A few weeks’ ago, animal rights activists sought a court injunction that would have prevented a traditional Zulu ceremony from taking place. The ceremony involved the killing of a bull by a group of impis, or traditional warriors, using only their bare hands. The animal rights activists claimed that this traditional practice amounted to gross cruelty to the animal concerned that was quite unacceptable in this day and age. Those opposing the court application claimed that the ceremonial killing of the bull was an important cultural practice that was part of a time-honoured tradition. To prevent it from happening would have been an insult to the Zulu King and to the entire Zulu nation.
In the end, the court ruled that the ceremony could proceed – a decision which was greeted with joy by all those involved in the proceedings (except the bull, of course!)
Without getting caught up in the specific details of this particular case, it does raise an interesting question about the weight given to cultural claims over our lives. How often is the phrase heard, ‘But it’s my culture!’ to justify a certain behaviour or attitude that otherwise could not be justified?
Of course culture is important. Distinctive cultural practices and traditions are an essential part of the rich diversity of humanity. They add to the rich tapestry of life in this world. They can help to create a deep sense of identity and belonging. They can speak eloquently of the heart and soul of a people and can provide a framework for what is acceptable behaviour. And so it’s no surprise that the claims of culture can be weighty indeed, and can be very difficult to oppose, even when those claims are clearly no longer life-giving.
Which makes me wonder whether culture has become a sacred cow.
The Christmas story has much to say to this issue! Because in coming into the world, Christ Jesus was born into a very specific cultural context – a cultural context that shaped his identity and much of his behaviour, and left a deep imprint on the kind of person he was. However, and this is the crucial point, Jesus never hid behind his culture, and was never afraid to challenge any cultural norm that diminished the fullness of life that he came to bring. One just has to think of Jesus’ radically inclusive, counter-cultural attitudes towards women, children, lepers, outcasts and the poor. Or his subversion of many of the religious cultural practices of his day that had missed the whole point of who God really was and what God really required.
Yes, Jesus lived and died as a Jew – which shaped his identity in significant ways. But for him there was a more fundamental identity that went way deeper than the distinctions of nationality, race or ethnicity. It was the identity that was his as the Son of God, and as a member of the human race. Overtures of this ringing truth could already be heard at his birth when Magi from a distant land knelt in homage before him, revealing that the claims that he made would never be bound by the particularities of any specific culture.
And so the Christmas story invites us to reflect on the cultural context in which we find ourselves – to embrace the heritage that has been entrusted to us, but also to scrutinize the claims that our culture makes on us in the light of what we see revealed in Jesus. And anything within our culture that diminishes life must be surrendered to the higher claims of Christ and his Kingdom.
This includes, of course, any family cultural practices around the celebration of Christmas. My hope and prayer is that whatever those family cultural practices may be, that they would be life-giving for all who are affected by them. And if they no longer bring life, may you find the courage and grace this Christmas to relinquish them.
May you have a very happy Christmas tomorrow!
CHRISTMAS SERVICES AT MRMC
For those of you in the Durban area, you are warmly invited to attend the Christmas services at Manning Road Methodist Church, on the corner of Manning & Moore Rds in Glenwood. The details are as follows:
Thursday 24 December 11:15pm Christmas Eve Communion Service
Friday 25 December 7.30am & 9.00am Christmas Day Services
Thursday 24 December 2009
Wednesday 23 December 2009
Christmas and Climate Change
The United Nations Conference on Climate Change has just taken place in Copenhagen. Before the event the host city had been nicknamed ‘Hopenhagen’, because of the hope that a strong agreement would be reached by the nations of the world that would tackle the global crisis of climate change in a legally binding and accountable way.
Sadly, it was not to be. Instead a toothless, unenforceable Accord was signed that falls well short of what many scientists say is required to avert a global environmental catastrophe. The headlines of the Sunday Independent a few days’ ago read, ‘The Hopelesshagen Flop’. What’s most revealing about the Copenhagen Accord is that in trying to get it accepted before the UN-mandated deadline it was presented to only 28 of the 192 signatory nations of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, who just happen to be the strongest economies in the world (source The Sunday Independent, 20 December 2009, p.1.)
So, on an issue of far-reaching global importance that will impact everyone on the planet, but especially the poorer nations of the world, a minority consisting of the wealthiest and most powerful nations have determined the outcome not according to the principle of the greatest good for all, but according to their own narrow, short-term, economic self-interest.
Now I fully acknowledge that there are all sorts of complexities to these things that I do not understand, and that all sorts of delicate and extremely difficult balancing acts are part of the burden of global leadership. But I cannot help but think that ‘the rich and mighty’ have failed the people of the earth in this matter.
Which makes me think of Christmas, and its subversive, upside-down message of the respective places of the poor and the rich in God’s plans for the transformation of the world. I think of Mary’s song when she sings of what the world misses in what God is doing, who “…has scattered the proud, brought down rulers from their thrones, lifted up the humble, filled the hungry with good things but sent the rich away empty” (see Lk 1:51-53).
I think of the shepherds, who were amongst the most economically-marginalized members of society, but who nevertheless were the first to hear the good news of the birth of a Saviour, and who were the first to spread this good news with others. (see Lk 2:8-18).
I think of the compelling truth that God entered our world not in a palace, but in the obscurity of a humble stable, as one who was poor, homeless, vulnerable to state power and soon forced to be a refugee / asylum seeker (see Matthew 2:13-14).
What does this say to the crisis of climate change? Well, it says to me that if we continue to look to the rich and mighty for providing the initiative and impetus this world needs for ecological transformation, we are looking in the wrong place – as the Copenhagen Conference so tragically reveals. Rather, it will be in the gathering, growing voices of ordinary people everywhere, and especially the poor, that will provide the groundswell for global transformation that ‘the rich and mighty’ will ultimately be unable to ignore.
For many this will seem like nothing – a hopeless scenario that cannot possibly bring about the change which we so desperately need. But for others with Christmas light in their eyes, they will see that this is how God’s greatest work always unfolds. And for them, it is reason enough to commit themselves to being part of the birthing of the altogether surprising answer that awaits our world.
PRAYER
Lord, it doesn’t make sense. That your change-agents in this world are not the mighty but the meek, not the powerful but the poor. We find ourselves asking, ‘How can this be? How can we be part of the healing of our planet?’
May the Holy Spirit come upon us, and may the power of the Most High overshadow us, and may we come to see that truly nothing is impossible with God. Amen
COMMENT
What ideas do you have for how ordinary people can become change-agents for the sake of our planet?
The Barking Dog-Collar is now available online at http://tt-bdc.blogspot.com.
On Facebook? Join the Barking Dog-Collar group or become a fan of BDC
Please post your comments on any of these forums or e-mail bdc@mrmc.co.za
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please SMS the words ‘MOBI BDC’ to 33978(R1.50 as a once-off SMS cost)
Sadly, it was not to be. Instead a toothless, unenforceable Accord was signed that falls well short of what many scientists say is required to avert a global environmental catastrophe. The headlines of the Sunday Independent a few days’ ago read, ‘The Hopelesshagen Flop’. What’s most revealing about the Copenhagen Accord is that in trying to get it accepted before the UN-mandated deadline it was presented to only 28 of the 192 signatory nations of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, who just happen to be the strongest economies in the world (source The Sunday Independent, 20 December 2009, p.1.)
So, on an issue of far-reaching global importance that will impact everyone on the planet, but especially the poorer nations of the world, a minority consisting of the wealthiest and most powerful nations have determined the outcome not according to the principle of the greatest good for all, but according to their own narrow, short-term, economic self-interest.
Now I fully acknowledge that there are all sorts of complexities to these things that I do not understand, and that all sorts of delicate and extremely difficult balancing acts are part of the burden of global leadership. But I cannot help but think that ‘the rich and mighty’ have failed the people of the earth in this matter.
Which makes me think of Christmas, and its subversive, upside-down message of the respective places of the poor and the rich in God’s plans for the transformation of the world. I think of Mary’s song when she sings of what the world misses in what God is doing, who “…has scattered the proud, brought down rulers from their thrones, lifted up the humble, filled the hungry with good things but sent the rich away empty” (see Lk 1:51-53).
I think of the shepherds, who were amongst the most economically-marginalized members of society, but who nevertheless were the first to hear the good news of the birth of a Saviour, and who were the first to spread this good news with others. (see Lk 2:8-18).
I think of the compelling truth that God entered our world not in a palace, but in the obscurity of a humble stable, as one who was poor, homeless, vulnerable to state power and soon forced to be a refugee / asylum seeker (see Matthew 2:13-14).
What does this say to the crisis of climate change? Well, it says to me that if we continue to look to the rich and mighty for providing the initiative and impetus this world needs for ecological transformation, we are looking in the wrong place – as the Copenhagen Conference so tragically reveals. Rather, it will be in the gathering, growing voices of ordinary people everywhere, and especially the poor, that will provide the groundswell for global transformation that ‘the rich and mighty’ will ultimately be unable to ignore.
For many this will seem like nothing – a hopeless scenario that cannot possibly bring about the change which we so desperately need. But for others with Christmas light in their eyes, they will see that this is how God’s greatest work always unfolds. And for them, it is reason enough to commit themselves to being part of the birthing of the altogether surprising answer that awaits our world.
PRAYER
Lord, it doesn’t make sense. That your change-agents in this world are not the mighty but the meek, not the powerful but the poor. We find ourselves asking, ‘How can this be? How can we be part of the healing of our planet?’
May the Holy Spirit come upon us, and may the power of the Most High overshadow us, and may we come to see that truly nothing is impossible with God. Amen
COMMENT
What ideas do you have for how ordinary people can become change-agents for the sake of our planet?
The Barking Dog-Collar is now available online at http://tt-bdc.blogspot.com.
On Facebook? Join the Barking Dog-Collar group or become a fan of BDC
Please post your comments on any of these forums or e-mail bdc@mrmc.co.za
To receive these devotions directly on your cellphone,
please SMS the words ‘MOBI BDC’ to 33978(R1.50 as a once-off SMS cost)
Tuesday 22 December 2009
Good news for Tiger Woods (and us all)
by Rev Roger Scholtz
About three weeks ago allegations surfaced about the world’s greatest golfer – Tiger Woods – having numerous extra-marital affairs. He has since confirmed that the allegations are true, has expressed his profound regret for the pain and disappointment that he has caused, and has announced his indefinite withdrawal from competitive golf.
Tiger Woods’ story is another tragic example of the wreckage that sinful choices inevitably produce. Because of his iconic status as a sports celebrity, his story has made the headlines, but it’s by no means unique. His story mirrors that of many, and is a sobering reminder to us all of the debris of broken relationships and shattered dreams that we can leave in our wake when we overstep the boundary lines of our own commitments. This is true not just of marital infidelity, but of any commitment that we violate.
So what does the Christmas story have to say to the likes of Tiger Woods (which incidentally includes the likes of you and me)?
1. The underlying point of Christmas is the recognition by God of our fundamental inability as people to deal with the destructive impulses within us that seem hell-bent on wrecking our lives. Christmas is God’s decisive response to humanity’s desperate need to be rescued from ourselves.
2. The poverty, humility and scandal surrounding the birth of Christ suggest that when God chose to enter the world in human form, God did so from the very bottom. Accordingly, there are no depths to the human condition that are lower than where God in Christ is willing to go. Not even our greatest shortcomings and most spectacular moral failures are greater than the compassionate reach of an endlessly gracious God.
3. While many people have described Tiger Woods’ demise as a “fall from grace”, the Christmas story reminds us that this is in fact a contradiction in terms. We cannot fall from grace, for when we fall we find out that it is into God’s grace that we fall. Christmas declares that humanity’s fall and God’s grace are inextricably bound together. This is the hope for Tiger and for us all – that it is precisely in our greatest humiliations and most crushing failures that we find an invitation for something truly transformative and authentically new.
This is “the good news of great joy that shall be for all people” (Lk 2:10).
SCRIPTURE
The Lord said, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ (2 Corinthians 12:9)
PRAYER
Thank you Lord that there is nothing that can separate us from your love and your grace, which are greater and stronger than even the very worst things that we can do. Amen
COMMENT
What do you think are the necessary steps that must be taken by those who seek healing and restoration after a significant moral failure?
Monday 21 December 2009
The contemporary relevance of Christmas
What do you still have left to do before Christmas? Maybe a few presents still need to be bought, or certainly wrapped. Maybe there are cards still to be made. Maybe what you’ll be eating for Christmas Day lunch still needs to be finalized, not to mention the actual cooking thereof. Maybe your Christmas Day sermon still needs to written (or maybe that’s just me!)
Many people describe these last days before Christmas as incredibly busy, rushed and stressful. And many secretly long for it all to be over so that their lives can go back to ‘normal’. It would seem that the issue of there ‘being no room’ for Christ is as true today as when Joseph and Mary found no room at the inn so long ago.
So at the risk of driving you insane, let me add one more item to your ‘to do’ list for these final few days before Christmas. Set aside just ten minutes when you know that you won’t be interrupted to think about these two simple questions:
1. What do I really believe about Christmas?
2. What can I do to celebrate Christmas in a way that expresses what I believe?
For me, I really do believe that Christmas is not just about something that happened 2000 years ago. For me, there’s a contemporary relevance about Christmas that is largely ignored. For me, the Christmas story has a remarkable ability to speak sharply into many of the issues of today with penetrating insight and searing truth. This is what makes it such good news.
And so, as I prepare to celebrate Christmas in a way that expresses what I believe, I’d like to reflect on some current issues in the light of the Christmas story. Over the next few days I’ll be doing that in these devotions, as I take some of the stories that have recently been in the headlines, and consider what the Christmas story has to say to them.
Some of the headline stories I’ll be looking at will be Tiger Woods; the response to the crisis of climate change in the Copenhagen Accord; and the recent furore over the killing of a bull in a traditional ceremony with Zulu King Goodwill Zwelithini. I hope that you’ll find the time over these next few days to participate in these reflections. And any comments you may have will be most welcome.
PRAYER
Lord, guard me from the danger of seeing Christmas as some kind of fairy story from long ago. Help me to recognize the compelling relevance of the Christmas story for the issues of today. May my celebration of Christmas this year be a meaningful expression of what I believe, and may my convictions and understanding of what Christmas really means be stretched and grown. Amen
COMMENT
What good ideas do you have for making Christmas celebrations this year more meaningful / relevant?
The Barking Dog-Collar is now available online at http://bdc.posterous.com.
On Facebook? Join the Barking Dog-Collar group or become a fan of BDC
Please post your comments on any of these forums or e-mail bdc@mrmc.co.za
Many people describe these last days before Christmas as incredibly busy, rushed and stressful. And many secretly long for it all to be over so that their lives can go back to ‘normal’. It would seem that the issue of there ‘being no room’ for Christ is as true today as when Joseph and Mary found no room at the inn so long ago.
So at the risk of driving you insane, let me add one more item to your ‘to do’ list for these final few days before Christmas. Set aside just ten minutes when you know that you won’t be interrupted to think about these two simple questions:
1. What do I really believe about Christmas?
2. What can I do to celebrate Christmas in a way that expresses what I believe?
For me, I really do believe that Christmas is not just about something that happened 2000 years ago. For me, there’s a contemporary relevance about Christmas that is largely ignored. For me, the Christmas story has a remarkable ability to speak sharply into many of the issues of today with penetrating insight and searing truth. This is what makes it such good news.
And so, as I prepare to celebrate Christmas in a way that expresses what I believe, I’d like to reflect on some current issues in the light of the Christmas story. Over the next few days I’ll be doing that in these devotions, as I take some of the stories that have recently been in the headlines, and consider what the Christmas story has to say to them.
Some of the headline stories I’ll be looking at will be Tiger Woods; the response to the crisis of climate change in the Copenhagen Accord; and the recent furore over the killing of a bull in a traditional ceremony with Zulu King Goodwill Zwelithini. I hope that you’ll find the time over these next few days to participate in these reflections. And any comments you may have will be most welcome.
PRAYER
Lord, guard me from the danger of seeing Christmas as some kind of fairy story from long ago. Help me to recognize the compelling relevance of the Christmas story for the issues of today. May my celebration of Christmas this year be a meaningful expression of what I believe, and may my convictions and understanding of what Christmas really means be stretched and grown. Amen
COMMENT
What good ideas do you have for making Christmas celebrations this year more meaningful / relevant?
The Barking Dog-Collar is now available online at http://bdc.posterous.com.
On Facebook? Join the Barking Dog-Collar group or become a fan of BDC
Please post your comments on any of these forums or e-mail bdc@mrmc.co.za
Monday 14 December 2009
Beware The Day after Christmas
DAILY BYTE
The day after Christmas can be mildly depressing.
