Selah2020: Pause and Reflect

[Transcript of a midweek message published by Horley Baptist Church on YouTube^[1], July 2021]

As followers of Jesus we are called to serve the least, the last, and the lost – but what does that look like practically for us in 2021?

On Sunday we were talking about following in Jesus’s footsteps and becoming world changers; the first part was humbly serving the poor, but my question is “Well, how do we practically do that?”

So on Sunday we read in Luke about Jesus’s manifesto where he laid out what his mission was going to be like here on earth. He talked about the idea of being good news – not just preaching it – but being it; serving the poor, acting for justice, bringing healing and freedom to to people, and we looked at the idea that if we are truly followers of Jesus Christ, we have to follow Jesus. We have to follow in his footsteps, do those things that he did, sign up for his manifesto. But I left that question “Well, what does that practically look like for me now in 2021?”

Jesus lived in the Middle East, he had a massive following and it was 2,000 years ago, so what does it look like? How do I translate that into today’s world really? Well, let’s just look at what Jesus didn’t do. He said he was going to humbly serve the poor but that didn’t mean that he supported aid organizations, he didn’t send money, he didn’t give money out so the poor could be served. Also he didn’t sit in a church or a building waiting for people to come to him, he wasn’t putting up a sign saying ‘help here’. He didn’t do that so what did Jesus do?

Well I think what we see Jesus do time and time again as recorded in all four gospels was that Jesus was a guy who rolled up his sleeves, got stuck in and got his hands dirty. He went to where the needs were. We find him going to places like the pool of Siloam where people who needed healing hung out and he healed people. He often went off the beaten track, he took detours in order to reach those people on the fringes of society, like stopping to look up into a sycamore tree to chat to a guy called Zacchaeus. Also what he’d spent a lot of time doing is hanging out with those who the religious authorities labelled as sinners. He went to their houses, he ate with them, he attended their parties and when we talk about parties here we’re not talking about church buffets; we’re talking about probably pretty raucous affairs with drink and food and goodness knows what else.

Jesus was willing to sacrifice his reputation in order to hang out with all the wrong kinds of people. So how can we follow in Jesus’s footsteps?
Well, number one, I think what it takes is enormous courage because for most of us to serve in that sort of way is to step out of our comfort zones It takes courage to move out of what is perhaps our normal social circles and to move into areas that are unknown to us. Actually, it takes courage to step into places where life is increasingly messy because we like to avoid mess rather than get involved in it. So, number one, it takes enormous courage.

Number two, it takes intent. You need to decide that this is what you’re going to do. This isn’t something that’s going to fall into your lap; you need to decide and choose to serve in this way. You need to go out and look for it. Now, that may not be going on the streets searching for poor people but it could be signing up to an organization that serves in some way or another.

For me, when I was in my 20s, I contacted the Salvation Army and said “Look, I’d like to just help with a soup kitchen” so I served in a soup kitchen one evening a fortnight. I had to make some sandwiches, I had to make some soup, bring it along and just spend some time serving the poor in the town. I had to be intentional with that, I had to go and seek it out and, thirdly, what it needs is just an initial step. It doesn’t have to be a giant leap, it’s just that first tentative step towards increasingly serving the least in our society.

I’m not asking you to go and find some homeless guy, drag him off the streets and move them into your house, but what I am saying is “What are those small things that you can do intentionally to start to serve the poor?” I think actually one of the best ways is to hook up with an organisation, to volunteer for an organization whose job it is to serve the poor.

I would go as far as this: when we’re thinking about going back to a physical church and starting up many of our church activities I know we are asking for volunteers but perhaps God is telling you not to volunteer for a church but to volunteer for an organization that serves the poor. A bit controversial, might get my wrists slapped for that one. Now you might be saying to me, “Well, that’s all great but my life is just too busy for that”. Perhaps your life is too busy, maybe your life is too busy for you to be a follower of Jesus Christ because actually Jesus calls you to make him the number one priority in your life.

I doubt that your life is truly too busy; it just maybe may need a resorting and reordering of your priorities. Are you willing to take that challenge to follow in Jesus’s footsteps by firstly humbly serving the poor in our community?

