I saw a sign once in the shop in Colchester Zoo. “Unattended children will be sold as slaves”. For the family of one of the community of prophets murdered by Queen Jezabel, that was not a joke. That was exactly the situation the impoverished widow was facing in this morning’s story of the prophet Elisha and the poor widow. This is one of my favourite passages in the whole of the Old Testament, and I am sure you will soon see why. Here is a woman in desperate need. Speaking on behalf of God, the prophet Elisha responds to the woman with a wonderful question.
How can I help you? What can I do for you?
Here is the offer of help God graciously makes to anyone and everyone. But we only hear it at those times in our lives when we turn to God for help. What can I do for you? How can I help you?
God asks each one of us the same question. What do WE need from God? There are so many different kinds of need – so many hurting people. Facing the cost of living crisis, with the prices of food and fuel and energy going up so quickly, coming so soon after all the struggles of the Covid pandemic, many people now can’t make ends meet and are finding themselves in debt, as this poor widow had done. Very many people need wisdom to find the right way forward in these pressing circumstances. How can I help you? Wisdom was the thing that King Solomon asked for when God asked him that same question.
1 Kings 3 5 At Gibeon the LORD appeared to Solomon during the night in a dream, and God said, ‘Ask for whatever you want me to give you.’
Solomon could have asked God for riches or power or victory in battle. But he realised his greatest need was very different.
8 Your servant is here among the people you have chosen, a great people, too numerous to count or number. 9 So give your servant a discerning heart to govern your people and to distinguish between right and wrong. For who is able to govern this great people of yours?’
We read that: 10 The Lord was pleased that Solomon had asked for this. 11 So God said to him, ‘Since you have asked for this and not for long life or wealth for yourself, nor have asked for the death of your enemies but for discernment in administering justice, 12 I will do what you have asked. I will give you a wise and discerning heart, so that there will never have been anyone like you, nor will there ever be. 13 Moreover, I will give you what you have not asked for—both wealth and honour—so that in your lifetime you will have no equal among kings.
Many people feel we need the wisdom of Solomon just to cope in these difficult times. What do you want me to give you? How can I help you? What is your answer to God’s question this morning? I think this must surely be God’s favourite question. Because we find Jesus himself asking the blind beggar named Bartimaeus exactly the same thing. We looked at that story in a family service some years back but I haven’t preached a full length sermon about Bartimaeus here at North Springfield. It comes at the end of Mark 10.
Mark 10 46 Then they came to Jericho. As Jesus and his disciples, together with a large crowd, were leaving the city, a blind man, Bartimaeus (which means ‘son of Timaeus’), was sitting by the roadside begging. 47 When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout, ‘Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!’
48 Many rebuked him and told him to be quiet, but he shouted all the more, ‘Son of David, have mercy on me!’
49 Jesus stopped and said, ‘Call him.’
So they called to the blind man, ‘Cheer up! On your feet! He’s calling you.’ 50 Throwing his cloak aside, he jumped to his feet and came to Jesus.
51 ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ Jesus asked him.
The blind man said, ‘Rabbi, I want to see.’
52 ‘Go,’ said Jesus, ‘your faith has healed you.’ Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus along the road.
Since there won’t be time to return to Bartimaeus again, let me highlight the key points of his story this morning, using the first four letters of his name.
Bartimaeus was BLIND. That had trapped him in a life of inescapable poverty. But Bartimaeus knew that Jesus, the Messiah, the Son of David, could help him. He cried out and Jesus heard him and called him to him and asked that wonderful question, “What do you want me to do for you?” Bartimaeus could have just begged for food, or money or for a new cloak. But he was much bolder than that. “Rabbi, I want to see.”
Bartimaeus ASKED for his greatest need, the thing which would transform his life. He asked to be able to see. And then Jesus worked his miracle
Bartimaeus RECEIVED his sight. He could see again. “Your faith has healed you.”
We can also ask, and we also will receive. Jesus made these promises to all his disciples,
Matthew 7 7 ‘Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.
Jesus invites us to ask him for whatever we need. Jesus asked Bartimaeus: ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ And Bartimaeus received his sight. In fact, the miracle was even greater than we might imagine. The word Jesus used was sozo, which means “your faith has made you whole”, and even “your faith has saved you.” Bartimaeus asked for his sight but the gift he received was all the blessings of God’s wonderful salvation. How did this happen?
Simply because Bartimaeus TRUSTED in Jesus. “Your faith has healed you.” Bartimaeus put his faith in Jesus. He asked and he received because he trusted. And we can do the same. There’s a four point sermon which is easy to remember. B. A. R. T. Blind Asked Received Trusted. If we had the time I could expand that into ten points using all the letters of Bartimaeus’s name. “Bartimaeus was Blind. He Asked and he Received because he Trusted Jesus.” In the same way, “I May Ask Expecting Undeserved Salvation.” There you go: Bartimaeus – a ten point acrostic sermon. Some people might think that was just showing off. But it’s true – Jesus invites us all to ask Him for whatever we need, even all the blessings of salvation.
What do you want me to do for you? How can I help you? That is the lovely question God is asking all of us this morning. Like Bartimaeus we may need healing. We may need wholeness. People may need to ask for God’s forgiveness and for all the blessings of salvation and new life. We may need God’s wisdom and guidance as Solomon did. Or our needs may be more practical – we may be facing money problems as desperate as the widow who came to Elisha. God cares just as much about “practical” matters as he does about “spiritual” things.
In this time of national mourning, we may be sad and grieving and we need God to comfort us. Facing the cost of living crisis in these uncertain times, people may be anxious or afraid. We may want to ask God to give us his peace. We may need God’s help in all kind’s of ways: for victory over temptation, or power to witness, or the grace to grow in Christ.
“How can I help you?” “What can I do for you?” Elisha asks this poor widow on God’s behalf in our story. But then she doesn’t even need to answer. God already knew her needs, just as God already KNOWS our needs! So the prophet goes on,
“What do you have in your house?” What have you got? (verse 2)
God wants to use US to work his miracles. We may feel we have very little to offer God – but HOWEVER little that is God can use it! The widow answered,
‘Your servant has nothing there at all,’ she said, ‘except a small jar of olive oil.’
The jar was so small that the woman almost forgot to mention it. But it was enough. When we offer God the little we have, however small it may be, he can take and use and transform it and do more than we can ask or even imagine.
“What do you have?” “What have you got?” Each of us have our spiritual gifts and our natural talents. We have our skills and our experience. We have our homes, our money, our possessions, our jobs, our friendships. From time to time it is good to hand all these back to God again. Everything that we have, indeed everything that we are, is given to us by God. We should surrender everything back to God again. He can use all these things to bless us, to bless each other and to bless a needy world. We may not feel we have a lot to give, just a tiny jar of oil, too small to mention, but God wants to use every one of us in his service for his glory! We just need to offer everything back to God as this woman did.
This is the case in our everyday lives, and it is also true in the life of the church. We have seen from Ephesians chapter 4 God wants all of his people to be active in serving Him.
The Good News Translation of Ephesians 4:16 Under Christ’s control all the different parts of the body fit together, and the whole body is held together by every joint with which it is provided. So when each separate part works as it should, the whole body grows and builds itself up through love.
The church will only thrive when each part does its work, when every one of us puts the little we have got into God’s hands for Him to use as He chooses. When each of us use our spiritual gifts, and build each other up by showing true Christian love for each other. “What have you got?” God wants to use EACH and EVERY one of us here in His church.
Back to the plot. “What have you got?” Elisha asked. So we find the poor widow and her sons stepping out in faith and obedience.
3 Elisha said, ‘Go round and ask all your neighbours for empty jars. Don’t ask for just a few. 4 Then go inside and shut the door behind you and your sons. Pour oil into all the jars, and as each is filled, put it to one side.’
5 She left him and shut the door behind her and her sons.
Can you imagine how foolish that woman felt going round to all her neighbours asking for empty jars. EVERYBODY knew she didn’t have ANYTHING to put in the jars. But the woman and her sons were courageous enough and trusting enough to do as Elisha had instructed. They went out on a limb for God. We don’t need great faith – just faith in a great God, going out on a limb for God.
That is exactly what God calls us to do. To be prepared to step out on a limb for Him. To be prepared to look a little bit foolish telling other people about Jesus. All it takes is a little bit of faith. A little bit of obedience. That’s what the widow did. She trusted, she obeyed, and here comes the miracle!
They brought the jars to her and she kept pouring. 6 When all the jars were full, she said to her son, ‘Bring me another one.’
But he replied, ‘There is not a jar left.’ Then the oil stopped flowing.
She just kept on pouring! Vv 5-7
She didn’t have a lot – just a tiny jar of oil. Still she kept on pouring olive oil out of her jar into all the empty jars until there wasn’t an empty jar left. God’s grace is overflowing! God doesn’t just meet her immediate needs – he goes on to do far more than she dared ask or even imagine. Because our God is the God who works miracles!
7 She went and told the man of God, and he said, ‘Go, sell the oil and pay your debts. You and your sons can live on what is left.’
God’s blessing NEVER runs out. The only limit to God’s working is the extent to which we give Him opportunities to act. How much we are prepared to give of ourselves, our time, our talents, for him to use and transform. How open we are to being channels of HIS love, grace and power. We may not think we have very much “just a tiny little jar of oil, hardly worth mentioning really,” but when we surrender the little we do have to God he can work miracles! “She kept on pouring!” Each of us as individuals needs more of God’s love and grace and power! As a church we all need more of the overflowing grace and love and power of God which just keeps on pouring out!
Just a few weeks ago we thought about the church in terms of the premises, the programme, the people and the presence of God. In the context of our life as a church God asks us, “How can I help you?” “What can I do for you?” That might lead us just to think about the programme of the church. But then God asks, “What have you got?” That will prompt us to thank God for his provision of our premises, and also for all the people He has brought together in this fellowship. Then we read of how the poor widow just kept on pouring, and that will speak to us of the presence of God in our midst, pouring out his power and His Holy Spirit into our lives, blessing upon blessing upon blessing. If any of us want to move on in our individual Christian lives, we need to be open to the working of God the Holy Spirit. Ministers who want to be used by God need the Holy Spirit. And if any church wants to move on with God the secret is the same – we need more of the power and presence of God the Holy Spirit.
“She just kept on pouring”. The blessings God pours down will never, ever run out. Paul reminded the Philippians that God’s grace is always adequate for ALL our needs!
Philippians 4:19 And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.
We also have received this same amazing grace of God. We also know the one we have put our trust in. Jesus has died for our sins. We share in his resurrection life and his immortality. We have received the love of God which never lets us go. God will always be faithful. God is not just able, he is much, much, more than able to meet all our needs and take care of us and keep us safe.
She just kept on pouring. God’s grace never runs out. Let me remind you of that story about an ambassador who was looking for a new car. He sent off to all the major manufacturers, Jaguar, Bentley, Daimler asking for the specifications of their top models. The other makes replied with all sorts of details: top speed, brake horsepower, miles per gallon, time to 60 mph, sound system and so on. Rolls Royce sent back a message with just one word on it. “Adequate”. For all of our situations the overflowing grace of God is much more than just adequate! Our God is “more than able”!
She offered to God that tiny jar of olive oil, and with the miraculous power of Almighty God, the woman just kept on pouring. And God will keep on pouring his love and his peace and His Holy Spirit into our lives.
She just kept on pouring. In the same way, we can open our lives to the unlimited possibilities which the Presence of Almighty God brings to us. How can I help you? What do you want me to do for you? What have you got? She just kept on pouring!
Ephesians 3 20 Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.
Let us respond in reflection and prayer.
What are your answers to God’s questions?
How can I help you?
What do you have?
Draw near in faith and obedience – she just kept on pouring!

