessed by Beelzebul!”

This is so shocking that it might be hard for us to see any way in which we might even begin to approximate his family’s reaction. And yet it is sadly true that we can believe we have some kind of prior call upon the Lord, that before all others we have the right to his attention and his allegiance, that he simply must be compliant with our prayers and desires. That he is there to fulfil our agendas for our lives and for our church. No one knows better than we do, not even Jesus.

Of course that will seldom be overt; our sinful hearts know how to trade in subtlety. But it can be real, seeping into our prayers and insidiously debasing them. When we are blind to that and succumb to the temptation, it damages and undermines our worship and our glad dependence upon the Saviour. Would you be willing to ask the Lord to show you if that might the case with you? To pray with David, “Search me, O God and know my heart…see if there is any offensive way in me.” (Ps. 139:23f)

Thankfully, a better way is also on display in this passage.

The crowd that had gathered was so large and so insistent on seeing the Lord that neither he nor his disciples were able to eat. The house was so rammed with people there was no space to sit down for a meal. But some of them, at least, were not there just to gawk at this miracle-worker; they had come to sit and learn at Jesus’ feet.

They readily adopted the posture of disciples - learners of the Lord who listen in order to live in the light of all that he is and has said. This chaotic scene has, at its centre, a space and a place of calm, of unhurried reflection and the dawning of devotion. Is it possible that within the turbulent times of our own days there might also be that kind of ‘cleft in the rock’ where we can choose the better part and sit with Jesus?

For those who did so then, and for all who do so today, the Lord Jesus utters unspeakably precious words: he declares that these are his true family - his brother and sister and mother. Those who do the will of God by placing their faith in his Son and their lives into his hands are openly acknowledged to belong to his family. Cherished and welcomed, honoured and humbled, blessed without measure.

Not seeking to take control of the Lord but captivated by his grace.

A Better Country (Joy in the Journey 93)

There are so many things in life we could wish were ‘better’. Better health; better job; better friendships. We long for things to be different, to be improved. And perhaps we can see that, for others, it does indeed appear to be better. From the little that we can see, they seem to have what we lack. In a time of national distress those comparisons can seem even starker. And the memories of better times we cherish and that have often comforted us now cruelly mock our present loss.

The saints of old who are celebrated in Hebrews 11 are said to have been longing for “a better country”. Not an earthly one, where they had won the culture wars, but a heavenly one, not susceptible to change and decay. An inheritance that cannot be stolen or soiled. A country that is the dwelling place of God. A city with foundations whose builder and maker is God. In every way it deserves to be thought of as ‘better’.

It’s possible that one of the significant differences between the way they handled their distress and how we find ourselves responding to our own is where they were looking and how they looked.

Their eyes were not so much fixed on the terrain of their troubles but were lifted to the farther horizon, to the better country and to the God who had prepared a lasting home for them. Lifting our eyes to take in that view can be hard. We’re often overcome and in our weakness we wilt under the heat of trial. We walk with our eyes lowered to the ground and our hearts deflated. Our only hope is to ask the Lord to grant us faith, to strengthen our trust and dependence upon him. It won’t self-generate. But he is wonderfully kind in meeting us in our frailties.

One of the striking points made about these saints is not only that they lived by faith but “were still living by faith when they died.” Their trust in God was not because he had already answered all their hopes (which is sight, not faith). The better country was not yet present - it had been made clear to them that perfection awaited the full complement of God’s people. All they could do - and what they did in such exemplary manner - was to see and welcome the promises from a distance, to embrace them, cherishing every present indication of their ultimate fulfilment.

In Lamentations 3:21 there is a similar movement of the soul: “Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope…” Embracing the promises of God, even at a distance, and welcoming them into our lives requires a deliberate choice, the humbled heart open to receive and not closed by cynicism.

