On 23rd March 2020 the United Kingdom entered its first Coronavirus lockdown. The last year has been strange and confusing and frustrating and sometimes scary. For many people it has been 13 months filled with difficulty and pain and tragedy. How can we deal with the legacy of the last year, emotionally and practically? How will our faith help get us through?
And now we are halfway through the four steps of the roadmap back to normality. Even in the summer we are likely to find that some things will never be as they were before, or certainly not for a long time. We may need to keep some social distancing, and keep on wearing masks in certain places, and we will definitely still be washing our hands more often and using a lot of hand sanitiser. As we go forward, some people will be understandably be worried or even afraid about going out and meeting other people, or welcoming others into their home. What help does our faith offer us as we adjust to the “new normal”?
The apostle Paul knew a lot about suffering. He also knew about facing dangers and hardships and coping with anxiety and fear.
2 Corinthians 4 7 But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. 8 We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; 9 persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. 10 We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. 11 For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may also be revealed in our mortal body. 12 So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you.
We may sometimes feel like jars of clay, cheap, fragile, disposable. Hard pressed on every side. Knocked down but not knocked out. Continually carrying around in our bodies the dying of Christ. But Paul says, despite all that we do not lose heart! What was his secret for keeping on going despite all the opposition and persecution and suffering he experienced? What will help us as we try to deal with all the challenges of the last year and face the uncertainties of the future?
2 Corinthians 4 16 Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. 17 For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. 18 So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.
Fixing our eyes not on what is seen but on what is unseen! “Light and momentary troubles” “An eternal glory which far outweighs them all”“What is seen is temporary” “What is unseen is eternal” The things we see now are here today, gone tomorrow. But the things we can’t see now will last forever. (Message)
How important is our hope of heaven to us? I suspect that if we are honest, we don’t think about heaven very much for most of the time. Most of the time our lives here and now are comfortable enough. It is only when times get hard, or perhaps we are facing illness or bereavement, that our hope of heaven begins to mean as much to us as it meant to the apostle Paul, or the other apostles, or the saints through the ages who have faced persecution and martyrdom for their faith.
What does it mean to fix our eyes not on what is seen but what is unseen? In what ways should we be looking forward to our heavenly home? There is a direct relationship between faith and hope. Our lives here should continually be influenced by our hope of heaven.
2 Corinthians 5:1 For 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 instead 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 instead with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life.
This passage puts our life on earth into perspective – God’s perspective. Life here on earth is like living in a tent. I love going on holiday in a tent. But I wouldn’t want to live in one permanently. But waiting for us is an eternal building, built not by human hands but by God. Here, says Paul, we are unclothed. But there we will be clothed. Here we are mortal. There our mortality will be swallowed up by life!
In all of this, the Holy Spirit is our guarantee, our foretaste and our first instalment of heaven.
5 Now the one who has fashioned us for this very purpose is God, who has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.
Message The Spirit of God whets our appetite by giving us a taste of what’s ahead. He puts a little of heaven in our hearts so that we’ll never settle for less
So if we are setting our sights on our heavenly home, how should we be living now? Paul uses an interesting phrase when he says we should be
Living by faith, not by sight
6 Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord. 7 For we live by faith, not by sight.
Here in these human bodies we are away from the Lord. There we will be away from the body but at home with the Lord. Until then, at present, here and now, we “live by faith, not by sight”.
We live by faith, not by sight. (2 Corinthians 5:7)
Literally it says, “we walk by faith.”
It’s what we put our trust in but don’t yet see that keeps us going. (The Message)
Paul says, “We live by faith, not by sight”. But in fact most of us for most of the time live on the basis of what we can see, touch and feel rather than what we believe to be true even though we can’t see it. A simple test. “In what ways have you shown faith over the last week?” Actions that spring from faith are those acts of obedience which we would NOT HAVE DONE if we did not have faith in Christ
Living by faith means basing our life on what God has said and done. Among other things it means
Trusting the Bible. Basing our lives on God’s reliable word rather than the post-truths we find in the world around us. So Christians will read the Bible and study the Bible and even commit verses and passages and stories to memory, so that we can live by faith and not by sight.
Trusting what Christians say. When Christians talk about God answering their prayers, some people assume they are just making up stories. We should instead always assume that when Christian friends talk about the difference Jesus makes in their lives, the peace he gives them, the help and the guidance, assume that they are telling the truth.
Trusting our own experience. We can all discover for ourselves God is real, that God is there, that God will help anybody who sincerely searches for him! (C. S. Lewis) who wrote the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe once said, “You never know how much you really believe anything until its truth or falsehood becomes a matter of life and death to you.” Trusting our experiences of God includes trusting when God speaks to us – expecting God to speak to us in supernatural ways, in words of prophecy and dreams and visions and flashes of imagination.
Expressing our faith in prayer. Perhaps the most important aspect of living by faith is by praying. Trusting that when we are speaking to God in times of worship or in silence then God actually hears us and answers our prayers. If we are just living by what we can see and here and touch then prayer will be a complete waste of time. But when we are living by faith, prayer is the most important expression of our relationship with God.
“Faith is not believing that God can, but that God will!” (Abraham Lincoln)
“The more we depend on God, the more dependable we find he is.” (Cliff Richard)
“Faith is a reasoning trust, a trust which reckons thoughtfully and confidently upon the trustworthiness of God”. (John Stott)
Living by faith means clinging on to God’s promises, even when they seem impossible. When we think about it, living by faith is eminently sensible and logical. It is rational to put our trust in God because of His character. When we trust other people, there is always the risk that they might lie to us, or cheat us. But God will never do that! Because God is infinitely Good –
God is good and just: He will never deceive us – so it should be EASIER to trust Him than it is to trust other people. We should be able to trust God MORE than we do other people!
Then when we trust other people there is also the risk that they will hurt us in some way. But that will never happen with God because God is all loving. God IS love. “I have loved you with an everlasting love!” God says. Oswald Chambers wrote, “Faith is deliberate confidence in the character of God.”
God is all-loving: He will never let us down: it should be EASIER to trust God than to trust anybody else. We should trust God MORE than we do anybody else.
Then when we trust other people there is always the risk that they will mess up. That however much they try, they might fail to do what they have promised. But there is no risk of that happening with God. Because
God is all-powerful – God is Almighty. God can do whatever He chooses to do!
God is all-powerful – He CAN keep His promises: it should be EASIER to trust God than it is to trust other people. We should trust God MORE than we do anybody else!
We trust other people all the time. We put our confidence in them, have faith in them, believe in them –
People are fallible and fickle – But God is INFINITELY GOOD;
Human love is partial, limited – But God is ALL LOVING;
People can fail because of their limitations – But God is ALL-POWERFUL:
So we should trust God most of all! Martin Luther said this. “Faith is a living well-founded confidence in the grace of God; so perfectly certain that it would die a thousand times rather than surrender its conviction.”
Corrie Ten Boom said these things about Faith.
“You don’t need great faith, but faith in a great God.”
“If all things are possible with God, then all things are possible to him who believes in him.”
“Faith sees the invisible, believes the unbelievable, and receives the impossible.”
“Faith is a Fantastic Adventure in Trusting Him.”
So we should be living by faith and not by sight.
. 8 We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord.
Again I ask – would we really prefer to be with God in glory right now? Or don’t we really care about heaven because we are quite comfortable enough living here on earth?
When the rubber hits the road, we show that we are walking by faith and not by sight by aiming to please God in everything we do.
9 So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it. 10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due to us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.
Since we have this eternal destiny, we make it our aim to please God in everything, knowing that we will have to give account for the way we have lived. Have we really been living by faith? Or are we only living by sight?
A large number of people aged over 95 were asked one question. It was an open-ended question they could answer any way they wished. The question was: If you could live your life over again, what would you do differently? Amongst the most popular answers were these.
“If I could live my life over again: I would risk more.”
“If I could live my life over again: I would do more things that would live on after I’m dead.”
Our greatest regrets in life are not usually about the things we did do – but about the things we did not do but wished we had done! So we should step out in bold leaps of faith in obedience to the challenges God has set before us! Living by faith, not by sight.
The manse where we live now is the nicest we have ever lives in. But there is one thing I have always missed from our Manse in Brentwood – the squirrels. I could sit at my desk preparing my sermons under the gaze of Mr Squirrel as he sat about 6 feet away in the tree immediately outside the study window eating the nuts he had just stolen from our bird feeder. Squirrels are such crazy creatures! They jump from one high tree to another. Sometimes they appear to be aiming for a limb so far out of reach that the leap looked like suicide. Sometimes they miss–but they usually land, safe and unconcerned, on a branch several feet lower. Then they just climb up to the branch they were aiming for, and carry on with their journey. A lot of them miss, but none ever get hurt in trying. Even though they are sometimes only a few feet above the dog who is enthusiastically defending her garden from invaders. The thing is, squirrels have got to take the risks if they don’t want to spend their whole lives stuck in one tree. Too many Christians and churches spend all of their lives stuck in one place forever. We need to be prepared to take some risks in God’s name.
4:18 So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen,
5:2 we groan, longing to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling,
5:7 For we live by faith, not by sight.