“Jesus wept.” At the graveside of his dear friend Lazarus, “Jesus wept.”
This morning we are marking the death of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second. We are giving thanks for her inspiring example of a life of service over more than seven decades as our Queen. For many of us, Queen Elizabeth has been on the throne for the whole of our lives. We praise God for Her Majesty’s living faith in the Lord Jesus Christ as her Saviour. So we are sad. Many are weeping. And some people may be wrestling with grief for all kinds of other losses as well today. So this is a good time to remember that Jesus also wept.
It is there marked out for us in the shortest verse in the Bible, John 11:35. It is so helpful in times of grief and mourning to remember that Jesus himself wept in grief. That remarkable occasion has two vitally important things to say to us. As the perfect human being, Jesus Christ shows us how to weep and mourn which is just what our reaction to death should be. And as the Son of God, Jesus Christ shows us that God understands our sadness and pain and indeed God mourns with us in our grief. Let me unpack these two statements this morning as we mourn for our treasured Queen.
Jesus wept. As the perfect human being, Jesus Christ shows us how to weep and mourn and just what our reaction to death should be.
33 When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. 34 “Where have you laid him?” he asked.
“Come and see, Lord,” they replied.
35 Jesus wept.
36 Then the Jews said, “See how he loved him!”
The normal response to the death of somebody we love is to weep. To cry. To be sad for their death and for our loss. And that was just as true for Jesus Christ the Son of God as it will ever be for any of us!
Of course Jesus was sad. Jesus really cared for Lazarus and for his sisters Mary and Martha.3 So the sisters sent word to Jesus, “Lord, the one you love is sick.” 5 Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.
It is no surprise then to read later that 35 Jesus wept 36 Then the Jews said, “See how he loved him!”
The more we loved somebody, the closer they were to us, the more we will grieve and weep when they are gone. And that mourning will last not just for days but for weeks and months and years. And that’s alright. That’s the way it should be. That is our natural human response to death.
But let us pause for a moment to remember just why we are weeping. We are not weeping for what our loved one has lost. Our loved one is not affected by what they have left behind. More than that, Christians believe that there is eternal life which continues beyond this mortal life. If the person who died was a believer we can be sure that they are even now in the presence of Almighty God. In that light, we believe that Her Majesty is even now in the presence of God her Heavenly Father. She has been promoted to glory. That confidence is not based on the fact that Her Majesty had been our Queen, nor on her very long and wonderful life of compassion and sacrificial service. A life of good works does not open the door to heaven, even for a Queen. But we do have every reason to understand that Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth had a profound and radiant faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Queen herself bore witness to her personal relationship with God and Her Majesty enjoyed that eternal life which not even death can take away. Queen Elizabeth is now in the presence of the Lord who she loved and served throughout her life.
We are not weeping for what our loved one has lost. Nor are we weeping at the circumstances of their death. In fact, Her Majesty had remained in fine health and remarkably active through all the years until recent weeks. We are given to understand that Queen Elizabeth passed very peacefully from this life to the next.
When we weep we are weeping for what we ourselves have lost. The grief is ours, not our loved one’s. The loss is ours, not theirs. Because it is we who have to go on without them. It is us who have to rebuild a new life, not them. We miss their company and their conversation. There is absolutely nothing we can do which will affect them any more. The only situation we can do anything at all about is our own situation. The only things which can change are within us – not within them. Today we weep because Her Majesty’s passing leaves a hole, not only in our own lives and the life of our nation, but truly as King Charles pointed out, across the entire world.
Of course we will never forget our loved ones who have departed. We will always treasure our happy memories. And we will continue to weep. Nothing we can do will bring them back. They have gone. Our sadness comes from the pain of separation and loss. And our mourning and grieving takes us through the terrible process of adjusting to life without the person we have lost. In this it is good to know that Jesus also wept. Because faced with the cold cruel realities of death, that is what human beings will naturally do. Weeping is healthy. Allowing ourselves to express that deep emotion is very healthy. Because death it horrible and dreadful. Death itself should always cause us to weep. Even though we have faith. Even when we have the hope of heaven. Even though we trust in the love of God. We weep. We are allowed to weep. We are supposed to weep. We know that is the case because Jesus Christ the only perfect man who ever lived – Jesus wept.
Jesus wept. Even though he already knew exactly what was going to do next.
4 When he heard this, Jesus said, “This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God’s glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it.”
11 After he had said this, he went on to tell them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up.”
Even though He knew it was the Father’s plan to raise Lazarus from the dead – Jesus wept.
23 Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.”
24 Martha answered, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”
25 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; 26 and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.”
Even though He is the resurrection and the life and he knew he was going to bring Lazarus back to life – Jesus still wept!
So when we are mourning we will also weep. And in our weeping we can find comfort and peace. Since this is a sermon in a church by a Christian Minister you might expect me to say that our comfort comes from knowing that our loved ones are safe with God in heaven. I could encourage you today to find hope in those words of Jesus, who tells Mary, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.” (John 11:25-26)
But I am not going to say that. Because when we are grieving, where our loved ones are now is actually not the most important thing to us. What matters is that they are not right here right now with us.
There is a time and a place to focus on the hope of heaven. But Ecclesiastes 3:14 tells us there is a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance.
When a loved one dies then it is the time to weep and to mourn. And Romans 12:15 calls us all to Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. We are called to weep with those who weep. Job was a righteous man. His seven sons and three daughters all died in an accident. His animals were all stolen by raiders and almost all his servants were killed. In the middle of his grieving Job’s three friends came along and we read,
“Job 2: 12 When they saw him from a distance, they could hardly recognise him; they began to weep aloud, and they tore their robes and sprinkled dust on their heads. 13 Then they sat on the ground with him for seven days and seven nights. No-one said a word to him, because they saw how great his suffering was.
If someone we care about dies we may send a card, or some flowers, or phone or even visit their family. Following the death of Her Majesty the Queen, we have seen an enormous outpouring of expressions of grief in floral tributes and messages of condolence. But in our country we aren’t so good at sitting on the ground for seven days and seven nights in silence as Job’s friends did. We like to try to find something meaningful to say, although actually we don’t need to. We aren’t so good at not saying a word but just being there! We need to learn how to weep with those who weep. In this season of national mourning we are joining with millions of other people in weeping at the death of our Queen.
In these times of mourning, the Christian faith does give us comfort. But that comfort is not so much rooted in the hope of eternal life, but rather in the second implication of Jesus weeping at the graveside of Lazarus.
Jesus Christ the Son of God wept. And this shows us that God understands our sadness and pain and indeed God mourns with us in our grief. Sometimes when somebody dies we can think that God just doesn’t care about what happens in this world. That God has turned His back on us. That is completely untrue. The opposite is the truth. God DOES care. God is completely involved in His world. God knows. God cares. God understands. And we know this because Jesus wept. Jesus was deeply troubled by the death of Lazarus.
33 When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled.
35 Jesus Wept
38 Jesus, once more deeply moved (deeply troubled, deeply upset), came to the tomb. It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance.
God understands. That is the message of Christmas. Jesus is Immanuel, God with us. Time and again the Bible tells us that Jesus experienced the same sufferings and pains and griefs that all human beings face.
Hebrews 4:15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathise with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are- yet was without sin. 16 Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.
The MESSAGE translates those verses this way:- We don’t have a priest who is out of touch with our reality. He’s been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin. So let’s walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help.
Jesus wept. God sympathises with us. God has compassion for us. Our English word sympathy comes from the Greek meaning to suffer with. Our word compassion is from the Latin and means to suffer with or alongside. Jesus has sympathy with and compassion for everybody who grieves. Whenever we are mourning, God understands our suffering. God feels our pain.
In Gethsemane, Jesus experienced the full realities of the prospect of pain and suffering and death as any other human being would. And God even knows what it is like to die. That is the message of the cross. Jesus the Son knows from experience what it is to die, as the Son of God was separated from His Father. The Incarnation. Gethsemane. Golgotha. The cross and the stone cold tomb. There are times when our only consolation, the only answer to all our unanswerable questions, is to know that God suffers with us. God understands. The shortest verse in the Bible is one of the most significant. Jesus wept. As the perfect human being, Jesus Christ shows us how to weep and mourn and just what our reaction to death should be. And as the Son of God, Jesus Christ shows us that God understands our sadness and pain and indeed God mourns with us in our grief. “Jesus wept.”

You can watch the video for this message here

The captions are here:

Sin that leads to death 1 John 5:13-21

What is “sin that leads to death”? (Verse 16)

16 If you see any brother or sister commit a sin that does not lead to death, you should pray and God will give them life. I refer to those whose sin does not lead to death. There is a sin that leads to death. I am not saying that you should pray about that. 17 All wrongdoing is sin, and there is sin that does not lead to death.