After the long build up to Christmas, and all the excitement beforehand, once all the presents are unwrapped, the family have gone home and the last of the Christmas meal is packed into Tupperware for leftovers; everything afterwards seems so blasé.
The day after Christmas, everything goes back to normal all too quickly.
But the promise of Christmas is NOT just for one day a year, or even the month preceding it. The promise of Christmas in NOT just for happy days filled with friends and presents, laughter and feasts.
No, the promise of Christmas is for everyday and that includes sad and difficult times.
Zephaniah’s prophesy encompasses this by promising that although troubles will come, they will not overwhelm us. Because of Christmas, Zephaniah is saying, everything that oppresses us will be dealt with, the lame will be rescued and the scattered will be gathered.
This is not to say that we won’t ever face troubles because no literature on earth is more realistic about the harsh facts of life than the Bible. Scripture never says life will be perfect, but does promise that God will make sense out of the imperfections.
The story is told of a church in the USA where for many years the children’s Christmas pageant had run like clockwork. The director was highly efficient, demanded perfection, and insisted that only the very best children got roles.
One year, a new minister at the church insisted that all children who wanted to be a part of the pageant could do so – parts would be found for them. The Director resigned in a huff. Now the pageant didn’t fall flat without her, but it certainly was different.
Firstly, there were far too many children cluttering the stage – about 20 angels, dozens of shepherds and even more sheep. About half-way through the play the sheep decided they would have a much better view from the seats, and so bleated their way down into some empty seats in the front. But the real climax of imprecision came when Mary and Joseph entered. The narrator was to read how Joseph was going to Bethlehem with Mary ‘his espoused wife, being great with child.’
One of the mothers had realised the children didn’t really understand the Elizabethan English of the King James Version and so changed it to the Good News Version at the last minute. So as Mary and Joseph entered, the narrator read: ‘Mary was promised in marriage to Joseph. She was pregnant’.
As the last word echoed through the P.A., little Joseph froze in his tracks. This was not how he had heard it at rehearsal! He gave Mary an incredulous look, then looked out at the congregation and said, ‘Pregnant? What do you mean pregnant?’
Needless to say, this brought this house down. The pastor’s wife, wiping the tears from her eyes, said: ‘You know, that may be exactly what Joseph actually said.” Afterwards, everyone agreed that the pageant was the best it had been in years. Not perfect of course, the way it had been previously. In fact, it was a mess, but a wonderful mess filled with laughter and joy.
You see, it was perfect in another sense. Perfect in the way God makes things perfect – for sometimes life gets messy and troublesome, mistakes get made, people get it wrong, and yet God can still bring sense to it all.
God takes meaningless, tough situations and somehow presses divine meaning into them.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Lord God, we commit into your hands every tough and difficult situation we may be facing. We trust that you would be able to press divine meaning even into our messy and disordered situations. Amen.
FOCUS VERSE
Zephaniah 3 : 19-20 (NIV)
At that time I will deal
with all who oppressed you;
I will rescue the lame
and gather those who have been scattered.
I will give them praise and honour
in every land where they were put to shame.
At that time I will gather you;
at that time I will bring you home.
The day after Christmas can be mildly depressing.
After the long build up to Christmas, and all the excitement beforehand, once all the presents are unwrapped, the family have gone home and the last of the Christmas meal is packed into Tupperware for leftovers; everything afterwards seems so blasé.
The day after Christmas, everything goes back to normal all too quickly.
But the promise of Christmas is NOT just for one day a year, or even the month preceding it. The promise of Christmas in NOT just for happy days filled with friends and presents, laughter and feasts.
No, the promise of Christmas is for everyday and that includes sad and difficult times.
Zephaniah’s prophesy encompasses this by promising that although troubles will come, they will not overwhelm us. Because of Christmas, Zephaniah is saying, everything that oppresses us will be dealt with, the lame will be rescued and the scattered will be gathered.
This is not to say that we won’t ever face troubles because no literature on earth is more realistic about the harsh facts of life than the Bible. Scripture never says life will be perfect, but does promise that God will make sense out of the imperfections.
The story is told of a church in the USA where for many years the children’s Christmas pageant had run like clockwork. The director was highly efficient, demanded perfection, and insisted that only the very best children got roles.
One year, a new minister at the church insisted that all children who wanted to be a part of the pageant could do so – parts would be found for them. The Director resigned in a huff. Now the pageant didn’t fall flat without her, but it certainly was different.
Firstly, there were far too many children cluttering the stage – about 20 angels, dozens of shepherds and even more sheep. About half-way through the play the sheep decided they would have a much better view from the seats, and so bleated their way down into some empty seats in the front. But the real climax of imprecision came when Mary and Joseph entered. The narrator was to read how Joseph was going to Bethlehem with Mary ‘his espoused wife, being great with child.’
One of the mothers had realised the children didn’t really understand the Elizabethan English of the King James Version and so changed it to the Good News Version at the last minute. So as Mary and Joseph entered, the narrator read: ‘Mary was promised in marriage to Joseph. She was pregnant’.
As the last word echoed through the P.A., little Joseph froze in his tracks. This was not how he had heard it at rehearsal! He gave Mary an incredulous look, then looked out at the congregation and said, ‘Pregnant? What do you mean pregnant?’
Needless to say, this brought this house down. The pastor’s wife, wiping the tears from her eyes, said: ‘You know, that may be exactly what Joseph actually said.” Afterwards, everyone agreed that the pageant was the best it had been in years. Not perfect of course, the way it had been previously. In fact, it was a mess, but a wonderful mess filled with laughter and joy.
You see, it was perfect in another sense. Perfect in the way God makes things perfect – for sometimes life gets messy and troublesome, mistakes get made, people get it wrong, and yet God can still bring sense to it all.
God takes meaningless, tough situations and somehow presses divine meaning into them.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Lord God, we commit into your hands every tough and difficult situation we may be facing. We trust that you would be able to press divine meaning even into our messy and disordered situations. Amen.
FOCUS VERSE
Zephaniah 3 : 19-20 (NIV)
At that time I will deal
with all who oppressed you;
I will rescue the lame
and gather those who have been scattered.
I will give them praise and honour
in every land where they were put to shame.
At that time I will gather you;
at that time I will bring you home.
The Christmas ‘Yes’!
DAILY BYTE
When our elder daughter first started to speak, her very first word was ‘No.’ I’m not sure whether it had anything to do with the fact that I was sneaking a swig of her Liqui-Fruit straight out of the carton at the time. But whatever the reason, that was her first word. Which evidently is not that unusual. Linguistically, a ‘no’ is easier to pronounce than ‘yes’ and usually comes pretty early in a child’s vocabulary.
But I wonder if there’s more to that early ‘no’ than linguistics. I wonder if, at even an early age, there is something within us that leans toward saying, ‘No!’ Maybe it’s something we inherit, or perhaps it’s something we learn. But certainly, as we grow older and experience a little more of the world and its ways, so this word can easily become our first response to what life presents to us.
Jim Harnish writes, “Saying ‘no’ is a form of self-protection. It wards off the risk of commitment; it protects us from involvement; it shields us from intimate relationships. An unqualified ‘yes’ is a much harder sell. To say ‘yes’ is to make a leap of faith, to risk oneself in a new and often scary relationship.”
Saying no protects us from being taken for a ride. And it’s often appropriate in a world of scams and abuse. But when it’s our default response in life, we WILL end up missing out on much of the richness that life has to offer.
Which brings us to the whole point of today.
Christmas is God’s unqualified ‘Yes’ to the world. Christmas is God declaring that He will risk sharing life with us. That He is open to us. That He is passionately committed to being in relationship with us. Christmas is God taking the monumental risk of having His life bound up with ours.
Listen carefully to the vulnerable cry from the manger and you will know it’s true. Listen carefully to Joseph giving this child his name and you will hear an echo of God’s yes. YESu. ‘His name will be called YESu, for he will save his people from their sins.’
Today, may you hear God’s great ‘YES’ spoken over your life, and may you in turn say ‘Yes’ to God.
Happy Christmas!
PRAY AS YOU GO
Thank you Lord for never giving up on me, for always believing in me. Help me this Christmas to hear you saying ‘Yes’ to me again, and to let it echo in my own life as I seek to respond to you. Amen.
FOCUS SCRIPTURE
Matthew 1 : 20-21
An angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.
When our elder daughter first started to speak, her very first word was ‘No.’ I’m not sure whether it had anything to do with the fact that I was sneaking a swig of her Liqui-Fruit straight out of the carton at the time. But whatever the reason, that was her first word. Which evidently is not that unusual. Linguistically, a ‘no’ is easier to pronounce than ‘yes’ and usually comes pretty early in a child’s vocabulary.
But I wonder if there’s more to that early ‘no’ than linguistics. I wonder if, at even an early age, there is something within us that leans toward saying, ‘No!’ Maybe it’s something we inherit, or perhaps it’s something we learn. But certainly, as we grow older and experience a little more of the world and its ways, so this word can easily become our first response to what life presents to us.
Jim Harnish writes, “Saying ‘no’ is a form of self-protection. It wards off the risk of commitment; it protects us from involvement; it shields us from intimate relationships. An unqualified ‘yes’ is a much harder sell. To say ‘yes’ is to make a leap of faith, to risk oneself in a new and often scary relationship.”
Saying no protects us from being taken for a ride. And it’s often appropriate in a world of scams and abuse. But when it’s our default response in life, we WILL end up missing out on much of the richness that life has to offer.
Which brings us to the whole point of today.
Christmas is God’s unqualified ‘Yes’ to the world. Christmas is God declaring that He will risk sharing life with us. That He is open to us. That He is passionately committed to being in relationship with us. Christmas is God taking the monumental risk of having His life bound up with ours.
Listen carefully to the vulnerable cry from the manger and you will know it’s true. Listen carefully to Joseph giving this child his name and you will hear an echo of God’s yes. YESu. ‘His name will be called YESu, for he will save his people from their sins.’
Today, may you hear God’s great ‘YES’ spoken over your life, and may you in turn say ‘Yes’ to God.
Happy Christmas!
PRAY AS YOU GO
Thank you Lord for never giving up on me, for always believing in me. Help me this Christmas to hear you saying ‘Yes’ to me again, and to let it echo in my own life as I seek to respond to you. Amen.
FOCUS SCRIPTURE
Matthew 1 : 20-21
An angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.
Renewing Your Christmas Spirit: Looking Up
DAILY BYTE
Yesterday, I mentioned the rush that Christmas can be. It seems that we hustle to and fro with our heads down as we desperately try to complete shopping lists and other chores in time for the big day. We keep our heads down so much that we don’t stop to pay enough attention to what is really important at this time of the year.
For Christmas is a time that we should remember to look up.
To look up to the God who is in all life’s experiences because this profound truth is never made more clearly to us than at this time of the year.
For Christmas celebrates the wonder of God’s incarnation – that God became human and so has shared in our lives in awesome ways. God walked earth and knew hunger, thirst and suffering. He attended parties and feasts and so also ate tasty food and drank good wine. He experienced both tears and laughter.
The very presence of Jesus on earth teaches us that God shares all of our life’s experiences with us – God is not distant and aloof from us.
Many, many years before Jesus was born, the prophet Zephaniah looked up to God and prophesied the coming Jesus. He foresaw the Messiah’s coming and understood what that would mean for us. Twice within the space of two verses, Zephaniah proclaimed the great Christmas truth: ‘The Lord your God is WITH you’! (See focus verse).
This cry was later echoed by the author of Matthew’s Gospel who informs us: “All this took place to fulfil what the Lord had said through the prophet: ‘The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel, - which means ‘God with us.’” (See Matt 1. 22-23).
In Manila, tens of thousands of people make their homes on garbage dumps. People are born, live and die without ever leaving these dumps. They try desperately to eke out an existence from what they can scavenge.
Did you know that there are missionaries who also make their homes on these dumps?
They live there so they might tell the people about God’s love for them. It is very difficult to hear this message from someone who lives in an entirely different world from you, and so these missionaries leave their first world comforts in an effort to reach out to their brothers and sisters.
When I think about how selfish I can often be, I find what those missionaries do to be extremely humbling. But not as humbling as the thought of God stooping down into human flesh so that we might truly know that God IS WITH US.
God With Us means that God has held nothing back from us, not all the treasures of heaven, and not even his own life.
Because Christmas is a time we should remember to look up to the God who is an all of life’s experiences.
God IS with you. Don’t ever forget that.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Almighty God, the Christmas story is a reminder of Your constant presence with us, and for that we give You thanks and praise.
For calling us into intimacy with you … we give thanks!
For forgiving us of our sins and restoring us … we give thanks!
For healing us and making us whole … we give thanks!
God of grace and wonder, receive our praise, and the love of our hearts, souls, minds and strength, expressed in these words. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Zephaniah 3 : 15b-17 (NIV)
The LORD, the King of Israel, is with you;
never again will you fear any harm.
On that day they will say to Jerusalem,
"Do not fear, O Zion;
do not let your hands hang limp.
The LORD your God is with you,
he is mighty to save.
Yesterday, I mentioned the rush that Christmas can be. It seems that we hustle to and fro with our heads down as we desperately try to complete shopping lists and other chores in time for the big day. We keep our heads down so much that we don’t stop to pay enough attention to what is really important at this time of the year.
For Christmas is a time that we should remember to look up.
To look up to the God who is in all life’s experiences because this profound truth is never made more clearly to us than at this time of the year.
For Christmas celebrates the wonder of God’s incarnation – that God became human and so has shared in our lives in awesome ways. God walked earth and knew hunger, thirst and suffering. He attended parties and feasts and so also ate tasty food and drank good wine. He experienced both tears and laughter.
The very presence of Jesus on earth teaches us that God shares all of our life’s experiences with us – God is not distant and aloof from us.
Many, many years before Jesus was born, the prophet Zephaniah looked up to God and prophesied the coming Jesus. He foresaw the Messiah’s coming and understood what that would mean for us. Twice within the space of two verses, Zephaniah proclaimed the great Christmas truth: ‘The Lord your God is WITH you’! (See focus verse).
This cry was later echoed by the author of Matthew’s Gospel who informs us: “All this took place to fulfil what the Lord had said through the prophet: ‘The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel, - which means ‘God with us.’” (See Matt 1. 22-23).
In Manila, tens of thousands of people make their homes on garbage dumps. People are born, live and die without ever leaving these dumps. They try desperately to eke out an existence from what they can scavenge.
Did you know that there are missionaries who also make their homes on these dumps?
They live there so they might tell the people about God’s love for them. It is very difficult to hear this message from someone who lives in an entirely different world from you, and so these missionaries leave their first world comforts in an effort to reach out to their brothers and sisters.
When I think about how selfish I can often be, I find what those missionaries do to be extremely humbling. But not as humbling as the thought of God stooping down into human flesh so that we might truly know that God IS WITH US.
God With Us means that God has held nothing back from us, not all the treasures of heaven, and not even his own life.
Because Christmas is a time we should remember to look up to the God who is an all of life’s experiences.
God IS with you. Don’t ever forget that.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Almighty God, the Christmas story is a reminder of Your constant presence with us, and for that we give You thanks and praise.
For calling us into intimacy with you … we give thanks!
For forgiving us of our sins and restoring us … we give thanks!
For healing us and making us whole … we give thanks!
God of grace and wonder, receive our praise, and the love of our hearts, souls, minds and strength, expressed in these words. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Zephaniah 3 : 15b-17 (NIV)
The LORD, the King of Israel, is with you;
never again will you fear any harm.
On that day they will say to Jerusalem,
"Do not fear, O Zion;
do not let your hands hang limp.
The LORD your God is with you,
he is mighty to save.
Renewing Your Christmas Spirit: Fatigue
DAILY BYTE
I don’t know about you but I find December to be an exhausting time. December arrives at a time of the year when we are already feeling tired and drained. We then find ourselves pushed onto a treadmill of Christmas parties, shopping trips, and seemingly never-ending lists of things that have to get done.
Fatigue poses great dangers to our spirituality.
This is because fatigue affects our perspectives and ability to think straight on issues. Fatigue drains us emotionally and spiritually as well as physically. Instead of being a time of rest and renewal, the Christmas rush can lead to even further exhaustion, leaving us depressed and down.
It is very important that we learn how to deal with our fatigue if we want to renew our Christmas spirits. In the next few weeks try out the following two suggestions:
Take regular time out to rest. This seems so obvious but the fact remains we just do not do this enough. Did you know that in his 3 year ministry, Jesus is recorded as having a holiday or retreat 14 times. 14 retreats in 3 years! What is more, in the story of Creation, we are taught that God worked only 6 days before resting on the 7th. Rest is a gift given to us by God and modelled to us by Jesus. We may say to ourselves that we cannot afford the time to rest but the truth of the matter is that we just cannot afford the time NOT to.
