• Jeremiah 28:5–9                Few Prophets speak of Peace
• Romans 6:12–23               Be Slaves to God not Sin
• Matthew 10:40–42           Whoever receives you receives Me
• Psalm 89:8–18                   Mighty, Righteous, Faithful; our Shield

Introduction

Well, here it is, Trinity 3 and my last sermon amongst these churches. Last week I shared something of my personal testimony to the glorious reality that is God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This week I want to say something about that reality in the people that he calls to be his treasured possession amongst all his creation.

In doing so I am aware of the extraordinary times in which we now live and the challenge of being Church in them. As I retire others will take up the responsibility of leading these six churches across the south-east Lizard coast and it is an impossible task. I commend them to you with love. Pray for them.

But Church has never been about the people who lead. It is nothing less, or more, than the body of Christ, a gathering of Christians together in relationship to Christ and one another. What Church is, is what those Christians are, whatever institution or leadership they are involved with.

God is Serious about His Church

Whoever receives you receives Me

So, Jesus, as he sends his disciples out ahead of him can say, “Whoever receives you receives me”. When they knock on a door it is as if Jesus is knocking on the door. Some will receive him, and others will not, but either way it is Jesus, not the Disciples that they are responding to.

That is an extraordinary statement. Sometimes people have tried to distinguish Jesus from his church and say something like ‘come to Jesus, not church’, but that is not the way Jesus sees it.

There is a real downside to this, as scripture shows, when people get the wrong idea about God because of his people:

“For, as it is written, ‘The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.’” (Rom 2:24)

But the upside is that the church will display God’s name, not only to friends and neighbours, but also to the whole of creation:

^“ … and to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God, who created all things, so that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places.” (Eph 3:9-10)

That is why God will reward anyone who gives even a cup of cold water to one of his little ones, because they are Christ’s disciple/representative.

When we have an idea of church as something separate from us, something we can join, we may think that we can hide in what that ‘church’ is. We may act like supporters reflecting in is glory or accomplishments. But not before God. Church is not a club we can join or attend, it is a body we are born (again) into.

God is serious about this. God did not withhold his own Son; he held nothing back, as he pursued his plan to display his glory in human disciples – a church, body and bride – together in Christ. And he will hold nothing back in bringing that body to the perfection of Christ, formed in them.

Nor can we think that he will deal kindly with those who “destroy the one for who Christ died” (Rom 14:15) in the way that treat the members of his body.

Judgement Begins with the Household of God

God is serious about church. He is serious about church being Christ’s body. So, when as Christians we may look down on the world and think ourselves ok, we should remember the scripture:

“… it is time for judgment to begin at the household of God; and if it begins with us, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God?” (1 Pet 4:17)

God will not turn a Blind Eye

That, I think, is what underlies Jeremiah’s words to the false prophet Hananiah. Hananiah had been telling God’s people that they were ok. He said that the people who had been captured and sent into exile in Babylon would soon be returned. But God has exiled them for a reason, because he was serious about his church (his people). God was not going to let them go their own way and cause his name to be blasphemed.

So, Jeremiah sarcastically says “Amen”. But, he says, that is not what God usually has to say. If God warns “many countries and great kingdoms” to turn and repent, who would think that he is going to turn a blind eye to his own people’s rebelliousness?

God will Prune

And Jesus, himself, tells us that the Father prunes his vine, casting off the dead branches and pruning the fruitful ones (Jn 15). If we are being faithful and fruitful, the loving judgment of pruning will still come, so that we may bear more fruit – so that we may display more of Christ in us. Pruning is not comfortable, but it is an act of love – God’s love for his vine, his church.

But, especially with what is going on in the church at this time, we ought to be careful to ensure that it is God’s pruning, not ours. There is too much history of well-meaning Christians taking it into their own hands to prune away what they see as wrong with the church.

It is not that the church lacks things that need pruning. But when we do it in our own wisdom and strength, we are apt to miss the log in our own eyes and do as much or more damage than good. It is a much harder thing to build up in truth and love, than to tear down.

So, Present yourselves to God

We are called much more to build up than to tear down. And the work of building up the church always starts with ourselves. As our Romans reading reminds us, the one bit of the church we can make a real difference to, is ourselves. As we present ourselves to God, the fruit that he gives us “leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life”

As Ephesians tells us, building up the body (the church) comes from Christ, but it comes through us as we are joined together by him – with all the joints that he supplies – and as “each part is working properly” (Eph 4:15-16). Jesus promised to build his church, but he uses his people to do so. In Christ, his body builds itself up in love.

