Category: Pastor’s Pen

Taking up our Cross

Israel Folau has again made news for expressing views on sexuality that go against the prevailing views of four culture. He dared to express that homosexuality was sinful, it would bring judgement, and salvation could be found in Christ. In other words, he dared to state what the Bible says, and what has been the view of Christians for 2000 years.

How should we as a church respond to this? We can recognise the hypocrisy of a culture that speaks so much about tolerance yet refuses to tolerate those with views that differ on sexuality to the cultural norm. We remember Jesus’ promise/warning that ‘if they persecuted me they will also persecute you’ (John 15:20).

And we also remember what Jesus calls us to do as his disciples. Just after Peter had identified him as the Christ, and then declared his mission (that he would suffer, die and then rise), he gave some of the most challenging words in the Bible.

‘If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?’ (Mark 8:34-37).

Christ paid the ultimate price for our salvation. Folau is now paying the price for his refusal to go along with the world, and instead cling to God’s Word. What price are we willing to pay?

Are we willing to let people think we are strange because we keep speaking of Jesus? To be thought of as bigots? To be considered strange because we are willing to speak the truth and don’t hide behind lies?

Are we willing to suffer?

They mock

‘All who see me mock me; they make mouths at me; they wag their heads; “He trusts in the LORD; let him deliver him; let him rescue him, for he delights in him!”’ (Psalm 22:7-8)

You can feel the heartache, the drowning despair, in these words. The loneliness in the sea of people, as they all turn on this person in mocking derision. The shame as he is attacked for his trust and loyalty to God.

These are the words of David, King of Israel. When did he feel this way? When did this event happen? It is hard to pinpoint exactly when anything like this happened in his lifetime. Was this when Saul was chasing him? When Ish-bosheth challenged him?

While David may have had moments where it felt like everyone was against him and mocking him, this Psalm is not about him (when did verses 16-18 happen to David?!). This Psalm describes the heart-wrenching pain of great David’s Greater Son. It is a prophecy about the King of God’s people who was willing to suffer to save his people.

What a Saviour we have. What a King! It has long been the pattern throughout biblical history that’s God’s people have suffered at the hands of their enemies – e.g. Abel, Joseph, Israel in Egypt. And Jesus not only followed the pattern – he was the reason for the pattern! He didn’t suffer to be like them; they suffered to be like him, to show what the Saviour-King would endure.

He endured the cross, depising the shame (Heb 12:2). He emptied himself, taking the form of a servant (Phil 2:7). He set the pattern – shame now, glory later. That is a fundamental truth Easter teaches, and it’s a pattern we must follow ourselves. Are you ready to be mocked like Christ?

Christ, our Passover

‘Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. Let us therefore celebrate the festival, not with the old leaven, the leaven of malice and envy, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth’ (1 Cor 5:7-8).

Easter is coming quickly. Many in the churches and in the world don’t understand, however, that this was an event long planned and promised, and even prefigured. Rather than being a random and brutal death of someone who became the founder of a religious movement, this was the fulfilment of God’s eternal plan to save his people from sin, judgement, and the one who would judge them – God himself.

This lack of understanding in the churches is tragic and is reflected in an unwillingness to read and teach through the Old Testament. Rather than seeing a unified story of God’s grace – that the Old Testament is the record of promises made, and the New Testament is the record of promises kept – they see a God of anger and judgement in the Old, and a God of love in the New.

But this is plainly wrong! Christ is our Passover lamb. In the Exodus, God saved his people through the Passover lamb. He saved them from both the cruel slavery of the Egyptians, and also from himself. He saved them from the plague of death, instead only bringing it upon the Egyptians.

Repeatedly, this event is used as a prefiguring of Jesus’ work on the cross. The lamb died instead of the firstborn – Jesus died instead of the sinner. Israel were slaves to Egypt – we were slaves to sin. Israel were led to the promised land – we are being led to the promised land of heaven/the new creation.

Let us then trust in the sacrifice, ‘celebrate the festival,’ and live lives of sincerity and truth.