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!

AN INTRODUCTION DURING THE CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC.
We thought last week about 10 ways in which God wants to bless us. Three of those ways are things we can do by meeting together in twos and threes.
We talked about 2s and 3s for New Christians, encouraging a new believer by meeting with an established Christian. We thought about pairs for prayer and prayer triplets, two or three “soul friends” praying and discussing the Bible together. And I mentioned Fan The Flame, the Guided Course in Discipleship for an established Christian studying and praying privately and then meeting together with a Guide. Ways of growing by meeting in twos and threes. You can read more about all these things in my book Making Disciples One-To-One.
These things will be more important to Christians now than ever with the limits imposed on everybody over gathering together. The “rule of six” limits what we can do in terms of Home Groups or Bible Studies or Prayer Meetings. And I am sad to say that I predict that it will only be weeks before the rules become even stricter so that only two households can meet together, or even to the point where people are not allowed to go into each other’s houses at all – which is the situation in Scotland already. So meeting together in 2s and 3s will be even more valuable because that is something we can still do on Zoom or on the phone, or taking a walk in the park. Carpe diem – seize the day, take the opportunities to meet together while we can!

So why is meeting together such a good thing? If you aren’t already convinced, this morning I am going to give you

Twelve Great Reasons for Meeting Together One-to-One or in Threes
Who were the people who have made the most impact on your Christian life? Who brought you to faith in the first place and who has helped you most to grow along the way? It might have been a speaker at a big event, or a memorable sermon in your local church, or a book by somebody you have never met. But many people would agree that for them a Minister or a Home Group Leader or close Christian friends were much more significant. The times which have shaped our faith were not so much occasions in crowds or even in small groups, but the times which we spent with those precious individuals One-to-One.
Disciples are learners. The preacher and evangelist David Watson wrote, “If we were willing to learn the meaning of real discipleship and actually to become disciples, the church in the West would be transformed and the resultant impact on society would be staggering.” And one way in which disciples through the ages have always learned is by meeting together One-to-One.
When two or three people who regularly meet to talk about God and pray together are at roughly the same stage in their Christian experience, books describe this variously as “Spiritual Friendships”, “Soul Friends”, “Sustaining Friends” “Prayer Buddies” or “Peer Mentoring”. When a more mature Christian helps a younger Christian find their way, a better description might “Spiritual Direction”, “Christian Formation”, “Coaching” or “Mentoring”. All these are immensely helpful in the process of knowing God better and becoming disciples of Jesus.
I can find at least twelve excellent reasons why it is good for Christians to get together One-to-One. Any one of these great blessings would be reason enough for you to begin to meet together.

1. Anybody can do it!
We can’t all give lots of time to lots of other people – but everybody can give time to just one or two! Even Home Groups can’t be just right for everybody all the time. But meeting One-to-One will always be at just the right level for both. A meeting of just two is totally flexible – you can always get together when you want to.
Meeting with the intention and the expectation of talking about Christian things gives freedom to actually talk about Christ without awkwardness or embarrassment; because that is the very reason you are meeting. And there are things you would be prepared to share One-to-One which you would never share even in a small group. You can feel amazingly safe. Going on a journey into unknown territory it always feels better to share that adventure with somebody else than going there by yourself, especially if the other person has been there before.

2. Dialogue teaches the parts monologue can’t teach
We learn all kinds of things much better by talking about them and by doing them with other people than just by reading or by listening to a professor or a preacher talking about them. Talking things through with another person brings so many blessings – blessings for you and blessings for person you are meeting with so double the blessings! Talking helps us understand the things we have heard in sermons or read in books. It helps us think through decisions we are making and find ways through problems we face. It brings encouragement in difficult times and helps us keep going when we feel like giving up.
Some Christians only talk to another person about their faith when problems arise. The wonderful thing about meeting regularly is that when times of trial come the relationship of “sustaining friends” already exists.

3. Jesus tells us to pray together.
“Again, I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything you ask for, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them.” (Matthew 18:19-20)
Here Jesus very clearly makes two promises. The second (in order of the saying) is that Jesus the Risen Christ is present when believers meet together in some special way in which He is not present with them when they are apart and alone. And this is linked in some way to the first promise which is that God the Father will answer the prayers of believers who come together in agreement about what they are praying for, more than if they had prayed alone and separately.
Jesus here is specifically promising to bless Christians who meet together and pray together. And the minimum number meeting together to claim these promises is precisely two. Praying together is good. Intercessions carry more power because they are united. Praying for each other is good. Praying through each other’s decisions and problems is good. And having somebody else committed to praying for your personal spiritual growth is guaranteed to be good – all because God answers prayer.

4. Opening up to each other is opening up to God
If we really mean business with God we need to open up every part of our lives to Him. An important way of doing this is to open up our lives to other people. Many Christians are afraid of doing this. I am afraid of letting other people see “the real me” because then they would realise (in the words of Michael Caine’s character in the film Educating Rita) “there is less to me than meets the eye”.
But I really do need to let somebody else in on “the real me” because only then, when I am truly being myself, only then can God really begin to change me. Christians need to learn to open up to each other, Sharing emotions of sadness, anger, disappointment or discouragement with each other is the same as sharing these feelings with God. When we have poured out our heart to our friend, and we know our friend has heard us, then we can be assured that God also has heard and understood us. It is very healthy to have a spiritual context where we can uncork the bottle!

5. Confession and absolution helps deal with sin
Especially in the battle against the world, the flesh and the devil, having a Christian friend standing with you can make all the difference. Through history the church has known the value of confession and absolution. Jesus has given to all Christians the authority to declare sins forgiven. So James 5:16 makes this invitation. Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. In the process of Christian holiness, turning away from sin and being transformed into the image of Christ, every Christian would benefit from having a friend to whom he could confess his or her sins. That friend could offer the blessing of declaring those sins forgiven. More than that, the friend would be there to pray alongside us against in the future. Too many Christians walk the road to holiness alone. We don’t need to be alone!

6. Discipleship, like salvation, is intended to be shared
In twenty-first century Western Christianity the focus in our understanding of salvation is almost entirely individual. We are concerned about our personal relationship with God. In eht Bible salvation is very different. It is corporate. We are saved into the Body of Christ of which each of us is only one single part. We are part of the family of God, being built into the Temple of the Holy Spirit. We are saved together and being disciples is something we are supposed to do together. Christians can be too individualistic. “It’s my faith and my life, and I can live it as I want to.” That is NOT right. That is the attitude of the footballer who hogs the ball instead of passing it around the team. It’s the attitude of the tuba player who plays in any key he chooses, any notes he wants, ignoring the conductor and the rest of the orchestra and thinks it doesn’t matter. Richard Foster has written, “None of us is supposed to live the Christian life alone. We gain help and strength from others.”

7. It is good to be in a covenant relationship with each other
There is a place in the Christian life for discipline. For making promises to God and to each other, and for allowing others to call us to account for those promises. In essence most spiritual promises of value are wrapped up in the promise made in many traditions at baptism, “to follow Jesus Christ all the days of my life in the fellowship of His church.” It is valuable to allow other Christians to encourage us in keeping our promises.
We know we should sometimes be more motivated and committed than we are. It’s good to pray when we feel like it – it is even better to pray when we don’t feel like it, and even in times when we feel we cannot pray at all, And it helps us to pray when we have made the commitment to God and to the other person that we will meet.

8. Being accountable is a good thing
Being accountable helps us keep learning and praying and it helps us stand firm against temptation. Accountability means we can’t cheat ourselves, or God. Richard Foster commends this idea of “loving accountability”. He says, “I need others to ask hard questions about my prayer experiences, temptations and struggles, and plans for spiritual growth.” Any Christian who is serious about being a disciple of Jesus should not be afraid of searching questions. “How is it with your soul?” “How are you experiencing God this week?”
Christians have the right and the obligation to “watch over each other” and support each other in Christian life. If we see a brother falling into sin, all Christians, and especially those in leadership are obliged to try to rescue them (Acts 20:28; James 5:19-20; 1 John 5:16). And every Christian is obliged to allow others to help us on the road to holiness.