In that passage in Ephesians, Paul speaks of this building up as each one of us “speaking the truth in love”. But “each part working properly” is a greater thing that just what we say and the way we say it. So, he goes on to urge us all to be imitators of God, by walking (i.e. living) in love and righteousness. The way we live, each one of us, is either building the church up in Christ or stunting its growth and bringing it down.

As a mundane example, I remember my pastor advising me as a young man in search of a godly woman, to look to myself. ‘Be a godly man, and you will attract a godly woman’. The same is true in the church. The more each one of us pursues Christ in our own lives, the more we will encourage others to do so. It is a hard thing to live faithfully as Christ’s disciple in this world (as our Gospel last week reminded us), we ought to be making church an easier place to do so.

Each one of us has a part to play, as God calls us and equips us. It is not for us to compare ourselves to others, or to mistake public exposure for importance. God says, ‘present yourself’, and as we do so he will build his church.

Pilgrim Church

What all this means at this present time is a real challenge. As I am preparing to move on to God’s next thing in my life, it has never been harder to see what is the way forward for the churches that I have been part of here.

A Weak Church and a Hungry People.

The institutional church that many of us have known is weak and in danger of collapse. At the same time, the hunger for God among our communities seems greater than ever.

If people do not find that hunger satisfied in God, they will seek satisfaction elsewhere (even though it is no satisfaction). But God’s design is that they find him in the company of his people.

I am convinced that being church is at the heart of all this. God’s desire is for a church that is so full of the life of Christ that, even in its imperfections (of which there will always be many), the church is both salt and light in its community.

A Passionate God

I believe that God is passionate about this church and is moving heaven and earth to bring it into being. But I do not think that he is passionate about church buildings, or the Church of England, or any other institution, or any idea of our church that sets itself apart from other Christians

I do believe that God is passionate about you, each and every Christian whom he has purchased with the blood of Christ. And everyone in our communities whom he knew before he made the universe, whom he chose and has purchased with the blood of Christ, though they do not yet know him.

God is at work amongst us, in our churches and outside them. And he is at work in all the challenges that we face. He is working everything according to his wisdom and plan. And he is calling us out to journey with him as his Pilgrim People.

Pilgrim Church

We too easily forget that God has always called a Pilgrim People out to journey with him to the fulfilment of his promise. Because we use church buildings that have stood for generations organised by an institution that is just as old, we forget that we are a Pilgrim People. Our buildings, no matter how old, are just tents – temporary structures for the journey. So are our institutions.

Even the newer churches that have grown up in recent years are apt to become too fixed. The first generation sets out as pilgrims with nothing but a sense of calling, but traditions, buildings and institutions grow. Too often people can settle into maintenance mode and forget that we are pilgrims, we are called out. Like Abraham, we are “looking forward to a city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God” (Heb 11:10)

God know that we need tents, whether they are made of stone or canvass. He knows that we need organisation, the church is a body after all. Worshiping together needs liturgy, we need common hymn sheet. But when any of these things become more important than the call and the journey, God will shake them up. Just as he is doing.

So, What Now?

Though so much seems uncertain and unclear, God’s word and his promise still stand. The work of Christ for our salvation is eternal. The Holy Spirit is amongst us and working in our world. God’s call on your life and his promises to you, will not be taken back – they are guaranteed in Christ himself.

Each one of us must play our part in love and truth, bearing with and encouraging one another in Christ.

May God bless you all, as you pursue his upward call together in Christ.

• Jeremiah 20:7–13 To You I have Committed my cause
• Romans 6:1–11 Died to Sin … Alive to Christ
• Matthew 10:24–39 a Call to Witness in the face of Opposition

Daily, Ordinary, Life

Today is the Second Sunday of Trinity, that great season of ordinary time in the Church’s calendar. And its also my penultimate Sunday as Rector of the parishes of St Keverne, St Ruan w Grade and Landewednack. I have a feeling that these last two Sunday’s ought to be more important and yet they occur in the Church’s Ordinary Time.

But, perhaps, this is as it should be. We can all rise to the occasion of a special season (whether its Christmas, Lent, Easter or Pentecost), but it is in our ordinary days that we show our true life. The reality is, of course, that all of our days are lived in Ordinary Time. We may take time to remember the great seasons that are the grounds of our faith and life, but we live that life now, day by day, between those foundational beginnings and the great hope that is to come when Christ returns and fulfils all his promises.

Lent may touch on this, but it has an unusual intensity and limited duration. Jesus has called us to live in him and for him in the ongoing ordinariness of our lives. Other seasons flow through our lives – childhood, becoming adults, working life, perhaps marriage and parenthood, retirement and old age – but these are the ordinary seasons of life that we share with all our friends and neighbours.