All the while as they did this - and through the very act of doing so - they admitted that they were foreigners and strangers on earth. Lasting security and ultimate reality lay elsewhere, with the God whose promises would one day be fulfilled in and through his Son. Their sense of non-belonging didn’t dismiss the joys of this present creation but saw, with piercing clarity, where true value and beauty lay, in the heavenly country.

This kind of perspective is hard-won but deeply consoling. It can revive a spirit that is fainting, athirst for substance and hope, in the knowledge of the better Saviour and his better country.

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Guide me, O Thou great Jehovah,

    Pilgrim through this barren land;

I am weak, but Thou art mighty,

    Hold me with Thy powerful hand.

        Bread of heaven

Feed me till I want no more;

Open Thou the crystal fountain

    Whence the healing stream doth flow;

Let the fiery, cloudy pillar

    Lead me all my journey through;

        Strong Deliverer,

Be Thou still my strength and shield.

When I tread the verge of Jordan,

    Bid my anxious fears subside;

Death of death and hell’s Destruction,

    Land me safe on Canaan’s side.

        Songs of praises

I will ever give to Thee.

(William Williams, 1717-91;

tr. Peter Williams, 1721-96)

“This time I will praise the LORD.” (Joy in the Journey 92)

Leah is the woman wronged by her father and rejected by her husband. Her story is told in Genesis 29, where she is used by her father to deceive her cousin Jacob into more service. It is a marriage made without reference to her hopes or her happiness. She is simply collateral damage as men misuse their power.

Verses 31-35 record the birth and naming of Jacob’s first four sons, all by Leah. Interestingly, it is she who names the children, not Jacob (who seems completely disinterested). The names, along with the reasoning behind them, give us insight into Leah’s pain and the travel of her soul.

When the first son is born, she names him Reuben, “because the LORD has seen my misery.” He has seen that she is unloved by her husband. Her hope is that now Jacob will love her. He will discern where God’s blessing lies and do rightly by her. She will be cleared of shame and attract his affection.

But that seems to have been a forlorn hope. Her life is unchanged, her pain unrelieved. For when her second son is born, she names him Simeon, “Because the LORD heard I am [still] not loved”. The fond hopes that surrounded the birth of Reuben were clearly not fulfilled; Jacob loves Rachel only. He is oblivious to the legitimate needs of his first wife. She is neglected and passed over.

Leah’s pain continues unabated. When her third son is born she names him Levi, ardently hoping that now, at last, his birth will cause her husband to be attached to her. Her hopes appear futile. She has been placed in an intolerable situation and not by her own choice. She is deeply pained at Jacob’s rejection and longs for him to have a change of heart, that the anguish in hers might be healed. But Jacob is impassive and unmoved, blind to the LORD’s favour towards Leah.

How much pain and rejection can one woman bear?

When her fourth son is born, she names him Judah saying, "This time I will praise the LORD." No mention now of her husband, nor of her desperate desire to be loved and accepted by him (a wholly legitimate desire). Leah, so slighted and demeaned, is not abandoned in her misery and with the birth of Judah she recognises it. No doubt the grief remains but she is able now to praise the LORD out of her pain. Reconciled to her situation, she is able to rejoice in the God who is ever-loving and ever-loyal to his people.

"This time" her focus is higher than her husband and her joy greater than he could arouse or sustain. To be loved and accepted by the LORD and to know his favour means more than anything else could. He has begun to fill her horizons and to satisfy her deepest longings. He had been with her at every step of her long and arduous journey, holding her heart when it broke apart, gifting and growing the faith that has now begun to blossom.

Her story speaks to us so powerfully as we wrestle with life and with aspirations that maybe entirely proper but remain unmet. Our misery is seen and we are known by the LORD. He is not unmindful of us. We might be tempted to measure his care in the currency of fulfilled longings but that is a false step, even if understandable. The true satisfaction of our search for happiness and meaning and the deepest acceptance is found supremely in the Lord. He is precious beyond words.

Leah’s struggle with her sister and her husband would be a running sore that continues to fester. But perhaps it’s no coincidence that at this point, for a time at least, "she stopped having children." Her joy was full and overflowing in knowing and worshipping the LORD.