Not “a sin” but “sin” or “a kind of sin”
(no indefinite article)

If you see your brother or sister committing what is not a mortal sin, you will ask, and God will give life to such a one—to those whose sin is not mortal. NRSV

If you see a fellow believer sinning in a way that does not lead to death, you should pray, and God will give that person life. (New Living Translation)

For instance, if we see a Christian believer sinning (clearly I’m not talking about those who make a practice of sin in a way that is “fatal,” leading to eternal death), we ask for God’s help and he gladly gives it, gives life to the sinner whose sin is not fatal. (Message)

CONTEXT of 1 John – 3 sins he has talked about already

1) The sin of insisting they are sinless, refusing to confess and repent

1 John 1 8 If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us.

2) The sin of denying the true humanity of Christ

1 John 4 2 This is how you can recognise the Spirit of God: every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, 3 but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world.

If a person does not believe that Jesus is truly the Lord, the Messiah and the Son of God, then they will not be saved.

3) The sin of failing to love brothers and sisters, disobeying the New Commandment and rejecting the Christian community

1 John 3 14 We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love each other. Anyone who does not love remains in death. 15 Anyone who hates a brother or sister is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life residing in him.

1 John 4 7 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.

1 John 4 19 We love because he first loved us. 20 Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen.

As long as people persist in these kinds of sin, they are rejecting God’s forgiveness.

jesus’s teaching on the sin of “blasphemy against the Holy Spirit”

Matthew 12 28 But if it is by the Spirit of God that I drive out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. ….
31 And so I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. 32 Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.

In Matthew/Mark/Luke, blasphemy against the Holy Spirit means denying that the Holy Spirit was at work in Jesus’s ministry proclaiming God’s Kingdom

In the context of John’s Gospel
The sin of rejecting the witness of the Holy Spirit

John 14 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you for ever —17 the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. …

26 But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.

John 15 26 ‘When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father—the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father—he will testify about me.

John 16:7 … Unless I go away, the Counselor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you. 8 When he comes, he will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment: 9 in regard to sin, because men do not believe in me; 10 in regard to righteousness, because I am going to the Father, where you can see me no longer; 11 and in regard to judgment, because the prince of this world now stands condemned.
13 But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth.

When people persist in rejecting the Holy Spirit’s witness about Jesus, they close the door to forgiveness.

Romans 6 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

All sin leads to death.
“Sin that leads to death” means all kinds of sin which stop a person from receiving God’s gift of forgiveness and eternal life.
But everybody can be forgiven if they believe the witness of the Holy Spirit that Jesus is Son of God and Saviour, and turn from their sins.

1 John 1 8 If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.

Happy New Year! Please forgive me if I am not sounding quite as upbeat as I would hope to. Usually I come back after a bit of holiday after Christmas full of energy and enthusiasm and excitement as we look forward to all the New Year will bring. This year instead my mood is best summed up in a picture I discovered a few years ago. In it a polar bear is saying, “I’m up! If you’re expecting bright eyed and bushy tailed, go catch a squirrel!” That is a bit like what I am feeling today. The truth is that after all the pressures of last year I am still pretty worn out, and I am sure I am not the only one. We are very grateful to have enjoyed a few pleasant and relaxing days, but not enough to feel refreshed and recharged. And while the arrival of vaccines against Coronavirus is very good news for the long term, for the next few months at least life is still going to be full of challenges and even hardships. On top of that, today the sleet is falling. With the joys of Christmas almost over and very little to look forward to, we should be grateful for the very many blessings we are receiving. But this can sometimes be hard to do.
I feel unprepared and inadequate to face all that 2021 is likely to bring. So for this evening, a verse of Scripture to encourage and inspire us for the days and weeks and months ahead. A wonderful promise to claim when the going gets tough.
Philippians 4:13 “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me”
The obvious question to ask with this text to begin with, and one reason why it is sometimes misquoted, is, what does Paul mean by ALL THINGS? Surely Paul wasn’t saying he could fly, or walk through walls! This verse is not a guarantee that every Christians will have a successful career, or that we will be brilliant at every hobby we enjoy. We need to look at the context to see what “all things” means here and the context is that Paul is talking about everything he had suffered for Christ’s sake.
Paul had been through tough times. He was writing to the Philippians while he was in prison in Rome because of corrupt officials, waiting for possible execution on false charges. But it hadn’t been an easy ride for Paul to that point either! Years earlier he had made a list of the ways he had suffered for Christ up until that point when he was writing to the Corinthians.
2 Corinthians 1123 I have in prison more frequently, been flogged more severely, and been exposed to death again and again. 24 Five times I received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. 25 Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, I spent a night and a day in the open sea, 26 I have been constantly on the move. I have been in danger from rivers, in danger from bandits, in danger from my own countrymen, in danger from Gentiles; in danger in the city, in danger in the country, in danger at sea; and in danger from false brothers. 27 I have labored and toiled and have often gone without sleep; I have known hunger and thirst and have often gone without food; I have been cold and naked.
In J.B.Phillips’ words, many times Paul had been, “Knocked down but never knocked out.”
Yet still Paul could write in Philippians 4:12,“I have learned the secret of being content it any and every situation.”
MESSAGE I’ve learned by now to be quite content whatever my circumstances. I’m just as happy with little as with much, with much as with little. I’ve found the recipe for being happy whether full or hungry, hands full or hands empty.
If only we could learn as Christians to be content with what God has chosen to give us, however much or however little. If only we could learn to the secret of contentment whether we are well-fed or hungry, full or empty. If only we could learn not to chase after things God does not want us to have!
We should not need a nice job, a nice house or a nice car. We should not need to be successful or to have lots of friends. All these things may bring superficial happiness but they don’t make anybody content. We should not need money or possessions to make us happy. Paul wrote to Timothy,
1 Timothy 6 6 But godliness with contentment is great gain. … 8… if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that.
When they face problems, many people think they can just buy their way out. They rely on money to avoid troubles and hardship. But the truth is that Money can’t solve every problem and possessions don’t bring contentment – materialism brings so many problems and doesn’t solve any.
Other people think they can achieve contentment through sheer hard work. When they face problem they just try to plough on through by their own efforts. Other people rely on their own willpower to get them through the hard times. The truth is there is nothing any of us can do for ourselves which will guarantee contentment. And we just don’t have it within ourselves to cope with every problem we may face in life.
In these days, many people are putting their trust in science to solve the whole world’s problems. Others turn to technology to make them happy. When we face problems with our health, folk look to medicine or therapy to help them cope, and at times this is absolutely the right thing to do of course. But too many people rely on prescriptions when they don’t need them. Not to mention those who try to drown their sorrows with alcohol, or illegal drugs. All to find the contentment which these things can never provide.
In contrast, Paul had found the secret of true contentment. “I have learned the secret of being content it any and every situation.”
For Paul contentment meant an inner sense of rest or peace that comes from being right with God and knowing that He is in control of all that happens to us. It is not always easy to be content, especially when life is not going well and things get tough. I don’t know how well any of us would have coped with all those terrible things which Paul went through. Yet we sometimes think life is tough for us!
Notice that Paul does NOT say that his secret of contentment was that God miraculously rescued him from all those times of danger, although that did happen on several occasions. Paul does not say that he learned to be content because God always took his problems and hardships away. Some peddlers of the false “Health, wealth and prosperity” doctrines teach that the believing Christian will never have any problems like poverty or bad health or indeed any suffering of any kind. That is not what Paul says here and it’s not what the Bible says anywhere! Christians will all go through rough times. If Christ suffered, we can expect to suffer too. That is “the normal Christian life.”
So what was Paul’s secret of contentment?
“I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.” “I have strength for all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
The Message translates the verse like this. “Whatever I have, wherever I am, I can make it through anything in the One who makes me who I am.”
Or in other words, Christ gives me the power to cope with life no matter what comes my way. “I can make it through anything,” That was Paul’s honest testimony. Whatever life had thrown at him, he had come through. “I can do everything through him who gives me strength.” Paul’s secret for contentment was Christ Himself, giving him all the strength he ever needed for a joyful life and an effective ministry.
The secret is clear. “Christ strengthening me”. “Strengthening” there is a present participle and that implies an ongoing continuous or repeated action. Forgive me if I labour the point. Paul is not saying that at some point in his life Christ gave him some kind of strength which Paul can then use whenever he likes to help him cope. What Paul is saying instead is that whenever he is facing hardship, at that point he is able to cope because at that moment Christ strengthens and keeps on strengthening him. The strength and help come each time as Paul relies on the strength Christ gives him and not on his own human resources.
And this takes us right back to a well known passage earlier in Philippians 4.
6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 7 And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
Everybody faces problems sometimes. We all have things to worry about. Jobs. Family. Money. Health. What the future may hold. And our worries will rob us of our joy and our peace and our contentment. Whenever we face problems or hardships, whenever anything burdens or distresses us, God does not want us to be anxious or worried or afraid. He simply invites us to come to Him in prayer. Prayer is our conversation drawing near to God and petitions are our specific requests to Him. And heartfelt thanksgiving to God for so many blessings is always appropriate. We can even thank God for the problems we may face, because these are opportunities for God to give us strength and for our faith to grow and for God to be glorified in our hours of weakness. Our contentment and our rejoicing and our peace and our strengthening will come to us directly from Christ and they come to us as God answers our prayers! Here again, for emphasis. “Present your requests to God” is another continuing action. “Keep on letting your requests be known to God.” And the result will be that each time God’s amazing peace will keep on garrisoning your mind keeping it safe in Christ. The peace of God will stand sentry over our minds and hearts keeping us safe from anxieties and fears. God does not offer anyone a guarantee that he will always take all our problems and all our sufferings away. What God does promise is strength to cope with whatever may come – the strength that comes from Christ Himself.
Note again, there is no once-for-all-time experience from God which will give to a Christian some kind of permanent peace and contentment which will never go away whatever troubles we face. But Paul’s experience and God’s promise to us is that on every occasion as we bring our requests to Him, Christ WILL give us the strength to cope and the peace and contentment we all long for.
Isaiah 26:3 You will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is fixed on you, because he trusts in you. 4 Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord, the Lord, is the Rock eternal.
It is precisely as we trust in God, and fix our minds on Him, and bring our requests and our needs to Him, that we experience His peace and His contentment and his strengthening.
“I can do all things through Christ strengthening me.” Paul uses this same word for strength in his prayer for the Colossians. Colossians 1 9 … we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding. 10 And we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, 11 being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience …
God wants us all to be strengthened with all power according to His glorious might so that we might have great endurance and patience whatever life may be throwing at us. In the challenging months ahead, God wants us to bring all our prayers and petitions to him. That is the way we will prove again in our own experience that we too can make it through anything through Christ as He strengthens us!