What is it, then, that shapes and fills your ordinary days? What is the fountain of life in them, from which your daily living flows? And what sustains you when living is itself an exercise in perseverance – more like walking through mud than surfing the crest of a wave?

Costly Christianity

Our readings this morning set a challenging context for such thoughts.

Just Like Jesus

Jesus tells us clearly that being a Christian – in anything more than mere words – is going to be as difficult for us as it was for him. People will try to stop you living that way, to oppose what you do and say, or to try and make you keep it private – hidden and personal – not part of ordinary life. And some of that opposition will come from your closest friends and family.

Sometimes that is the hardest place to be true to Christ’s calling, amongst your friends and family. I read, as I was preparing this, of a young man in India murdered by his fellow villagers because he and his family converted to become Christians. That is extreme for us, but it reminds us that living as a Christian is as hard as Jesus told us it would be, even for us.

And yet, even here, there is another dynamic. The Father sees, the Father knows, and he loves it when his children show themselves to be his children.

Struggling with this

And Jeremiah illustrates this so powerfully.

He struggles with his calling, because it is so hard – “everyone mocks me”. He feels deceived even. Perhaps, when he felt that call to be a prophet, he had hoped that it would be a good and honourable thing, and now his experience is anything but. He has become a reproach and derision, not honoured. And people are threatening his life.

And yet he cannot but speak as he does; it is like fire in his bones and he can’t keep it in. Being a prophet, rather than good and honourable, feels more like being a slave. God has overcome him – “you are stronger than I”.

Perhaps, sometimes for us, being a Christian can seem like a burden; something we feel forced to do. I think that God gives us times like that. But as Jeremiah pushes through – as we push through such times – he comes to a deeper entrusting of his life to God and a deeper hope in God.

So, he comes to say – “to you have I committed my cause”. And he comes to trust in the one who – “has delivered the life of the needy from the hand of evildoers”.

Always a Slave

And then, in Romans, we see a hard truth. None of us are as free as we think that we are.

There is a freedom in Christ. It is the freedom from being enslaved to a way of life that is killing us. But is comes at a price, being enslaved to a way of life that leads to enduring life. It is a hard truth to take in, but it is the reality of life whether we like it or not. All of us must commit ourselves to life – slaves, is not too strong a word – in order to live.

The difference that Jesus makes is that before him we had no choice in whose slave we would be. We were born into slavery to sin and death. And it is only through death – his death, and our death in him – that we are freed from that slavery. We were helpless and hopeless, even the faith that unites us to Christ in the benefits of his death and resurrection life, is a gift to us from God.

So, now, we have a choice – a choice we make and live each day. Whose will I be? Sin no longer has any claim over us, but we can still present ourselves to is as if it did. Or we can present ourselves to Christ, alive to God in Jesus Christ. It may sometimes feel like a new slavery – just as it did to Jeremiah – but it is one of life and freedom.

An Ordinary Glory

What is it, then, that shapes and fills your ordinary days? What is the fountain of life in you, from which your daily living flows? And what sustains you when living is itself an exercise in perseverance? Perhaps, in my penultimate sermon, you might indulge me sharing something of my answer to those questions.

If I look back at my ordinary life – and it has been ordinary – three things have had an enduring impact from God and fulfil what those questions are looking for.

God Is

First comes an encounter in a railway carriage – it could have been a brief encounter, but it has stood at the heart of my life ever since.

I was not brought up as a Christian and had no encouragement to seek Christ or become a Christian. But I suppose I was looking for something, a meaning and purpose to life, something spiritual. In that I was very ordinary, like so many people then and now looking for s spiritual reality.

In my sixth form college I met a young catholic boy, I can’t even remember his name, or whether the encounter was really significant. But we discussed what we believed in – I with my mixture of eastern philosophies and he with his faith in Jesus. I don’t remember anything that you would call gospel or doctrine, it was just a discussion, but perhaps it stirred something.

Whatever, one morning following this I was alone in a railway carriage on my daily commute to college, and I had an extraordinary experience of God’s presence. It was the most real thing, but completely inexplicable. I just experienced a presence and reality and knew that God is, God was there, and I could not deny that he was.

As a result of this I sought out Christians at the college and sought out a local church to join. That’s another story. But what I want to emphasise is that realisation that God Is. There was no burning bush and no sound saying, ‘I am”, but there might as well have been.

The thing about God is that you can’t make him up. He is what he is. He is the reality behind all reality, the life behind all life. The only choice is whether you accept him as he is and seek to know him, or whether you reject who he is and try and ignore and hide from his reality and truth.

Word and Spirit

Once I had encountered this reality and said yes to him, two other things became real and central.

