If I were to ask you how many years you’ve been consciously Jesus’ person, I wonder what you would answer!
For me, it’s –
well, it’s really rather a long time, let’s put it that way!
And during that time, I hope, you have grown and changed,
and allowed God to grow and change you and help you become more and more the person you were created to be.
I don’t suppose for one moment you’ve got there –
I know I haven’t:
God still has a lot of work to do in me!
I expect your views on what God’s people should be like have grown and changed over time, too.
Mine have;
but then, they’d have had need to!
I ended up in a weirdly toxic form of evangelicalism that demanded that if you wanted to be a Christian you had to do it in a particular way, and no other way was valid.
And God was incredibly picky, and out to catch you out whenever possible.
Which was, of course, ridiculous, but you don’t realise it at the time.
But over the years I’ve learnt, and I expect you have too, slowly and often painfully, that “in my Father’s house are many mansions”,
and there is room for us all, no matter how differently we may express our faith, and our commitment to being Jesus’ person.
And, indeed, that God is looking for every excuse to pardon and forgive us, not condemn us.
But, of course, there are caveats.
Look at our first reading, from Isaiah:
“Do you think I want all these sacrifices you keep offering to me?” asks God.
“I have had more than enough of the sheep you burn as sacrifices and of the fat of your fine animals.
I am tired of the blood of bulls and sheep and goats.”
And then;
“When you lift your hands in prayer, I will not look at you.
No matter how much you pray, I will not listen, for your hands are covered with blood.”
God wants his people to:
“Wash yourselves clean.
Stop all this evil that I see you doing.
Yes, stop doing evil and learn to do right.
See that justice is done;
help those who are oppressed, give orphans their rights, and defend widows.”
I wonder, sometimes, what God thinks of what’s going on in America right now, with people there calling on His name to justify cutting aid to the poorest of the poor, and so on.
Well, I am sure justice will be done in the end.
Remember Jesus’ warning:
“Not everyone who calls me ‘Lord, Lord’ will enter the Kingdom of heaven, but only those who do what my Father in heaven wants them to do.”
But meanwhile, we do need to be stepping up to the plate to help those less fortunate than ourselves.
The need for the Food Bank, for instance, hasn’t stopped just because it is August;
rather the reverse, as people who can just about cope in term time when their children get their main meal at school can find it very much more difficult in the school holidays.
You will, perhaps, remember footballer Marcus Rashford’s campaign to have meals provided for children in poorer families during, and I think after, the pandemic.
Just about a year ago there were riots against asylum seekers, prompted by the rumour –
untrue, of course –
that the person who murdered some little girls at a dance class was an illegal immigrant.
He wasn’t, but it served as an excuse for the most appalling displays of racist behaviour that you can possibly imagine.
They even set fire to hotels where they thought asylum seekers were being housed!
And I believe there have been similar gatherings this past week, on the anniversary.
It is this old chestnut that “they” are getting more support than people in this country are.
Which is also not true.
They get less than £50 a week to live on, and they are certainly not housed in 5-star hotels!
But what are we, as God’s people, to do about this?
Yes, we can and do express our disgust at such behaviour, but is that all?
What, I wonder, would Jesus do?
If we look at how he treated people whom his culture thought despicable, maybe we will get an idea:
he loved them and forgave them!
He made it quite clear that their behaviour was, or had been, wrong, but then he loved them and forgave them, just as he does us.
Just as, I hate to say it, he does some of those “pseudo-Christians” in the USA.
But enough of that particular rabbit-hole!
Today I am trying to talk about faith!
Faith that manifests itself in action!
Faith that probably has to be grown over many years.
“To
have faith” says the letter to the Hebrews, “is to be sure of the
things we hope for, to be certain of the things we cannot see.”
And the letter goes on to give us an example in Abraham, who,
we are told, was promised a wonderful inheritance.
God promised
to make his descendants, quite literally, more numerous than the
grains of sand on the seashore.
He was going to be given a
wonderful land for them to live in.
Now, at this stage,
Abraham was living very comfortably thank you, in a very civilised
city called Ur,
and although he didn't have any children, he
was happy and settled.
But God told Abraham that if he wanted to
see this promise fulfilled he had to get up,
to leave his
comfortable life,
and to move on out into the unknown,
just
trusting God.