The second suggestion follows on from the first. Henri Nouwen once said that, “Without solitude it is virtually impossible to live a spiritual life.” Again I would remind you of how often Jesus took time out to spend in solitude and silence. Jesus knew that times of solitude and silence provide fuel for the soul and therefore are vital to countering the effects of fatigue.
This is your challenge today. Book yourself time out to rest, not to do shopping or other chores but just to rest. Ensure that at least part of this time is spent in solitude and silence – just you and God.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Lord God, today we want to bring to you our tiredness. Help us to remember the great danger that living continually with a sense of fatigue can be to us. Give us the strength and discipline to regularly place ourselves in your presence. Help us to take time out in silence and solitude. Thank-you Jesus for your promise that if we do come to you we will certainly find rest for our souls. Help us to be still and know you as God. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Matthew 11:28-30 (NIV)
Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.
I don’t know about you but I find December to be an exhausting time. December arrives at a time of the year when we are already feeling tired and drained. We then find ourselves pushed onto a treadmill of Christmas parties, shopping trips, and seemingly never-ending lists of things that have to get done.
Fatigue poses great dangers to our spirituality.
This is because fatigue affects our perspectives and ability to think straight on issues. Fatigue drains us emotionally and spiritually as well as physically. Instead of being a time of rest and renewal, the Christmas rush can lead to even further exhaustion, leaving us depressed and down.
It is very important that we learn how to deal with our fatigue if we want to renew our Christmas spirits. In the next few weeks try out the following two suggestions:
Take regular time out to rest. This seems so obvious but the fact remains we just do not do this enough. Did you know that in his 3 year ministry, Jesus is recorded as having a holiday or retreat 14 times. 14 retreats in 3 years! What is more, in the story of Creation, we are taught that God worked only 6 days before resting on the 7th. Rest is a gift given to us by God and modelled to us by Jesus. We may say to ourselves that we cannot afford the time to rest but the truth of the matter is that we just cannot afford the time NOT to.
The second suggestion follows on from the first. Henri Nouwen once said that, “Without solitude it is virtually impossible to live a spiritual life.” Again I would remind you of how often Jesus took time out to spend in solitude and silence. Jesus knew that times of solitude and silence provide fuel for the soul and therefore are vital to countering the effects of fatigue.
This is your challenge today. Book yourself time out to rest, not to do shopping or other chores but just to rest. Ensure that at least part of this time is spent in solitude and silence – just you and God.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Lord God, today we want to bring to you our tiredness. Help us to remember the great danger that living continually with a sense of fatigue can be to us. Give us the strength and discipline to regularly place ourselves in your presence. Help us to take time out in silence and solitude. Thank-you Jesus for your promise that if we do come to you we will certainly find rest for our souls. Help us to be still and know you as God. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Matthew 11:28-30 (NIV)
Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.
Renewing Your Christmas Spirit: Pessimism
DAILY BYTE
Christmas is just around the corner! For many of us Christmas is a time of great excitement as we think happy thoughts of food, family and presents. However, for others Christmas is something to dread rather than look forward to. Reports tell us that depression and suicide rates actually increase at this time of year.
With this in mind, we will be spending the next few days looking at some of the common issues which can turn Christmas into a real downer for some. Issues that can potentially kill off our Christmas spirit. We will be looking at how during a stressed holiday season, we can open our hearts to God renewing our Christmas spirits.
The first issue we will be looking at is pessimism. Pessimism can be defined as a general belief that things around us in the world are bad, and are tending to become worse.
There is a great deal of pessimism today that grips and even paralyses people. Some of the challenging issues we South Africans face can lead to pessimism if we are not careful. We read stories of horrible crimes, we drive past hungry street children, we hear tales of corruption and power abuse and we begin to lose hope as a result.
It is important though to remember that to lose hope is to lose life.
The movie, “Children of Men,” although graphically violent, is a stark portrayal of what happens to people when hope is lost. In the movie the human race loses its ability to reproduce and so begins to go into a downward spiral of deep depression. Pessimism becomes the norm because no one can see any hope for life beyond themselves. The lesson of the movie is that our outer worlds will surely collapse around us if we do not hold onto hope within.
The opposite to pessimism is not blind, idealistic optimism. Instead it is faith.
Faith is being sure of what we do not see (Heb 11.1); and so faith counters pessimism because it holds onto hope despite even the worst circumstances.
While pessimism can kill the Christmas spirit, faith is that quality which lightens our hearts and minds with the good news of Christ’s love and presence. Let us never forget that Christmas is a powerful reminder that God is with us always and everywhere. As today’s focus reading reminds us, even if we face great opposition (such as crime, poverty and disease), we need never lose hope if we can keep our eyes firmly fixed on Jesus.
Pray As You Go
Lord God, we give thanks to you for Jesus Christ who is hope and life for all the world. We confess that we often allow a pessimistic spirit to grip and even paralyse all that is good and positive within us. We bring to you our fears and the feelings we get when we become overwhelmed by the world’s problems. We ask that you would renew our hope and strengthen our faith. Help us to keep our eyes firmly fixed on Jesus, no matter what problems we are currently facing. Amen.
Focus Readings
Hebrews 12:1-3 (NIV)
Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful people, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.
Christmas is just around the corner! For many of us Christmas is a time of great excitement as we think happy thoughts of food, family and presents. However, for others Christmas is something to dread rather than look forward to. Reports tell us that depression and suicide rates actually increase at this time of year.
With this in mind, we will be spending the next few days looking at some of the common issues which can turn Christmas into a real downer for some. Issues that can potentially kill off our Christmas spirit. We will be looking at how during a stressed holiday season, we can open our hearts to God renewing our Christmas spirits.
The first issue we will be looking at is pessimism. Pessimism can be defined as a general belief that things around us in the world are bad, and are tending to become worse.
There is a great deal of pessimism today that grips and even paralyses people. Some of the challenging issues we South Africans face can lead to pessimism if we are not careful. We read stories of horrible crimes, we drive past hungry street children, we hear tales of corruption and power abuse and we begin to lose hope as a result.
It is important though to remember that to lose hope is to lose life.
The movie, “Children of Men,” although graphically violent, is a stark portrayal of what happens to people when hope is lost. In the movie the human race loses its ability to reproduce and so begins to go into a downward spiral of deep depression. Pessimism becomes the norm because no one can see any hope for life beyond themselves. The lesson of the movie is that our outer worlds will surely collapse around us if we do not hold onto hope within.
The opposite to pessimism is not blind, idealistic optimism. Instead it is faith.
Faith is being sure of what we do not see (Heb 11.1); and so faith counters pessimism because it holds onto hope despite even the worst circumstances.
While pessimism can kill the Christmas spirit, faith is that quality which lightens our hearts and minds with the good news of Christ’s love and presence. Let us never forget that Christmas is a powerful reminder that God is with us always and everywhere. As today’s focus reading reminds us, even if we face great opposition (such as crime, poverty and disease), we need never lose hope if we can keep our eyes firmly fixed on Jesus.
Pray As You Go
Lord God, we give thanks to you for Jesus Christ who is hope and life for all the world. We confess that we often allow a pessimistic spirit to grip and even paralyse all that is good and positive within us. We bring to you our fears and the feelings we get when we become overwhelmed by the world’s problems. We ask that you would renew our hope and strengthen our faith. Help us to keep our eyes firmly fixed on Jesus, no matter what problems we are currently facing. Amen.
Focus Readings
Hebrews 12:1-3 (NIV)
Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful people, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.
Monday 7 December 2009
Give More of Yourself
DAILY BYTE
A final ‘starting suggestion’ for the practical expression of your worship of Christ as King this Christmas would be this – give more of yourself.
Whatever you may give to others this Christmas, be sure to include more of yourself as an intrinsic part of every gift. It’s one thing to dig into your pocket in order to give a gift, but altogether another to dig into your heart and offer something of what is there.
Again, this gets to the very core of the Christmas story, which is all about the self-giving love of God that held nothing back in pouring out his love & his life in the person of His son Jesus. Our giving can truly become a worshipful response when it engages our hearts in the same kind of way.
Remember, it doesn’t cost anything to express sincere words of appreciation, or encouragement, or reconciliation, or love – whether they be spoken, or written in a note or a card.
It doesn’t cost anything to ask a family member who is going through a really tough time to tell you about it, if they want, and then to listen with kindness and care and without any judgement to what they say.
It doesn’t cost anything to come to church, not for the sake of appearances or because it’s the thing to do, but because you want to present the totality of who you are before God in complete surrender.
It is your presence that transforms the presents you give from mere things to generous and precious acts of love. It is the investment of your self that transforms the giving of gifts from soulless consumerism to life-giving gestures of love.
There’s a well-known story about a missionary who was working on some remote island, spreading the good news of the gospel. He had been telling the local population how Christians, as an expression of their love, gave each other presents at Christmas time.
On Christmas morning, one of the natives brought the missionary a seashell of exquisite beauty. When asked where he had discovered such an extraordinary shell, the man said he had walked many miles to a certain bay on the far side of the island, the only spot where such shells could be found.
The missionary was astounded. “Do you mean to say that you walked all that way for me?” he said.
The man’s eyes brightened as he replied, “Long walk part of gift.”
Give more of yourself this Christmas.
In concluding this week’s devotions I’d ask you to consider this question one more time: What kind of festive season do you want to have this year?
Remember, there is a fundamental choice that we each can make. Either, like Herod, we can allow the pursuit of our own agenda and our own selfish needs and desires be the motivation for our ‘coming to Bethlehem’. Or, like the Magi, we can approach this season in order to worship Christ with the totality of our lives.
If you’re serious about wanting to offer the counter-cultural response of worship this Christmas, there are three starting suggestions as to how you can begin to do that. Simplify; practice hospitality, give more of yourself.
This is the way not just to survive Christmas, but to consecrate it. And through the worship of your life this festive season, may you encounter once again the God who comes to be with us in all of his liberating love and redeeming power.
PRAY AS YOU GO
“I want to give you more, all praises you deserve, you’re holy and you’re righteous!
I want to listen more, to your Spirit’s call, you’re holy and you’re righteous!
Jesus you are God, high above all else!
Maker of the universe, high above all else!”
Lord Jesus, those words from a chorus express a deep desire of what we truly want – to give you more, in acknowledgement of the Lord and God that you are! May this be true for us this Christmas. Amen.
SCRIPTURE READING
Philippians 2:4-5
Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus.
A final ‘starting suggestion’ for the practical expression of your worship of Christ as King this Christmas would be this – give more of yourself.
Whatever you may give to others this Christmas, be sure to include more of yourself as an intrinsic part of every gift. It’s one thing to dig into your pocket in order to give a gift, but altogether another to dig into your heart and offer something of what is there.
Again, this gets to the very core of the Christmas story, which is all about the self-giving love of God that held nothing back in pouring out his love & his life in the person of His son Jesus. Our giving can truly become a worshipful response when it engages our hearts in the same kind of way.
Remember, it doesn’t cost anything to express sincere words of appreciation, or encouragement, or reconciliation, or love – whether they be spoken, or written in a note or a card.
It doesn’t cost anything to ask a family member who is going through a really tough time to tell you about it, if they want, and then to listen with kindness and care and without any judgement to what they say.
It doesn’t cost anything to come to church, not for the sake of appearances or because it’s the thing to do, but because you want to present the totality of who you are before God in complete surrender.
It is your presence that transforms the presents you give from mere things to generous and precious acts of love. It is the investment of your self that transforms the giving of gifts from soulless consumerism to life-giving gestures of love.
There’s a well-known story about a missionary who was working on some remote island, spreading the good news of the gospel. He had been telling the local population how Christians, as an expression of their love, gave each other presents at Christmas time.
On Christmas morning, one of the natives brought the missionary a seashell of exquisite beauty. When asked where he had discovered such an extraordinary shell, the man said he had walked many miles to a certain bay on the far side of the island, the only spot where such shells could be found.
The missionary was astounded. “Do you mean to say that you walked all that way for me?” he said.
The man’s eyes brightened as he replied, “Long walk part of gift.”
Give more of yourself this Christmas.
In concluding this week’s devotions I’d ask you to consider this question one more time: What kind of festive season do you want to have this year?
Remember, there is a fundamental choice that we each can make. Either, like Herod, we can allow the pursuit of our own agenda and our own selfish needs and desires be the motivation for our ‘coming to Bethlehem’. Or, like the Magi, we can approach this season in order to worship Christ with the totality of our lives.
If you’re serious about wanting to offer the counter-cultural response of worship this Christmas, there are three starting suggestions as to how you can begin to do that. Simplify; practice hospitality, give more of yourself.
This is the way not just to survive Christmas, but to consecrate it. And through the worship of your life this festive season, may you encounter once again the God who comes to be with us in all of his liberating love and redeeming power.
PRAY AS YOU GO
“I want to give you more, all praises you deserve, you’re holy and you’re righteous!
I want to listen more, to your Spirit’s call, you’re holy and you’re righteous!
Jesus you are God, high above all else!
Maker of the universe, high above all else!”
Lord Jesus, those words from a chorus express a deep desire of what we truly want – to give you more, in acknowledgement of the Lord and God that you are! May this be true for us this Christmas. Amen.
SCRIPTURE READING
Philippians 2:4-5
Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus.
Practice hospitality
DAILY BYTE
The first suggestion of a practical way to express our worship of Christ this Christmas season that was made yesterday was to SIMPLIFY. A second suggestion is this – PRACTICE HOSPITALITY.
Hospitality is one of the great themes that lies at the very heart of the Christmas story. The truth of Christmas is that Christ enters our world in a manner and form we would least expect, and is found to be present in the least and the lowest in the eyes of our world. The great challenge of Christmas, therefore, is for us to cultivate an openness within us for the strangers and outcasts in our midst, for there Christ can be found in a special way.
The practice of hospitality is the way in which this can happen, and it can be a beautiful expression of our worship.
How might you become a little more open to the poor in your midst this Christmas? Might it mean taking the time to really listen to somebody’s story; or simply affording the beggar on the street the dignity of a friendly greeting and a warm smile; or even inviting someone in for a meal that you would never normally invite?
Of course, the practice of hospitality extends not only to those who may be strangers to you, but also to family and friends. If hosting Christmas lunch for your family feels like an ordeal, how might it be reframed in your mind for it to become an act of worship for you? How could it become your personal way of saying ‘thank you’ to God for the wholehearted hospitality that God has shown to you? How could your home become a Christmas stable this year, providing a gracious space where the miracle of the incarnation can be experienced once again?
What about your spouse, or your children, or your friends? There are very definite ways in which we can practice hospitality towards them. (Which, incidentally, will be a far better present than anything you could buy them.) It simply requires making space for them in your life – that means giving them your time and attention – and allowing what is most important for them to become what is most important for you.
Most wives would give virtually anything for their husbands to take them on a date and give them their undivided attention, taking an active interest in what they had to say, listening not only to their words but the feelings beneath them, without judging or offering advice, but simply being there and remaining present. That’s one simple, but powerful way of practicing hospitality.
Similarly with our kids. Most children would give virtually anything for their mom or dad to really play with them. To spend chunk time with them. To enter their world. To remain present to them for more than just a brief moment. To allow them the space to be kids, and to join with them in that experience.
The same principles apply with our friends. Practicing hospitality is a profound way to allow the heart of the Christmas story to be expressed in our lives, and as such can be a beautiful expression of our worship of Jesus.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Lord Jesus, we read in the Christmas story that there was no room for you at the inn. We confess with shame that the inn often reflects our own lives, especially at Christmastime – too busy, too cluttered and too crowded for there to be any real space for you. But as we practice hospitality towards others, making more room in our lives for them, so we trust that you also would find more space within us to come and take your rightful place. Thank you for the wonder of encountering you in others, when we extend ourselves towards them in sacrificial and self-giving ways. Help us, this Christmas, to be more hospitable. Amen.
SCRIPTURE READING
Romans 12:13
Share with God’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality.
The first suggestion of a practical way to express our worship of Christ this Christmas season that was made yesterday was to SIMPLIFY. A second suggestion is this – PRACTICE HOSPITALITY.
Hospitality is one of the great themes that lies at the very heart of the Christmas story. The truth of Christmas is that Christ enters our world in a manner and form we would least expect, and is found to be present in the least and the lowest in the eyes of our world. The great challenge of Christmas, therefore, is for us to cultivate an openness within us for the strangers and outcasts in our midst, for there Christ can be found in a special way.
The practice of hospitality is the way in which this can happen, and it can be a beautiful expression of our worship.