************

My Jesus, I love Thee, I know Thou art mine;

For Thee all the pleasures of sin I resign;

My gracious Redeemer, my Saviour art Thou,

If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, 'tis now.

I love Thee because Thou hast first loved me

And purchased my pardon on Calvary's tree;

I love Thee for wearing the thorns on Thy brow,

If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, 'tis now.

I will love Thee in life, I will love Thee in death,

And praise Thee as long as Thou lendest me breath;

And say when the death-dew lies cold on my brow,

If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, 'tis now.

In mansions of glory and endless delight,

I'll ever adore Thee in heaven so bright;

I'll sing with the glittering crown on my brow,

If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, 'tis now. 

(William Ralph Featherston, 1842-70)

The God of the double-lock (Joy in the Journey 91)

The first readers of the letter to the Hebrews were living in difficult times. Their faith was being assaulted and they faced strong temptation to refute Jesus as the unique Saviour and to become re-absorbed into their previous way of life. Their commitment was on a knife-edge; they’d reached a crossroads and were being pulled towards defection.

And so the writer/preacher speaks to them in 6:18 of a double-lock - the promise of God to Abraham, sealed with an oath made in his own name. This is intended to end all argument: the God for whom it is impossible to lie has spoken. This is more than a promise being set in stone; this is embedded in his own strength of character. Nothing could be more certain.

The upshot is that those who receive the promise, who stake their all on it, “may be greatly encouraged”. In a world of slander and the slippery pathway into temptation’s big blue eyes, there is a hope that has a secure foundation. It doesn’t rest in the performance of the readers; it isn’t guaranteed by their resolution. It depends entirely on the God whose promise is to bless all peoples - a promise sealed by his oath.

This secure hope has been taken back into God’s presence, carried there by “our forerunner Jesus”. That journey into the inner sanctuary, the throne-room of God, makes this hope “an anchor for the soul, firm and secure”. Nothing can change what God has said and what Jesus has done. Nothing can move him from his commitment to his promise; nothing can cause him to revoke the oath with which it was sealed.

Our world has many similarities to that in which this letter was written. Uncertain times, faith under duress, temptations aplenty. The death by a thousand cuts that is compromise. The sudden squall of emotional breakdown that demands comfort at any price. These are days when our souls can feel anything but secure, when we sense our weakness and vulnerability, as we sadly conclude that we, too, are “prone to wander”.

Here is a word in season for all who know that dark foreboding: we can be “greatly encouraged”. Not simply jollied along for a while but made strong in the grace that is in our Lord Jesus Christ. The outcome is settled, the One who calls us does not lie - it is impossible for him to do so. He is the God of all truth. His loving commitment to rescue and make new, to destroy the one who held the power of death, to cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, that we might serve the living God - all this is immutable.

He does not change and we cannot be lost.

With such a hope before us, when all around is desolation and despair, the example of the readers of Hebrews carries great weight: they had “fled to take hold of the hope before [them]”. They ran, full pelt, to the One whose word cannot fail and whose salvation is secure. They saw their danger and didn’t wait to see if they might be able to tough it out; they went, in desperate haste, to the faithful One, the God of the double-lock.

We can make that journey ours, too.

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There is a hope that burns within my heart,

That gives me strength for every passing day;

A glimpse of glory now revealed in meagre part,

Yet drives all doubt away:

I stand in Christ, with sins forgiven;

And Christ in me, the hope of heaven!

My highest calling and my deepest joy,

To make His will my home.

There is a hope that lifts my weary head,

A consolation strong against despair,

That when the world has plunged me in its deepest pit,

I find the Saviour there!

Through present sufferings, future’s fear,

He whispers ‘courage’ in my ear.

For I am safe in everlasting arms,

And they will lead me home.

There is a hope that stands the test of time,

That lifts my eyes beyond the beckoning grave,

To see the matchless beauty of a day divine

When I behold His face!