9. Seeing Christ in each other
Imprisoned for his faith and tortured for Christ, Romanian pastor Richard Wurmbrand saw the suffering of his fellow prisoners and asked, “If that were Christ, would you give Him your blanket?” The parable of the Sheep and the Goats in Matthew 25:31-46 reminds us that when we love and serve our neighbour we are loving and serving Christ Himself. Somebody once asked Mother Teresa of Calcutta how she could work with the untouchables and the sick and the dying? Her answer was that she sees Jesus in each one of the people she helps. So as she serves and cares for those who are dying she is serving and caring for Christ Himself. The best way to learn to see Christ in others is to develop a close relationship with a fellow Christian. Meeting with Christ in another person is a wonderful way of experiencing the presence of Christ in ordinary everyday life.
–
10. Some things are “better caught than taught”
There are many things in life which we learn by watching others. The piano teacher, the driving instructor, the personal trainer and the life coach all show us HOW TO do what we want to do. The best way to learn to speak French is to spend time with a French person. So also in the Christian life there are individuals who inspire and encourage us by their passion in prayer, their boldness in evangelism, their commitment to holiness and their complete devotion to God. From their examples we learn skills and attitudes and character. We learn hospitality, patterns of prayer and devotional reading. We learn how to cope with life. We are fired by their wisdom, zeal and love. They are our role models. We catch their faith. And as other people share their lives with us, we learn from them how to share our own life with other people. This sharing of life is at the heart of meeting One-to-One.

11. Exercising Spiritual Gifts
The safety of a One-to-One relationship is the perfect context for learning to recognise God’s voice and deliver God’s messages. The Bible teaches the prophet-hood of all believers. Every Christian has received that Holy Spirit who inspired the prophets so potentially all may exercise prophetic gifts (Acts 2:17-18; 38-39). Where better place than meeting One-to-One to begin to explore spiritual gifts and especially prophecy?

12. God gives us other Christians so we can practise His kind of love.
A very good way to learn to love your enemies is to practise by loving your friends! God gives us other Christians so we can learn to love and accept and forgive. The challenge just of making space for somebody else in our busy lives is good. Learning to really listen to them will make us better at listening to others. We can practise helping others and learn to be Jesus to other people. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. (1 John 4:20)
Then also, many of us find it incredibly difficult to talk to other people about Jesus. Sharing our story One-to-One is good practice for sharing Jesus with other friends and with strangers.
After a distinguished career as a performer, one famous virtuoso violinist became a professor of music. Somebody asked him what had prompted his change of career. The violinist replied: “Violin playing is a perishable art. It must be passed on as a personal skill; otherwise it is lost.” We can’t learn to live the Christian life by ourselves just by reading books. We all need help in the “perishable art” of Christian living.
With all these great reasons for meeting together One-to-One, it is hard to think of any excuses why every Christian should not be meeting regularly with a Spiritual Friend.

Twelve Great Reasons for Meeting Together One-to-One or in Threes
1. Anybody can do it!
2. Dialogue teaches the parts monologue can’t teach
3. Jesus tells us to pray together (Matthew 18:19-20)
4. Opening up to each other is opening up to God
5. Confession and absolution helps deal with sin (James 5:16)
6. Discipleship, like salvation, is intended to be shared
7. It is good to be in a covenant relationship with each other
8. Being accountable is a good thing
9. Seeing Christ in each other (Matthew 25:31-46)
10. Some things are “better caught than taught”
11. Exercising Spiritual Gifts
12. God gives us other Christians so we can practise His kind of love (1 John 4:20)

I was on the point of missing out the next dozen Psalms from this series because they seemed to be almost boring in the way the Psalm writer poured our complaint after complaint about how hard his life was. Then I remembered that these Psalms of Lament make up the greatest proportion of all the Psalms. There are actually 42 Psalms of Lament in the Bible – that is more than a quarter of the total. 12 of those are corporate lament but 30 are individual and personal laments which make up one fifth of all the Psalms. So although when we think about different kinds of prayers they don’t immediately spring to our minds, obviously these kinds of prayers of lament are actually very important in the life of faith.

Laments may be statements of personal despair, like Psalm 22, or communal cries in times of crisis, such as Psalm 137. Lamenting personal suffering 69, 38 or complaints against enemies 109. Some are complaints against God 22. They sometimes describing distress or misfortune Psalm 22:6-18 and cry out for deliverance. Some protest innocence Psalm 59, or express wishes or curses Psalms 55:15, 61:4, 106:6, 30.

Psalms of Lament are simply cries for help. They teach us how we can pray when our life gets tough and we are facing problems of every kind. This is particularly the case with the Psalms of Individual Lament where the writer is pouring out his heart to God in the crisis he is experiencing. Psalms of lament tend to contain the same elements in the same order

Calling on God, Describing our suffering. Anger and blame against those causing the suffering
. Calling on God to intervene and to help. Expression of faith and confidence in God. Anticipating God’s help. Thanksgiving for God’s help and promise of commitment.
For each of these elements we’re going to start by looking specifically at Psalm 54. A couple of years ago we spent an evening of reflection on Psalms 3, 5 and 6 and I will remind us of what those Psalms said as well. And but I will also point to other examples of the different elements because they are all there as well in Psalms 55 through to 63.

Calling on God

54 1 Save me, O God, by your name; vindicate me by your might.

Psalms of Lament usually begin with a declaration of faith in God as the writer calls on God to help. They often include an appeal to an aspect of God’s character, to God’s name as the holy and righteous and unchanging and all-powerful Almighty God.

55 19 God, who is enthroned from of old, who does not change—
he will hear them and humble them, because they have no fear of God.

57 1 Have mercy on me, my God, have mercy on me, for in you I take refuge.
I will take refuge in the shadow of your wings until the disaster has passed.
2 I cry out to God Most High, to God, who vindicates me.

Or some Psalms make an appeal to God’s loving-faithfulness, his covenant loyalty.

5 7 But I, by your great love, can come into your house; in reverence I bow down towards your holy temple.

6 4 Turn, LORD, and deliver me; save me because of your unfailing love.

Some Psalms describe God with words like shield, rock, refuge, fortress and tower.

3 3 But you, LORD, are a shield around me, my glory, the One who lifts my head high.

59 1 Deliver me from my enemies, O God; be my fortress against those who are attacking me.
9 You are my strength, I watch for you; you, God, are my fortress,
10 my God on whom I can rely. God will go before me
62 1 Truly my soul finds rest in God; my salvation comes from him.
2 Truly he is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I shall never be shaken.

When it comes to praying about the problems we are facing, the Psalms of Lament teach us that it is important to start with God himself. To begin by taking our eyes off our problems and fix them instead on the Almighty and Eternal God and his loving faithfulness. The grounds for all our prayers will always be the character of God, and his love expressed to us in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Describing our suffering

54 3 Arrogant foes are attacking me; ruthless people are trying to kill me— people without regard for God.

5 9 Not a word from their mouth can be trusted; their heart is filled with malice.
Their throat is an open grave; with their tongues they tell lies.

6 2 Have mercy on me, LORD, for I am faint; heal me, LORD, for my bones are in agony.
3 My soul is in deep anguish. How long, LORD, how long?

55 4 My heart is in anguish within me; the terrors of death have fallen on me.
5 Fear and trembling have beset me; horror has overwhelmed me.

56 1 Be merciful to me, my God, for my enemies are in hot pursuit; all day long they press their attack. 2 My adversaries pursue me all day long; in their pride many are attacking me.

57 4 I am in the midst of lions; I am forced to dwell among ravenous beasts— men whose teeth are spears and arrows, whose tongues are sharp swords.

We should never be afraid of telling God how we are feeling. It is alright to complain to God about the situations we are facing and it is acceptable in prayer to spell our the details of our problems. We can be completely honest with God.

Anger and blame and even cursing against those causing the suffering

54 5 Let evil recoil on those who slander me; in your faithfulness destroy them.

3:7 Arise, LORD! Deliver me, my God! Strike all my enemies on the jaw; break the teeth of the wicked.

58 6 Break the teeth in their mouths, O God; LORD, tear out the fangs of those lions! 7 Let them vanish like water that flows away; when they draw the bow, let their arrows fall short. 8 May they be like a slug that melts away as it moves along, like a stillborn child that never sees the sun.

The Psalms of Lament are clear that we are allowed to be angry with people who are threatening or hurting us or those that we love. We saw this especially as part of our Survey of the Old Testament last summer when we looked at what are called the imprecatory Psalms. Some passages call down judgment on Israel’s enemies, like just then Psalm 58:6, Break the teeth in their mouths O Lord, or Psalm 139:21-22, ‘Do I not hate them that hate thee, O Lord? … I count them my enemies.’ Perhaps the most extreme example is Psalm 137:8-9 recalling the destruction of Jerusalem and of Solomon’s Temple by the invading Babylonians and crying out for equally brutal retribution.
Psalm 137 8 Daughter Babylon, doomed to destruction, happy is the one who repays you according to what you have done to us. 9 Happy is the one who seizes your infants and dashes them against the rocks.