How might you become a little more open to the poor in your midst this Christmas? Might it mean taking the time to really listen to somebody’s story; or simply affording the beggar on the street the dignity of a friendly greeting and a warm smile; or even inviting someone in for a meal that you would never normally invite?
Of course, the practice of hospitality extends not only to those who may be strangers to you, but also to family and friends. If hosting Christmas lunch for your family feels like an ordeal, how might it be reframed in your mind for it to become an act of worship for you? How could it become your personal way of saying ‘thank you’ to God for the wholehearted hospitality that God has shown to you? How could your home become a Christmas stable this year, providing a gracious space where the miracle of the incarnation can be experienced once again?
What about your spouse, or your children, or your friends? There are very definite ways in which we can practice hospitality towards them. (Which, incidentally, will be a far better present than anything you could buy them.) It simply requires making space for them in your life – that means giving them your time and attention – and allowing what is most important for them to become what is most important for you.
Most wives would give virtually anything for their husbands to take them on a date and give them their undivided attention, taking an active interest in what they had to say, listening not only to their words but the feelings beneath them, without judging or offering advice, but simply being there and remaining present. That’s one simple, but powerful way of practicing hospitality.
Similarly with our kids. Most children would give virtually anything for their mom or dad to really play with them. To spend chunk time with them. To enter their world. To remain present to them for more than just a brief moment. To allow them the space to be kids, and to join with them in that experience.
The same principles apply with our friends. Practicing hospitality is a profound way to allow the heart of the Christmas story to be expressed in our lives, and as such can be a beautiful expression of our worship of Jesus.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Lord Jesus, we read in the Christmas story that there was no room for you at the inn. We confess with shame that the inn often reflects our own lives, especially at Christmastime – too busy, too cluttered and too crowded for there to be any real space for you. But as we practice hospitality towards others, making more room in our lives for them, so we trust that you also would find more space within us to come and take your rightful place. Thank you for the wonder of encountering you in others, when we extend ourselves towards them in sacrificial and self-giving ways. Help us, this Christmas, to be more hospitable. Amen.
SCRIPTURE READING
Romans 12:13
Share with God’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality.
Simplify
DAILY BYTE
What kind of festive season do you want to have this year?
That’s the question we’re considering this week. Yesterday I suggested that the story of the Magi, who chose to come and worship the new-born king, reveals the only appropriate way to approach Christ – on our knees in worship. However, such worship will bring us into conflict with the norms and expectations of the systems of this world – represented by Herod.
When we declare our sole allegiance to the One who rules on the basis of selflessness and love, it requires a selflessness and love from us in return. Now such selflessness and love is commonly understood to be the essence of the Christmas spirit. And there will be many wonderful stories again this year of acts of kindness and generosity that reveal this spirit. But what is often missed is the extent to which our selfless, loving worship of Christ needs to shape the totality of our lives, and not just a few isolated gestures.
Let’s consider then some practical ways in which this might begin to happen for us this Christmas.
The first suggestion is this: simplify. It’s no exaggeration to say that the many forms of excessive indulgence that are so common to this season are symptomatic of a widespread spirit of materialism and greed in our culture that constantly has to take in more and more and more, but is never satisfied.
We see this with people over-eating, over-drinking, and over-spending. It can so easily get out of hand, and is so glibly justified as part of festive living. But it’s not – that’s the lie that our consumerist culture presents as the truth. The lie that the more you have the happier you’ll be.
The way to expose the lie is through the simple commitment to simplify. To simplify what you eat and drink, the presents you buy, the kind of entertainment you pursue – and to do so as an act of worship.
I’m not for a moment suggesting that your entire Christmas become bland and boring. In fact, I’m suggesting exactly the opposite – to rediscover the source of real richness & abundance. For every time you choose to simplify what you consume, it’s an opportunity to affirm that true happiness and fulfillment do not depend upon the abundance of one’s possessions. Every time you do so, it will be act of counter-cultural defiance as you declare that there is a more fundamental spiritual reality to this world than the glossy superficiality of materialistic things.
Many of us know how little children often seem to have more fun playing with the box than with the expensive present that comes inside of it. There’s a truth in that observation that’s worth reflecting on, as we think about what is truly important.
This Christmas, as an act of worship – simplify!
PRAY AS YOU GO
O Lord, how easily we miss the point. How quickly our lives get cluttered up with empty things. How readily we believe the adverts that convince us that we need more stuff to be happy and fulfilled. But when you entered the world it was without any razzmatazz or fanfare. In simplicity you came – a baby born in a stable. This Christmas, help us to recognize the profound truth contained in the manner of your coming. Help us to simplify our consumption and reduce the many unnecessary excesses that only get in the way of truly seeing and experiencing you. Amen.
SCRIPTURE READING
Isaiah 55:1-3
Come, all you who are thirsty,
come to the waters;
and you who have no money,
come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without money and without cost.
Why spend money on what is not bread,
and your labor on what does not satisfy?
Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good,
and your soul will delight in the richest of fare.
Give ear and come to me;
hear me, that your soul may live.
What kind of festive season do you want to have this year?
That’s the question we’re considering this week. Yesterday I suggested that the story of the Magi, who chose to come and worship the new-born king, reveals the only appropriate way to approach Christ – on our knees in worship. However, such worship will bring us into conflict with the norms and expectations of the systems of this world – represented by Herod.
When we declare our sole allegiance to the One who rules on the basis of selflessness and love, it requires a selflessness and love from us in return. Now such selflessness and love is commonly understood to be the essence of the Christmas spirit. And there will be many wonderful stories again this year of acts of kindness and generosity that reveal this spirit. But what is often missed is the extent to which our selfless, loving worship of Christ needs to shape the totality of our lives, and not just a few isolated gestures.
Let’s consider then some practical ways in which this might begin to happen for us this Christmas.
The first suggestion is this: simplify. It’s no exaggeration to say that the many forms of excessive indulgence that are so common to this season are symptomatic of a widespread spirit of materialism and greed in our culture that constantly has to take in more and more and more, but is never satisfied.
We see this with people over-eating, over-drinking, and over-spending. It can so easily get out of hand, and is so glibly justified as part of festive living. But it’s not – that’s the lie that our consumerist culture presents as the truth. The lie that the more you have the happier you’ll be.
The way to expose the lie is through the simple commitment to simplify. To simplify what you eat and drink, the presents you buy, the kind of entertainment you pursue – and to do so as an act of worship.
I’m not for a moment suggesting that your entire Christmas become bland and boring. In fact, I’m suggesting exactly the opposite – to rediscover the source of real richness & abundance. For every time you choose to simplify what you consume, it’s an opportunity to affirm that true happiness and fulfillment do not depend upon the abundance of one’s possessions. Every time you do so, it will be act of counter-cultural defiance as you declare that there is a more fundamental spiritual reality to this world than the glossy superficiality of materialistic things.
Many of us know how little children often seem to have more fun playing with the box than with the expensive present that comes inside of it. There’s a truth in that observation that’s worth reflecting on, as we think about what is truly important.
This Christmas, as an act of worship – simplify!
PRAY AS YOU GO
O Lord, how easily we miss the point. How quickly our lives get cluttered up with empty things. How readily we believe the adverts that convince us that we need more stuff to be happy and fulfilled. But when you entered the world it was without any razzmatazz or fanfare. In simplicity you came – a baby born in a stable. This Christmas, help us to recognize the profound truth contained in the manner of your coming. Help us to simplify our consumption and reduce the many unnecessary excesses that only get in the way of truly seeing and experiencing you. Amen.
SCRIPTURE READING
Isaiah 55:1-3
Come, all you who are thirsty,
come to the waters;
and you who have no money,
come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without money and without cost.
Why spend money on what is not bread,
and your labor on what does not satisfy?
Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good,
and your soul will delight in the richest of fare.
Give ear and come to me;
hear me, that your soul may live.
Choosing to worship
DAILY BYTE
What kind of festive season do you want to have this year?
That’s the question I want us to think about this week as we consider both the delights and the difficulties of Christmas that await us. Yesterday I suggested that the answer to this question is not merely a matter a chance. Of course, there are many things that can happen to us over which we have little or no control - things that can have dramatic consequences for our lives. (Think, for instance, about those families who will have to face the devastating trauma of losing loved ones in accidents on our nation’s roads this month.)
Yet, in spite of the many unforeseen things that can happen to us, I would still affirm that the kind of festive season we will experience is essentially a matter of choice, not chance.
The story in Matthew 2 of the Magi coming to Bethlehem to worship the Christ-child, guided by a star, is one of the iconic stories of the Christmas narrative. But embedded within this strange but wonderful story is a clear presentation of the fundamental choice that confronts all of us, as we come closer to Christmas.
On the one hand there is the choice of the Magi, who came to Bethlehem in order to WORSHIP the new-born king. On the other hand there is the choice of King Herod. He claimed that he too wanted to go and worship, but in fact he wanted to kill the child. He “came to Bethlehem” in order to serve his own interests, to preserve his own position, to affirm his continued authority as king.
This reflects the choice that confronts all of us as we “come to Bethlehem” this year. Either, like the Magi, we can acknowledge Christ as King, and kneel in worship before him. Or, like Herod, we can seek to serve our own self-centered interests as we continue occupying the throne of our lives.
It seems pretty obvious which option we should choose. And no prizes for guessing what I, a preacher, am going to suggest. But before we rush to that conclusion, let’s be clear about one thing: If we choose to make the worship of Christ our primary concern this Christmas, there are some serious implications to that.
The decision of the Magi to worship Christ is really an act of political defiance, and a form of counter-cultural protest. Think about it. The Magi walk into Jerusalem, the capital of Herod, the king. And they say, “We have come to worship another king. Not you Herod. We’re not going to bow down to you. There’s another king who we think is greater than you. He’s the one we have come to worship.”
And we read that when King Herod heard this, he and all Jerusalem with him were disturbed. They were disturbed because suddenly their entire system was under serious threat. The entire basis for the ordering of their society was being challenged.
That’s what authentic worship does. It challenges the way things are, and the assumptions of the dominant systems of this world. Authentic worship is an act of defiance that dares to declare that our ultimate allegiance is not to any worldly authority but to Christ alone.
Are you up for that this Christmas? Because that’s what it means to worship Christ as King. And should you make that your choice, I guarantee that it will radically change the kind of festive season you will experience.
Over the next three days we’ll explore some practical ways in which this kind of worship can be expressed this Christmas. They are really just starting suggestions, which hopefully will spark some thoughts of your own as to how you might journey through the festive season more faithfully this year.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Lord Jesus Christ, let my whole-hearted worship of you be my primary concern this Christmas. Amen.
SCRIPTURE READING
Matthew 2:1-3
After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, "Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him."
When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him.
What kind of festive season do you want to have this year?
That’s the question I want us to think about this week as we consider both the delights and the difficulties of Christmas that await us. Yesterday I suggested that the answer to this question is not merely a matter a chance. Of course, there are many things that can happen to us over which we have little or no control - things that can have dramatic consequences for our lives. (Think, for instance, about those families who will have to face the devastating trauma of losing loved ones in accidents on our nation’s roads this month.)
Yet, in spite of the many unforeseen things that can happen to us, I would still affirm that the kind of festive season we will experience is essentially a matter of choice, not chance.
The story in Matthew 2 of the Magi coming to Bethlehem to worship the Christ-child, guided by a star, is one of the iconic stories of the Christmas narrative. But embedded within this strange but wonderful story is a clear presentation of the fundamental choice that confronts all of us, as we come closer to Christmas.
On the one hand there is the choice of the Magi, who came to Bethlehem in order to WORSHIP the new-born king. On the other hand there is the choice of King Herod. He claimed that he too wanted to go and worship, but in fact he wanted to kill the child. He “came to Bethlehem” in order to serve his own interests, to preserve his own position, to affirm his continued authority as king.
This reflects the choice that confronts all of us as we “come to Bethlehem” this year. Either, like the Magi, we can acknowledge Christ as King, and kneel in worship before him. Or, like Herod, we can seek to serve our own self-centered interests as we continue occupying the throne of our lives.
It seems pretty obvious which option we should choose. And no prizes for guessing what I, a preacher, am going to suggest. But before we rush to that conclusion, let’s be clear about one thing: If we choose to make the worship of Christ our primary concern this Christmas, there are some serious implications to that.
The decision of the Magi to worship Christ is really an act of political defiance, and a form of counter-cultural protest. Think about it. The Magi walk into Jerusalem, the capital of Herod, the king. And they say, “We have come to worship another king. Not you Herod. We’re not going to bow down to you. There’s another king who we think is greater than you. He’s the one we have come to worship.”
And we read that when King Herod heard this, he and all Jerusalem with him were disturbed. They were disturbed because suddenly their entire system was under serious threat. The entire basis for the ordering of their society was being challenged.
That’s what authentic worship does. It challenges the way things are, and the assumptions of the dominant systems of this world. Authentic worship is an act of defiance that dares to declare that our ultimate allegiance is not to any worldly authority but to Christ alone.
Are you up for that this Christmas? Because that’s what it means to worship Christ as King. And should you make that your choice, I guarantee that it will radically change the kind of festive season you will experience.
Over the next three days we’ll explore some practical ways in which this kind of worship can be expressed this Christmas. They are really just starting suggestions, which hopefully will spark some thoughts of your own as to how you might journey through the festive season more faithfully this year.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Lord Jesus Christ, let my whole-hearted worship of you be my primary concern this Christmas. Amen.
SCRIPTURE READING
Matthew 2:1-3
After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, "Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him."
When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him.
A Disciple’s Survival Guide to Christmas
DAILY BYTE
It’s December, and the holiday season is upon us! For many people (though not all), the next month or so is a time to relax and unwind, and hopefully take things a little more leisurely.
And in the midst of it all, of course, there’s Christmas, with all of its festivities. And then there’s New Year, with all of its fanfare. There’s food and family, parties and presents, singing and celebrating. No wonder we call this the Festive Season.
All of which can be very good. It’s important to feast and to celebrate. To reconnect with family. To lighten up and laugh a little more. To spoil our loved ones, and maybe even be spoiled in return. This is part of the gift of this season.
But we all know that there’s more to this time of year than just carefree fun and games. For even the festive season delivers its fair share of stress and strain.
For instance, there are the expectations and responsibilities of family that can often be quite demanding. Les Dawson, the British comedian, once said: ‘My mother-in-law’s been coming around to our house for Christmas for the past 17 years. This year we’re thinking of letting her in!’
Certainly, family dynamics at Christmastime are often complicated, to say the least. Particularly if there’s been a divorce, or some other kind of estrangement, or if there are underlying tensions between certain family members. For some, their annual family get-together at Christmas feels a bit like taking a stroll through a minefield. Maybe you’ve experienced your fair share of emotional shrapnel flying around your family at Christmas.
For others, the struggle of this season lies in family being far away. Or missing loved ones who have died, the grief of which is felt more sharply at this time. Many experience the constant ache of loneliness that is only heightened at Christmastime.
Then there’s the carefully planned, cleverly co-ordinated and meticulously executed assault of a consumerist culture that somehow convinces us to spend money we don’t really have to buy things we don’t really need.
Which is why so many people return to their jobs in January singing, “I owe, I owe, so it’s off to work I go.”
But there’s an even darker side to this season. The number of suicide attempts at this time of year is higher than at any other. Domestic violence will increase this month, as will the number of abandoned pets, teenage pregnancies, the incidence of drunk driving, and the number of road deaths.
What does this say to us as a society? Is all this shadowy stuff of this season just an unfortunate but inevitable consequence of people going on holiday and letting their hair down? Or is something deeper happening, something damaging that touches us on the level of our collective soul?
Whatever you might think about that, I’m sure you will agree that as individuals we can handle the holidays and Christmas and New Year in ways that either good for us or bad for us.
And so the simple question I want to pose at the start of this week’s devotions is this, ‘WHAT KIND OF FESTIVE SEASON DO YOU WANT TO HAVE THIS YEAR?’ I’d like to suggest that the answer to that question is not merely a matter of chance, depending on how obnoxious Uncle Herbert gets at Christmas lunch or whether you find a decent parking place at the Mall. There are choices that we can personally make that will determine the kind of festive season we will experience.
This week, the invitation is for you to become a little more mindful of the choices you will be making this Christmas, in the hope that your experience of this festive season will be more in keeping with what God intends for you.
PRAY AS YOU GO
O God, as Christmas draws near we know how easy it is to get caught up in so many non-essential and often superficial things. Help us to see more deeply into this season, and to recognise your presence at the very heart of it all. Amen.
SCRIPTURE READING
Luke 2:15
“Let’s go to Bethlehem and see for ourselves what God has revealed to us.”
It’s December, and the holiday season is upon us! For many people (though not all), the next month or so is a time to relax and unwind, and hopefully take things a little more leisurely.
