Month: December 2013

The Main Character

The motives may not be evangelical, but many evangelicals understandably have encouraged and applauded the development of some upcoming Hollywood productions featuring Biblical characters. Indeed, this can only be good, even if the producers and directors are seeing in it only the same sort of results they have had from making effects-laden (as the Biblical flicks will be) productions based on Bible stories.

Russell Crowe as Noah, Anthony Hopkins as Methuselah, Christian Bale as Moses, Brad Pitt as Pontius Pilate–what believer would not celebrate this kind of publicity for Biblical stories and chracters?I would not say we should not. But I also am thinking of all the young lives that have been turned from the Bible because of wretched Sunday School curricula that moralized on the lives of Biblical characters–only to be disillusioned later on. \

The films will be an opportunity for pastors to point out to people–who may thankfully have a heightened or new interest in the bible because of the movies–that the same God who worked through these seriously flawed characters works through us in our place and time to bring about his purposes of ddrawingpeople to himself and making them part of his plan.

May we all be drawn to the one Main Character.

 

Extra Ordinary

Outline of message prepared for Sunday, December 22, 2013 at Fallingbrook Presbyterian Church, Toronto (the service was cancelled due to ice storm). Scripture: Matthew 1:18-25.

One implication of Christmas is that the timeless can be born in the very timely circumstances of our life. What is extraordinary (meaning outside of the ordinary, not just unusual or special) can transform our ‘ordinary’ experience.

1. a) The circumstances of Christ’s birth were in some ways quite ordinary, even less than than ordinary. b) Other aspects of Christ’s birth were well outside of the ordinary (the meaning of his name, conceived by the Holy Spirit). c) The extra ordinary invaded the ordinary to bring about his birth.

2. a) Much our essence is “ordinary” or less: the reality of sin as descendants of Adam. b) God causes us to be extra ordinary because Christ also can be born in us through the same Holy Spirit by whom he was conceived in Mary’s womb. c) We can allow what is eternal and timelss to invade our “ordinary” experience with its needs and challenges by allowing Christ to be born in us.

 

The Privileged Many

Summary of message at Fallingbrook Presbyterian Church, Sunday, December 15 2013 (Advent 3). Scripture: Matthew 11:2-11.

It is often observed that this is a time of year when people who are down may feel even more down. There can be disillusionment – both with personal circumstances and from observation of the world. Where is the peace and joy of which Christmas speaks? It may seem any sort of success in life is for an elite, a privileged few. Christmas actually brings the message that we can be part of the privileged many – privileged to be part of God’s kingdom brought in Christ.

From Matthew’s telling at the beginning of chapter 11, it  seems John the Baptist may have been suffering some disillusionment. He who had been first to recognize and point to Jesus as Messiah was in prison, and did not see from  his vantage point how anything was different. He sent friends to ask of Jesus, “Are you the one who is to come, or should we wait for another?” Jesus replies by pointing to what is happening: massive healing, a sign of the kingdom’s breaking into the world in and through him. And he adds, as great a figure as John the Baptist is, having been foretold as the one to point to what is happening, the least in the kingdom is greater than he. This kingdom is both now and forever.

So what about us and our disillusionment? We need, like John, to see beyond our own circumstances to perceive the bigger picture of what God is doing in the world, and what he can do for us personally, especially as we accept the special fellowship that rest from our striving (end of chapter 11) can bring. We can handle pretty much anything with the right support.

Most importantly, our part in Christ’s kingdom gives us our true identity, which is not to be equated with our particular roles in life that can bring us disappointment and disillusionment. Our identity is wrapped up in Christ, who will not fail us. And we find we are already on what Isaiah celebrated as the highway of the redeemed (Isaiah 35:1-10). We are among the privileged many.

 

Don’t Miss This Turn

Don’t Miss This Turn: The Importance of Thinking Differently
Summary of message at Fallingbrook Presbyterian Church, Sunday, December 8, 2013 (Advent 2). Scripture: Matthew 3:1-12.

John the Baptist had one essential message: “Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven (other than in Matthew “Kingdom of God”) is near, or at hand.” To repent meant basically to change your mind, to turn and seek more the mind and point of view of God. A change in behaviour, particularly toward others, would necessarily follow. John’s baptism was a sign of acceptance of such ‘turning.’

Among those who came to John at the River Jordan were the religious leaders. John called them hypocrites because he perceived that, in their treatment of things of faith as matters of possession and position, they were not seeking change, but were investigating a movement that threatened to have power outside of their purview and control. The common people flocked to John because he ignited in them an old prophetic hope: of independence from foreign influence and an era of justice and peace. Their repentance would help prepare them to be part of that.

Today, those of us (already) in the church may be susceptible, like the religious leaders then, of only wanting to be affirmed in our position and traditions. Or we may, like the people back then but in our own way, see a call to faith as a means toward better social conditions, and that is well and good. But John pointed to another, greater than he, who would baptize with his own life-altering power, and usher in a kingdom and reality, of a totslly different and eternal order. Rooted in the Lord, and therefore clearing away obstacles in our life that would let us welcome his new life, new creation really, and risking new ways of living and serving in the self-giving way of Christ, we show we are more and more being “turned” to adopt within us the mind of the Lord. Anything else is subject to judgment.

A question to reflect and work on, that I believe brings these things together: What are you committed to that will succeed only if God will do it? This question
(a) takes into account that the matter must be something that would be in keeping with God’s Kingdom goals,
(b) requires, at the same time, our own diligent work, and,
(c) will draw us closer to the Lord, and will lead us to having more his point of view as we move in to the next opportunity, and ongoing opportunities, to invite him to work in and through us.

Such a challenge is important both for our own discipleship and the life and work of the church.