Happy New Year. I am sure that all of us were very, very happy to say goodbye and good riddance to 2020. A year we would all wish we could forget. Sadly, the first part of 2021 is not looking much brighter or happier. Indeed, the next few months could well be as hard as any we have just lived through. So to give us hope and encouragement for the days ahead, let me point to the wonderful promise Jesus makes right at the end of Matthew’s Gospel.
Surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” NIV 2011
Surely, be sure of this, remember, behold. I am with you always!
As Christians we do not follow a dead martyr. We worship a living Saviour, who walks with us and talks with us every step of the way. Whatever challenges we may face, we never face them alone. Jesus gives us this promise, “I am with you always.”
It was the presence of God which had always protected and sustained God’s chosen people of Israel
At the end of his life Moses encouraged the Israelites.
Deuteronomy 31 6 Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified … for the LORD your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. …. 8 The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.”
God made exactly this promise to Joshua.
Joshua 1 5 No one will be able to stand up against you all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you. … 9 Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go.”
When King Solomon dedicated to the Lord the Temple he had built in Jerusalem, he prayed this inspiring prayer.
1 Kings 8 52 “May your eyes be open to your servant’s plea and to the plea of your people Israel, and may you listen to them whenever they cry out to you. 53 For you singled them out from all the nations of the world to be your own inheritance, just as you declared through your servant Moses when you, O Sovereign LORD, brought our fathers out of Egypt.” …. 57 May the LORD our God be with us as he was with our fathers; may he never leave us nor forsake us. 58 May he turn our hearts to him, to walk in all his ways and to keep the commands, decrees and regulations he gave our fathers.
Time and again the prophets encouraged the Israelites with the promise that God is with them.

Isaiah 43:1 But now, this is what the LORD says— he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine.
2 When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze.
Such wonderful promises, fulfilled in the lives of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego when they were thrown into the fiery furnace and Daniel in the lion’s den. In Psalm 23, David is convinced that even at the end of life, and in the face of death, God would be with him.
Psalm 23 4 Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil,
for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.
These were the promises God made to his people. Through thousands of years the people of God knew the blessings of God’s presence with them, protecting them and guiding them. Because these promises are in the Word of God, God still makes the same promises to us today. In our reading Jesus promises those same blessings to all his followers.
And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” NIV 2011
Two weeks ago at our Christmas communion we thought about what it means to us that Jesus is Immanuel, God with us.
JESUS WAS COMPLETELY HUMAN and faced all the struggles of life just as we do hunger and thirst and tiredness and pain. Jesus felt all the intense emotions we all feel –joy and sadness, anger and disappointment, sorrow and grief.
Jesus was completely human. More than that, Jesus was just an ordinary, average, human typical of all the human beings who have ever lived. Poor, not rich. Powerless, not powerful. The Son of God shared in the sufferings of the exploited, mistreated, ignored and marginalised people who have always made up the vast majority of the world ever since the fall. With the poor and meek and lowly Lived on earth our Saviour holy. Immanuel – God with us. And Jesus promises, “I am with you always.”
This means that GOD COMPLETELY UNDERSTANDS our situation. Jesus was God with us. He has faced all the temptations we face. The pull of selfishness. The pangs of greed and lust and bitterness and self-pity. He faced them all. The only difference is that we give in to temptations. We dwell on them and let them lead us into sin. But Jesus did not. He fought harder than we do and he beat the devil every time. So whatever problems we may be facing today, whatever challenges, whatever battles. Jesus understands. We may be lonely, or afraid, or sad, or grieving, or confused. We may be feeling angry or deserted or betrayed or misunderstood. Jesus understands. However sad and disappointed we may be feeling going into the New Year, even if we are suffering or in great pain, Jesus understands. That’s why he is able to help us. Jesus is with us always, to the end of the age!
JESUS WAS COMPLETELY GOD. This means it is God who is with us always, to the end of the age. God the Son, the second person of the Holy Trinity is with us. The Almighty, All knowing, ever-present God is with us, everywhere, all the time. The Eternal, Holy and Perfect God is with us. The all-loving God whose mercies will never come to an end is with us. The Almighty and Eternal God who is the Creator who made heaven and earth and everything that exists – that God is with us!
But let’s take a moment to see this marvellous promise in its context. The promise to be with us comes as part of the last three verses of Matthew’s Gospel which are known as The Great Commission. Here are Jesus’s final instructions to his disciples, sending them out into the world to continue his mission.
v18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.
Jesus is promising to be with all his disciples forever and in every situation – but particularly in the context of the Great Commission, as we are going out and making disciples of all nations.
v18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
The one who is promising to be with us is none less than the Lord Jesus Christ, King of Kings and Lord of Lords. The one who takes the highest place in all of creation, the one who has the name greater than any other name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:10-11)
All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me, says Jesus, who then commands his disciples,
V19 Therefore go
Actually we must not be distracted by the word “go” because it appears first in our English translation. “Go”. That is not where the emphasis lies in the command Jesus is about to give. Grammatically, “Go” is not an imperative verb here. It is actually a participle, and it means “as you are going”, or “while you are going.” We don’t all have to “go” but we do all have to obey the command which follows, the strong imperative:
Make disciples. This is the heart of the Great Commission, the heart of the task Jesus has entrusted to His church – make disciples. It’s followed by two more participles, baptising and teaching. These describe the way in which we are to go about “making disciples”. But it is “disciple-making” which is the main task of the church. It is not just the task of those who are particularly sent out and who literally “go”. The command is to “make disciples”, and that is not just the task of missionaries or evangelists or ministers. It is the responsibility shared by all Christians. Make disciples. People who will obey Jesus’s call to “deny self, take up the cross daily, and follow me”. Help other people to put their trust in Jesus and to follow Jesus.
Making disciples has never been easy. Being witnesses for Christ and ambassadors for Christ has never been easy in a world which has rejected God. It many ways Covid19 has made it harder than ever to share our faith. Over the next few months we will be thinking much more about how we can make disciples in this strange new world. At the beginning of this New Year, let us commit ourselves to being disciples of Jesus ourselves. And let us commit ourselves to seeking to help other people to become his disciples as well. But for today, let us just remember that it is in the context of the Great Commission that Jesus made the wonderful promise, Surely I am with you always! Indeed Jesus is with us always, but especially all who are doing our best to be his disciples and to be disciple-makers. Guiding us, giving us strength and answering our prayers.
v20 surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
We have the ONGOING PRESENCE OF GOD, the presence of the Risen Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit who leads and strengthens us and brings us God’s joy and God’s peace.
John 14 15 “If you love me, you will obey what I command. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever— 17 the Spirit of truth. … you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. … Because I live, you also will live. 20 On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you. … 23 If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.
Jesus is with us always through the Holy Spirit. It is the Holy Spirit who makes Jesus real to us and will give us the strength to serve God. I will be with you always.
After the missionary David Livingstone had returned from Africa, many people were very surprised that he planned to go back there again. He explained, “I return with misgiving and with great gladness. For would you like me to tell you what supported me through all the years of exile among people whose language I could not understand, and whose attitude towards me was always uncertain and often hostile? It was this: ‘Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world!’ On these words I staked everything, and they never failed!”
In God’s strength we CAN be the disciples and the disciple makers he calls us to be. In the words of Livingstone, “Here is the promise of a gentleman who would never break His word”
v20 And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