In passages like these the Bible is not telling us that God approves of such curses. But it does teach us that it is alright to express our true feelings to God in prayer. We do not have to dress up our appeals in politically correct language. With God we can tell it like it is.

Calling on God to intervene and to help

54 2 Hear my prayer, O God; listen to the words of my mouth.
54 4 Surely God is my help; the Lord is the one who sustains me.

3 4 I call out to the LORD, and he answers me from his holy mountain.
5 1 Listen to my words, LORD, consider my lament.
2 Hear my cry for help, my King and my God, for to you I pray.

In prayer we do not just complain and tell God how we are feeling about our problems. Part of prayer will surely be to ask God to help us, to rescue us and deliver us. Even though God already knows what challenges we are facing, our requests should always be specific. Telling God the actual ways in which we need him to help us is a way of expressing our dependence on his grace minute by minute and day by day.

But at the same time true prayer comes from a certainty that God will indeed help us in our hour of need.

Expression of faith and confidence in God

3 6 I will not fear though tens of thousands assail me on every side.

55 22 Cast your cares on the LORD and he will sustain you;
he will never let the righteous be shaken.
23 But you, God, will bring down the wicked into the pit of decay;
56 10 In God, whose word I praise, in the LORD, whose word I praise—
11 in God I trust and am not afraid. What can man do to me?

When we bring our concerns to God in prayer, we should have the faith to trust that he will indeed act on our behalf.

Anticipating God’s help

54 7 You have delivered me from all my troubles, and my eyes have looked in triumph on my foes.

5 3 In the morning, LORD, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait expectantly.

6 8 Away from me, all you who do evil, for the LORD has heard my weeping.
9 The LORD has heard my cry for mercy; the LORD accepts my prayer.
10 All my enemies will be overwhelmed with shame and anguish; they will turn back and suddenly be put to shame.

55 16 As for me, I call to God, and the LORD saves me.
17 Evening, morning and noon I cry out in distress, and he hears my voice.
18 He rescues me unharmed from the battle waged against me, even though many oppose me.

56 3 When I am afraid, I put my trust in you.
4 In God, whose word I praise— in God I trust and am not afraid. What can mere mortals do to me?

Often in the Psalms of Lament, the writer is so confident of God’s help that he gives thanks in anticipation even before his prayers are answered and he has received the help he needs. At other times he makes promises that he will bring thanksgiving, or praise, or sacrifices when God has answered his prayers. All our requests to God should always be accompanied by thanksgiving to God, for what he has already done and for everything he is going to do.

Thanksgiving for God’s help and promise of commitment

54 6 I will sacrifice a freewill offering to you; I will praise your name, LORD, for it is good.

5 11 But let all who take refuge in you be glad; let them ever sing for joy.
56 12 I am under vows to you, my God; I will present my thank-offerings to you.
13 For you have delivered me from death and my feet from stumbling,
that I may walk before God in the light of life.
57 7 My heart, O God, is steadfast, my heart is steadfast; I will sing and make music.
8 Awake, my soul! Awake, harp and lyre! I will awaken the dawn.
9 I will praise you, Lord, among the nations; I will sing of you among the peoples.
10 For great is your love, reaching to the heavens; your faithfulness reaches to the skies.
11 Be exalted, O God, above the heavens; let your glory be over all the earth.

59 16 But I will sing of your strength, in the morning I will sing of your love; for you are my fortress, my refuge in times of trouble.
17 You are my strength, I sing praise to you; you, God, are my fortress, my God on whom I can rely.

So here are the elements of the Psalms of Lament. Here is how we also should pray in times of trouble. Calling on God, remembering that the grounds of our prayers are his divine character. Describing our suffering, telling God how we truly feel even if that involves anger and blame against those causing the suffering. . Calling on God to intervene and to help. Expressions of faith and confidence in God which anticipate God’s help. Leading to thanksgiving for God’s help and promises of commitment.

As David said in 2 Samuel 22 4 ‘I have called upon the LORD, who is worthy to be praised. So I have been saved from my enemies.

Take of your old nature. Put on your new nature. We thought last week about how as Christians our lives should be different from what they were like before we were Christians. Our old way of life is like a filthy shabby set of old clothes which we should take off and throw away. We should put on our new life which is created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. We should follow the example of Jesus and live as God’s beloved children. Remember who you are!
And Paul continues this theme in Ephesians 5. He gives more examples of the old sins we must leave behind – immorality and greed, obscene talk and deception. He introduces a new picture, of darkness and light.
Ephesians 5 8 For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light 9 (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) 10 and find out what pleases the Lord.
We should live in the light. We should not be foolish but instead we should be wise, Ephesians tells us. But how can we change our lives so dramatically? We all know how difficult it is to stop doing wrong and only do the right thing all the time. The truth of course is that by ourselves we cannot change. But we don’t have to struggle alone. As Christians we have God the Holy Spirit living inside us. The Holy Spirit is God’s seal on our lives guaranteeing our inheritance and our first instalment of heaven. And the Holy Spirit brings the power of God which raised Jesus from the dead into our lives. God is able to do in us more than we can ever ask or even imagine, through the power of the Holy Spirit. The secret of living a new life and becoming more like Jesus is simple.
“Be filled with the Spirit.” “Keep on being filled with the Spirit.” (Ephesians 5:18)
In several places the New Testament uses the phrases “being filled with the Spirit” and “receiving the Holy Spirit” to describe an inspiring empowering experience of the Holy Spirit. This is picture language, of course. The Spirit is not a liquid and we are not containers which can hold different amounts of Spirit. In “being filled with the Spirit”, we don’t receive more of the Spirit. It might be better to say that He receives more of us. As we open our lives to God in obedience and faith, so He chooses to transform us and use us the more.

Each of us would admit that there are times in our Christian lives when we are more obedient and more trusting, when we are walking more closely with our Lord. At those times we reflect better the glory of Christ and we are more open to God’s Holy Spirit working in our lives. Many Christians would also say that they have experienced a variety of experiences from the Holy Spirit (not just once but many times) and these have deepened their relationship with God or empowered them for witness and service, or marked the beginning of them experiencing a particular spiritual gift, often praying in tongues. “Being filled with the Holy Spirit” describes these uplifting occasions.
In Ephesians 5:18 Paul commands all Christians “Keep on being filled with the Spirit”.
The command is in the present imperative – keep on being filled with the Spirit, not just once but time and time again. Many of us are a long way from being “filled with the Spirit” for most of the time. As D.L.Moody said, “I am filled, but I leak!” We drift from God and we need to repent and be lifted back to Him. There is not one experience following conversion which will lift us up on to a higher plateau of Christian living from which we can never fall. Time and time again we need to return to God in repentance, to draw closer and closer to Him.
There are also times when we need special grace and power from God to meet specific situations. The Biblical command is to “keep on being filled with the Spirit”. It implies a continuous appropriation of the Spirit’s power to become more and more like Christ. Not just one “second blessing” but many further blessings.
Bob Gordon compares our Christian life to a canal boat journey up a mountainside, through a series of locks. “Many of us know God to one degree or another but we are not unlike a canal boat sitting in an empty lock. It is not that there is no water there but we are just not full. We have enough experience to keep us afloat in the Christian life, but not enough to take us ahead.” We need, he says, “a conscious awareness that we have come as far as we can as we are. There needs to be a closing of the doors behind us …… and an opening up to a fresh infilling of the water of the Holy Spirit.” Such infillings, not once but many times, should lead to more Christ-like living, greater love in relationships, bolder witnessing, greater praise and worship and thanksgiving, and more effective service.
So – How can I be filled with the Spirit?
Any experience of being filled with the Holy Spirit is a gift of God’s grace, neither earned nor deserved. Sometimes people are filled with the Spirit suddenly and unexpectedly. But more usually the Holy Spirit comes upon Christians while they are actively seeking God and desiring His moving in their lives.