And in the midst of it all, of course, there’s Christmas, with all of its festivities. And then there’s New Year, with all of its fanfare. There’s food and family, parties and presents, singing and celebrating. No wonder we call this the Festive Season.
All of which can be very good. It’s important to feast and to celebrate. To reconnect with family. To lighten up and laugh a little more. To spoil our loved ones, and maybe even be spoiled in return. This is part of the gift of this season.
But we all know that there’s more to this time of year than just carefree fun and games. For even the festive season delivers its fair share of stress and strain.
For instance, there are the expectations and responsibilities of family that can often be quite demanding. Les Dawson, the British comedian, once said: ‘My mother-in-law’s been coming around to our house for Christmas for the past 17 years. This year we’re thinking of letting her in!’
Certainly, family dynamics at Christmastime are often complicated, to say the least. Particularly if there’s been a divorce, or some other kind of estrangement, or if there are underlying tensions between certain family members. For some, their annual family get-together at Christmas feels a bit like taking a stroll through a minefield. Maybe you’ve experienced your fair share of emotional shrapnel flying around your family at Christmas.
For others, the struggle of this season lies in family being far away. Or missing loved ones who have died, the grief of which is felt more sharply at this time. Many experience the constant ache of loneliness that is only heightened at Christmastime.
Then there’s the carefully planned, cleverly co-ordinated and meticulously executed assault of a consumerist culture that somehow convinces us to spend money we don’t really have to buy things we don’t really need.
Which is why so many people return to their jobs in January singing, “I owe, I owe, so it’s off to work I go.”
But there’s an even darker side to this season. The number of suicide attempts at this time of year is higher than at any other. Domestic violence will increase this month, as will the number of abandoned pets, teenage pregnancies, the incidence of drunk driving, and the number of road deaths.
What does this say to us as a society? Is all this shadowy stuff of this season just an unfortunate but inevitable consequence of people going on holiday and letting their hair down? Or is something deeper happening, something damaging that touches us on the level of our collective soul?
Whatever you might think about that, I’m sure you will agree that as individuals we can handle the holidays and Christmas and New Year in ways that either good for us or bad for us.
And so the simple question I want to pose at the start of this week’s devotions is this, ‘WHAT KIND OF FESTIVE SEASON DO YOU WANT TO HAVE THIS YEAR?’ I’d like to suggest that the answer to that question is not merely a matter of chance, depending on how obnoxious Uncle Herbert gets at Christmas lunch or whether you find a decent parking place at the Mall. There are choices that we can personally make that will determine the kind of festive season we will experience.
This week, the invitation is for you to become a little more mindful of the choices you will be making this Christmas, in the hope that your experience of this festive season will be more in keeping with what God intends for you.
PRAY AS YOU GO
O God, as Christmas draws near we know how easy it is to get caught up in so many non-essential and often superficial things. Help us to see more deeply into this season, and to recognise your presence at the very heart of it all. Amen.
SCRIPTURE READING
Luke 2:15
“Let’s go to Bethlehem and see for ourselves what God has revealed to us.”
Friday 27 November 2009
Being a Hope-carrier
DAILY BYTE
This story teaches one other vital factor of water-walking to us – that it is to be a hope-carrier!
To be a water-walker is to carry a vision of God-possibilities with us wherever we go. Sure, we all get moments like Peter, where the size of our obstacles, the sheer Tsunami scale of evil gets the better of us and our spiritual imaginations ... and then we begin to sink under the weight of it all.
But here we need to remember again how Jesus immediately grabbed Peter’s hand, and then also rebuked him (although gently) for his little faith. Is this not a powerful reminder that to walk on water is to keep our eyes firmly fixed on Jesus (our hope)? Is this not a gracious reminder that Jesus is willing to work even with our little faith?
Of course it would be silly not to be aware of the waves surrounding us, waves of crime and fear and poverty and disease all mixed in with our own personal hurts and failings, but walking on water means that we are EVEN MORE AWARE of the goodness of the God who is near and the amazing possibilities that lie within that!
For it was only when Peter took his eyes off hope, and concentrated more on the bad news of the waves that he began to diminish ... shrink ... sink.
To walk on water is to live in hope. It’s not wishful thinking, but living and acting in anticipating God’s desire to eventually still the storm. To walk on water is hope not as resignation to an unjust world, but rather a refusal to accept that this is what God wants for humanity.
So then, may you hope and then hope some more. May you hope in the God who finds us lost or stuck within our own storms, who loves us and heals us, but then calls us to enter the bigger social storms of life more fully ... to trust more, to love more, to be more.
May you hope in the God who calls us to do crazy things like walk on water. To walk over the systems of evil and hatred present in this world, to break all ‘natural’ human-invented laws of vengeance, violence and selfishness.
May you hope in the God who has promised to never let us sink beneath the waves of our life storms, the God who takes us by the hand and lifts us up.
And may you be lifted up into all these things, and more. Amen.
PRAY AS YOU GO
God of Life, help me to live in hope always and to keep my eyes fixed firmly upon you. I don’t want to be nieve and unaware, I just want to live in a way that is even more aware of your presence in this world. In Jesus name I pray. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Matthew 14: 22-33 NRSV
Immediately he made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds. And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up the mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone, but by this time the boat, battered by the waves, was far from the land, for the wind was against them. And early in the morning he came walking toward them on the sea. But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, saying, "It is a ghost!" And they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, "Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid." Peter answered him, "Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water. "He said, "Come." So Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came toward Jesus. But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, "Lord, save me!" Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, "You of little faith, why did you doubt?" When they got into the boat, the wind ceased. And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, "Truly you are the Son of God."
This story teaches one other vital factor of water-walking to us – that it is to be a hope-carrier!
To be a water-walker is to carry a vision of God-possibilities with us wherever we go. Sure, we all get moments like Peter, where the size of our obstacles, the sheer Tsunami scale of evil gets the better of us and our spiritual imaginations ... and then we begin to sink under the weight of it all.
But here we need to remember again how Jesus immediately grabbed Peter’s hand, and then also rebuked him (although gently) for his little faith. Is this not a powerful reminder that to walk on water is to keep our eyes firmly fixed on Jesus (our hope)? Is this not a gracious reminder that Jesus is willing to work even with our little faith?
Of course it would be silly not to be aware of the waves surrounding us, waves of crime and fear and poverty and disease all mixed in with our own personal hurts and failings, but walking on water means that we are EVEN MORE AWARE of the goodness of the God who is near and the amazing possibilities that lie within that!
For it was only when Peter took his eyes off hope, and concentrated more on the bad news of the waves that he began to diminish ... shrink ... sink.
To walk on water is to live in hope. It’s not wishful thinking, but living and acting in anticipating God’s desire to eventually still the storm. To walk on water is hope not as resignation to an unjust world, but rather a refusal to accept that this is what God wants for humanity.
So then, may you hope and then hope some more. May you hope in the God who finds us lost or stuck within our own storms, who loves us and heals us, but then calls us to enter the bigger social storms of life more fully ... to trust more, to love more, to be more.
May you hope in the God who calls us to do crazy things like walk on water. To walk over the systems of evil and hatred present in this world, to break all ‘natural’ human-invented laws of vengeance, violence and selfishness.
May you hope in the God who has promised to never let us sink beneath the waves of our life storms, the God who takes us by the hand and lifts us up.
And may you be lifted up into all these things, and more. Amen.
PRAY AS YOU GO
God of Life, help me to live in hope always and to keep my eyes fixed firmly upon you. I don’t want to be nieve and unaware, I just want to live in a way that is even more aware of your presence in this world. In Jesus name I pray. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Matthew 14: 22-33 NRSV
Immediately he made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds. And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up the mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone, but by this time the boat, battered by the waves, was far from the land, for the wind was against them. And early in the morning he came walking toward them on the sea. But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, saying, "It is a ghost!" And they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, "Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid." Peter answered him, "Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water. "He said, "Come." So Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came toward Jesus. But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, "Lord, save me!" Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, "You of little faith, why did you doubt?" When they got into the boat, the wind ceased. And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, "Truly you are the Son of God."
What does it mean to be a Water-walker?
DAILY BYTE
Yet it is in the stepping out of our boats, that we begin to wrestle with the biggest question of this story, which is:
What does it actually mean (for us) to be a water-walker? What exactly is the story trying to teach us here?
People have often wondered about the laws of nature that Jesus seemingly broke with impunity as he strolled across a couple of metric tons of heaving H2O. How did he do it we wonder?
Yet, perhaps the deepest part of the story is not so much how Jesus walked on water, but rather why? To be spectacular and gain attention? Well, we know from how Jesus actively avoided the attention his miracles brought, that this was just not his style.
No, the point is this: Only God can walk on the waves! That’s what the Bible teaches. In Job. In Isaiah. In Habakkuk. In the Psalms.
In Bible-speak, it is God who walks the sea, calms the sea, tames the sea, parts the sea. Again, why?
Well, because in ancient Near Eastern thought, the sea was a place of evil. Leviathan lived there – the enemy of everything right and good dwelled in the water. In the Bible, deep water represented a place of sheer chaos. And in this story, God, in the person of Jesus, walks ON the sea, putting everything that is oppositional to God literally under his feet.
To be a water-walker means that we follow God in this journey of walking over evil.
Jesus broke all natural laws of science (as we understand them), by walking on water, but we are called to break many other ‘natural’ laws of humanity by how and why we live.
It seems totally unnatural to forgive great hurts, but that’s what Jesus calls us to do. That’s walking on water. It seems bizarre to love not only our friends and family, but also our enemies and those we fear. That’s walking on water.
It seems fundamentally crazy to turn away from a survival of the fittest and wealthiest and instead seek to live lives of service to widows, orphans, and the poor and the weak. Well, that is walking on water. That is walking over this world’s chaos, hurt and pain.
To walk on water is to follow Jesus in walking over evil, and work to overturn many of our ‘natural’ laws of injustice.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Almighty God, Lord of earth, sea and sky, you call me to follow you in overturning ‘natural’ human laws of un-forgiveness, greed and selfishness. Help me to walk on water as I obediently seek to do your will and work against the chaos in this world. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Matthew 14 : 28-33
Peter answered him, "Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water. "He said, "Come." So Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came toward Jesus. But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, "Lord, save me!" Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, "You of little faith, why did you doubt?" When they got into the boat, the wind ceased. And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, "Truly you are the Son of God."
Yet it is in the stepping out of our boats, that we begin to wrestle with the biggest question of this story, which is:
What does it actually mean (for us) to be a water-walker? What exactly is the story trying to teach us here?
People have often wondered about the laws of nature that Jesus seemingly broke with impunity as he strolled across a couple of metric tons of heaving H2O. How did he do it we wonder?
Yet, perhaps the deepest part of the story is not so much how Jesus walked on water, but rather why? To be spectacular and gain attention? Well, we know from how Jesus actively avoided the attention his miracles brought, that this was just not his style.
No, the point is this: Only God can walk on the waves! That’s what the Bible teaches. In Job. In Isaiah. In Habakkuk. In the Psalms.
In Bible-speak, it is God who walks the sea, calms the sea, tames the sea, parts the sea. Again, why?
Well, because in ancient Near Eastern thought, the sea was a place of evil. Leviathan lived there – the enemy of everything right and good dwelled in the water. In the Bible, deep water represented a place of sheer chaos. And in this story, God, in the person of Jesus, walks ON the sea, putting everything that is oppositional to God literally under his feet.
To be a water-walker means that we follow God in this journey of walking over evil.
Jesus broke all natural laws of science (as we understand them), by walking on water, but we are called to break many other ‘natural’ laws of humanity by how and why we live.
It seems totally unnatural to forgive great hurts, but that’s what Jesus calls us to do. That’s walking on water. It seems bizarre to love not only our friends and family, but also our enemies and those we fear. That’s walking on water.
It seems fundamentally crazy to turn away from a survival of the fittest and wealthiest and instead seek to live lives of service to widows, orphans, and the poor and the weak. Well, that is walking on water. That is walking over this world’s chaos, hurt and pain.
To walk on water is to follow Jesus in walking over evil, and work to overturn many of our ‘natural’ laws of injustice.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Almighty God, Lord of earth, sea and sky, you call me to follow you in overturning ‘natural’ human laws of un-forgiveness, greed and selfishness. Help me to walk on water as I obediently seek to do your will and work against the chaos in this world. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Matthew 14 : 28-33
Peter answered him, "Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water. "He said, "Come." So Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came toward Jesus. But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, "Lord, save me!" Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, "You of little faith, why did you doubt?" When they got into the boat, the wind ceased. And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, "Truly you are the Son of God."
Step out the Boat!
DAILY BYTE
If we are left with only yesterday’s message: That God is with us even in our darkest times, then that it is good and true message, but it is actually only half God’s message. You will notice that we have covered only half the material in this story so far.
Faith should do more than just bring comfort, it should also bring challenge. This story reminds us that the very nature of faith means being challenged to step out in some way: To be more, to become more, to share more.
Peter says to Jesus in Matt. 14. 28, “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” As John Ortberg has so famously said: “If you want to walk on water, you have to get out the boat.”
Sometimes our boats represent places of false security and safety for us. When I worked as a Youth Pastor, I spent years pastorally counselling a young teenage girl who had anorexia. We went through countless emergency visits, prayer times and hospital visitations until one day we both realised something.
She did not actually want to get better.
Perhaps in more frustration than I should have, I once asked her, “Do you really want to be healed?”
She gave me a strange look, thought for awhile, and then replied: “Actually I don’t think so. My anorexia is my thing, it brings me the attention I crave from my parents and friends. I can’t imagine my life without it.”
Sometimes we live in circles of dysfunction. It is like our little boat becomes stuck in a whirlpool and perpetually travels round and round the same old issues, never truly embracing the possibility of God-offered healing, wholeness and freedom.
There is no way of making this easier for us, and God does not even try. Notice that Jesus did not calm the waves for Peter. He just said ‘come,’ and within that call is a sense of ‘trust me, I’ll be here if you need me BUT if you want to walk on water, if you want to follow me, YOU HAVE TO GET OUT YOUR BOAT.
You have to leave behind your comfort zones and places of false security. It’s never going to be easy, but it just has to be done. Believing in God can give you wonderful life dreams, but following God will give you blisters. Or at the very least it will give you wet feet!
At the beginning of his ministry, Jesus called his disciples to become fishers of people, but about half way through comes this change, where Jesus began to say ‘well, now I need to teach you to carry a cross.’
To be healed, comforted, loved and encouraged is only part of the bigger salvation story that we get to step out into. A story that seeks to move us beyond us, if that makes any sense.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Gracious God, help me to obey your call to step more fully out into wherever you are calling me. Help me to get out of whatever boat I may be in, and to courageously follow you wherever you may lead. Amen
FOCUS READING
Matthew 14 : 28-33
Peter answered him, "Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water. "He said, "Come." So Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came toward Jesus. But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, "Lord, save me!" Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, "You of little faith, why did you doubt?" When they got into the boat, the wind ceased. And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, "Truly you are the Son of God."
If we are left with only yesterday’s message: That God is with us even in our darkest times, then that it is good and true message, but it is actually only half God’s message. You will notice that we have covered only half the material in this story so far.
Faith should do more than just bring comfort, it should also bring challenge. This story reminds us that the very nature of faith means being challenged to step out in some way: To be more, to become more, to share more.
Peter says to Jesus in Matt. 14. 28, “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” As John Ortberg has so famously said: “If you want to walk on water, you have to get out the boat.”
Sometimes our boats represent places of false security and safety for us. When I worked as a Youth Pastor, I spent years pastorally counselling a young teenage girl who had anorexia. We went through countless emergency visits, prayer times and hospital visitations until one day we both realised something.
She did not actually want to get better.
Perhaps in more frustration than I should have, I once asked her, “Do you really want to be healed?”
She gave me a strange look, thought for awhile, and then replied: “Actually I don’t think so. My anorexia is my thing, it brings me the attention I crave from my parents and friends. I can’t imagine my life without it.”
Sometimes we live in circles of dysfunction. It is like our little boat becomes stuck in a whirlpool and perpetually travels round and round the same old issues, never truly embracing the possibility of God-offered healing, wholeness and freedom.
There is no way of making this easier for us, and God does not even try. Notice that Jesus did not calm the waves for Peter. He just said ‘come,’ and within that call is a sense of ‘trust me, I’ll be here if you need me BUT if you want to walk on water, if you want to follow me, YOU HAVE TO GET OUT YOUR BOAT.
You have to leave behind your comfort zones and places of false security. It’s never going to be easy, but it just has to be done. Believing in God can give you wonderful life dreams, but following God will give you blisters. Or at the very least it will give you wet feet!
At the beginning of his ministry, Jesus called his disciples to become fishers of people, but about half way through comes this change, where Jesus began to say ‘well, now I need to teach you to carry a cross.’