Isaiah 40:29 (The Lord) gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. 30 Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; 31 but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.
In Zambia Ruth was working in Kapumpe Christian Primary School. In the local language of Bemba the word Kapumpe means eagle. The aim of the school is that the pupils should grow up soaring on wings like eagles in the strength God supplies. Those children are amazing. It must be so hard to run and not grow weary or even to walk and not to be faint when you have to walk for a couple of hours each way to school, when you are only five or six years old!
God wants us all to be soaring on wings like eagles, renewing our strength by putting our hope in the Lord. God wants us all to be running and not growing weary, walking and not growing faint. So hear this wonderful promise the Lord Jesus Christ makes to everyone who believes in him.
Matthew 11;28 ‘Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.’
I didn’t have to walk ten miles a day to get to school. It was just a mile each way for me. The farthest I ever walked was 250 miles in 3 weeks a very long time ago when I used to be young and fit and athletic. I was in the sixth form on the school-organised Trek walking 250 miles across the Alps from Pralognan-la-Vanoise in France to Aosta in Italy. The high spot was climbing Gran Paradiso, the highest mountain entirely in Italy. On that unforgettable day we left our camp at 4 am and climbed by lunchtime to a height of over 4000 metres to within 50 metres of the summit before the snow became impassible in the mist. Then we sat down on our cagoules and capes and tobogganed back down the track we had trodden in the deep snow going up. It took just 15 minutes to slide back down the path it had taken us 8 hours to climb!
Of course on that expedition it wasn’t the walking along that wore us out as much as all the ups and downs! The only way from the village in one valley to the village in the next was over the mountain in between! We were each carrying parts of the tent, stove and food and water as well as our own sleeping bags and clothes. My rucksack weighed 25 kg – around half a hundredweight. A couple of days before the big climb we were two weeks through the Trek, a few days on from Val D’Isère about to cross the border into Italy. We were above the snowline and a fresh fall of a couple of feet of snow had made the going very difficult underfoot. Like many in our group I had been ill for a few days, and by the middle of that afternoon I was feeling completely exhausted, desperate to sit down, take off that heavy rucksack and just sleep! But we still had several miles to go that day to the next campsite!
I remember how I felt there in the Alps, close to collapsing. Just when I was feeling I couldn’t go a step further, we came to an Aubege, a wayside inn offering shelter and warmth! Taking the rucksack off was wonderful. But it didn’t take away the thirst or the exhaustion. We needed refreshment as well! They offered hot chocolate. But I was still worn out!
I had only been a Christian a couple of months when I went on Trek. It wasn’t easy, finding space to read my Bible and pray sharing a tent with three other people, as the only Christian in a party of 50 Trekkers. But that wayside inn provided me with more than a chance to take off my rucksack and have a warm drink. On the wall I found a copy of “La prière des Alpinistes”, the mountaineers’ prayer. We were less than 30 miles from the Great St Bernard’s Pass which is named after Bernard of Mont-Joux. The Prayer of the Alpinists is attributed to St Bernard, the Patron Saint of the Alps It was in French and translates something like this.
“Lord, you have given us Saint Bernard as patron of mountaineers and mountain dwellers. Through his intercession, protect us in all our ascensions. After enjoying the beauty of nature, let us return to our task more serene and stronger in the service of God and our brethren. As we strive to walk in his footsteps here below, grant us to reach the true Summit which is Christ.”
Reading that prayer reminded me that everywhere I went, God was already there. That Jesus was always with me. That He would bear my burdens. He would refresh me and strengthen me. At that point I had only memorised a few Bible verses but I was reminded of the words of Jesus in Matthew 11:28-30.
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
On that afternoon on Trek I discovered for the first of many times in my life just how true God’s promises are. Inspired by that prayer, although I was still carrying my rucksack, I didn’t notice the weight at all. The sickness I had been feeling had gone completely. I felt as full of energy as I had on the very first day. Jesus the burden-bearer was carrying my heavy load. His spirit had refreshed me.
Of course, serious mountaineers have their porters to carry their bags for them. Our friends Richard and Heather were missionaries in Nepal with Baptist World Mission. They showed us pictures of the Treks they did as a family over some of the foothills of the Himalayas. And they had a Sherpa. A porter. One man carrying the luggage for all of them as they walked from village to village. A burden-bearer.
Do you need a burden bearer this morning? Some people may be struggling with illness and pain. Some are grieving. Others are carrying all kinds of heavy burdens. Some are worried about their loved ones. Some are weighed down by stress – not waving but drowning. Some may be facing problems at work, or unemployment, or financial difficulties. Many are anxious about what the future holds in these troubled times. Some are scarred by disappointment or guilt or deep fears. Some are struggling with family conflicts and some are hurting deep down inside. God promises to help us! Jesus invites us to bring ALL our burdens to Him and cast our cares on him..
WHAT A FRIEND WE HAVE IN JESUS, All our sins and griefs to bear!
What a privilege to carry Everything to God in prayer!
O what peace we often forfeit! O what needless pain we bear!
All because we do not carry Everything to God in prayer.
Are we weak and heavy-laden, Cumbered with a load of care?
Precious Saviour, still our refuge, Take it to the Lord in prayer.
Perhaps the most important thing we learned from the Christians in Zambia is that they pray about everything. They don’t just give thanks for food by saying grace before a meal. They thank God continually for their health and their strength and for the things they have, even though by our standards they have next to nothing. They begin the day by thanking God that they have woken up and are able to go about their daily activities. They pray before every journey – which even in a 4 by 4 is hazardous on roads which are more potholes than tarmac and off tarmac on the sand is even more dangerous. Even worse on a bicycle – although most people have no choice but to walk everywhere they go. When somebody is ill they pray – often they won’t have enough money to buy the medicines they need or to travel by bus to the hospital. The students sang a hymn and prayed before every lecture. Often they prayed that they would be able to understand their teacher – I wasn’t quite sure how to take that! African Christians know so much more about prayer than we British Christians do!
Jesus is our burden bearer. An inspiring passage in Hebrews 4 encourages us to pray.
Hebrews 4:15 we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathise with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin. 16 Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.
When we need God, we can be confident that He will help us. When we need mercy and forgiveness God promises we will not be disappointed. When we need God’s grace and strength to help us in whatever situations we find ourselves, we can be confident that God will help us in our times of need. . Because Jesus understands. He is more than able to sympathise. Whatever our situation: Jesus knows what it’s like! When God became a human in Jesus Christ, Immanuel, God with us, He shared all our experiences of life! In His birth, in his life, and in his death.
v.1 HE walked where I walk, He stood where I stand, He felt what I feel, He understands.
He knows my frailty, Shared my humanity, Tempted in every way, Yet without sin.
God with us, so close to us. God with us, Immanuel!
v.2 One of a hated race, Stung by the prejudice, Suffering injustice, Yet He forgives.
Wept for my wasted years, Paid for my wickedness, He died in my place That I might live.
God with us, so close to us. God with us, Immanuel!
So whatever problems or battles or challenges we may be facing today, Jesus offers to take our burdens from us.
Psalm 55:22 makes the same promise. Cast your cares on the LORD and he will sustain you;
So does 1 Peter 5:7 Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you..
God wants us to bring our burdens to Him and cast our anxieties on Him. Do you need a burden-bearer this morning? God is just waiting to answer our prayers!
Matthew 11 28 “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. (Matthew 11:28-29)

There is a very important question many people spend a lot of time thinking about and many other people try hard to avoid thinking about. What happens when we die? Three score years, and then – what? The only way we can really know the answer to that question would be if somebody came back from the dead to tell us. So the only person in history we can trust for the answer is Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Jesus died on the cross but three days later God raised Him from the dead. And Jesus Christ has revealed to us the truth about life after death, the glorious hope of heaven which Christians share and which everybody can discover for themselves in the Bible. So how do we get to heaven?
A couple of weeks ago we read the shortest verse in the whole Bible, “Jesus wept.” We saw that as the perfect human being, Jesus shows us how to weep and mourn which is just what our reaction to death should be. And as the Son of God, Jesus Christ shows us that God understands our sadness and pain and indeed God mourns with us in our grief. On that morning I decided not to talk about the comfort which our wonderful hope of heaven gives to us, because I was saving that message for this morning. We may be experiencing grief and bereavement. We all face the prospect of death: of losing loved ones. In time we must all come to terms with the reality of our own mortality. And in the first six verses of John 14 we read some wonderful promises Jesus makes which give us comfort in our grief and hope for our future. Hear these words of Jesus this morning.
John 14:1 ‘Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me.
Whatever might be worrying or troubling us, we put our trust in God and we can put our trust in Jesus. But especially as we face sadness and grief and weeping and mourning, Jesus says this.
2 My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you?
Jesus is preparing a place for us – a special place ready for each one of us. The secondary school I went to organized a number of camping holidays. Each Whitsuntide I went to the Borrowdale Camp where we walked the hills and climbed the mountains of the Lake District. A hundred and twenty of us would jump off the coaches and walk along the valley beside Stonethwaite Beck to find the tents all set up ready for us and a hot meal waiting. Then when I was in the sixth form I discovered how everything was prepared. I was part of the Advance Party and we went up three days earlier. Half a dozen of us put up all the tents. We put up the marquee. We dug the holes in the field for the toilets and set up the cooking tents and the stoves and cooked the meals. The Advance Party got everything ready.
Jesus Himself is the Advance Party of heaven – preparing a very special place for each one of us. Jesus has prepared the way for us. He has gone before us. Hebrews 6:20 describes Jesus as our “forerunner.”

Hebrews 6 19 We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain, 20 where our forerunner, Jesus, has entered on our behalf. He has become a high priest for ever, in the order of Melchizedek.

Jesus is the forerunner – the one who prepares the way. The same word is used of the pilot boat which would lead the great merchant ships into safe harbour. It was also the word for the reconnaissance troops who would blaze the trail for the army to follow in their steps. Jesus is our forerunner – who has prepared the way for us into heaven. Jesus goes on,
“My Father’s house has many rooms”, many dwelling places,
The word which the NIV translates as “room” here only appears in one other place in the new Testament, later in John 14:23. And there most Bible versions translate the word as “home.”
John 14 23 Jesus replied, ‘Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.

My Father’s house has many homes. It is interesting that some work to keep that idea of “home” in John 14:2 as well.
Message There is plenty of room for you in my Father’s home. If that weren’t so, would I have told you that I’m on my way to get a room ready for you? And if I’m on my way to get your room ready,

We have a home in the Father’s house! What does “home” mean to you? Comfort? Peace? Tranquillity? Safety? Security? Home, sweet home. There’s no place like home. Home is where the heart is. After a hard day or a long journey there is nothing like the wonderful feeling of arriving home. After setting up and taking down a marquee and thirty tents and digging pits and in between walking between 10 and 20 miles a day and climbing Scafell Pike and Helvellyn and the Langdales and a handful of smaller hills and only having the cold water of Stonethwaite Beck to wash in and a thin plastic groundsheet to sleep on, it was such a marvellous experience just to get back home to a hot shower and a soft comfortable bed again! Somebody has said, “Home is not a place – it’s a feeling.” And we each have a home waiting for us in the Father’s house.

I remember Nell who was the mother of our organist in Borehamwood. When she was 92 Nell was in hospital and in the end I was beside her bed when she died. The nurses told me, “She’s been saying all day, ‘I want to go home.’ Can you explain to her that she needs to stay in hospital? She is too sick to go home.” I explained to the nurses. “When Nell says she wants to go home she doesn’t mean she wants to go back to her house. Nell is saying that she is ready and longing to go to her eternal home in heaven.” Home, sweet home. Comfort. Peace. Tranquillity. Safety. Security. Jesus has gone ahead of us to prepare a wonderful eternal home for us in heaven. So in some churches when somebody dies, they simply announce “she has been called home.” A home prepared for us.
3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.
Message. And if I’m on my way to get your room ready, I’ll come back and get you so you can live where I live.

Here is our Christian hope, our happy certainty of heaven. The Bible gives us different pictures of heaven. It will be like a city, a place of community. It will be like a party, a celebration. It will be a place of continual glorious worship. But the most important thing and the biggest difference between life in this world is that we will be in the very presence of Jesus. You will be where I am!
1 Corinthians 13:12 says, Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

Seeing Jesus face to face. Jim Packer wrote, “We know very little about heaven, but a theologian once described it as ‘an unknown region with a well-known inhabitant.’”
I’ve quoted these words of Richard Baxter before.
Come, Lord, when grace has made me meet, Thy blessed face to see;
For if thy work on earth be sweet, What will thy glory be!
My knowledge of that life is small, The eye of faith is dim;
But ’tis enough that Christ knows all, And I shall be with him.