Paul says, “Eagerly desire spiritual gifts” (1 Corinthians 14:1). We need to want the Holy Spirit to work in us. We must desire God the Giver and not just His gifts.
We also always need to be praying. Acts 4:31 After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.
Jesus said in Luke 11: 9 “So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened. 11 “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? 12 Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? 13 If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
We need to ask, and seek, and knock. Keep on asking, keep on seeking, keep on knocking, and we can be certain that God will pour His Holy Spirit into our lives.
We all need our spiritual batteries recharging sometimes. Every one of us needs to experience more of the dynamo and the dynamite of the Spirit in our lives. We all need to be filled afresh with the Spirit of God, time and time again. But do we really want to be?
A.W. Tozer (1897–1963) wrote this. “Before we can be filled with the Spirit, the desire to be filled must be all-consuming. It must be for the time the biggest thing in the life, so acute, so intrusive as to crowd out everything else. The degree of fullness in any life accords perfectly with the intensity of true desire. We have as much of God as we actually want.”
Paul encouraged Timothy like this. fan into flame the gift of God, ….. For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline. (2 Timothy 1:6-7).
We all need to fan the flame of the Spirit in our lives. To know more of the power and love and holiness the Spirit brings. There’s an old expression: to “put yourself in the way of blessing.” It means to make a decision to be in places where God can bless you! Somebody has said that the rain of God’s blessing starts to fall we each have an umbrella – and we each have a choice. We can hold the umbrella over our heads so the rain of God’s blessing doesn’t land on us. Or we can hold the umbrella upside down to catch as much of the blessing as possible! Which way up is your umbrella?
In the film Castaway, Tom Hanks plays a kind of modern Robinson Crusoe, stranded alone on a desert island in the middle of the ocean. Fairly early on he makes himself a boat out of trees and tries desperately to paddle out to sea. But the island is surrounded by a coral reef and however hard he tries to row, the waves over the reef push him back, until in the end the boat turns over and he is badly injured on the coral. Many attempts to row out to sea end in disaster. But then one day a piece of wreckage comes to shore and the castaway sees how he can use it. He changes the design of his boat. He rows out to the reef again but instead of trying to row against the waves he hoists the wreckage as a sail. The wind catches the sail and blows the boat past the waves out to sea and eventual rescue. At the end of the film the castaway is telling his story to a friend. “I was trapped on the island,” he says, “until one day God gave me a sail.”
Many Christians spend all their lives rowing hard trying to go somewhere new with God. But all the time the waves of life push them back. Sometimes they even fall overboard and the coral hurts! But God has given us a sail – or a number of sails. What we need to do is hoist the sails and let the wind of the Spirit carry us where God wants us to go. The sail of obedience. Conscientiously doing what God has already told us he wants us to do. The sail of faith. Trusting God to work in our lives, stepping out in faith and inviting God to surprise us. “Trust and obey, for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus – but to trust and obey.” The sail of worship. Offering God the first and the best in our worship to Him and inviting Him to break in and surprise us. And finally the sail of prayer. Not a shopping list of asking prayers but time spent earnestly seeking God’s face in listening prayer. If we want God to surprise us, we need to spend time seeking Him in prayer.
If we want to grow in our Christian lives, if we want to live our new lives to the full and become more like Jesus, we each need to keep on being filled with the Spirit. The God of surprises is longing to surprise us. We need to stop rowing frantically to battle the waves. Instead we just need to hoist the sails. “He longs to do much more than our faith has yet allowed. To thrill us and surprise us with His sovereign power.” “Ask, seek, knock. How much more will your Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!”
Spirit of the Living God, fall afresh on me.
Break me, melt me, mould me, fill me.
Spirit of the Living God, fall afresh on me.

We started our expedition 6 am. Trains took us to Dover and a very rough sea crossing. By evening we were in Paris and then we spent a sleepless night standing in the corridor of a French “sleeper” train which didn’t have any seats. At 6 pm we arrived in the French Alps and so began a 3 week Trek in Moutiers in France to Aosta in Italy up and down several mountains including 13,323 feet up Gran Paradiso which is the highest mountain in Italy. We walked more than 200 miles with rucksacks weighing half a hundredweight full of tents, stoves, food and clothes. When the sun shone the temperature was in the 80s. When the sun wasn’t shining it was raining. At night and at altitudes above 2000 feet it was snowing. We had none of the conveniences you might expect at modern campsites because there weren’t campsites. We just stopped overnight where we could find a piece of level ground near an icy mountain stream. It was the most memorable holiday of my life even though it happened more than 40 years ago.
Three weeks later we arrived home and our families didn’t recognise us. Stepping into a warm bath to wash away three weeks of mud and grime was one of the happiest moments of my life! Hot water and soap! Feeling clean at last! And of course then when I got dressed, I didn’t just climb back into all the clothes I had been wearing for three weeks. That would have been stupid! To get really clean but then put on those filthy damp clothes again. Of course, I put on clean fresh dry clothes. Because you just don’t return to civilisation but then carry on wearing the same clothes you wore hiking across the Alps. That wouldn’t be at all appropriate. It’s just not done!
But, Paul says to the Ephesians, that is a picture of exactly what Christians are doing if we live our lives after we become Christians in the same sinful ways as we did before we were saved!
22 You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; 23 to be made new in the attitude of your minds; 24 and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.
For Paul, becoming a Christian and beginning the Christian life is just like throwing off an old set of filthy tatty rags and putting on a brand new spotless suit.
We have taken off our old self – we throw away our old life and our old sinful human nature when we come to Christ as Saviour and Lord. We throw off our old deceitful desires. We let God make us anew in our thinking and our attitudes. And we need to put on the new self – as Christ cleanses us all our sins are forgiven and we receive a brand new life to live, a new nature, a new self.
That new self, Paul says, is created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness
24 Put on your new nature, created to be like God—truly righteous and holy. (NLT)
Throwing off the old – putting on the new. But how do we do that? We begin by turning our back on what our lives used to be like.
17 So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. 18 They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. 19 Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, and they are full of greed.
Here Paul is saying that one aspect of human sin is ignorance. Since Adam and Eve rebelled against God in the Garden of Eden, human beings have not known God. Their thinking is futile. They are hopelessly confused, empty headed, mindless. This ignorance separates people from God. As a result they descend into all kinds of sins of immorality and greed.
When people are saved, they need to learn how to live a new life. The route out of ignorance is teaching. It’s as if we have to go back to school and learn all over again how to live. Christ is the teacher and Christ is the school and the truth that is in Jesus is the lesson we must learn.
20 That, however, is not the way of life you learned 21 when you heard about Christ and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. 22 You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; 23 to be made new in the attitude of your minds; 24 and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.

We need to learn to put off our old self and put on our new self. So we have a list of aspects of life we need to take off and throw away.
25 Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to your neighbour, for we are all members of one body.

We need to be completely honest with each other. Truth is vital. And we need to get rid of anger.

26 ‘In your anger do not sin’: do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, 27 and do not give the devil a foothold.

We should never be stealing or dishonest in any way.

28 Anyone who has been stealing must steal no longer, but must work, doing something useful with their own hands, that they may have something to share with those in need.

And the things we say matter as much as the things we do.

29 Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.

When we are saved God puts His Holy Spirit inside us, the seal of our salvation and the deposit and guarantee, the first installment of heaven. The Holy Spirit releases the power which raised Jesus from the dead into our own lives. Sin in any form saddens the Holy Spirit.

30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.

So like a suit of old tatty clothes we must throw off all kinds of sin.

31 Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice.

That is the old life we need to put off. And Paul goes on describe the new life we should put on: the new nature which is created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. We are called to become like God himself. And of course, God is love so we should demonstrate God’s kind of love in our lives.

32 Be kind and compassionate to one another,

An essential part of loving other people is forgiving them.

forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.

In every aspect of our new life, God is our example.

5 1 Follow God’s example, therefore, as dearly loved children 2 and live a life of love,

Our new life of love is all about living as God’s children. In the Disney film The Lion King, the new king Simba is scared and wracked with doubts. In a memorable scene the ghost of his father Mufasa appears to him to encourage him and says this. “You have forgotten who you are. … Remember who you are. You are my son, and the one true King. Remember who you are.” The secret of putting on our new nature and living our new life is simply to remember who we are. Sons and daughters of the Living God. Remember who you are.

In fact, as if it wasn’t completely obvious, we should be following the example of Jesus Christ. Our new nature is to be like Christ. Jesus is our example in everything.
2 and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

So we must learn Christ. Be like Jesus.
MESSAGE we do not have the excuse of ignorance, everything—and I do mean everything—connected with that old way of life has to go. It’s rotten through and through. Get rid of it! And then take on an entirely new way of life—a God-fashioned life, a life renewed from the inside and working itself into your conduct as God accurately reproduces his character in you.

Be like Jesus. Put off the old nature. Put on your new nature!