The God of grace and sacrifice

‘So Abraham called the name of that place, “The LORD will provide”; as it is said to this day, “On the mount of the LORD it shall be provided’ (Gen 22:14).

In Abraham’s time, this story would have been shocking for the opposite reason it is shocking to us today. The gods of the cultures around Abraham were selfish, callous, and uncaring. They wanted sacrifice, and human sacrifices were the ultimate. That command Abraham received – ‘Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you’ (v2) – would be considered completely normal.

What would have been shocking to them, however, is the grace from God! The sudden appearance of the angel calling out for Abraham to stop before completing the sacrifice would be completely unfamiliar. Grace and kindness were not characteristics prized in those societies. Instead, they were brutal and sexualised, and the gods were worshipped through brutality and sex.

In our culture, what is shocking is not the call for Abraham to stop, but the fact he was given the command to sacrifice his son at all! The gods of our culture aren’t gods who command us to sacrifice; they’re gods who invite us to enjoy our sinful pleasures and be enslaved by them. Our culture is not opposed to kindness, but to sacrifice of any kind.

But we have a God who not only demands sacrifice but is the one who in kindness and grace gave himself as that sacrifice. God provided a ram in Gen 22, but he provided his own Son as the Lamb in the Gospel. What else could we do but give everything we are and have to him?

Made Valuable by God

Have you heard of ‘imposter syndrome’? It’s a phenomenon where those who are perfectly qualified, with all the required skills, fear being exposed as a fraud in their workplace. They could be one of the top people in their field yet be paralysed by a nagging anxiety that it will all come crashing down.

Many Christians struggle from ‘imposter syndrome’ when we think about our faith. We’re tempted to doubt our value as God’s child, either because we are burdened by the shame of sin or we feel useless because we can’t contribute in various ways.

But truth is not found by looking at our feelings. We cannot discover who we are by looking within. When tempted to despair, we should stop looking within ourselves and start looking outside ourselves. We should look to God’s Word.

In God’s Word we find those comforting words, ‘in one Spirit we were all baptised into one body … and all were made to drink of one Spirit’ (1 Cor 12:13). Feel like a foot but wish you were a hand? Wish you could offer more? Listen to God’s Word. Your value is not found in what you offer. Your value is in what God has made you. You are part of the church, the body of Christ.

Feel worse than a foot? Completely useless? ‘The parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and on those parts of the body that we think less honourable we bestow the greatest honour, and our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty…’ (v22-23).

We are all valuable to the body. Can you pray? That is a valuable contribution – more than you can imagine. But our value isn’t in what we can offer, but in who God has made us – part of Christ’s body.

Trusting while hated

The world has always hated God’s people, because they have always hated God. That might sound overly brash but consider the words of Jesus: ‘If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you’ (John 15:18). Jesus is the showcase of the world’s hatred – he is the God-Man.

But hatred of God and his people didn’t begin with Jesus. There was a long pedigree of hatred. Jesus himself recognised this in the parable of the wicked tenants (Luke 20:9-18), and we can trace it back to God’s Word to the serpent in Gen 3:15 (‘I will put enmity between … [the serpent’s] offspring and [the woman’s] offspring.’)

Cain (of the serpent) killed Abel (of the woman). And on it goes through biblical history – Pharaoh and Israel, Goliath and David, Haman and Mordechai. The hatred the world shows towards God’s people is nothing new.

We shouldn’t be surprised when the world continues to show its hatred towards us and God. In some places and people it is easily recognisable. Violence, arrests, verbal abuse and blatant contempt are regular occurrences. In other places and people it is much more subtle. Hatred shows itself in polite rejection of the gospel and ‘logical’ arguments against God’s claims to decide morality (consider Rom 1:30).

This may feel overwhelming. How should we respond? We could point to any number of godly reactions, and condemn ungodly reactions. David points us to one godly reaction in Psalm 52:8. ‘I am like a green olive tree in the house of God. I trust in the steadfast love of God forever and ever.’

Will you continue to trust God when trouble from the world comes? He loves you and has shown that supremely at the cross. His love will never fail. Hold on to him.