To be healed, comforted, loved and encouraged is only part of the bigger salvation story that we get to step out into. A story that seeks to move us beyond us, if that makes any sense.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Gracious God, help me to obey your call to step more fully out into wherever you are calling me. Help me to get out of whatever boat I may be in, and to courageously follow you wherever you may lead. Amen
FOCUS READING
Matthew 14 : 28-33
Peter answered him, "Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water. "He said, "Come." So Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came toward Jesus. But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, "Lord, save me!" Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, "You of little faith, why did you doubt?" When they got into the boat, the wind ceased. And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, "Truly you are the Son of God."
God’s Presence in the Midst of Storms
DAILY BYTE
We are told that this story of the disciples caught in a storm occurred during the fourth watch of the night, between 3am and 6am. Have you ever lain awake until 3am in the morning fretting about something?
I don’t know if you have noticed, but ‘3 o’ Clock in the morning faith’ is always the hardest faith to come by.
This story hastens to comfort and encourage all who ever find themselves caught up in one of those inevitable life storms, by reminding us just how much we can trust God TO BE THERE in the midst of them with us.
If you read the whole story carefully, you will find that we are told three separate times that Jesus immediately does something. In the beginning of the story Jesus immediately sends his disciples out on a boat to cross to the other side. In the middle of the story Jesus immediately reassures them by saying it is he, and at the end of the story Jesus immediately reaches out to grab Peter’s hand.
There is an immediate sense of the divine in this story. Even while it crackles with lightening-strikes of tension, and has these thunder-rumbling undercurrents of fear, throughout there is this sense of the closeness of God.
If the centre of Matthew’s Gospel is this story, then the centre of the story itself are Jesus’ words of comfort to his fearful disciples which if we translated exactly word for word from the Greek would read: “take courage, I am, not be feared.” The ‘I am’ of course should be recognised as a divine affirmation.
This story affirms that your life can never get so dark and stormy that God cannot find you!
Yet notice that at this point in the story, Jesus does not take away the threat of the storm. This story is not about being spectacularly saved from our troubles but rather it is an affirmation that the presence of a loving God can bring us through times even when our very worst fears rage unchecked around us.
And so at the fourth watch of the night, at about 3am when faith is hardest to come by and when the chaos of the storm is at the peak of its powers, we need to know that God IS with us.
In the middle of our darkest nights, Jesus is always near.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Holy God, you are Lord of all life, and I give thanks to you that your loving presence surrounds and sustains me even during the very worst of my life’s storms. Help me to hold onto you always. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Matthew 14: 22-27 NRSV
Immediately he made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds. And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up the mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone, but by this time the boat, battered by the waves, was far from the land, for the wind was against them. And early in the morning he came walking toward them on the sea. But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, saying, "It is a ghost!" And they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, "Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid."
We are told that this story of the disciples caught in a storm occurred during the fourth watch of the night, between 3am and 6am. Have you ever lain awake until 3am in the morning fretting about something?
I don’t know if you have noticed, but ‘3 o’ Clock in the morning faith’ is always the hardest faith to come by.
This story hastens to comfort and encourage all who ever find themselves caught up in one of those inevitable life storms, by reminding us just how much we can trust God TO BE THERE in the midst of them with us.
If you read the whole story carefully, you will find that we are told three separate times that Jesus immediately does something. In the beginning of the story Jesus immediately sends his disciples out on a boat to cross to the other side. In the middle of the story Jesus immediately reassures them by saying it is he, and at the end of the story Jesus immediately reaches out to grab Peter’s hand.
There is an immediate sense of the divine in this story. Even while it crackles with lightening-strikes of tension, and has these thunder-rumbling undercurrents of fear, throughout there is this sense of the closeness of God.
If the centre of Matthew’s Gospel is this story, then the centre of the story itself are Jesus’ words of comfort to his fearful disciples which if we translated exactly word for word from the Greek would read: “take courage, I am, not be feared.” The ‘I am’ of course should be recognised as a divine affirmation.
This story affirms that your life can never get so dark and stormy that God cannot find you!
Yet notice that at this point in the story, Jesus does not take away the threat of the storm. This story is not about being spectacularly saved from our troubles but rather it is an affirmation that the presence of a loving God can bring us through times even when our very worst fears rage unchecked around us.
And so at the fourth watch of the night, at about 3am when faith is hardest to come by and when the chaos of the storm is at the peak of its powers, we need to know that God IS with us.
In the middle of our darkest nights, Jesus is always near.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Holy God, you are Lord of all life, and I give thanks to you that your loving presence surrounds and sustains me even during the very worst of my life’s storms. Help me to hold onto you always. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Matthew 14: 22-27 NRSV
Immediately he made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds. And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up the mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone, but by this time the boat, battered by the waves, was far from the land, for the wind was against them. And early in the morning he came walking toward them on the sea. But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, saying, "It is a ghost!" And they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, "Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid."
Storms Happen!
DAILY BYTE
The community that Matthew’s Gospel was written for were brutally persecuted for their faith. Many of them had lost an eye or limb, parent or child, friend or sibling because of religious violence. That must really take it out of a community leaving disillusionment and fear in its wake.
Right in the middle of Matthew’s Gospel, (Matthew 14. 22-33), comes the story of the disciples caught in the storm and Jesus walking on water. One scholar argues that the words and images of this story actually form part of the very heart of Matthew’s Gospel because this story was Matthew’s attempt as a pastor to bring hope and encouragement to his bruised and broken people.
Perhaps this is why a story that is so vividly permeated by danger, and which reeks with human fear, resonates with us as powerfully as it does, because we ALL know this, that:
In everyone’s life, storms inevitably occur.
Matthew 14.24 reads: “by this time the boat, battered by the waves, was far from the land, for the wind was against them.”
The Greek word translated as “batter” here is basanizo, which means to torture and torment. The Greek adjective to describe the wind is enantios which suggests active opposition or hostility.
Obviously knowing that Matthew’s community was suffering persecution helps us understand why he used images and words like this. In its larger context, this is the story of Matthew’s church, fearful and confused, looking for something to grasp onto in the midst of their suffering.
In its largest context, this is the story of every human being, because life seems inevitably full of storms beyond our control, and sometimes we move between doubt and faith; between focussing on storms or focussing on Jesus; between huddling down in fear in the boat or courageously risking all to walk on water.
Gordon MacDonald tells the story of a massive storm which hit his property and destroyed his driveway. MacDonald called out a builder to repair it but while he was there, the builder’s truck got stuck in some mud. So he fetched his bulldozer to pull it out, attached a chain to the truck, and then revved up the bulldozer. The chain took the strain and ... snapped! The mud won!
MacDonald makes the point that the fault didn’t lie with the bulldozer for it was more than powerful enough to do the job. No, the fault lay with the chain for as soon as the builder fetched a stronger, thicker chain he managed to pull his truck out the mud.
So here’s a question worth wrestling with: Is the faith connection that enables us to trundle merrily along on sunny, warm, happy days, is that strong enough to keep us connected to God without breaking when these inevitable stormy and muddy life moments occur?
PRAY AS YOU GO
Almighty God, in the midst of my own life storms, may you strengthen my faith so that I will never let go of you and your promises to me. Amen.
FOCUS VERSE
Matthew 14: 22-33 NRSV
Immediately he made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds. And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up the mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone, but by this time the boat, battered by the waves, was far from the land, for the wind was against them. And early in the morning he came walking toward them on the sea. But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, saying, "It is a ghost!" And they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, "Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid." Peter answered him, "Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water. "He said, "Come." So Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came toward Jesus. But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, "Lord, save me!" Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, "You of little faith, why did you doubt?" When they got into the boat, the wind ceased. And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, "Truly you are the Son of God."
The community that Matthew’s Gospel was written for were brutally persecuted for their faith. Many of them had lost an eye or limb, parent or child, friend or sibling because of religious violence. That must really take it out of a community leaving disillusionment and fear in its wake.
Right in the middle of Matthew’s Gospel, (Matthew 14. 22-33), comes the story of the disciples caught in the storm and Jesus walking on water. One scholar argues that the words and images of this story actually form part of the very heart of Matthew’s Gospel because this story was Matthew’s attempt as a pastor to bring hope and encouragement to his bruised and broken people.
Perhaps this is why a story that is so vividly permeated by danger, and which reeks with human fear, resonates with us as powerfully as it does, because we ALL know this, that:
In everyone’s life, storms inevitably occur.
Matthew 14.24 reads: “by this time the boat, battered by the waves, was far from the land, for the wind was against them.”
The Greek word translated as “batter” here is basanizo, which means to torture and torment. The Greek adjective to describe the wind is enantios which suggests active opposition or hostility.
Obviously knowing that Matthew’s community was suffering persecution helps us understand why he used images and words like this. In its larger context, this is the story of Matthew’s church, fearful and confused, looking for something to grasp onto in the midst of their suffering.
In its largest context, this is the story of every human being, because life seems inevitably full of storms beyond our control, and sometimes we move between doubt and faith; between focussing on storms or focussing on Jesus; between huddling down in fear in the boat or courageously risking all to walk on water.
Gordon MacDonald tells the story of a massive storm which hit his property and destroyed his driveway. MacDonald called out a builder to repair it but while he was there, the builder’s truck got stuck in some mud. So he fetched his bulldozer to pull it out, attached a chain to the truck, and then revved up the bulldozer. The chain took the strain and ... snapped! The mud won!
MacDonald makes the point that the fault didn’t lie with the bulldozer for it was more than powerful enough to do the job. No, the fault lay with the chain for as soon as the builder fetched a stronger, thicker chain he managed to pull his truck out the mud.
So here’s a question worth wrestling with: Is the faith connection that enables us to trundle merrily along on sunny, warm, happy days, is that strong enough to keep us connected to God without breaking when these inevitable stormy and muddy life moments occur?
PRAY AS YOU GO
Almighty God, in the midst of my own life storms, may you strengthen my faith so that I will never let go of you and your promises to me. Amen.
FOCUS VERSE
Matthew 14: 22-33 NRSV
Immediately he made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds. And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up the mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone, but by this time the boat, battered by the waves, was far from the land, for the wind was against them. And early in the morning he came walking toward them on the sea. But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, saying, "It is a ghost!" And they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, "Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid." Peter answered him, "Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water. "He said, "Come." So Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came toward Jesus. But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, "Lord, save me!" Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, "You of little faith, why did you doubt?" When they got into the boat, the wind ceased. And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, "Truly you are the Son of God."
Monday 23 November 2009
Wind
DAILY BYTE
There is one further lesson about calling that the story of Abraham teaches us, and this is going to sound a little strange initially. But it is that following our calling is like walking with the wind at our backs.
Did you notice that the original poem of Abraham’s call ends on somewhat of a jarring note? It says in Genesis 12.3 that “I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse.”
What are we to understand by this? In the midst of promised blessing, why is it ok to include a curse? Is that not just mean and petty and vengeful?
Well, Brian McLaren helps us to understand this part of the call better by reminding us of the old Irish blessing of the wind being at your back, and saying that the idea of cursing on this poem suggests that any who oppose Abraham’s descendants in their co-operation with God would find the wind of God’s displeasure in their faces.
Abraham’s call extends to all who are descended from him. Biblically that means all of us who have chosen to follow his God. We are ALL part of Abraham’s faith family and we are all being enrolled as God’s helpers or collaborators ... and THE WIND will be at our backs as we co-operate with God in the ongoing creation of goodness in this world.
Yet, equally it is true that any who opposes the general direction of this good would be working against God, they would be fighting the wind of God’s presence in this world, they would be walking into the wind!
I remember recently running down Curry Road in Durban and feeling great. I was just flying along! It was only when I moved up to Musgrave Road (parallel to Curry) and began running in the opposite direction that I found I had previously been running with the wind at my back. I found that running into the wind was nowhere near as easy or pleasant.
In essence then, hearing and obeying our calling is to walk with the wind of God’s spirit at our backs.
So then, may you stop to listen to that hard-to-hear voice that is carried along on the wind. May you hear and see how God is continually working his goodness and love, and continually recreating grace and mercy into this broken, hurting world. God has started a resistance movement against all evil in this world and so God desires all of us who have descended from Abraham in faith to begin walking in a direction with this wind at our backs.
May this be you and me ... may we hear the call and may we walk with the wind of God’s spirit at our backs.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Almighty God, help me to listen constantly for your voice, and help me to walk with the wind of your Spirit at my back. I commit myself to being a part of your ongoing creation of goodness in this world. In Jesus name I pray. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Genesis 12: 1-4
Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed." So Abram went, as the LORD had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran.
There is one further lesson about calling that the story of Abraham teaches us, and this is going to sound a little strange initially. But it is that following our calling is like walking with the wind at our backs.
Did you notice that the original poem of Abraham’s call ends on somewhat of a jarring note? It says in Genesis 12.3 that “I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse.”
What are we to understand by this? In the midst of promised blessing, why is it ok to include a curse? Is that not just mean and petty and vengeful?
Well, Brian McLaren helps us to understand this part of the call better by reminding us of the old Irish blessing of the wind being at your back, and saying that the idea of cursing on this poem suggests that any who oppose Abraham’s descendants in their co-operation with God would find the wind of God’s displeasure in their faces.
Abraham’s call extends to all who are descended from him. Biblically that means all of us who have chosen to follow his God. We are ALL part of Abraham’s faith family and we are all being enrolled as God’s helpers or collaborators ... and THE WIND will be at our backs as we co-operate with God in the ongoing creation of goodness in this world.
Yet, equally it is true that any who opposes the general direction of this good would be working against God, they would be fighting the wind of God’s presence in this world, they would be walking into the wind!
I remember recently running down Curry Road in Durban and feeling great. I was just flying along! It was only when I moved up to Musgrave Road (parallel to Curry) and began running in the opposite direction that I found I had previously been running with the wind at my back. I found that running into the wind was nowhere near as easy or pleasant.
In essence then, hearing and obeying our calling is to walk with the wind of God’s spirit at our backs.
So then, may you stop to listen to that hard-to-hear voice that is carried along on the wind. May you hear and see how God is continually working his goodness and love, and continually recreating grace and mercy into this broken, hurting world. God has started a resistance movement against all evil in this world and so God desires all of us who have descended from Abraham in faith to begin walking in a direction with this wind at our backs.
May this be you and me ... may we hear the call and may we walk with the wind of God’s spirit at our backs.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Almighty God, help me to listen constantly for your voice, and help me to walk with the wind of your Spirit at my back. I commit myself to being a part of your ongoing creation of goodness in this world. In Jesus name I pray. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Genesis 12: 1-4
Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed." So Abram went, as the LORD had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran.
Enough?
DAILY BYTE
When it comes to sharing our blessings, greed is not the only thing we wrestle with, for there is also fear. When we look at what we have, we fear that we don’t really have much worth offering others. We hang back and hesitate in the act of giving ourselves because we are anxious that that we don’t have anything of real value to offer.
A wonderful story is told of Pope John Paul II. Now as a pope he did many wonderful things – he healed divides, wrote books and brought peace. But three little girls will remember that the greatest thing he ever did was kiss them on the head.
What happened was that the pope was very late in attending a certain function, and that many had queued for hours outside the function venue in the hope of just catching a glimpse of him as he entered.
When the pope arrived he was being hurried along by his harassed retinue, when suddenly he stopped in his tracks, drawn by the sight of three energised and youthful faces in the crowd alongside him. Smiling, the pope waved away those who were trying to hurry him along, and he stopped and blessed each one of these little girls by touching them on the forehead and then kissing them.
Their mother burst into tears of joy, whilst others in the crowd were overcome with emotion as they recognised a holy and sacred moment. A busy, overstretched man, a leader on the world stage, found the time to stop and share of himself in a relatively small way with three little girls.
As William Wordsworth once wrote: “That best portion of a good person’s life, those little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love.”
You may not feel that you have much worth offering others, but know that the tiniest, most unremembered acts of kindness and love are immeasurably worth-filled in God’s economy.
Simply because you are blessed to be a blessing, whatever you are blessed with WILL BE ENOUGH to bring tremendous blessing to others as well.
As you wrestle with your blessings, never forget that.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Holy God, whatever I have to offer this world will be enough when it has been blessed by you. Thank you for this comforting truth. Help me to courageously offer myself in your service both in big and small ways knowing that every action in your name really means something. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Isaiah 52: 7
How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of the messenger who announces peace, who brings good news, who announces salvation, who says to Zion, "Your God reigns."
When it comes to sharing our blessings, greed is not the only thing we wrestle with, for there is also fear. When we look at what we have, we fear that we don’t really have much worth offering others. We hang back and hesitate in the act of giving ourselves because we are anxious that that we don’t have anything of real value to offer.