What is life in the church supposed to be like?
Ephesians 4 15 … speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. 16 From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.
We grow as Christians and we grow as a church when each of us plays our part.
New Living Translation 16 He makes the whole body fit together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love.
But what does each part doing its work mean? Paul probably wrote his Letter to the Ephesians from prison around 62 AD. Church life was very different for the first Christians to what it is like today. For a start, churches were just groups of people, meeting together in each other’s homes. The earliest church buildings date from the first half of the third century. So churches didn’t run activities like Toddlers or Café or Drop-In. Churches didn’t run events like International Evenings or Family Fun Days. In fact, life in the early church was probably more like our church life has been during lockdown than it has been at any other time we can remember.
When Paul wrote about each member of Body of Christ doing its work so that the whole body was built up, he probably did have specific things in mind. To begin with, we play our part in the body of Christ by obeying the great Commandments: loving God and loving our neighbours. And Jesus also gave his disciples a Third Commandment.
John 13 34 ‘A new command I give you: love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.’
We each grow up into Christ and play our part in the Body of Christ by loving other people. The Bible commands Christians to love one another or love each other 15 times. A dozen times it commands us to forgive each other, to agree with each other, to live in peace and to submit to one another. We are called to encourage each other 4 times, as well as to build each other up, to help and admonish and warn each other. We heard these commands from earlier in Ephesians 4 last week.
2 Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. 3 Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.
We play our part by keeping the peace. At the same time, loving other people will also mean doing all the good works of practical service which God calls us to do within the church community, in our workplace and with our neighbours.
Ephesians 2 10 For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
Another aspect of the work God has given to Christians to do is to bear witness to his salvation, to share the good news about Jesus and to make disciples. Jesus commanded,
Matthew 28 19 … go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.
An essential part of growing up into Christ is learning the truth which sets us free.
4:15 speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ.
We have thought before about some of the wonderful truths God wants us to learn. Discovering for ourselves just how wide and long and high and deep God’s love is. Experiencing the amazing power which raised Jesus from the dead released in our own lives. God calls all Christians to learn and grow in their faith that comes as we teach each other.
Colossians 3:16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God.
Christians can also each play our part and do our work by exercising spiritual gifts. Some of these seem more spectacular, others very mundane, but all gifts are just as important in building up the Body of Christ. 1 Corinthians 12 talks about prophetic gifts: prophecy, words of knowledge, words of wisdom, discerning spirits, speaking in tongues and interpretation of tongues. Apostles and prophets and teachers are named alongside those with gifts of helping and of administration. When spiritual gifts are exercised, the Body of Christ is built up.
In Romans 12 Paul says this. 4 Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, 5 so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. 6 We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. If a man’s gift is prophesying, let him use it in proportion to his faith. 7 If it is serving, let him serve; if it is teaching, let him teach; 8 if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously; if it is leadership, let him govern diligently; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully.
Prophesying, serving, teaching, encouraging, contributing, leading, acts of mercy. Our spiritual gifts may be different but all Christians have our work to do. Every Christian has our part to play in the body of Christ. In the comedy horror film/series “The Addams Family”, a strange creature “Hand” pops out of a box to answer the telephone. But there is no such thing as a disembodied hand in the church. No Christian is an “independent ear” or a “freelance nose”! We ALL have a part to play in the Body of Christ. NONE of US is useless. That is the difference between the Body of Christ and the human body – the Body of Christ doesn’t have an appendix. NO part of the Body of Christ is redundant, NO part in the Body of Christ is useless! God has jobs for each and every one of us to do. Our responsibility is to use the gifts God has given to do the jobs he wants us to do. It is only when EVERY separate part works as it should that the whole body grows. We each have to play our part.
Ephesians 4 also tells us that God has provided ways for us to grow in our faith as individuals and move on with God as a church. Those ways lie in the people Christ has given as gifts to the church – apostles, prophets, evangelists and pastor-teachers.
Ephesians 4 11 So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, 12 to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up 13 until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.
Too many churches misunderstand this passage. They think it says that “God has given pastor-teachers … for works of service”, as if all the works of service are done by just a few people, just the pastor-teachers. That is wrong. What it actually says is that God has given the pastor-teachers to prepare all God’s people for works of service so that the body of Christ may be built up. It is NOT that the apostles and prophets and evangelists and pastor-teachers do all the works of service themselves! The role even of evangelists and especially of pastor-teachers, is to to equip and prepare and enable ALL God’s people for works of service so that the body of Christ may be built up! Incidentally, in the Greek the phrase in Ephesians 4 is not “pastors and teachers” which might imply two different kinds of people doing two different jobs. These are pastor-teachers, teaching shepherds, those who pastor by teaching, one person, one task.
Baptist Christians have always believed that ministers are not some special kind of Christian, set apart from ordinary Christians. The pastor-teacher is just an ordinary Christian with particular spiritual gifts (and often with training and experience) called to do a particular job in the life of the church. Baptist churches recognise that the pastor is not the only person who can do “pastoral care”. Loving God, loving other Christians and loving our neighbours and being a witness for Jesus should be part of “the normal Christian life” for EVERY believer, just as much as worship and prayer are. The work of the pastor-teachers, and the apostles and prophets and evangelists, equip and enable and support and train and encourage and help every member of the Body of Christ to play their part. Pastor-teachers are called to help every Christian grow to become active serving Christians, to help all Christians express and share their faith in daily life and in the community, and equip everyone to exercise pastoral care for one another, and bring glory to God in their worship and their witness. When Christians are growing in their faith, then outreach and pastoral care will follow naturally. “Evangelism is the overflow of our joyful faith.”
So this is what being the church is all about. Each of us playing our part. This is what God wants North Springfield Baptist Church to become, more and more in the months and years ahead.
,,, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church. 16 He makes the whole body fit together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love. (New Living Translation)

Psalm 49 is different from most of the Psalms we have looked at so far. It is not a song of praise or thanksgiving. Nor is it a prayer. Instead it is much more similar to parts of the book of Proverbs and the Wisdom Literature in the Old Testament like Ecclesiastes and Job. It uses poetry to reveal wisdom from God.
1 Hear this, all you peoples; listen, all who live in this world,
2 both low and high, rich and poor alike:
3 My mouth will speak words of wisdom; the meditation of my heart will give you understanding.
4 I will turn my ear to a proverb; with the harp I will expound my riddle:

This riddle, this message of wisdom declares the mystery that faith in God is more important than wealth or riches.
5 Why should I fear when evil days come, when wicked deceivers surround me—
6 those who trust in their wealth and boast of their great riches?

Even when he is oppressed by rich and wicked people, the Psalm writer knows he is safe in God’s hands. The truth is that death the great leveller will come to everybody one day. Those who have put their trust in money will die just as much as the wise who are trusting in God. And then into eternity all the wealth the rich have spent their lives accumulating will count for absolutely nothing.

10 For all can see that the wise die, that the foolish and the senseless also perish,
leaving their wealth to others.
11 Their tombs will remain their houses for ever, their dwellings for endless generations,
though they had named lands after themselves.
12 People, despite their wealth, do not endure; they are like the beasts that perish.
People who have put their trust in their wealth die just like the animals in the fields. You may have seen the film on television last week, “All the money in the world” about the kidnapping of the grandson of the billionaire John Paul Getty, the richest man in the world,. After Getty died two people were talking on a bus. “How much did he leave?” one asked. The other replied, “Everything”.
It’s true what they say, “you can’t take it with you.” Wealth and possessions only last for this life. After that, we all face death.
13 This is the fate of those who trust in themselves, and of their followers, who approve their sayings.
14 They are like sheep and are destined to die; death will be their shepherd
(but the upright will prevail over them in the morning).
Their forms will decay in the grave, far from their princely mansions.

But the Psalm writer reveals that his hope is not in wealth or possessions. His hope is in God alone and he is certain God will not let him down.

15 But God will redeem me from the realm of the dead; he will surely take me to himself.

The Psalm writer is not impressed by the wealth of others. There are things which seem to be important in this life, which so many people chase after. But big houses and lots of money and possessions are ultimately worthless. The Psalm writer will not be lured into joining the rat-race. There is no point. Instead he puts his trust in God.

16 Do not be overawed when others grow rich, when the splendour of their houses increases;
17 for they will take nothing with them when they die, their splendour will not descend with them.
18 Though while they live they count themselves blessed— and people praise you when you prosper—
19 they will join those who have gone before them, who will never again see the light of life.

All the money in the world is of no use to anybody when they are dead. Those who put their trust in money and possessions will never see the light of life again. The fool goes to a lost eternity. The wisdom in Psalm 49 is the same central message as Jesus’s parable of the rich fool who was prospering and tore down his barns to build bigger barns to store all his grain in.
Luke 12 . 19 And I’ll say to myself, ‘You have plenty of grain laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.’ ”
20 ‘But God said to him, “You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?”
You can’t take it with you. So the Psalm ends, 20 People who have wealth but lack understanding are like the beasts that perish.
No better than the wild animals. But the future of those who put their trust in God is altogether different. Back to verse 14
(The rich fools) are like sheep and are destined to die; death will be their shepherd
(but the upright will prevail over them in the morning).