We will be with the Lord forever more. We will be with Jesus! Last week I was talking with another minister about the joys of being grandparents. He sees his toddler granddaughter most days and he was telling me how she comes to the door of his study. Knock knock. “Grandad, let me in.” “Grandad’s working.” Knock knock knock knock. “Grandad, let me in.” “Grandad’s working.” Knock knock knock knock. You can guess how the story ends.
Grandchildren love to be with their grandparents. Even more children love to be with their parents. To talk. To cuddle. To do jobs together. Just to be together. How much more wonderful still will it be for us to be in the presence of God, to spend eternity with God our glorious heavenly Father and Jesus our wonderful Saviour.

Revelation 22:3-5 gives us this marvellous picture of heaven.
The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. 4 They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. 5 There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever.

Being forever with the Lord and seeing God face to face. This is our glorious Christian hope – our happy certainty, our inheritance.

Jesus has prepared a wonderful home for us with Him in Heaven. And He has also promised to take us there to be with Him.

3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.

Jesus had already said this in John 12 25 The man who loves his life will lose it, while the man who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. 26 Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me.

Just before the words we are looking at today, at the end of John 13 Jesus made an amazing promise to Peter and to all His disciples. “Where I am going, you cannot follow now, but you will follow later.” (John 13:36) Jesus will take us to where He has gone, to be with Him forever!

Where I am, my servant will also be. Jesus will make where He is going even clearer in John 16:5 “Now I am going to him who sent me.”

So Jesus is going to the Father and He will return to take us to be with the Father too. But how can we get there? This is the question human beings have asked for millennia. How can we reach God? How can we get to heaven? As we look beyond this mortal life into eternity we all face prospect of death. Death is the ultimate statistic – 1 out of 1 die. But what will come after death? Three score years and THEN – WHAT?

4 You know the way to the place where I am going.’
5 Thomas said to him, ‘Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?’

Here is the answer Jesus gave.

6 Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

What Jesus was saying is this. “The Father is where I am going, and I am how you will get there.”

I am the way, Jesus said. To find our way around our land and our world we had signposts and then we had maps. Nowadays we also have satellite navigation systems. But there are still parts of the world where the only way to find your way through the jungle and the dead ends is to have a guide who knows the way. Somebody at home in the neighbourhood who has been that way before. Jesus knows the way to the place he has prepared for us because He has been there. Jesus is the way. We live in a world which has lost its way. A world which says that all ways lead to God – you pays your money and you takes your choice. But Jesus Christ says “I am the way” THE way, the one and only way. “No-one comes to the Father except through me.”

I am the truth. Jesus said, You will know the truth and the truth will set you free. Jesus reveals the truth about heaven because He is the man from heaven. At the same time Jesus reveals the truth about God because He Himself is God. Jesus is the truth. We live in a world which has abandoned the idea of absolute truth. We each have our own truth, people say, it’s all relative and one person’s truth is as good as any other! But Jesus Christ says “I am the truth” THE Truth, the one and only ultimate truth!. “No-one comes to the Father except through me.”

I am the life, Jesus said. Jesus the creator is the source of all life. Jesus the Saviour is the source of new birth and new life, abundant life, life in all its fulness, eternal life which not even death can take away. Jesus is the life, the resurrection and the life. We live in a world where people are looking for the meaning of life in all the wrong places. And Jesus Christ says “I am the life” – THE life – the one and only way to find life in all its fullness.

And Jesus said this. “No-one comes to the Father except through me.”
Jesus is the only way to God. This is what the first Christians believed and this is what they preached. Acts 4:12 “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.”

Jesus is the way and the truth and the life – the only way to God. He has opened the way to heaven. He has prepared a place for us – our eternal home. This is not wishful thinking. This is not just pie in the sky when you die. This reality is the happy certainty of our Christian hope. And this promise is for every person who puts their trust in Jesus Christ who died and rose again; Jesus who said, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.” (John 11:25-26)

So we should be looking forward to heaven and setting our hearts on heaven.
Colossians 3: 1 Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things above,
not on earthly things. 3 For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.
4 When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
Richard Baxter put is this way. “Why are not our hearts continually set on heaven? Why dwell we not there in constant contemplation? … Bend thy soul to study eternity, busy thyself about the life to come, habituate thyself to such contemplations, and let not those thoughts be seldom and cursory, but bathe thyself in heaven’s delights.”
A place prepared for us. A home in heaven where we will be with the Lord forever. Let us all “bathe ourselves in heaven’s delights!”

2 My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.

Ps 145:3 Great is the LORD and most worthy of praise; his greatness no-one can fathom.

Ps 150:2 Praise him for his acts of power; praise him for his surpassing greatness.

We are going to think this evening about the surpassing greatness of God. About the greatness no-one can fathom. About the fact that our God is truly All Mighty, All powerful, omnipotent. That our God is completely able to do ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING HE chooses.

Job was struggling in his sufferings. One of Job’s friends, his “comforters”, Elihu, reminds him of God’s greatness.

36:22 “God is exalted in his power. Who is a teacher like him? 23 Who has prescribed his ways for him, or said to him, `You have done wrong’?
24 ¶ Remember to extol his work, which men have praised in song. 25 All mankind has seen it; men gaze on it from afar. 26 How great is God- beyond our understanding! The number of his years is past finding out.

And then as Elihu continues, a storm is approaching, and Elihu points to the storm.

37:14 ¶ “Listen to this, Job; stop and consider God’s wonders.
15 Do you know how God controls the clouds and makes his lightning flash?
16 Do you know how the clouds hang poised, those wonders of him who is
perfect in knowledge?
17 You who swelter in your clothes when the land lies hushed under the south wind,
18 can you join him in spreading out the skies, hard as a mirror of cast bronze?

God explodes our of the storm and speaks to Job out of the power of the storm. Job realises that God is much bigger, much greater, much more powerful than he can possibly imagine.

38: 4 ¶ “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation? Tell me, if you
understand. 5 Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know! Who stretched a
measuring line across it? 6 On what were its footings set, or who laid its cornerstone- 7 while the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy?

CREATOR

38:16 “Have you journeyed to the springs of the sea or walked in the recesses of the deep? 17 Have the gates of death been shown to you? Have you seen the gates of the shadow of death?
18 Have you comprehended the vast expanses of the earth? Tell me, if you know all this. 19 “What is the way to the abode of light? And where does darkness reside?
20 Can you take them to their places? Do you know the paths to their dwellings?

“Do we want to contemplate God’s power? We see it in the immensity of the creation. Do we want to contemplate his wisdom? We see it in the unchangeable order by which the incomprehensible whole is governed. Do we want to contemplate his munificence? We see it in the abundance with which he fills the earth.” Thomas Paine (1737–1809)

And Creation is far far bigger than the earth!!

38:31 “Can you bind the beautiful Pleiades? Can you loose the cords of Orion?
32 Can you bring forth the constellations in their seasons or lead out the Bear with its cubs? 33 Do you know the laws of the heavens? Can you set up [God’s] dominion over the earth?

Our concepts of measurement embrace mountains and men, atoms and stars, gravity, energy, numbers, speed, but never God. We cannot speak of measure or amount or size or weight and at the same time be speaking of God, for these tell of degrees and there are no degrees in God. All that he is he is without growth or addition or development.
A. W. Tozer (1897–1963)

To say that God is infinite is to say that he is measureless. Measurement is the way created things have of accounting for themselves. It describes limitations, imperfections, and cannot apply to God. Weight describes the gravitational pull of the earth upon material bodies; distance describes intervals between bodies in space; length means extension in space; and there are other familiar measurements such as those for liquid, energy, sound, light, and numbers for pluralities. We also try to measure abstract qualities, and speak of great or little faith, high or low intelligence, large or meager talents. Is it not plain that all this does not and cannot apply to God? … He is above all this, outside of it, beyond it. A. W. Tozer (1897–1963)

Before anything in the universe existed, there was God Almighty!

Gen 1:3 ¶ And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.

John 1:1* ¶ In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the
Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.

African Proverb : “No rain, no mushrooms. No God, no world.”

SUSTAINER

38:39 “Do you hunt the prey for the lioness and satisfy the hunger of the lions 40 when they crouch in their dens or lie in wait in a thicket? 41 Who provides food for the raven when its young cry out to God and wander about for lack of food?

Sustaining not only the earth but the whole universe.

Isaiah 40:25 “To whom will you compare me? Or who is my equal?” says the Holy One. 26 Lift your eyes and look to the heavens: Who created all these? He who brings out the starry host one by one, and calls them each by name. Because of his great power and mighty strength, not one of them is missing.

Heb 1:3 The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word.

Colossians 1:15 Christ is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.
16 For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. 17 He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

Sometimes we forget that God is the creator and sustainer of heaven and earth. We limit God. Philosophers say things like, “God can do anything that is logically possible.” What they mean is that God can do anything which is consistent with the rules which underpin the whole universe. But remember, God created the universe. He can change the rules any time he likes! God could change the rules of the universe so that what used to be logically impossible becomes possible! God is THAT great and Almighty.

“God can change the future, but he can’t change the past.” That’s not true. God can change the future but he CHOOSES NOT to change the past!
After Noah and his family and all the animals came out of the ark, we read this promise in Genesis 8: 22 “As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.”

The laws of nature, the rules of space and time, only exist because God created them! They only continue because God keeps them going. God is powerful enough to bend or break or change those rules whenever and wherever He chooses. God is THAT great and Almighty!

SAVIOUR

The Old Testament – Exodus, Crossing the Red Sea, Miracles in wilderness, victory over Canaanites and claiming of the promised land.

Psalm 77:11 ¶ I will remember the deeds of the LORD; yes, I will remember your
miracles of long ago. 12 I will meditate on all your works and consider all your mighty deeds. 13 Your ways, O God, are holy. What god is so great as our God?
14 You are the God who performs miracles; you display your power among the peoples. 15 With your mighty arm you redeemed your people, the descendants of Jacob and Joseph.

The New Testament

Miracles of Jesus
Lu 7:22 So he replied to the messengers, “Go back and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor.

Calming of storm, feeding of 5000 with just 5 loaves and 2 fishes.

Greatest miracle of all – the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

Jim Packer wrote: “Your thoughts of God are too human.” This is where most of us go astray. Our thoughts of God are not great enough; we fail to reckon with the reality of his limitless wisdom and power. Put this mistake right: learn to acknowledge the full majesty of your incomparable God and Savior.