A wonderful story is told of Pope John Paul II. Now as a pope he did many wonderful things – he healed divides, wrote books and brought peace. But three little girls will remember that the greatest thing he ever did was kiss them on the head.
What happened was that the pope was very late in attending a certain function, and that many had queued for hours outside the function venue in the hope of just catching a glimpse of him as he entered.
When the pope arrived he was being hurried along by his harassed retinue, when suddenly he stopped in his tracks, drawn by the sight of three energised and youthful faces in the crowd alongside him. Smiling, the pope waved away those who were trying to hurry him along, and he stopped and blessed each one of these little girls by touching them on the forehead and then kissing them.
Their mother burst into tears of joy, whilst others in the crowd were overcome with emotion as they recognised a holy and sacred moment. A busy, overstretched man, a leader on the world stage, found the time to stop and share of himself in a relatively small way with three little girls.
As William Wordsworth once wrote: “That best portion of a good person’s life, those little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love.”
You may not feel that you have much worth offering others, but know that the tiniest, most unremembered acts of kindness and love are immeasurably worth-filled in God’s economy.
Simply because you are blessed to be a blessing, whatever you are blessed with WILL BE ENOUGH to bring tremendous blessing to others as well.
As you wrestle with your blessings, never forget that.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Holy God, whatever I have to offer this world will be enough when it has been blessed by you. Thank you for this comforting truth. Help me to courageously offer myself in your service both in big and small ways knowing that every action in your name really means something. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Isaiah 52: 7
How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of the messenger who announces peace, who brings good news, who announces salvation, who says to Zion, "Your God reigns."
Blessing
DAILY BYTE
The next aspect of calling that Abraham’s story helps us understand more clearly can be summarised in the following way:
Calling is wrestling with your blessing.
In Genesis 12. 2, Abraham is told that, “I will bless you, and make your name great, SO THAT YOU WILL BE A BLESSING.”
What we religious people do is continually make the mistake of living as if we have been chosen by God only so that we may personally be blessed. Yet when we do this, when we forget that we are blessed TO BE a blessing, we distort our truest identity and we drift from God’s calling for us.
When we assume that we have been blessed exclusively rather than instrumentally; and when we see ourselves as blessed to the exclusion of others rather than for the benefit of others, then we become part of the problem instead of the solution.
Follow a calling almost always involves wrestling with blessing. If I have been blessed with millions of rands, is it really so that I can have a big house and lots of cars. Is that why? Really?
Or if I have been blessed with incredibly singing or artistic talent, is it really so that I can fulfill my need to be the centre of attention. Is that why? Really?
We are always going to need to actively wrestle with our blessing, because our tendency is to want to take whatever we may be blessed with and make it all about us. To hoard it and keep it only for ourselves.
But God’s calling will never let us forget that we are blessed so that we might become a blessing to others.
How might God want you to begin using your blessings for the benefit of others?
PRAY AS YOU GO
Gracious God, thank you for pouring your blessings upon me. Help me to truly appreciate all that I have, and to creatively use these blessings to benefit others. Amen
FOCUS READING
Genesis 12: 1-2
Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.
Isaiah 52: 7
How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of the messenger who announces peace, who brings good news, who announces salvation, who says to Zion, "Your God reigns."
The next aspect of calling that Abraham’s story helps us understand more clearly can be summarised in the following way:
Calling is wrestling with your blessing.
In Genesis 12. 2, Abraham is told that, “I will bless you, and make your name great, SO THAT YOU WILL BE A BLESSING.”
What we religious people do is continually make the mistake of living as if we have been chosen by God only so that we may personally be blessed. Yet when we do this, when we forget that we are blessed TO BE a blessing, we distort our truest identity and we drift from God’s calling for us.
When we assume that we have been blessed exclusively rather than instrumentally; and when we see ourselves as blessed to the exclusion of others rather than for the benefit of others, then we become part of the problem instead of the solution.
Follow a calling almost always involves wrestling with blessing. If I have been blessed with millions of rands, is it really so that I can have a big house and lots of cars. Is that why? Really?
Or if I have been blessed with incredibly singing or artistic talent, is it really so that I can fulfill my need to be the centre of attention. Is that why? Really?
We are always going to need to actively wrestle with our blessing, because our tendency is to want to take whatever we may be blessed with and make it all about us. To hoard it and keep it only for ourselves.
But God’s calling will never let us forget that we are blessed so that we might become a blessing to others.
How might God want you to begin using your blessings for the benefit of others?
PRAY AS YOU GO
Gracious God, thank you for pouring your blessings upon me. Help me to truly appreciate all that I have, and to creatively use these blessings to benefit others. Amen
FOCUS READING
Genesis 12: 1-2
Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.
Isaiah 52: 7
How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of the messenger who announces peace, who brings good news, who announces salvation, who says to Zion, "Your God reigns."
Becoming
DAILY BYTE
If the beginning of all calling is listening (see yesterday), then the story of Abram teaches us another wonderful truth about calling: It is that calling is about becoming. Abram is told to leave behind all his securities (land and family), and to go out dressed only in the promises of God.
Calling always addresses issues of identity – those places we gain security, meaning, definition and purpose. We later learn that there is some irony behind God’s promise to bless Abram and make of him a great nation, because he and Sarai are barren, they have been unable to conceive for all their roughly 75 years of life.
As Abram’s story unfold, it seems that this barrenness is deeply wrapped up in who he was and how he perceived himself. It was as if God was challenging him by saying: “Abram, you may think you and Sarai are empty inside and don’t have much to offer the world in the way of life, but this is not my plan for you. When I look at you, I don’t just see the person you are right now, but the person I made you to be!”
When we think about call, we often make the mistake of starting with what we are supposed to do, but a far deeper dimension of God’s calling is to become. Your calling is intrinsically wrapped up in your identity – the person God had in mind when he first thought you up!
You cannot succeed in what you do and fail in who you are!
Recently, a good friend of mine was tragically killed when surf ski paddling just outside Port Elizabeth. I flew down to his funeral, and let me tell you he was a very talented person. He could DO lots of things! He was intelligent, musical and a natural leader. But at his funeral what people spoke about and cried about was not to do with any of those things – it was to do with WHO he was.
They spoke of his passion, faith and integrity. As he followed his call, it was his character and core identity that most marked others.
A couple of chapters after this call, Abram is given a new name – Abraham. While Abram means ‘father,’ Abraham steps up the irony a notch further because it means ‘father of nations.’ When he was given his new name, Abraham was 99 and still without children … God’s promise had not come through for him yet.
Can you imagine how he felt standing up at parties, aged 99 and with no children, and yet introducing himself as ‘Father of nations’?
But that’s exactly the point.
It takes faith to feel naked, empty, even barren and yet still trust that God will bring new life into this world through us not so much by what we can do but by WHO WE BECOME.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Holy God, may you graciously work your life into me as I gradually become who you originally created me to be. In this way, I ask that you would use me to bring life and hope to others. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Genesis 12: 1-2
Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.
If the beginning of all calling is listening (see yesterday), then the story of Abram teaches us another wonderful truth about calling: It is that calling is about becoming. Abram is told to leave behind all his securities (land and family), and to go out dressed only in the promises of God.
Calling always addresses issues of identity – those places we gain security, meaning, definition and purpose. We later learn that there is some irony behind God’s promise to bless Abram and make of him a great nation, because he and Sarai are barren, they have been unable to conceive for all their roughly 75 years of life.
As Abram’s story unfold, it seems that this barrenness is deeply wrapped up in who he was and how he perceived himself. It was as if God was challenging him by saying: “Abram, you may think you and Sarai are empty inside and don’t have much to offer the world in the way of life, but this is not my plan for you. When I look at you, I don’t just see the person you are right now, but the person I made you to be!”
When we think about call, we often make the mistake of starting with what we are supposed to do, but a far deeper dimension of God’s calling is to become. Your calling is intrinsically wrapped up in your identity – the person God had in mind when he first thought you up!
You cannot succeed in what you do and fail in who you are!
Recently, a good friend of mine was tragically killed when surf ski paddling just outside Port Elizabeth. I flew down to his funeral, and let me tell you he was a very talented person. He could DO lots of things! He was intelligent, musical and a natural leader. But at his funeral what people spoke about and cried about was not to do with any of those things – it was to do with WHO he was.
They spoke of his passion, faith and integrity. As he followed his call, it was his character and core identity that most marked others.
A couple of chapters after this call, Abram is given a new name – Abraham. While Abram means ‘father,’ Abraham steps up the irony a notch further because it means ‘father of nations.’ When he was given his new name, Abraham was 99 and still without children … God’s promise had not come through for him yet.
Can you imagine how he felt standing up at parties, aged 99 and with no children, and yet introducing himself as ‘Father of nations’?
But that’s exactly the point.
It takes faith to feel naked, empty, even barren and yet still trust that God will bring new life into this world through us not so much by what we can do but by WHO WE BECOME.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Holy God, may you graciously work your life into me as I gradually become who you originally created me to be. In this way, I ask that you would use me to bring life and hope to others. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Genesis 12: 1-2
Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.
Symphony
DAILY BYTE
If you had to compose a symphony based on the salvation story (as it is recorded in Scripture), you probably would have to begin with the most beautiful, soul-stirring and life-giving notes that you could find. This would describe God’s act of creation ... God singing, harmonising and bringing everything into being.
However, after the Fall of Adam and Eve described in Genesis 3, there would have been a sudden change in our symphony to discordant, jarring notes – something almost heavy-metal in tone. This would well symbolise the chaos that ensued as a result of Adam and Eve’s disobedience.
The third part of the symphony would have brought another drastic change. This time there would have been silence. Not outright silence but something so soft that it would have been on the edge of hearing that you would have to strain to hear it.
This is because the third part of the salvation story represents calling, and at its very heart, calling is about listening. We have many misconceptions and misunderstandings about calling and what it means for us, so if you are going to remember anything – let it be this – that calling is about listening.
In fact, if you look at the stories of chaos found in the book of Genesis between chapters 3-11 (the heavy metal part of our symphony), you will find that central to them is the failure to listen and the result is a falling out of harmony with God’s creative and redemptive music.
Adam and Eve did not really listen to what God had to say about the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Cain killed Abel because he failed to truly listen to what God had to say about his worship offerings. In Noah’s time, a flood wiped out humanity because they stopped listening to God and instead were doing evil.
Even the Tower of Babel story is about a people who once shared a common language, but then lost the ability to hear and understand each other because of their pride, arrogance and selfishness.
It is then our salvation symphony takes its shift. Genesis 12 is about the first time God called people to begin doing something about the chaos. It is a faint song that you will really have to stop and listen for carefully before you will be able to hear it at all.
Calling is listening! This monumental shift in the symphony, the salvation story, begins with, “the Lord said to Abram” (Genesis 12. 1), but it would also have ended right there if Abram had not stopped to listen.
Calling is listening – without that none of us will have a beginning in God.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Almighty God, help me to hear you today – give me the strength and discipline I need to put aside everything that weighs me down and dominates my thoughts, and allow me to simply listen for your voice. Not only today, but may this become a constant discipline of my life. Amen.
FOCUS VERSE
Genesis 12: 1-2
Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.
If you had to compose a symphony based on the salvation story (as it is recorded in Scripture), you probably would have to begin with the most beautiful, soul-stirring and life-giving notes that you could find. This would describe God’s act of creation ... God singing, harmonising and bringing everything into being.
However, after the Fall of Adam and Eve described in Genesis 3, there would have been a sudden change in our symphony to discordant, jarring notes – something almost heavy-metal in tone. This would well symbolise the chaos that ensued as a result of Adam and Eve’s disobedience.
The third part of the symphony would have brought another drastic change. This time there would have been silence. Not outright silence but something so soft that it would have been on the edge of hearing that you would have to strain to hear it.
This is because the third part of the salvation story represents calling, and at its very heart, calling is about listening. We have many misconceptions and misunderstandings about calling and what it means for us, so if you are going to remember anything – let it be this – that calling is about listening.
In fact, if you look at the stories of chaos found in the book of Genesis between chapters 3-11 (the heavy metal part of our symphony), you will find that central to them is the failure to listen and the result is a falling out of harmony with God’s creative and redemptive music.
Adam and Eve did not really listen to what God had to say about the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Cain killed Abel because he failed to truly listen to what God had to say about his worship offerings. In Noah’s time, a flood wiped out humanity because they stopped listening to God and instead were doing evil.
Even the Tower of Babel story is about a people who once shared a common language, but then lost the ability to hear and understand each other because of their pride, arrogance and selfishness.
It is then our salvation symphony takes its shift. Genesis 12 is about the first time God called people to begin doing something about the chaos. It is a faint song that you will really have to stop and listen for carefully before you will be able to hear it at all.
Calling is listening! This monumental shift in the symphony, the salvation story, begins with, “the Lord said to Abram” (Genesis 12. 1), but it would also have ended right there if Abram had not stopped to listen.
Calling is listening – without that none of us will have a beginning in God.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Almighty God, help me to hear you today – give me the strength and discipline I need to put aside everything that weighs me down and dominates my thoughts, and allow me to simply listen for your voice. Not only today, but may this become a constant discipline of my life. Amen.
FOCUS VERSE
Genesis 12: 1-2
Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.
Wednesday 18 November 2009
Building the Temple
DAILY BYTE
When I was in primary school, my older brother and I were friends with another boy and girl the same ages. We used to play outside for hours on end until one day, we decided we needed a clubhouse. So, we hauled things and built shelves and made desks, and moved out the old, smelly port-a-loo, making that shack our castle. And to accomplish these tasks my brother gave us all roles. We even had official, laminated business cards. He – was the president. His friend was the Vice-president. My friend was the Treasurer. And I, was the Janitor...
We’ve been talking about building and working this week, so I hope you’ve been thinking about the jobs you have been given and have chosen both inside and outside the church – some of them more glamorous than others. But we’re not just talking about the specific occupation that we get paid for. We’re talking about the purpose behind all our actions. Haggai didn’t just want the people to build a temple building – he called them to build the place where God dwelled – a place that embodied hope, life, prosperity and peace.
Our chief aim in life is not to become workaholics. Our chief aim in church is not to become busybodies, involved in every activity, but we can’t remember why. Our chief aim is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. So, if you are an accountant, a stay-at-home-mom, a domestic worker, a politician, a builder - every occupation and life has at its heart the torn down rubble and the building up of a temple. And you can choose whether or not you want to build it. The challenges of building each temple are slightly different.
Your occupation may require you to act in ways that you feel are ungodly. Perhaps part of building the temple of God within and around you is acknowledging unethical behavior, actively fighting against it and the powers that enable it.
Or, if you do work that seems mundane or without meaning, maybe God is asking you to open your eyes to his presence around you so that jobs like spray-painting lemons and cleaning toilets become less about their initial lack of glamour and more about the lives of the people you work with and the lives of those who eat the lemons and use the loos.
Perhaps neither of those situations apply, and your job brings great joy to you and glory to God! If so, give thanks for that today!
Perhaps you don’t have a job at all, and maybe, for all of us, the dirt and rubble in our life does not have to do with a job, but it comes from feeling like life lacks spiritual depth or growth. So, perhaps for us, building God’s temple means taking up a spiritual discipline – like writing in a prayer journal, fasting something you feel like you can’t live without, planting vegetables, spending more quality time with your family, reconciling with someone, taking time out to serve others and help build their temples, too, or joining a fellowship group that can keep you accountable to such disciplines.
These are not the occupational curses of being human. They are the deep blessings of God for our lives because when we work to build God’s temple within ourselves and in the world, God says he will “shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land – shake all the nations so that the treasure of all nations shall come.” And that doesn’t necessarily mean he will make you very rich – which is what most people and many churches seem to think is the meaning of God’s prosperity and the proper reward for hard work. When God shakes the nations and shakes up our lives, we may not get showered with gold, but nothing ever remains the same. Nothing can remain the status quo when we acknowledge that every part of our lives and the temples we build belong to God. And through God’s true work, all are given prosperity and peace. The word that the scriptures use at the end of this passage is Shalom – which means a thriving for the whole community.
Haggai is considered by many to be the only successful prophet because the people actually listened to him! They heard his message of hope, and they rebuilt the temple into a hub of administrative, economic, and religious life, empowering the work of God in the world at that time. And so, be unafraid to build God’s temple within your own life and work. Take what you pray about here today and work to act on it.
FOCUS TEXT
Haggai 2:6-2:9
For thus says the Lord of hosts: Once again, in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land; and I will shake all the nations, so that the treasure of all nations shall come, and I will fill this house with splendor, says the Lord of hosts. The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, says the Lord of hosts. The latter splendor of this house shall be greater than the former, says the Lord of hosts; and in this place I will give SHALOM, says the Lord of hosts.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Rebuilding God, remind us again of your presence, but also shake us up so that we will be unafraid and empowered to do the things you ask us to. Help us to be doers of Your word and not hearers only, working in ways that bring life to ourselves and to Your whole world. Amen.