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[1] YouTube link: How do I serve the poor?
Bible references: ~

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[This is one in a series of devotional reflections prepared for Horley Baptist Church during July 2021]

It was a cold November day, there was no shelter from the bitter wind blowing across the hillside as we stood around the coffin of our friend. How calm he looked, in a second-hand suit that was probably better than anything he had worn during his lifetime, his beard shaved and with a haircut that owed more to the mortician than any hairdresser.

Where was his joie de vivre – his enthusiasm for life? Where was his positive attitude, his willingness to get stuck in, to carry the heaviest sacks, to move the biggest boxes; the one who could be counted on whenever a helping hand was needed? All gone.

This man for whom risk represented an opportunity rather than a deterrent, did he make one final mistake? He had been helping to milk some cows – did he upset the cow, did he touch something that he shouldn’t have touched, was the equipment defective? Who knows but in an instant he was gone.

He was of no fixed abode; this man who was willing to help everywhere belonged nowhere – his last resting place in a remote corner of a distant graveyard was begged for him and the committal was performed as a favour. No eulogy, no epitaph, just a simple hand-written wooden cross bearing his name.

Such is the cycle of life and death. A time to be born, a time to die; a time to celebrate, a time to mourn. In the natural world too, summer and winter, springtime and harvest continue apparently ad-infinitum.

♰

We are reminded of another hillside, with a small group of people gathered to witness the departure of their friend. A man of the same age as our friend, he too was placed in a tomb which had been negotiated for him. But this man’s death was not accidental; it had been planned from before the beginning of time.

You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly.
[Romans 5 v 6]

Christ’s death opened the way for sinners to be reconciled with God.

But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
[Romans 5 v 8]

Nor was Christ’s death the end of the matter; his return will put an end to this perpetual sequence of life and death. There will be a new heaven and a new earth – are you ready?

There is a green hill far away, outside a city wall,
where the dear Lord was crucified, who died to save us all.

He died that we might be forgiv’n, he died to make us good,
that we might go at last to heav’n, saved by his precious blood.
[CF Alexander, 1848]

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Bible dates: Where appropriate, the dates given for Biblical events are based on the Bible Timeline resource
and are subject to the constraints defined on the corresponding webpage.

[This reflection was published in the weekly news bulletin of Horley Baptist Church, 04/July/2021]

Have you ever had a situation in your life that caused you not to flourish?

As a child growing up my parents stopped me from doing certain things that I know prevented me from being bolder for the rest of my life in certain areas.

Circumstances we find ourselves in and the people around us can dictate what we should or shouldn’t do and because of social etiquette we hold back and deeply regret it afterwards. 2 Timothy 1 v7 says: “for God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of love, power and a sound mind”.

I often wonder what church would be like if we obeyed the promptings of the Holy Spirit, but because it’s not the ‘done’ thing to speak out in church services, perhaps dance, sing in tongues or give a word of prophesy other people are stopped from being blessed.

When God has His way in a church, lives can be radically changed which will be a witness to others in our social sphere, our families and those we love and meet with on a regular basis. We then become the people that our Heavenly Father created us to be from the foundation of the world.

Over the years God has been doing a work in my life that has caused me to be bolder and able to enjoy life in a way I could never have done before.

For freedom Christ has set us free! [Galatians 5]

Here’s to a bright shiny new future, every blessing,

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Bible quotations: Unless otherwise specified, quotations are taken from the resources of Bible Gateway or Bible Hub, in accordance with the licencing conditions outlined on our Site Policies page.

Bible dates: Where appropriate, the dates given for Biblical events are based on the Bible Timeline resource
and are subject to the constraints defined on the corresponding webpage.

[Transcript of a midweek message published by Horley Baptist Church on YouTube^[1], July 2021]

How does being real affect the way we do mission and social action? have we been doing it wrong all these years?

Last Sunday I finished off our teaching series ‘back to basics’ with the value of being real, not putting up a fake front, a mask to cover up who we really are. I think that will have a massive impact not only on what we do in a church service and how we are in our our groups, in our community but I think it will have a particular impact on how we do mission and social action. In Luke’s gospel, Luke records yet another time when Jesus disciples were arguing over who was the greatest amongst them. It seemed to be quite a common discussion with them and Jesus says to them “Look, the kings of the Gentiles and the authorities, they lord it over them and call themselves benefactors; you are not to be like them”.