God is beyond our ken—infinite, immense, and his real greatness is known to himself alone. Our mind is too limited to understand him.

Novatian (D. 258) God is greater than mind itself. His greatness cannot be conceived. Nay, could we conceive of his greatness he would be less than the human mind which could form the conception. He is greater than all language, and no statement can express him.

GOD’S GREATNESS IN OUR LIVES

1 Chronicles 29:10 ¶ David praised the LORD in the presence of the whole assembly, saying, “Praise be to you, O LORD, God of our father Israel, from everlasting to everlasting.
11 Yours, O LORD, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendour, for everything in heaven and earth is yours. Yours, O LORD, is the
kingdom; you are exalted as head over all.
12 Wealth and honour come from you; you are the ruler of all things. In your hands are strength and power to exalt and give strength to all.
13 Now, our God, we give you thanks, and praise your glorious name.

Eph 1:18 I pray also 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 the saints, 19 and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, 20 which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, 21 far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come.

His incomparably great power for us who believe.

Phil 4:13 I can do everything through him who gives me strength.

2 Cor 12:9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

Halleluiah. For the Lord the omnipotent God reigns! Nothing is impossible for God! He is indeed ALL MIGHTY

The last couple of months have been among the toughest I can remember in the life of any church. Folk seriously ill and in great pain, waiting for tests and for operations. Folk facing all kinds of challenges in their own lives or in the lives of family members. Sudden bereavements, mourning and grieving. Many worn out and desperately needing a holiday. For a church of our size to have so many people suffering so much all at the same time is very unusual. It’s stretching our reserves and our faith almost to breaking point. This morning we all need refreshment and encouragement and we turn to one of the most inspiring verses in Scripture.
Romans 8:19 19 The creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed.
J.B.Phillips lovely translation puts it this way. “The whole of creation is straining on tiptoe just to see the wonderful sight of the children of God coming into their own.”
What is it that keeps Christians going when the battle against sin and the world and the flesh and the devil seems too hard? When this life seems so full of pain and suffering and discouragement. When it seems as if everybody is against us in the world around and sometimes even in church – and it seems as though nobody is on our side? What keeps us going? It is the hope of heaven. The trustworthy promise of God that however grim this world may get, the next world will be literally “out of this world!”
THE SPIRIT WHO MAKES US GOD’S CHILDREN
God has put His Holy Spirit inside us to make us His children. The Spirit who makes God’s love real to us and assures us that we are Sons and Daughters of the Living God.
Romans 8 14 For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. 15 The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’
The Holy Spirit inside us helps us to pray, Abba, Father. The Spirit brings us peace with God, and the Spirit also brings us “the peace of God” which passes all understanding. The Spirit brings us inexpressible joy in the midst of our sufferings. But these blessings are only the start of the wonderful things God is going to do for us.
We are also HEIRS OF GOD
16 The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. 17 Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.
Heirs with God and co-heirs with Christ. Inheritance usually works when some good things come to us when somebody else dies. Only the Christian inherits when we ourselves die! But there are so many blessings waiting for us to inherit beyond the grave. This is how much God loves us!
1 John 3: How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. 2 Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.
So much is waiting for us in heaven, hidden with Christ in God! Of course the blessings of being identified with Christ in heaven are only for those who have been united with Christ on earth. “if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.” If you do not bear the cross you cannot wear a crown. But for those who have followed Christ in this life, listen to the glorious promises.
THE GLORY TO BE REVEALED
18 I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.
There is a foretaste of this promise back in Romans 5.
And we boast in the hope of the glory of God. 3 Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; 4 perseverance, character; and character, hope. 5 And hope does not put us to shame, because God love has been poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.
We have this marvellous hope of sharing in God’s glory. The glory which is yet to be revealed. In the light of that amazing hope, our present sufferings are just not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. “Not worth comparing.”
The founder of the Protestant Reformation Martin Luther wrote this. “If we consider the greatness and the glory of the life we shall have when we have risen from the dead, it would not be difficult at all for us to bear the concerns of this world. If I believe the Word, I shall on the Last Day, after the sentence has been pronounced, not only gladly have suffered ordinary temptations, insults, and imprisonment, but I shall also say: “O, that I did not throw myself under the feet of all the godless for the sake of the great glory which I now see revealed and which has come to me through the merit of Christ!”
The sufferings of this life are not worth comparing with the glory which is to be revealed in us! The best is yet to come! As Thomas Moore said, “Earth has no sorrow which heaven cannot heal.” In 1 Corinthians 2:9 Paul quotes Isaiah 64:4. “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him”
The apostle John was granted a marvelous vision of what heaven will be like.
Revelation 22: Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb 2 down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. 3 No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. 4 They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. 5 There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever.

And the Bible tells us that the marvellous salvation which God has prepared for his children even has cosmic dimensions! The glorious freedom of the children of God!
Romans 8 19 For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. 20 For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.
The Bible tells us that when Adam and Eve rebelled against God in the Garden of Eden, the whole of creation shared in the curse.
Genesis 3 17 To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat of it,’
“Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. 18It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. 19By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground.

God’s curse on creation was part of his plan of salvation.
Romans 822 We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.

We find this longing that creation be restored again even in the Old Testament.
Jeremiah 12 4How long will the land lie parched and the grass in every field be withered? Because those who live in it are wicked, the animals and birds have perished. Moreover, the people are saying, “He will not see what happens to us.”
The whole of Creation is longing to be set free and to share in
THE FREEDOM AND THE GLORY OF THE CHILDREN OF GOD
Romans 8:21 the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.
At last in Heaven, all created things will be free. Free from sin, free from death, free from decay, free from suffering, free from pain.
Revelation 21:3 And I heard a great voice from the throne, saying: Behold the tabernacle of God with men: and he will dwell with them. And they shall be his people: and God himself with them shall be their God. 4 And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes: and death shall be no more. Nor mourning, nor crying, nor sorrow shall be any more, for the former things are passed away. 5 And he that sat on the throne, said: Behold, I make all things new.
The glorious liberty of the children of God. Freed from distractions and trivia and temptations. Freed from our own failings and weaknesses. Free to serve God and worship God and love God. Free from the bondage to decay and and the inevitability of death. Since this is what God has prepared in store for us,
WE WAIT EAGERLY
23 Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies.
We are already God’s children, God’s beloved sons and daughters. But we won’t really know what we are until our bodies are redeemed and transformed to be like Christ’s glorious body. There is that marvelous passage we often read at a funeral from 1 Corinthians 15.
49 And just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so shall we bear the likeness of the man from heaven.
50 I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. 51 Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— 52 in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. 53 For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality.
So, says Paul, we wait eagerly for that transformation! And we wait patiently.
24 For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? 25 But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.
This is our Christian hope. Not some vague optimism but a happy certainty. Hope is a combination of expectation and desire. I would love one day to walk on the moon. But since I have no expectation of that ever happening I can’t say “I hope to walk on the moon.” On the other hand one day I am sure I will have to visit the dentist. But since I have no desire ever to visit the dentist again it would be wrong to say, “I hope to visit the dentist.”
But my greatest desire is to spend eternity with Christ. And the promises of God make it absolutely certain that I will spend eternity with Christ. So it is correct to say, I hope to spend eternity with Christ. I hope to share in His glory. This is not wishful thinking. This is the happy certainty of our Christian hope.
And as a first instalment of all the good things God has prepared for those who love Jesus, we have
THE FIRSTFRUITS OF THE SPIRIT
23 Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies.
The Holy Spirit inside us gives us a foretaste of heaven, a first instalment if you like.
2 Corinthians 5:1 Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. 2 Meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, 3 because when we are clothed, we will not be found naked. 4 For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. 5 Now it is God who has made us for this very purpose and has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.
All the activity of God the Holy Spirit in our lives is a deposit, guaranteeing our inheritance. So indeed throughout this life we are groaning with anticipation, longing to be with Jesus! And the Spirit not only maintains our Christian hope within us, but also helps us in our limitations, giving us a foretaste of what it is like to meet with God face to face by helping us in our prayers.
26 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. 27 And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.
The Spirit gives us a foretaste of heaven, not least in helping us when we pray. So when this life seems too hard to bear, we should lift our eyes and look to the future. Look beyond death and the grave. Look at what God is doing preparing us to share in his glory forever.
With all these wonderful promises in mind, we can put our trust God whatever this life may throw at us.
28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
Whatever we or those we care about may be suffering in this life, we trust that God is at work behind the scenes to fulfil his promises! Those are waiting for us in His eternal presence in glory.
The story is told of an elderly couple who returned home from a lifetime of service on the mission field. Their ship was welcomed into port by bands and speeches but all that was for the President who was aboard – not for them. Nobody came to welcome them ashore. As they settled into their retirement flat nobody came to visit. The husband became resentful. In his prayers he poured out his heart to God. “I thought at least one person would come to welcome us home.” But God quietly spoke to him. “You aren’t home yet!”
Whatever hard times we are going through at the moment, whatever we may be suffering, we can find hope and strength and encouragement and comfort and peace in God’s promises. This is what we need to hear. The whole of creation is straining on tiptoe just to see the children of God come into their own. Every one of us can look forward to that day!