The first was his word, the Bible. I had read bits of the bible before. I had a very good RE teacher at secondary school, even though it did nothing for me at the time. But now the Bible came alive. The more I read it the more real and clear God became to me.

I have heard many rational arguments for the reliability and truth of the Bible. But the greatest for me is John Piper’s description of its peculiar glory that is self-authenticating. Reading it with enlightened eyes it is just satisfyingly true. And so it was for me. I kept finding more and more that just seemed to fit with the reality that I had first encountered.

Then, whilst all of this was going on, I stumbled upon the Holy Spirit. I was still searching for a church to join – I am afraid that I found the BCP and chanting of the local parish church too impenetrable – and I came across an advert for a meeting at the local Baptist Church with Arthur Wallis, speaking about the Holy Spirit.

I went. I did not know, as some Christians might have told me at the time, that the Holy Spirit was controversial or dangerous. I went, and that evening I both made my first public commitment to faith in Christ, and was baptised or filled with the Holy Spirit.

Perhaps without that, my first experience of God would have faded and become a mere memory. But in the Holy Spirit I found a daily renewal of that encounter and reality. That is not to say that every day since has felt Spirit filled. I have grieved him many times since then, and he has given me the gift of his apparent absence at times to increase my hunger.

But, in all that, the Holy Spirit has been an abiding presence and an ever-flowing fountain of life. If there is anything of Christ visible in me, or any understanding of his word, I know that it his doing as he has opened his word to me.

Glory

The third thing I need to share, is in many ways of a piece with the first two. But, somehow in my mind and heart, it seems to have its own life-giving experience.

It was given to me through the gift of a book by John Piper. His most famous book is probably “Desiring God”, but the one I came to first was “The Glory of God in Preaching”. I was not preaching at that time and I am not sure who recommended it to me (it might have been my father-in-law), but I am eternally grateful.

It begins with John Piper speaking about a preaching series he felt led to give. It was focussed on the Glory of God. It was unusual in that it contained no practical applications or exhortations, and preachers have always been taught that you must give people practical applications and make the preaching relevant to their lives. But this series was just about God.

It was a series about the God, just that – who he is, what he is like. It was about how glorious God is in all that he is; majestic, almighty, faithful, true, good … etc. It was just about the glorious reality that is God.

And in the midst of that series one family in the congregation were going through hell. Any normal pastor would have thought that they should preach words of comfort, about God’s love for us, about what he has done for us, about how he can meet our needs. But the experience of that family was that seeing God like this, seeing his glory, was more sustaining and healing than any practical teaching.

And since then, I have come to know that God in the glory of who he is, is everything. Unless God is my glory, unless he is the one who captivates my heart with the sight of him, no amount of me-orientated comfort means anything. I know, I also have been through times of hell.

In them I knew that God loved me and my family, but at the heart of that love was not me, but him. It was not that he loved me and would take away my pain and suffering, but that he would use them to bring me closer to him. The words of Asaph come to mind:

“Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. For behold, those who are far from you shall perish; you put an end to everyone who is unfaithful to you. But for me it is good to be near God; I have made the Lord God my refuge, that I may tell of all your works. (Ps 73:25-28 a Psalm of Asaph)

Is it Just Me?

All of which seems very self-indulgent of me and too much about me. But if this God is as real and glorious and present as I have come to know, surely it can’t just be me? Surely, others must see this and know and live this as well.

I have to believe that he is doing this in others as well. Though you might describe it with different words – God is more than any one can see and even the whole church of Christ is going to need eternity to explore his unfathomable riches – this glorious reality is meant to be shared.

At the same time, it has always seemed to me that this glorious God is mysteriously non-transferable. I can do nothing to make others see or share what I am talking about. All my words and deeds are just that, my words and deeds. Only God can give anyone an experience of his glorious reality.

But, equally, no one can see and remain silent. And neither can I.

So, as I am preparing to lay down my place amongst these churches, I hope that you will forgive my indulgence. I hope even more that you will worship with me and know the one whom to know is life. And that, in the ordinariness of your life his extraordinary glory will shine.

Next week, God willing I may share something about what I believe happens when we shine with his glory.

May God show us the path of Life.
In his presence alone is fullness of Joy
At his right hand is everlasting pleasure

• Matthew 9:35–10:8[9–23]         Disciples Called and Sent
• Exodus 19:2–8                                A Kingdom of Priests and a Holy Nation
• Romans 5:1–8                                Rejoicing in Hope … and Suffering

Introduction – the Importance of Names

Names can be powerful things when they are given to us with care. How many parents have agonised over the right name for a child, as yet unborn – unknown but full of hope? And, amongst friends, nicknames tell us something about how our friends see us and our place in the group. Surnames may say something about our place in society, a trade, location, or parentage.