When I was in primary school, my older brother and I were friends with another boy and girl the same ages. We used to play outside for hours on end until one day, we decided we needed a clubhouse. So, we hauled things and built shelves and made desks, and moved out the old, smelly port-a-loo, making that shack our castle. And to accomplish these tasks my brother gave us all roles. We even had official, laminated business cards. He – was the president. His friend was the Vice-president. My friend was the Treasurer. And I, was the Janitor...
We’ve been talking about building and working this week, so I hope you’ve been thinking about the jobs you have been given and have chosen both inside and outside the church – some of them more glamorous than others. But we’re not just talking about the specific occupation that we get paid for. We’re talking about the purpose behind all our actions. Haggai didn’t just want the people to build a temple building – he called them to build the place where God dwelled – a place that embodied hope, life, prosperity and peace.
Our chief aim in life is not to become workaholics. Our chief aim in church is not to become busybodies, involved in every activity, but we can’t remember why. Our chief aim is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. So, if you are an accountant, a stay-at-home-mom, a domestic worker, a politician, a builder - every occupation and life has at its heart the torn down rubble and the building up of a temple. And you can choose whether or not you want to build it. The challenges of building each temple are slightly different.
Your occupation may require you to act in ways that you feel are ungodly. Perhaps part of building the temple of God within and around you is acknowledging unethical behavior, actively fighting against it and the powers that enable it.
Or, if you do work that seems mundane or without meaning, maybe God is asking you to open your eyes to his presence around you so that jobs like spray-painting lemons and cleaning toilets become less about their initial lack of glamour and more about the lives of the people you work with and the lives of those who eat the lemons and use the loos.
Perhaps neither of those situations apply, and your job brings great joy to you and glory to God! If so, give thanks for that today!
Perhaps you don’t have a job at all, and maybe, for all of us, the dirt and rubble in our life does not have to do with a job, but it comes from feeling like life lacks spiritual depth or growth. So, perhaps for us, building God’s temple means taking up a spiritual discipline – like writing in a prayer journal, fasting something you feel like you can’t live without, planting vegetables, spending more quality time with your family, reconciling with someone, taking time out to serve others and help build their temples, too, or joining a fellowship group that can keep you accountable to such disciplines.
These are not the occupational curses of being human. They are the deep blessings of God for our lives because when we work to build God’s temple within ourselves and in the world, God says he will “shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land – shake all the nations so that the treasure of all nations shall come.” And that doesn’t necessarily mean he will make you very rich – which is what most people and many churches seem to think is the meaning of God’s prosperity and the proper reward for hard work. When God shakes the nations and shakes up our lives, we may not get showered with gold, but nothing ever remains the same. Nothing can remain the status quo when we acknowledge that every part of our lives and the temples we build belong to God. And through God’s true work, all are given prosperity and peace. The word that the scriptures use at the end of this passage is Shalom – which means a thriving for the whole community.
Haggai is considered by many to be the only successful prophet because the people actually listened to him! They heard his message of hope, and they rebuilt the temple into a hub of administrative, economic, and religious life, empowering the work of God in the world at that time. And so, be unafraid to build God’s temple within your own life and work. Take what you pray about here today and work to act on it.
FOCUS TEXT
Haggai 2:6-2:9
For thus says the Lord of hosts: Once again, in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land; and I will shake all the nations, so that the treasure of all nations shall come, and I will fill this house with splendor, says the Lord of hosts. The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, says the Lord of hosts. The latter splendor of this house shall be greater than the former, says the Lord of hosts; and in this place I will give SHALOM, says the Lord of hosts.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Rebuilding God, remind us again of your presence, but also shake us up so that we will be unafraid and empowered to do the things you ask us to. Help us to be doers of Your word and not hearers only, working in ways that bring life to ourselves and to Your whole world. Amen.
Take courage!
DAILY BYTE
If your life feels like a heap of rubble, and the future doesn’t seem any brighter than the past... If you’ve gone through life feeling like you’ve worked hard but have failed to achieve what you hoped – what is the impetus for working more?
Well, we looked yesterday at the prophet Haggai, and it's important for us to recognize that the prophecy is set "In the second year of King Darius, in the seventh month, on the twenty-first day of the month." It is set in what would have been The Feast of Booths - Sukkot - sometimes called the Festival of Tabernacles. This was the time when Israelites commemorated the dedication of the Temple to God as well as the way God freed them from bondage in Egypt to live in temporary shacks - or booths - as they wandered in the wilderness. Still today, people celebrate Sukkot, setting up temporary tent-like structures in their gardens to remember God's faithfulness and presence with them and to celebrate god’s provision in their lives.
When we feel as though our work and efforts lack meaning, we are reminded by traditions like these that God is with us, whether we’re building a shack or a temple. In fact, as 1 Corinthians 6:19 says, our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, and so everything that we build with them and within them is a dwelling place for God - the holiest of holies.
So, when we meet Haggai in scripture, the people of God are supposed to be celebrating God's faithfulness and telling of God’s glory in the temple, but instead we find them grumbling that the remains of the old temple and the beginning efforts to rebuild are not nearly as good as what they had before!
Haggai knows the work of building is daunting. He knows it can be backbreaking and seem pointless for the people who are drawing the plans as well as the labourers hauling the marble. So, he speaks to everyone. He speaks to Zerubbabel, which means "one sewn of Babylon." Son of Shealtiel - which means, "I have asked God." He's speaking to everyone who was exiled, feeling far from God. He's speaking to those who have stayed and cried out to God, asking him to answer their prayers. He's speaking to Joshua, the religious leader of the people. Son of Jehozadak, the high priest of Israel, whose name means, Jehovah is Righteous.
He’s claiming everyone as Jehovah’s – the religious and political leaders and all the day labourers of the land together. Those who wanted to rebuild the temple and people who actively opposed the idea are all included in the prophecy that came through Haggai from God. It was a prophecy that acknowledged that the temple was a mess - that it looked like nothing - that it couldn't compare to what had existed before in the "good old days."
But Haggai doesn't let anyone get away with tossing up their hands and saying, "There's nothing we can do." There's no point rebuilding in this mess. He says instead, God is still speaking, and is saying, "Take courage."
Take courage, Zerubbabel, says the Lord. Take courage, Joshua. Take courage, all you people of the land - insert your name here ____________.
Don't just be courageous and strong but take courage from God. It is being handed to you through the mouth of a prophet. Take that courage and use it for the glory of God to work. "Work, for I am with you, says the Lord of hosts." Through Haggai, God says, I made a promise to you when you came out of Egypt – and I continue to keep it and be faithful. God says, “My spirit abides among you; do not fear.” Even though the building of the temple structure is not yet complete, God says, I live in you.
So that whatever you build, wherever you build it, I am there.
FOCUS TEXT
Haggai 2:4-5 (NRSV)
Yet now take courage, O Zerubbabel, says the Lord; take courage, Oh Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the high priest; take courage, all you people of the land, says the Lord; work, for I am with you, says the Lord of hosts, according to the promise that I made you when you came out of Egypt. My spirit abides among you; do not fear.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Faithful God, you have been present with your people in all times and places. Help us to acknowledge your presence with us today. Empower us with your Spirit so that we can work and live for your glory. Amen.
If your life feels like a heap of rubble, and the future doesn’t seem any brighter than the past... If you’ve gone through life feeling like you’ve worked hard but have failed to achieve what you hoped – what is the impetus for working more?
Well, we looked yesterday at the prophet Haggai, and it's important for us to recognize that the prophecy is set "In the second year of King Darius, in the seventh month, on the twenty-first day of the month." It is set in what would have been The Feast of Booths - Sukkot - sometimes called the Festival of Tabernacles. This was the time when Israelites commemorated the dedication of the Temple to God as well as the way God freed them from bondage in Egypt to live in temporary shacks - or booths - as they wandered in the wilderness. Still today, people celebrate Sukkot, setting up temporary tent-like structures in their gardens to remember God's faithfulness and presence with them and to celebrate god’s provision in their lives.
When we feel as though our work and efforts lack meaning, we are reminded by traditions like these that God is with us, whether we’re building a shack or a temple. In fact, as 1 Corinthians 6:19 says, our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, and so everything that we build with them and within them is a dwelling place for God - the holiest of holies.
So, when we meet Haggai in scripture, the people of God are supposed to be celebrating God's faithfulness and telling of God’s glory in the temple, but instead we find them grumbling that the remains of the old temple and the beginning efforts to rebuild are not nearly as good as what they had before!
Haggai knows the work of building is daunting. He knows it can be backbreaking and seem pointless for the people who are drawing the plans as well as the labourers hauling the marble. So, he speaks to everyone. He speaks to Zerubbabel, which means "one sewn of Babylon." Son of Shealtiel - which means, "I have asked God." He's speaking to everyone who was exiled, feeling far from God. He's speaking to those who have stayed and cried out to God, asking him to answer their prayers. He's speaking to Joshua, the religious leader of the people. Son of Jehozadak, the high priest of Israel, whose name means, Jehovah is Righteous.
He’s claiming everyone as Jehovah’s – the religious and political leaders and all the day labourers of the land together. Those who wanted to rebuild the temple and people who actively opposed the idea are all included in the prophecy that came through Haggai from God. It was a prophecy that acknowledged that the temple was a mess - that it looked like nothing - that it couldn't compare to what had existed before in the "good old days."
But Haggai doesn't let anyone get away with tossing up their hands and saying, "There's nothing we can do." There's no point rebuilding in this mess. He says instead, God is still speaking, and is saying, "Take courage."
Take courage, Zerubbabel, says the Lord. Take courage, Joshua. Take courage, all you people of the land - insert your name here ____________.
Don't just be courageous and strong but take courage from God. It is being handed to you through the mouth of a prophet. Take that courage and use it for the glory of God to work. "Work, for I am with you, says the Lord of hosts." Through Haggai, God says, I made a promise to you when you came out of Egypt – and I continue to keep it and be faithful. God says, “My spirit abides among you; do not fear.” Even though the building of the temple structure is not yet complete, God says, I live in you.
So that whatever you build, wherever you build it, I am there.
FOCUS TEXT
Haggai 2:4-5 (NRSV)
Yet now take courage, O Zerubbabel, says the Lord; take courage, Oh Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the high priest; take courage, all you people of the land, says the Lord; work, for I am with you, says the Lord of hosts, according to the promise that I made you when you came out of Egypt. My spirit abides among you; do not fear.
PRAY AS YOU GO
Faithful God, you have been present with your people in all times and places. Help us to acknowledge your presence with us today. Empower us with your Spirit so that we can work and live for your glory. Amen.
The Temple
DAILY BYTE
In the Biblical story of Haggai, we find a prophet telling people that they must work. Now, this might not be the message you were hoping for today. Perhaps you're thinking - but I don't work - I'm retired. Or, I work too much. Or, I want to keep work at work and church at church. Or, I don't really know what I'm supposed to be doing with my life!
Well, Haggai is not just telling the people to work for the sake of working, to work themselves into a grave, or to work for the sake of achieving for their own glory – to make themselves like gods. That is what workaholics do.
He is calling them to a specific task - and that task is rebuilding the temple.
Now to understand the importance of this, we need to know a few things about the time Haggai lived - He was a prophet to the people of God who were coming out of exile. The Babylonians had conquered Israel years before, forcing the people either to live in the rubble or to leave their homes, as well as the temple, behind in Jerusalem, moving to Babylon, which is where Iraq is today.
We may associate temples mostly with modern-day Judaism or Buddhism or Hinduism, but to the ancient Israelites, the temple was also the place where God had dwelled in their land. The inner room of the temple was called the Holiest of Holies - the place where God lived. There were no windows, and it was shrouded with a veil because the presence of God was considered so powerful there that it was dangerous.
You can understand that the place God was supposed to inhabit would be considered the holiest place in the land – and the place that by its very presence, made everything else holy and sacred. But Israel's conquerers destroyed the temple - the place where God dwelled, and God's people were scattered, seemingly outside his presence.
Think about the feeling of alienation that you sense when it seems like you're away from the presence of God. It can be lonely and paralyzing and scary. It's what we often call a wilderness time - when we feel like we don't a have a home - like when the Israelites wandered in the wilderness before God led them to the promised land.
So, Haggai enters the picture not long after the ending of that wilderness time for the people of God. The Persians had conquered the Babylonians, and they decided to liberate the Israelites, allowing them to go back to Jerusalem – back to the promised land.
Thank God - they must have said - we can finally go back to the way things were before! But we all know that you can never go back to exactly the way things were in the past, and they returned home to find economic crisis, conflict with the people who had stayed behind, and a temple in ruins.
It must have been an intimidating time that may sound a bit familiar to us. It was a time when the people were faced with a choice. Do they continue to live in an attitude of wilderness and exile, refusing to rebuild the temple and recognize the presence of God in their midst? Or, do they work and rebuild?
We might ask ourselves the same questions. When we feel far away from God and when our life feels like a heap of rubble, we have a choice. We can continue to wander, or we can ask God how to rebuild. What does God desire to rebuild in your life?
FOCUS READING
Haggai 1:15b-2:4 (NRSV)
In the second year of King Darius, in the seventh month, on the twenty-first day of the month, the word of the Lord came by the prophet Haggai, saying: “Speak now to Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and to the remnant of the people, and say, Who is left among you that saw this house in its former glory? How does it look to you now? Is it not in your sight as nothing? Yet now take courage, O Zerubbabel, says the Lord; take courage, Oh Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the high priest; take courage, all you people of the land, says the Lord; work, for I am with you, says the Lord of hosts....
In the Biblical story of Haggai, we find a prophet telling people that they must work. Now, this might not be the message you were hoping for today. Perhaps you're thinking - but I don't work - I'm retired. Or, I work too much. Or, I want to keep work at work and church at church. Or, I don't really know what I'm supposed to be doing with my life!
Well, Haggai is not just telling the people to work for the sake of working, to work themselves into a grave, or to work for the sake of achieving for their own glory – to make themselves like gods. That is what workaholics do.
He is calling them to a specific task - and that task is rebuilding the temple.
Now to understand the importance of this, we need to know a few things about the time Haggai lived - He was a prophet to the people of God who were coming out of exile. The Babylonians had conquered Israel years before, forcing the people either to live in the rubble or to leave their homes, as well as the temple, behind in Jerusalem, moving to Babylon, which is where Iraq is today.
We may associate temples mostly with modern-day Judaism or Buddhism or Hinduism, but to the ancient Israelites, the temple was also the place where God had dwelled in their land. The inner room of the temple was called the Holiest of Holies - the place where God lived. There were no windows, and it was shrouded with a veil because the presence of God was considered so powerful there that it was dangerous.
You can understand that the place God was supposed to inhabit would be considered the holiest place in the land – and the place that by its very presence, made everything else holy and sacred. But Israel's conquerers destroyed the temple - the place where God dwelled, and God's people were scattered, seemingly outside his presence.
Think about the feeling of alienation that you sense when it seems like you're away from the presence of God. It can be lonely and paralyzing and scary. It's what we often call a wilderness time - when we feel like we don't a have a home - like when the Israelites wandered in the wilderness before God led them to the promised land.
So, Haggai enters the picture not long after the ending of that wilderness time for the people of God. The Persians had conquered the Babylonians, and they decided to liberate the Israelites, allowing them to go back to Jerusalem – back to the promised land.
Thank God - they must have said - we can finally go back to the way things were before! But we all know that you can never go back to exactly the way things were in the past, and they returned home to find economic crisis, conflict with the people who had stayed behind, and a temple in ruins.
It must have been an intimidating time that may sound a bit familiar to us. It was a time when the people were faced with a choice. Do they continue to live in an attitude of wilderness and exile, refusing to rebuild the temple and recognize the presence of God in their midst? Or, do they work and rebuild?
We might ask ourselves the same questions. When we feel far away from God and when our life feels like a heap of rubble, we have a choice. We can continue to wander, or we can ask God how to rebuild. What does God desire to rebuild in your life?
FOCUS READING
Haggai 1:15b-2:4 (NRSV)
In the second year of King Darius, in the seventh month, on the twenty-first day of the month, the word of the Lord came by the prophet Haggai, saying: “Speak now to Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and to the remnant of the people, and say, Who is left among you that saw this house in its former glory? How does it look to you now? Is it not in your sight as nothing? Yet now take courage, O Zerubbabel, says the Lord; take courage, Oh Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the high priest; take courage, all you people of the land, says the Lord; work, for I am with you, says the Lord of hosts....
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