And Abraham did just exactly that.
And,
eventually, Isaac was born to carry on the family.
And then
Isaac’s son, Jacob.
And we are told that, although none of
them actually saw the Promised Land, and although the promise was not
fulfilled in their lifetimes,
they never stopped believing that
one day, one day, it would be.
Their whole lives were informed
by their belief that God was in control.
This sort of
faith is the kind we'd all like to have, wouldn't we?
Wouldn't
we?
Hmmm, I wonder.
In our Gospel reading, Jesus says, “Do
not be afraid, little flock, for your Father is pleased to give you
the Kingdom.”
That's great, isn't it?
“Your Father is
pleased to give you the Kingdom.”
Well, it would be
great, but then he says, “Sell all your belongings and give the
money to the poor.
Provide for yourselves purses that don't wear
out, and save your riches in heaven, where they will never decrease,
because no thief can get to them, and no moth can destroy them. For
your heart will always be where your riches are.”
That's
the bit we don't like so well, do we?
Like Abraham, we are
very-nicely-thank-you in Ur,
comfortably settled in this world,
and we don't want to give it all up to go chasing after
something which might or might not be real.
This is the
difficult bit, the bit where what we say we believe comes up against
what we really do believe.
We would like to be
there –
to be that sort of faith-filled person –
without
the hard slog of actually getting there!
We want to have all the
privileges and joys of being Christians without actually having to do
anything.
Of course, in one of the many great paradoxes of
Christianity,
we don't have to do anything!
We can
do nothing to save ourselves!
It is God who does all that is
necessary for our salvation.
But if we are to be people of
faith, if we are to be of any use to God,
our faith does, or
should, prompt us to action.
First of all, then, our faith
should prompt us to repent.
To turn away from sin and turn to
God with all our hearts.
It's not just a once-and-for-all
thing;
it's a matter of daily repentance, daily choosing
to be God's person.
And as we do that, our faith grows and
develops and strengthens to the point where, if we are called to do
so,
we can leave our comfort zone and try great things for
God.
As Abraham did, and as Jesus calls us to do.
We
aren't all called to sell our possessions and give what we have to
the poor –
although a little more equity in the way this
world's goods are handed out wouldn't be a bad thing.
We are all
called to work for justice in our communities,
whether that is
a matter of writing to our MPs if something is clearly wrong,
or
getting involved in a more hands-on way.
We are called to pray
for those places where things are clearly wrong,
whether that’s
what’s happening in the USA right now
or for people in those
countries whose leaders are at war andw ho are suffering immeasurably
because of it.
Some people –
maybe some of you,
even –
are or have been called to leave your home countries
and work in a foreign land to be God's person there,
whether as
a professional missionary, as it were,
or just where you are
working.
Others are asked to stay put, but to be God's person
exactly where they are –
at school,
college,
work,
home,
at the shops,
on the bus,
in a traffic jam,
on social media...
everywhere!
Being God's person isn't something that
happens in church on Sundays and is put aside the rest of the
week.
It isn't easy. It's the every day, every moment hard
slog.
The times when we wish we could skip over all this,
and
be the wonderful faith-filled Christian we hope to be one day without
the hard work of getting there!
Sadly, it doesn't work
like that.
We don't have to do all the hard work in our own
strength, of course;
God the Holy Spirit is there to help
us, and remind us, and change us, and grow us as we gradually become
more and more the people God designed us to be.
But God doesn't
push in where He's not wanted.
If we are truly serious about
being God's person,
then we need to be being that every
day.
Each day we need to commit to God, whether explicitly or
implicitly.
Jesus reminds us that this world isn't
designed to be permanent.
One day it will come to an end, either
for each of us individually,
or perhaps in some great second
coming.
Scientists tell us it will be very soon now, as climate
change runs out of control.
But whichever way, it will end for
us one day,
and not all of us get notice to quit.
We need
to be ready and alert, busy with what we have been given to do, but
ready to let go and turn to Jesus whenever he calls us.
None
of this is easy.
Being a Christian isn't easy.
Becoming a
Christian is easy,
because God longs and longs for us to turn
to Him.
But being one isn't.
Allowing God to change us,
to
pull us out of our comfort zone,
to travel with Him along that
narrow way –
it's not easy.
But it is oh, so very
worthwhile!
Amen.
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