Now a benefactor is someone that offers money or help to a person or an organization and I don’t think Jesus had anything particularly against benefactors. It’s good to help people, to offer money and serve them in any way that we can but what Jesus did have an issue with was how that was done. I think he had an issue with the hierarchical aspect of being a benefactor – you know, when you say “You’ve got a problem, I haven’t. You need help, I don’t. You need something, I’ve got something to offer.” or maybe, you know “You’re uneducated, I’m educated. You have nothing, I have everything. You have nothing to offer me, I have everything to offer you”.

I think that has a real unfortunate influence, particularly when it comes to the middle class Christians (which most Christians are), when it comes to the way they serve those who are poor, those who are needy. I’ve known some lovely people who are followers of Jesus, who are kind and caring, and have wanted to serve people but have served in a hierarchical way. They have come to the situation saying “I have something to offer, you have nothing to offer me”, and it has a real negative impact, I think, on the relationship between the benefactor and a beneficiary. Too often the way we do mission and also, you know, the way we do social action but also the way that we share the good news about Jesus Christ; we have done it in such a way where “I have something, you have nothing”, we’ve approached it, say, the good news of Jesus Christ with “but I am right and you are wrong“.

But how about if instead we came to the situation where you say “yeah, you are struggling but so am I, I’ve got something to teach you but I’ve got something to learn from you as well”? I remember helping out in a soup kitchen and it was very much kind of a benefactor role. I bought my box of sandwiches and my thermos flask of soup; I offered it to these people but, having watched the way that these homeless people people who had so little cared for one another, gave to one another, it was a was a real eye opener to me. I had, it turns out, possibly more to gain from my interactions with them than they had to gain from my sandwiches and soup. Likewise when it comes to sharing the good news of Jesus Christ. Do you come along saying “I’ve come as a purveyor of the truth” or are you coming along saying “I want to learn from you, I want to travel with you on a journey. You have stuff to offer me, you have things to teach me”?

I just want you to think perhaps about those things that we do as a church or as followers of Jesus Christ to share the good news of Jesus Christ in word and deed. How do we need to change those things to level the playing fields and come as equals not superiors?

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[1] YouTube link: Are we doing mission wrong?
Bible references: ~

Bible quotations: Unless otherwise specified, quotations are taken from the resources of Bible Gateway or Bible Hub, in accordance with the licencing conditions outlined on our Site Policies page.

Bible dates: Where appropriate, the dates given for Biblical events are based on the Bible Timeline resource
and are subject to the constraints defined on the corresponding webpage.

[This reflection was published in the weekly news bulletin of Horley Baptist Church, 27/June/2021]

The book of Ezra describes how the Jews who had been deported to Babylon 70 years earlier were allowed to return to their homeland and rebuild the temple which the Babylonians had destroyed. When the foundations of the new temple had been built, the people came together to praise God, but many of the older people who remembered the old temple wept aloud (Ezra 3 v 12). In Haggai 2 v 3 God says “Who of you is left who saw this house in its former glory? How does it look to you now? Does it not seem to you like nothing?” God then goes on to say “I will shake all nations and the desired of all nations will come and I will fill this house with glory … The glory of this present house will be greater than the glory of the former house.” (Haggai 2 v 7, 9)

Many of us have been grieving for the loss of the old carefree days when we could meet together as a church without fear and without restrictions. For me it has been similar to the grief I felt when Michael’s diabetes diagnosis put an end to the freedom we had previously enjoyed. I longed for the days when he could eat what he liked when he liked without us having to count carbs, do blood tests and injections or worry about high or low blood sugars. Whilst there is still no cure for diabetes in sight, at least vaccines for Covid19 have given us hope that we can meet together again without fear, even if some restrictions remain.

We still don’t know what the new “normal” will look like and some things will never be the same. I don’t like change, but know that God has to shake us up to stop us becoming complacent and ineffective. God has certainly shaken all nations over the past year and a half. It would be a tragedy if we wasted all that suffering by just going back to the way things were before, even if that is possible.

Isaiah 43 v 18-19 says: “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See! I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland.”

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Bible quotations: Unless otherwise specified, quotations are taken from the resources of Bible Gateway or Bible Hub, in accordance with the licencing conditions outlined on our Site Policies page.

Bible dates: Where appropriate, the dates given for Biblical events are based on the Bible Timeline resource
and are subject to the constraints defined on the corresponding webpage.