Rejection and Acceptance

‘Am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ (Gal 1:10).

Have you experienced the heartache of rejection because of Christ? Being a Christian does not solve all your problems. For many, it makes things harder. There is a cost, and Jesus himself says we are to count the cost just like someone wanting to build a tower or a king going to war (Luke 14:28-33).

This rejection can come from all sides. It can come from friends and family who do not know Christ. They may reject you and your message, or simply dismiss you as a fool for believing. It comes from strangers, even the wider culture which rejects anyone who does not bow down to the modern morality (or, more precisely, modern a-morality).

Rejection can even come from fellow believers. Because you disagree about how to interpret various portions of the Bible, because you have a different understanding of various topics to them, you’re looked down upon. Either you’re too close-minded, or too open-minded.

This can cause great pain – though we need to be realistic and remember how much easier we have it than others around the world! But we count the cost, and we should come to the belief that it is worth the cost to follow Jesus. It is worth the pain of rejection and heartache because of what we get at the end. Not only does Jesus promise great blessings to those who suffer and lose so much for his sake and the gospel’s (Mark 10:29-31), but we get God himself. We live for his approval, not man’s. The truth is simple: the cost is worth it. Keep going.

God’s Plan A

Was the church always God’s Plan A? Was it always God’s intention to have Jew and Gentile, slave and free, male and female (Gal 3:28)? To have a hodgepodge of people from different backgrounds and experiences, many of whom were weak and unimportant to the outside world (1 Cor 1:26)?

There are Christians who believe the answer to those questions is ‘no.’ That God sent Jesus to be the Jewish Messiah, and when he was rejected by his people God then turned to the Gentiles to start his church. This church is viewed as the great parenthesis, the brackets in the sentence detailing God’s grand plan for Israel. They believe that one day soon God will close those brackets and begin again with the Jewish nation.

But this is not a natural reading of the Old Testament promises, or the New Testament reality. Consider Gen 12:1-3. God promised Abraham that all the nations would be blessed through him. When he was given the sign of circumcision in Gen 17 there were people outside Abraham’s family who received the sign. When the Israelites came out of Egypt, some Egyptians came with them (Ex 12:38). We have the stories of Rahab, Ruth and others who joined Israel. Israel was never ‘pure’ racially. There were always Gentiles included.

Think also of the New Testament church. The first Christians were Jewish. The Apostles called the Jews to join the church. James even declares Amos 9:11-12 (where David’s tent would be rebuilt) is fulfilled as the Gentiles enter the church.

Just as Israel can be called the congregation/church in the wilderness (Acts 7:38), so the church can be called the ‘Israel of God’ (Gal 6:16).

It was always God’s plan to have one people of God united together in Christ. We are God’s Plan A.

A Sure Word

We are a sceptical people filled with suspicion. I saw a photo recently of a truck filled with manure, with the statement written on it: ‘This truck is loaded will political promises.’

It is easy to laugh at such a statement. But it is also a sign of our sadly cynical times. We live in a time when we disbelieve whatever politicians say, and even the media are accused of bias. The question is, who can we trust? Is there anyone who will tell the truth?

The Bible makes a bold claim for itself. It claims to be the word of God, and therefore entirely trustworthy and true.

It says in Prov 30:5, ‘Every word of God proves true.’

‘Ah,’ someone will say. ‘Of course the Bible will make that claim! The Bible says it’s true, and people believe it blindly!’ The irreligious sceptic will use terms like ‘circular argument’ to get away from examining the claims of the Bible.

But when you examine the claim, how could the Bible say anything else? If the Bible is the word of God, then of course it is true! If these words are from him, if he was so in control of everything written that what we have in our Bibles is exactly what he intended, then they must be true! God cannot lie, the Bible tells us, therefore the Bible cannot lie because it is his word!

Every word from his mouth is truth. How comforting to know that in a world full of deception, there is a sure word we can turn to. When the world fears a political crisis will be the end of the world, we have the truth. When we are tempted to believe our sin has defeated us, we have his promises. His word is truth.