In scripture, names have always carried meaning, throughout the old testament and the new. Amongst the disciples, James and John were known where they came from as ‘the sons of thunder’. One wonders what this says about how their friends saw them. Yet John came to see himself in later years as ‘the beloved disciple’. Simon, for all his impetuousness and volatility, was named Peter (Rock), by Jesus, and became so in the early church.

Revelation tells us that those who is faithful in Jesus will receive a new name, that is not given or known by others, but a personal gift from God himself known only to the one who receives it (Rev 2:17). Imagine that, a name that is not about who we are in our community, or who we have come from, but all about who we are to God himself.

In our Gospel reading today, we have the names of the twelve followers that Jesus called to him and sent out before him; twelve disciples, who become apostles, representatives of the one who sent them. Whatever they had been – tax collectors, zealots, fishermen etc. – they were now his disciples. They had received a new name. And now, the way that they are received by people will be treated as if the people had received or rejected Jesus himself.

In our old testament reading, the people are called a ‘Treasured Possession’, ‘Priests’ and ‘Holy’ (set apart for God). And in the epistle, we are called sinners whom God has loved. Names are important, and what God calls us is most important of all. Let us pause and look again at what God calls us.

Called

Jesus had many who followed him in various ways. The crowds followed him about, perhaps intrigued or entertained. Some followed him out of a need to be healed or set free. Some followed him in order to test him. And some had left everything behind to follow him.

Chosen and Called

But all of those who truly followed him were first called by him, and none more so than the twelve disciples whom he called apostles. We see this truth in this passage as these twelve are called out from the rest of his followers as disciples. But we could also have seen it in the way each of them was called, one by one, to leave their old lives and follow him.

This has been the pattern of God’s way of salvation since Abraham and even, you might argue, since Adam, whom God called into being. So, Jesus can say to them in the upper room, “you did not choose me, but I chose you” (Jn 15:16). And Romans tells us

“And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.” (Rom 8:30)

A Liberating Blessing

This is a glorious truth that has blessed and sustained Christians through the ages … He chose. Whatever choice we made was in response to his first choosing, so it depends in his choosing not ours. But those whom he chose he also called; and he called them to be, and to become … something new.

In the normality of this world we are all called into being, by our parents, by the friends and community in which we live, by what we do. And we also call ourselves into being, as we pursue our own vision of who we are, and who we can be.

So, for example, John was called one of the sons of thunder, and may have lived up to that reputation. But as he followed Jesus call, he came to see himself as – and to be seen by others as – the beloved disciple. What does it do to you when you leave behind a sense of thunderously imposing yourself on life and come to know above all other things, that you are loved by God?

Or, Matthew, who was known to everyone – and judged by them – as a traitorous tax collector. He would become a father figure to many as he shared his master’s words in the Gospel and the growing churches for which it was first written.

Christ in You

And, what of us … what of you? Who are you? Each one of us, he has called, one by one, name by name. Part of our discipleship is allowing him to name us, to call us into being who and what he wants us to be. The Holy Spirit is at work in us so that Christ is formed in us (individually and together). Christ is the pattern and goal, but he is calling you to be ‘Christ in in you’. A name he gives to you, alone.

Nevertheless, since Christ is the pattern, there are some names that we share.

Treasured

So, God says to the people he called out with Moses – “you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples”.

Among all his possessions

To make it more clear, he says “all the earth is mine”. It is not as if we are his possession and the rest of the world is not. We are not God’s people in that way. All people are, in a real sense, God’s people. They are his whether they reject him or ignore him. We need to remember this in all the divisions and denigrations of racism and nationalism (or whatever) that beset our world. Every single person is God’s, made by him and for him.

With No Intrinsic Value

And amongst all these, God has not chosen the brightest and best, the wisest, strongest, or most skilled.

“For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.” (1 Cor 1:26-39)

But, though there is nothing in us that deserves it, God has called us Treasured. Out of all his possessions we are, in Christ, his treasured possession. For me, that says more than that God loves me. We can love people that we don’t like. We are called to love our enemies. But God calls you treasured – cherished, rejoiced over.

Whatever the world says, whatever your heart says, this is what God calls you!

God’s Eternal Choice

And we are Treasured by the one who sees all things. At his command, Jesus called twelve disciples, knowing that more than one would betray him. But only one was choses as a betrayer. Peter and the others were chosen as treasure.