There is a different destiny waiting for those who live upright lives and put their trust in God.
15 But God will redeem me from the realm of the dead; he will surely take me to himself.

God will take his upright and faithful servants to himself. This was David’s hope at the end of Psalm 23
6 Surely your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.
So all human beings have a choice. To chase after money, which will ultimately lead them nowhere. Or to pursue God. There is the wisdom the Psalm writer shares with us all.
But did you notice in the middle there another thread of wisdom which points prophetically to the wonderful way of salvation God will provide. The Psalmist knows that money cannot rescue anyone from death.
7 No one can redeem the life of another or give to God a ransom for them—
8 the ransom for a life is costly, no payment is ever enough—
9 so that they should live on for ever and not see decay.

The Psalm writer is absolutely correct. All the money in the world cannot redeem a person or bring them everlasting life. The ransom for a life would be too high. Jesus said exactly the same thing.
Matthew 16 26 What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?
So what would be a sufficient ransom? What can anyone give in exchange for a soul?
Jesus said in Mark 10:45 For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.
All the money in the world would not be sufficient to pay the ransom for a single life and rescue a person from death. But the life of Jesus Christ the Son of God would be sufficient. Jesus came to give his life as a ransom for many. We have seen before how that saying by Jesus echoes the prophecies of the Suffering Servant in Isaiah 53
Isaiah 53 10 Yet it was the LORD’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the LORD makes his life an offering for sin, he will see his offspring and prolong his days, and the will of the LORD will prosper in his hand.
11 After he has suffered, he will see the light of life and be satisfied;
by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many, and he will bear their iniquities.
12 Therefore I will give him a portion among the great, and he will divide the spoils with the strong, because he poured out his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors.
For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.
On the cross, Jesus became a sin-offering for us. Jesus has paid the ransom for our sins. The first letter of Peter spells it out.
1 Peter 1 18 For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. 20 He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake. 21 Through him you believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, and so your faith and hope are in God.
We rejoice, because we know that no amount of money could have paid the price for our sins. But Jesus, the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, paid the ultimate price and laid down his life for us.
Bearing shame and scoffing rude, In my place condemned He stood;
Sealed my pardon with His blood: Hallelujah! what a Saviour!
Guilty, vile, and helpless, we; Spotless Lamb of God was He:
Full atonement—can it be? Hallelujah! what a Saviour!
So the wisdom in Psalm 49 makes it clear. Death is the ultimate statistic – one out of one die. Death comes to everybody – but we face a choice. There is death without hope, or there is death which is full of hope. Die like the beasts, or die with understanding and wisdom and faith in God. And the Psalm poses a prophetic question when it reminds us that no amount of money would be enough to redeem the life of a sinner.
7 No one can redeem the life of another or give to God a ransom for them—
8 the ransom for a life is costly, no payment is ever enough—
9 so that they should live on for ever and not see decay.
Thanks be to God – Jesus has paid the price for us!

We have now been in Covid lockdown for 100 days. From next weekend many parts of the lockdown are going to be lifted. Some parts of church life will gradually be able to go back to normal. But not normal as it was before. “New normal”. The reality is that until a vaccine or an effective cure is found, in the same way as offices and factories and shops and public transport and the hospitality industries have changed, church life will not just go back to the way it was before. But what might church be like in the “new normal”? In what forms might our activities continue? Worship, teaching, prayer, fellowship, pastoral care, mission, evangelism, work with children and young people, community involvement and prophetic witness? What should the church be like after Covid?
We will find ways all to talk about these questions over the next few weeks. To start with, we need to go back to the Bible and find out what churches are meant to be and to do. Last week I shared with everybody a Booklet of sermons on “What is the church? This week I posted an article on “Church Life After Covid19.” The message for this morning, which will continue next week, explores these important questions. What is the church? And then, what part do we each have to play in the church?
C. S. Lewis (1898–1963) once said,
“The New Testament does not envisage solitary religion; some kind of regular assembly for worship and instruction is everywhere taken for granted. So we must be regular practicing members of the church. Of course we differ in temperament. Some (like you—and me) find it more natural to approach God in solitude; but we must go to church as well. For the church is not a human society of people united by their natural affinities, but the body of Christ, in which all members, however different (and he rejoices in their differences and by no means wishes to iron them out) must share the common life, complementing and helping one another precisely by their differences.”
The church is “the body of Christ, in which all members however different …. must share the common life, complementing and helping one another precisely by their differences.”
We have been finding out in Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians about God’s cosmic masterplan of salvation. This is worked out in each of our lives as God’s amazing grace forgives our sins and gives us the free gift of eternal life.
Ephesians 2 4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. 6 And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, 7 in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus.
As Christians we share all of these wonderful blessings. God’s Riches At Christ’s Expense. We have so many things in common. We are one body – says Paul. Think about your body. Is there any part of your body you don’t like? Your ears? Your nose? Your feet when they play you up? But is there any part of your body you dislike so much that if you could you would have the doctors chop it off? I doubt it. We read about the first Christians in Acts, “They were like family to each other.” We are the family of God! Christians should never ignore other Christians or treat them as if they aren’t part of the family of the church.
But there is more to being part of the body of Christ. We saw in Ephesians 2 that when any person is saved we become part of God’s new community. We are
no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow-citizens with God’s people and members of God’s household, (2:19)
This is God’s cosmic masterplan – we are all united in Christ.
built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. (2:20)
Each of us are the bricks God is using to build a new kind of temple.
In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit. (2:21-22)
The old Temples where people went to meet with God were built of stone. The New Temple is made of living stones and God lives in us! We are the church, the Body of Christ and the temple where God lives by His Holy Spirit.
So what part do we have to play in God’s cosmic masterplan? It’s very simple. God is creating a new community, all one in Christ Jesus. All we have to do is not mess things up! Don’t break up the unity of the church. Keep the peace.
Ephesians 4 As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.
As God’s family and the body of Christ, we are called to live in peace together. To get on with each other. Every Christian has received God’s amazing grace which makes us part of the church, and we are all called to live just like Jesus Himself.
Be completely humble and gentle; not arrogant or proud
be patient, not in a hurry, not demand that everybody else moves at the same speed as we do, but all moving together as one.
bearing with one another in love. Tolerant and not critical. Love always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. (1 Corinthians 13:7) Love never gives up!
So in the life of the church, we should all
Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.
We don’t have to create unity in the church. The church is already one. We just have to make every effort not to mess things up by dividing the church. We have to keep the peace.
Paul goes on to remind us that we have so much in common that draws us together – so much which we share as Christians which this lost world does not share.

4:4 There is one body and one Spirit- just as you were called to one hope when you were called- one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
We share so many things in common! One word appears seven times in those three verses, and that word is “one”. As Eugene Peterson comments, “Everything is permeated with Oneness.” Paul lists seven things which Christians share.
One Body – the church, the body of Christ
One Spirit – the Holy Spirit who lives in every Christian and makes us together to be the church
One Hope – the hope of sharing the glory of God, the inheritance which is guaranteed for us all by the Holy Spirit who lives inside us as the first instalment of heaven.
One Lord – the Lord Jesus Christ, our Saviour, risen from the dead and ascended on high, King of Kings and Lord of Lords
One Faith – the trust we all place in Jesus for our salvation
One Baptism – the sign God has given us to show that we share in the benefits of Christ’s death on the cross and we also share in the power of his resurrection life.
one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
We are part of God’s forever family the church because we all share the one God and Father of all.
Did you notice how all three Persons in God the Holy Trinity were included there? The one Spirit and the one Lord Jesus Christ and the one Father. Christians must be united as one, because God in Himself is one, unity in diversity.
Seven things which all Christians share and which unite us together.
4 There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
That is why all Christians should always Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.
New Living Translation 3 Make every effort to keep yourselves united in the Spirit, binding yourselves together with peace.

Keeping the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace can be very hard. Some people are very hard to please!!! We can all find things to criticise and even fall out about! So we need to work hard at preserving the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. God has already created the unity – in Christ. All we have to do is not mess things up! Because when we do we are getting in the way of His cosmic masterplan!
As we seek to discover what North Springfield Baptist Church should be like in the “new normal” the most important thing is that we move on together – maintaining the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Some of us would naturally want to rush on quickly. Others of us could well be anxious and afraid. Some may continue to be vulnerable and shielding and we must make sure that nobody is left behind or left out. Maintaining the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace.
The story is told of two porcupines in the freezing north country of Canada which huddled together to keep warm in the snow. Because they were pricked by each other’s quills, they moved apart. Soon they were shivering again and had to lie side by side again in order to survive. They needed each other even more than they needled each other!
Members of any church sometimes rub up against each other and needle each other.
To dwell above with saints we love, That will be grace and glory.
To live below with saints we know; Well that’s another story!
This time of lockdown has helped us to appreciate each other more. As we go forward, WE will need each other more than we needle each other! We need to work hard to stick together, to move on with God as ONE body, ONE family.