When sufferings cease and sorrows die,

And every longing satisfied.

Then joy unspeakable will flood my soul,

For I am truly home.

(Stuart Townend & Mark Edwards Copyright © 2007 Thankyou Music)

Scepticism dispelled: the bookends of John's Gospel

Bookending John’s gospel are two accounts of scepticism being dispelled by the Lord Jesus, tucked just after the prologue and just before the epilogue. And they have significant parallels:

That would seem to fit perfectly with John's stated purpose for writing his gospel: "that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing may have life in his name." (20:31). And maybe they help to throw into sharp relief the frequent temporal faith seen in the gospel and offer hope that it can be overcome.

Making the most of every opportunity (Joy in the Journey 90)

Be very careful, then, how you live —not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. (Ephesians 5:15,16)

Are you ready to "make the most of every opportunity"? Is your life being lived on the cutting-edge of evangelistic enterprise? Because this verse seems to suggest that it ought to be. Every day there are opportunities galore, if only you have eyes to see them, and your duty is to grasp them with both hands. Or at least it appears to say that if you ignore the context. Which is never the wise choice.

So maybe it's more about how the older translation puts it: "redeeming the time". Nailing down every last second of the day, making sure you can offer it to Jesus in full efficiency and complete effectiveness. No ragged edges or fluffed lines, because he's not interested in anything defective. As Depeche Mode sang, "Everything counts, in large amounts".

If that is the way to understand the text you can't ever afford to get it wrong, to freewheel during a single day or take your foot even an inch off the pedal. Not once. Because you've got to redeem the time - rescue it from the waste bin and recycle it into an always-on mode of discipleship. Anything less is failing to honour your Lord.

The good news is that neither of those explanations are correct. It's not about evangelism and it isn't about productivity. Those are not authentic readings of this text. Both are important in their respective contexts (one more so than the other, perhaps), but this verse is from somewhere else.

This is set within the daily grind of living as a Christian, in the in-between time of the here-and-now before the hereafter. The days when we get up reluctantly and go to bed wearily. When we see and hear sights and sounds that grieve us deeply, even as they pressure us towards acceptance and compromise. Days when we are tempted to fall in with the fruitless deeds of darkness rather than expose them. When the easy choice is moral slumber.

Faced with the starkness of those choices - between light and darkness, between wisdom and folly - Paul is urging us to redeem the time/make the most of every opportunity of living in the light. To approach our days in light of God's character and to act from his work within us. To serve his commission to be salt and light in a crooked and perverse generation. To find out what pleases him and to rejoice in making that our aim.

Such lives will, of course, invite questions about the Lord and requests for the reasons for the hope we have. They will be lives that sanctify each day, not through productivity hacks but in holiness and love, in Spirit-given worship, with heartfelt thankfulness "to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ."

The days we're living through desperately need us to act as though our words and deeds matter. An open display that the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth will be the most clarifying and compelling reality for a world whose days are framed in folly and shrouded in shame.

We are now, by his grace, "light in the Lord". Translated and transformed. Our high calling and our dearest privilege is to serve our Saviour in the freedom he has so freely given. Choosing to walk in love, owning that all our days are his, that we and they have been redeemed, liberated from the dominion of sin and grafted into the grace of life.

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Finding (Time) - by James K.A. Smith is a worthwhile read to go with this morning's reflection.

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My times are in Thy hand:

My God, I wish them there;

My life, my friends, my soul I leave

Entirely to Thy care.

My times are in Thy hand,

Whatever they may be,

Pleasing or painful, dark or bright,

As best may seem to Thee.

My times are in Thy hand:

Why should I doubt or fear?

A Father's hand will never cause

His child a needless tear.

My times are in Thy hand,

Jesus, the crucified;

Those hands my cruel sins had pierced

Are now my guard and guide.

My times are in Thy hand:

I'll always trust in Thee;

And, after death, at Thy right hand

I shall for ever be.

(William Freeman Lloyd, 1791-1853)