We may have let him down, and may disappoint him in the future. We may have given him every reason to regret his choice and calling. But he has determined that we will be his treasure, so that he sanctifies all whom he calls, and he glorifies all whom he sanctifies. And, if we can begin to feel what it means to be treasured, to be called a joy and crown, by the one who made all things, perhaps we can begin to find – in him – the way to become what we are called.

Holy

We are called Treasure, and we are Treasured. But we are also called Holy.

Holiness speaks of God’s uniqueness, in goodness, purity, power and wisdom. But the root meaning of the word is about separation. So, God in his holiness is not like us – he is certainly not made in our image – he is different, set apart, holy. And when God calls us holy, we too are set apart, to be his people, to bear his image.

Abraham: Called Out … to be a Blessing

So, from Abraham and his children, God called out a people for his won possession. They were part of the same overall people group as their neighbours, but they were called to separate themselves and live differently as God’s people. They were given religious markers – including circumcision, clothing & food – to mark them as separate. But the heart of their separateness (their holiness) was there love and worship of God alone and their moral way of living.

They were not entirely separate. They were to live among the other peoples surrounding them. But they were to have a different hear, and a different way of life from them.

Ultimately, from Abraham’s first call, they were to be a blessing to those amongst whom they lived. This was not an exclusive isolation. They had a duty to strangers and especially refugees. And what they were called to be was meant to be seen by the nations, who would wonder at the God who gave them such laws and instructions

And we also, in Christ

And when Christ came and the gentiles were included in this calling, some of the religious markers were fulfilled and left behind. We are no longer called to be circumcised physically, to avoid certain foods, to dress in a certain way, or to worship in a particular place or way. Now Christ is being formed amongst all the nations and cultures of the world. But the heart of our call remains the same, God has called us out from what and where we were to be his.

So, what does this mean for you and for me?

Christian British or British Christian

Fundamentally, it means that we belong to God in Christ. Whatever else we may also be in our relationships (husband, wife, parent, child, neighbour etc.), or in our nationality (British, Cornish or whatever), in our occupation (people always ask ‘what do you do?’), or even in our own identity – whatever else we are, first and fundamentally we are Christ’s.

So, if we are British and a Christian, are we a Christian British person or a British Christian person. The English language emphasises the last adjective as fundamental, so I would say that I am a Christian who is also British – a sort of dual nationality in which my fundamental identity is Christian.

New Person, New Roots, New Identity

This also means that I am a new person in Christ. I may have been a sinner, but now I am freed from sin and a new person (2 Cor 5:17). I may have been abused in my childhood, but now I am freed from any claim that abuse has on my identity, I am new in Christ.

When God calls you Holy, it is a liberating thing. You have been called out and set apart. So now you are free to live in wholeness and fulfil all God’s calling for you

But it is a freedom that does not entirely detach you from what you have been. Because God wants you to be a blessing. So (for example), if you have been abused, that abuse no longer defines or controls you, but you may have a special ministry to share with the abuses – to comfort with the comfort which you have been comforted with in Christ (2 Cor 1:4)

Sent

Which leads to a final part of our new calling and name. We are Called to God to be sent out by him. Just as the Twelve were called by Jesus to be sent out. The Apostles are special case for what is a general calling for all Jesus’ disciples.

Our Gospel reading records the calling of the twelve who were called Apostles – a word which means a representative, sent in the place of their master. But Jesus called other disciples and sent them out (Lk 10:1). And all of us are sent to make disciples (Matt 28:19)

Sent and Called

And as we go, we will discover that being sent is not merely a part of our calling, one aspect only. As we go, we will discover more of what it means to be called.

So, Jesus tells them not to take extra possessions. We are called to God in Christ and now belong to him, set apart and holy, and he is the one who now looks after us. So, going without extra supplies and resources, we will discover how much we are treasured as God supplies our needs.

And, whilst we are sent out as sheep amongst wolves, we will discover – in Christ by his word and Spirit – wisdom to overcome all their wiles. God will reveal Satan’s devices to us so that we are not left unaware and vulnerable. And, when we are tested by courts or kings, we will be given the words we need.

We cannot rejoice at being called and given a new name, or at being set apart and treasured, without also being sent and going as he directs us. Without the obedience of going, we ill not truly discover what our calling and new name is, or how set apart and treasured we are.

Called for Glory

Ultimately, we are called to be what Adam and Eve were made for – to bear and display the image of the God who made us. We are called for display –

• to be for the praise of his glory (Eph 1:12)
• a display of God’s wisdom (Eph 3:10

Just as God has delighted to display his glory in the extraordinary variety and beauty of the physical creation, even more he has purposed to display his deeper glory of wisdom and truth in a people that he has called and made (rescued and re-made). We should not be surprised that we are sent and called to go out into our communities and world rather than hide away. God wants his grace in us to be seen.