MESSAGE I don’t want any of you sitting around on your hands. I don’t want anyone strolling off, down some path that goes nowhere. And mark that you do this with humility and discipline—not in fits and starts, but steadily, pouring yourselves out for each other in acts of love, alert at noticing differences and quick at mending fences.
You were all called to travel on the same road and in the same direction, so stay together, both outwardly and inwardly.
New Living Translation 3 Make every effort to keep yourselves united in the Spirit, binding yourselves together with peace.

We looked last week at Psalms 46 and 47. Those two Psalms gave us a number of reasons why we should put our trust in God.

1 God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.

Because God is creator and sustainer of all things we need not fear natural disasters. Even if the whole earth should come to an end, God is in control!
And God is also the Ruler over all the nations, the awesome great King over all the earth. So God’s people do not need to fear anything that other people can do to us.
God has made his chosen people into a great nation and God is always working out his cosmic masterplan of salvation through his chosen people. We are never alone. The ever-present God will never fail us or forsake us or abandon us.
So God is our refuge and strength, always ready to help in times of trouble. NLT

Psalm 46:10 He says, ‘Be still, and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.’

God is ALREADY exalted all over the earth and among all the nations. And God ALWAYS WILL BE exalted and honoured over all the earth and among all the nations.
So what we need to do is, Be still and know that I am God.
1 God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.

So on to Psalm 48. We said last week that many theologians link Psalms 46 and 47 together with Psalm 48 with the suggestion of an annual ritual drama performed in the temple. They think it was part of a celebration of the Lord’s kingship over all the earth. Psalm 48 focuses on one particular way in which God keeps his chosen people safe. This way was a vital expression of the salvation God provided for Israel.
Psalm 48 1 Great is the LORD, and most worthy of praise, in the city of our God, his holy mountain.
2 Beautiful in its loftiness, the joy of the whole earth,
like the heights of Zaphon is Mount Zion, the city of the Great King.
3 God is in her citadels; he has shown himself to be her fortress.

God expressed his love for his chosen people in his Holy City Jerusalem. Built on Mount Zion, Jerusalem was the political and military capital city of the nation where the King had his palace.
At the same time Jerusalem was also the spiritual centre of Israel because it was the location of Solomon’s Temple. That was where sacrifices were offered day by day and particularly year after year at the great Festivals celebrating Israel’s faith. The nation believed that God was especially present in his Temple and in His Holy City and that as a consequence He would always protect Jerusalem.
So the Israelites found God to be their refuge and strength especially within Jerusalem.
For God’s chosen people, the city of God is the most beautiful and glorious place in the world.
Psalm 48 1 Great is the LORD, and most worthy of praise, in the city of our God, his holy mountain.
2 Beautiful in its loftiness, the joy of the whole earth,
like the heights of Zaphon is Mount Zion, the city of the Great King.

Because God in in his Holy City his people are safe there.

3 God is in her citadels; he has shown himself to be her fortress.

Verse 8 8 As we have heard, so we have seen in the city of the LORD Almighty,
in the city of our God: God makes her secure for ever.
The Israelites were convinced that God would always protect His Holy City and defend her against any attacks from other nations
4 When the kings joined forces, when they advanced together,
5 they saw her and were astounded; they fled in terror.
6 Trembling seized them there, pain like that of a woman in labour.
7 You destroyed them like ships of Tarshish shattered by an east wind.

God will keep Jerusalem safe because his Temple is there. The God who is Lord of heaven and earth has chosen to make Jerusalem his home
9 Within your temple, O God, we meditate on your unfailing love.
10 Like your name, O God, your praise reaches to the ends of the earth;
your right hand is filled with righteousness.
11 Mount Zion rejoices, the villages of Judah are glad because of your judgments.

Because God is in His Temple he will keep the whole city and of his chosen people within it safe forever.
12 Walk about Zion, go round her, count her towers,
13 consider well her ramparts, view her citadels,
that you may tell of them to the next generation.
14 For this God is our God for ever and ever; he will be our guide even to the end.

God is especially present in His Temple and in His Holy City and so he is the strength and refuge of all His chosen people there.
Psalm 46 7 The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.

This is another of the Psalms written the Sons of Korah. We can be pretty sure it was written in the tenth or ninth centuries BC, long before the time when God would allow the Babylonians to tear down Jerusalem and destroy the Temple and take the few surviving Israelites off to exile scattered across Babylonia. It expresses the complete faith the Israelites had in their God’s care and protection. They still trusted God in the face of overwhelming opposition.
As Christians, we view Jerusalem differently. The geographical city of Jerusalem has an important place in the history of the Jews and equally in the history of the church. Our Lord Jesus Christ died and rose again in Jerusalem. The church was born and grew out from Jerusalem. But Christians don’t attach the same importance to the city or to the ruins of the Temple there as the Jews still do.
For us there is a new Temple. The church is God’s new Temple. We are the living stones being built into a holy Temple and God lives in us by His Holy Spirit
For us there is a new city of God, the new Jerusalem. The church is the new city of God, now scattered throughout the earth but waiting one day to be revealed in glory.
Revelation 21 2 I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Look! God’s dwelling-place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.
Verse 9 One of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues came and said to me, ‘Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb.’ 10 And he carried me away in the Spirit to a mountain great and high, and showed me the Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God. 11 It shone with the glory of God, and its brilliance was like that of a very precious jewel.
So the Old Testament city of God, Jerusalem, has been replaced by the New Jerusalem, the Bride of Christ, the Church. The old Temples lie in ruins but we are the New Temple where the Holy Spirit lives. These ideas are summed up in a number of well-known hymns.
GLORIOUS THINGS OF THEE ARE SPOKEN, Zion, city of our God!
He whose word cannot be broken Formed thee for His own abode.
On the Rock of Ages founded, What can shake thy sure repose?
With salvation’s walls surrounded, Thou mayest smile at all thy foes.

See! The streams of living waters, Springing from eternal love,
Well supply thy sons and daughters, And all fear of want remove;
Who can faint, whilst such a river Ever flows their thirst to assuage?
Grace which, like the Lord, the Giver, Never fails from age to age.

Round each habitation hovering, See the cloud and fire appear!
For a glory and a covering, Showing that the Lord is near.
He who gives them daily manna, He who listens when they cry:
Let Him hear the loud hosanna Rising to His throne on high.

The church is the new city of God. We are the new Temple. So what does Psalm 48 have to say to us today? Something which I think is very important.
For us as Christians, Jerusalem and Mount Zion are now metaphors and symbols. God is still our refuge and strength. God is still our fortress. But our safety does not lie in some physical city on Mount Zion, or anywhere else. Our safety DOES still lie in the New Jerusalem, the church.
Let me put it another way. God wants us to experience peace and security. These come to us in our relationship with Him. But God’s peace and security also come to us through other Christians in our shared life in the church. We experience God caring for us, as Christians care for each other. We experience God helping us, as Christians help each other. God keeps us safe, as we keep each other safe.
Many folk have been saying to me during these hundred days of lockdown how much of a help and comfort the church family have been to them. We have been appreciating our fellowship and our common life together more and more. God has been our strength and refuge, and we have experienced that in the community of the church.
Jim Wallis and his organisation the Sojourners, is an influential advocate of Biblical community. In his book, Call to Conversion, he wrote “The greatest need of our time is for koinonia, the call simply to be the church, to love one another, and to offer our lives for the sake of the world … the creation of living, breathing, loving communities of faith at the local church level.” Wallis argues from Ephesians that such a life of love is central to God’s purposes for the church, which should be a family rather than an institution or an organisation. “Community is the great assumption of the New Testament.” Community life, he says “is both the lifestyle and vocation of the church.” I like this bit. “At a minimum the church should be known as the kind of community that makes it more possible, not less possible, to follow Jesus.”
So God is our strength and our refuge and this comes to us in large part through our experience of the common life of the Christian community, the church. I can’t find the exact quote, but Jim Wallis wrote that in all the crises which life can bring us to, he would rather have the support of the community of the church than the biggest Swiss bank account in the world.
God is our strength and our refuge. The God of Jacob is our fortress. And as Christians God wants us to experience those blessings through the fellowship and community of the church.
1 Great is the LORD, and most worthy of praise, in the city of our God, his holy mountain.
3 God is in her citadels; he has shown himself to be her fortress.
8 As we have heard, so we have seen in the city of the LORD Almighty, in the city of our God: God makes her secure for ever.