Where was God in Paris on Friday evening? On Friday evening the 13th November 2015 teams of Islamic State terrorists launched three separate attacks in Paris with machine guns and bombs. 129 people were murdered and more than 350 others were injured. This week people will be asking important questions. “Why doesn’t God do something to stop terrorists BEFORE they kill innocent people?” “Doesn’t the presence of so much evil in the world prove that God doesn’t exist at all?” “How can we believe in God in a world so full of suffering?” Where was God in Paris on Friday evening?
When we think about human suffering, all kinds of examples come to mind. The plight of refugees fleeing the evils of Islamic State. Famines and floods. The millions without food and billions without safe drinking water or the basics of medical care. And the individuals killed or maimed in car crashes and house fires. Sometimes people we know who are in agony from terrible diseases. And we may be experiencing suffering and grief in different situations ourselves. How can we believe in God in a world so full of suffering? This is one of the six big questions which people who are not Christians want an answer to – and as Christians we need to be prepared to give an answer which is true and satisfying. It first began to be asked after Auschwitz and Belsen, and came to a focus in Britain after Locherbie and Dunblane. Where was God in those places when so many innocent people were suffering and dying?
In many events, responsibility for the suffering obviously rests with people, with deliberate acts of evil. But in other situations nobody is to blame and nobody should be blamed! “Natural disasters” and tragic accidents happen and they could have happened to any one of us! So the question is very straightforward – why does God allow such accidents to happen? The problem of what is called “innocent suffering” is a vital issue for Christians to grapple with.
It’s a question which people who are not Christians will sometimes raise as their “proof” that God doesn’t exist at all. “If there was a God then he wouldn’t allow that kind of suffering,” they say. To some people the existence of innocent suffering is a knockdown argument which demonstrates to them that there is NO God at all.
The classic formulation of the problem of innocent suffering goes something like this.
If God is all-powerful he COULD stop all suffering.
If God is all-loving He WOULD stop all suffering.
So does the presence of suffering in the world prove that God is NOT all-loving?
Or does it prove that God is NOT all-powerful?
Or does it prove that God doesn’t exist at all?
Actually, when you stop to think about it, that argument doesn’t prove anything at all. “If there was a God, he wouldn’t allow innocent people to suffer,” people say. But saying, “if there was a God” in that kind of way is actually already making some important assumptions about what God is like. It assumes at least that God exists, that God is good, that God is just, that God is loving. Unless God exists, unless God is good and just and loving, there is NO reason to expect the world to be any different. Unless God exists and is good and just and loving, there would be no reason to expect him to do anything to STOP innocent suffering. Then the question also assumes that a God exists who is powerful enough to change events in the world if he wanted to. A God who wasn’t all-powerful could not be expected to do anything about innocent suffering.
So the person who asks, “where is God when innocent people are suffering?” is already assuming that a God exists who is not only good and just and loving but who is also powerful enough to prevent innocent suffering if He so chooses. The question is not really about whether God exists at all, but rather whether he is really the kind of God we believe him to be, in the light of events in the world which suggest the opposite.
The heart of the problem of innocent suffering is really best expressed like this. “Why does a good and just and loving and all-powerful God allow innocent people to suffer?” Does this mean that God is not really good and just and loving? Or does it mean that God isn’t really all-powerful after all?
In response to this question as Christians we want to say a number of things.

God IS good and just

The Bible teaches us in so many places that God is perfect in His justice, goodness, righteousness and fairness. The Bible talks about righteousness more than 500 times and justice almost 200. We are only human, limited in our wisdom and understanding. God rules the world with complete justice and fairness. And as well as being a good and just God, the Bible makes clear that

God IS all-powerful

The God of the Bible is God ALMIGHTY, Maker of heaven and earth and all that is in them. We see God’s mighty power at work in the events of the Exodus, in the miracles worked by the prophets and supremely by Jesus. But since God is both good and just, and also all-powerful, why doesn’t God surely bring innocent suffering to an end? The answer to that question lies in the reality of the free will of human beings to make choices.
Life is full of risks. Where we live. How we travel. What we eat. All these decisions carry risks of us being harmed in some way. Some accidents are simply that, totally unforeseen circumstances that lead to accidents that could happen to anyone. But these are rare. Frequently somewhere along the way human beings have made some choices which have made the accident a possibility. We have chosen to put ourselves into a position where we might be hurt. So the only way God could prevent those kinds of accidents would be to take away our free will – to never let anybody take any risks, ever.
In the same way, so much suffering of innocent people is actually caused directly or indirectly by the sinful actions of human beings. Not only through murder and war, where the powerful inflict terrible suffering on the powerless. So many of the world’s problems are caused by greed. There IS enough food to go round. So often, it just doesn’t get to the people who are starving at prices they can afford to pay. And there is enough land for people to be able to build homes in safety, instead of on flood plains or along fault lines or in the shadows of volcanoes.
The one sure-fire way that God could deal with the problem of innocent suffering would be to make sure that NOBODY could ever harm anybody else. But the only way to do that would be to get rid of all the people who could ever possibly, maybe, one day, not just by deliberate action but by omission or even by accident, all those people who could conceivably cause harm to others. And that would mean all of us, everybody, the whole human race. Because we are all human, all fallen, all sinful. We all have free will. Any one of us could choose to hurt others. And we are all fallible, all imperfect. Any one of us by our mistakes and failures and accidents could cause others to suffer even if that was the last thing we intended. We all make bad choices. So the only way God could get rid of innocent suffering completely would be to get rid of all the people. God could do this. He IS all-powerful. But at the same time,

God IS loving and merciful

The God of the Bible is a God of love and of mercy. The reason that God doesn’t solve the problem of innocent suffering by the simple plan of wiping out all the people is obvious proof of God’s love and mercy.
If God were to intervene in miraculous ways to prevent EVERY incident of innocent suffering, what a strange world we would live in. The car with brakes failing wouldn’t hit the pedestrian, because God would lift the pedestrian 10 feet into the air as the car crashed beneath him. The African village wouldn’t be swept away because, just as in the parting of the Red Sea, the floodwaters would separate and flow each side of the village instead of through it. The starving millions might discover that stones really do turn to bread for them each day. That would indeed be a world full of strange miracles. It would be a very confusing unpredictable world to live in. But that isn’t the world God created!
We believe in a God of miracles. We believe in a God who DOES act in power to bring healing and deliverance and salvation. But we also recognise that God only works in those kinds of ways in rare and exceptional circumstances, usually in his church and for his praise and glory and not usually in the world which does not even believe He exists. God alone has the wisdom and justice to decide fairly when it is right for Him to intervene by miracles and when to let events run their natural course, however tragic the outcome. We trust in God’s justice and fairness. And we recognise that it is actually a sign of God’s love and mercy that, although He IS all-powerful, God generally does allow the world to continue in its own way, with natural laws operating unhindered and events unfolding in predictable ways. For most of the time, God leaves human beings to take responsibility for our lives, and to take care of each other as best we are able. Because the only alternative would be to bring this world to an end and make a radically different world!
Somebody once asked the German preacher and theologian Helmut Thielicke what he thought was the most important question facing the Western World. He pointed to the question of suffering.
“Again and again I have the feeling that suffering is regarded as something which is fundamentally inadmissible, distressing, embarrassing, and not to be endured. Naturally, we are called upon to combat and diminish suffering. All medical and social action is motivated by the perfectly justified passion for this goal. But the idea that suffering is a burden which can or even should be fundamentally radically exterminated can only lead to disastrous illusions. One perhaps does not even have to be a Christian to know that suffering belongs to the very nature of this our world and will not pass away until this world passes away. And beyond this, we Christians know that in a hidden way it is connected with man’s reaching for the forbidden fruit, but that God can transform even this burden of a fallen world into a blessing and fill it with meaning.”
“Suffering is part of the very nature of this our world,” said Thielicke. It would be a very, very different world which did not have such suffering. The continued existence of evil and the possibility of innocent suffering are both consequences of God’s mercy and patience. He could just bring judgement on us all here and now and that would be and end of it! Until that judgement comes, there will always be suffering.

Suffering is a consequence of human free will.

The fact is that human beings DO have free will. And in the world as it is, the only way God could remove the evil and suffering from the world would be to take away all human freedom of choice. Somebody may ask “Why doesn’t God do something to stop terrorists BEFORE they kill innocent people?” The answer is simple. Because the only way God could stop evil people from doing evil things would be to take away freedom of choice from ALL of us, for ALL the time! God chooses not to do that. God chooses to give us free will and leave us all with free will. We are able to make choices and sometimes we make bad choices.
BUT (some people object) if God knew that human choice would lead to so much evil and suffering why did He give us free will in the first place? Some answers to that question go like this:
(a) Our experiences of suffering and evil are in some ways “good for us”. They teach us to make good choices, develop character, inspire faith and so “refine our souls”. (Rom 5:3-5) (Irenaeus)
(b) God wants us to love him freely, not because we are programmed to do so like robots. Human free will and the resulting evil and suffering are necessary so that we have a genuine free choice either to love or to reject God. The world is “a Vale of Soul-Making” (John Hick 1968)
(c) The existence of so much evil and suffering in the world are necessary so that God’s divine and mysterious purposes can be fulfilled. As limited human beings, we may never understand God’s plan in this life but in heaven we will understand why so much evil was necessary. (1 Pet 1:3ff)
God IS good and just, God IS all-powerful and God IS loving and merciful. In His wisdom he leaves the world to carry on and doesn’t prevent innocent suffering by continually intervening. But we mustn’t conclude that God is aloof or unaffected when people are suffering and dying. Because last, but by no means least, there is something else very important which Christians want to say.
God shares our sufferings

Sometimes we can feel that God doesn’t know what is going on in his world, or that he doesn’t care about us anymore. But when we reflect on the events of the last week of His earthly ministry we are reminded why Jesus Christ the Saviour has been the strength and inspiration for so many who have suffered innocently. The poor and the oppressed and the slaves, the sick and the suffering and the dying in every age have found comfort and hope not only in the resurrection of Jesus, but in His dying on the cross for them. Because more than anywhere else, it was on the cross that Jesus the Son of God took upon Himself our pains and our sufferings
After the Dunblane massacre nearly twenty years ago Steve Chalke wrote some wise words which apply to so many instances of innocent suffering. “We know that what happened was neither His doing nor His will. God’s was the first heart to break over the events that took place there. He wept with us for the children whose lives were cut short and the family they left behind. When confronted with the pain of the death of his friend Lazarus, Jesus also wept.”
God is suffering right now with so many who are injured and dying and bereaved, homeless and terrified. God suffers with communities shattered by every dreadful tragedy. God suffers with the thousands dying in floods and famines and conflicts, and with the tens of thousands dying of hunger and of terrible diseases every day, whose innocent suffering we never know about but God sees in intimate detail. God is suffering with the bereaved and the injured in Paris today.
God suffers with us in EVERY incident of innocent suffering, and God knows that suffering so well because there was none so innocent as Jesus, the Son of God, the spotless Lamb of God who took away the sins of the world, Jesus who experienced deeper grief and pain there on the cross than and human being before or since. God suffers with us.
How can we believe in God in a world so full of suffering? Because we know that, wherever people are suffering, God is there suffering with us. Where was God in Paris on Friday evening? God was there, weeping with the rest of us.