A New Name

Who is like God, and who is like the Son who he has given to be our saviour, and the Spirit whom he has lavished upon us in his grace? He has chosen us when we rejected him. He has called us when we were not looking for him. He has treasured us when we were less than worthless; loved loveless sinners. And he has given us a new name, a new calling and purpose, to the praise of his glorious grace.

Let us finish this morning with words from Romans (Rom 11:33-12:2)

“Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! “For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?” “Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?” For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.

So, may each of us, brothers and sisters, by these mercies of God, present our bodies as a living sacrifice, each one of us called holy and acceptable to God. What other worship can we give? Let us not be conformed to this world, as we have been called out of it. But may we be transformed by the renewal of our mind, as we obey his call and so discern his will in all its goodness and rightness and perfection.

• Matthew 28:16–20 All Authority … Go and make Disciples
• Isaiah 40:12–17, 27–31 Behold your God
• 2 Corinthians 13:11–14 Grace, Love & Fellowship

Introduction – Behold your God

The Old Testament speaks of a time when:

They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.

Isa 11:9

For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.

Hab 2:14

And in the coming of Jesus, the fullness of that blessing is revealed

And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.

Jn 17:3

On the Sunday in which, above all Sundays, our focus is on the fullness of God in his glorious Trinity and Unity, we ought to reflect on the God that we know.

Behold Your God

Our Isaiah reading begins, before the section we have in the lectionary, with this:

Comfort, comfort my people, says your God … Go on up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good news; lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good news; lift it up, fear not; say to the cities of Judah, “Behold your God!”

Isa 40:1,9

Behold your God. How well do you know him? The riches of his glory in Jesus Christ are unfathomable. But to know him is eternal life. And we should know him.

Good News

The Gospel is Good News; good news concerning Jesus Christ. But in its Old Testament roots (as we see in these verses) it is expressed as the heralds’ cry of good news – Behold your God. God, himself, in all his glorious trinity-unity, is the Good News. To speak of him, to see him and know him, is comfort and strength to God’s people.

By his grace we have been given eyes to see and hearts to know this God. His Glory has been made to shine in our hearts in seeing the face of Jesus Christ – the image of the invisible God (2 Cor 4:6).

He is the Good News. He alone is the comfort that we need. Anything else is fake news, comfortless, “a broken reed of a staff, which pierces the hand of the one that leans on it” (Isa 36:6)

Your God

The heralds of Good News proclaim, “Behold your God”. Yet, I wonder how many Christians see and know him as they should. From the beginning, Satan’s weapon of deceit has been aimed at the nature of God and his word. In the garden he says to Eve and Adam, “did God say?”, and he questions not only God’s word, but also his character.

Today, I wonder how many Christians have been deceived into seeing God as something less than he truly is. We may think that idolatry has to do with statues and carved images, but as A W Tozer says, it is much deeper than that:

“Among the sins to which the human heart is prone, hardly any other is more hateful to God than idolatry, for idolatry is at bottom a libel on His character. The idolatrous heart assumes God is other than He is—in itself a monstrous sin—and substitutes for the true God one made after its own likeness …

Let us beware lest we in our pride accept the erroneous notion that idolatry consists only in kneeling before visible objects of adoration, and that civilized peoples are therefore free from it. The essence of idolatry is the entertainment of thoughts about God that are unworthy of Him. It begins in the mind and may be present where no overt act of worship has taken place. “When they knew God,” wrote Paul, “they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.”[1]

Only the word of God and the grace of the Holy Spirit can truly enlighten our darkened hearts.

Go … and make Disciples

Our Gospel is familiar as the ‘Great Commission’ to go and make disciples. But it is founded on an awesome statement that Jesus makes:

“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.”

One God, over All

This is the one who is THE Way, THE Truth and THE Life, and he has authority over ALL things. We dare not present Jesus as other than he truly is. He is full of grace and truth, and we must not so emphasise the grace that the truth is lost, or so emphasize the truth that his grace is lost. Sometimes that will be hard, especially when the Truth is challenging, but we must seek always to proclaim Jesus in the fullness of his grace and truth.

And, as this Sunday should remind us, we must present Jesus as he is in the fullness of the Godhead. There is no place for setting the Father against the Son, or some idea of the Old Testament God of wrath against a New Testament idea of the God of love. Jesus tells us to baptise these new disciples,

“in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit”.

One Name, one God – Father, Son and Holy Spirit – throughout eternity; revealed in his one word (both old and new testaments).

Disciples of the Word

And this one God, over all, calls us to be disciples of his word – “teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you”.

The word ‘observe’ (gk. τηρέω tēreō) has its roots in a word for guarding, keeping watch over, or preserving. So, it speaks not only of obeying, or believing, but holding closely to, and passing on with care.

If we call ourselves disciples of Christ, we must cherish his word, being careful to keep it, to hear it, live it and pass it on, just as he has given it to us. Throughout history there have been those who sought to accommodate his word to their circumstances, their feelings, their group, or institution. But God has kept his word remarkably unchanged and available to us.

Every generation is charged to keep this word. And we must faithfully put this word at the centre of our discipleship, testing every tradition and new thought against its challenging plumb line.

Our Comfort in His Glory

Isaiah keeps this focus on God as the good news and our comfort in troubling times.

Is God Impotent or Uncaring

In the second part of our reading, we see the issue from the people’s point of view. The people are troubled and wondering about God:

• Can he not see the trouble we are in – “My way is hidden from the Lord”
• Does he not care about the trouble we are in – “my right is disregarded by my God”.

These two questions have worried Christians over centuries, when they are facing troubles; either God is not powerful, or he doesn’t care. You may have faced them, yourself. Certainly, they have been at the heart of philosophers’ criticisms of God, faced with the problem of suffering

So, what is the answer?

Who is Like God?

In our modern view of things, you might be quick to assert that God does care. You might point to the suffering of Christ for us? But this is not the answer that God gives. Whether you look at this reading, or in that great treatise on suffering, in Job. Again, and again, God does not tell us that he loves us (though he does). His first answer seems always to be to point us to his glorious fullness. ‘Who is like me?’, he says. Who has made all this, who understands and measures it, who taught him the wisdom?

We might look for God to affirm his love for us, to say that we are valuable to him and that he cares for us. But instead he says, “the nations are like a drop from a bucket and are accounted as the dust on the scales”. If all were offered as worship to him, they would still come to “less than nothing and emptiness”.

Our Comfort is in His Glory

It is not that he does not care. God is love, faithful love. But when we see God’s love as a reflection of some value in us, we are on shaky ground. So, God establishes his love on the solid ground of who he is, not who we are.

He is the everlasting one, the creator of everything, the unfainting, unwearying one. There is no limit to his knowledge or understanding. And, from this limitless fountain, those who wait on him receive strength. Those who see Gods love as a reflection of their own worth or value are doomed to faint and fall, but those who wait on God will fly – They

“shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint”

He works for those who wait

Is this your God? Too many Christians seem to have a view of God as the one who loves them, but when troubles come, they have no answer to them. In times of trouble the cant see that God loves them. They ask, does he not see, does he not care?

When we are like this, we may not realise, but it is as if we have made everything – including God – revolve around us and our cares. But the truth is that everything revolves around God. He is the centre; he has to be for our sakes. And for us to learn this, he may bring us to troubles, and to the pit of Ps 40, where we learn to wait patiently for him.

That may seem hard, but it is glorious and liberating. Every other god, every other religion seems to depend on us; we serve and look for blessings. But as Isaiah tells us elsewhere, this God is the one who works for those who wait for him:  

“From of old no one has heard or perceived by the ear, no eye has seen a God besides you, who acts for those who wait for him.”

Isa 64:4

So, let us put God at the centre and look to him to be God amongst us, as he wills.

Let God be God amongst us

And, finally, our short reading from Corinthians, speaks of what it looks like when we let God be the centre, when we let God be God amongst us.

When it is no longer about us, or our group but about him, we can begin to experience what it is like when his grace, his love and his fellowship is the reality of our being church. Rejoicing in him, we can pursue restoration and peace.

• His Grace – a faithful mercy that is founded in truth, freed to us through the sacrifice of Christ.
• His Love – a love that reflects who he is more than who we are, faithful and full of wisdom that flows from his holiness to meet our real need
• His Fellowship – bringing us to be with him in the mysterious fellowship of the eternal trinity, where we find our place, identity and meaning in him.

Going back full circle, we are those who are baptised, together, into his name and his word.

Behold your God

Now we see, dimly and imperfectly as in a mirror (1 Cor 13:12), but as be we see we are changed by what we see (2 Cor 3:18), from glory to glory. Now we see imperfectly, but one day we will see and know, just as truly as we are seen now by him. And when we see him, out transformation will be perfected (1 Jn 3:2).

So, let us take care how we see. Let us not let our own desire, or any tradition, replace the one who IS, with any idol. To see him truly is comfort and strength in our troubles. To know him is eternal life. Accept nothing less.

[1] AW Tozer, The Essence of Idolatry from ‘The Knowledge of the Holy’ 1961 Harper Collins