God's Holy People

This is the text of a sermon preached to a Guild meeting on 13th February 2007


It’s funny how we can fail to realise things about ourselves because we don’t perceive it to be the case. There’s probably no subject in our Christian lives that demonstrates this better than our holiness. Ask almost any Christian "Are you a holy person?" and they’ll say "No, I’m just an ordinary Christian." They know that they still sin every day, and imagine that holy people never sin, or only sin once in a blue moon. The same thing is true with the word "saint." I’ve heard loads of people use the expression, "I’m no saint – I’m just an ordinary Christian."

Well, just because we don’t feel we match up to our stained glass image of what a "saint" is or what a "holy person" is, doesn’t mean we aren’t saints or holy people.

I want to cover quite a lot of ground tonight, so we won’t be going into a lot of detail on some of the areas we’re going to touch on. And although I’ll be referring to this passage we’ve read in 1 Peter chapter 1, I’ll also be jumping about to quite a few passages in Scripture that have a bearing on our theme tonight. Basically, there are four things I want to look at.

First, we are saints, God’s holy people, because the Bible tells us we are.

Second, our holiness does not depend on our works, but on our status before God because of what Christ has done for us.

Third, it is because we are God’s holy people that we should live as God’s holy people. It is not by living holy lives that we become God’s holy people.

And fourth, the Bible gives us plenty of practical guidance on what it means to live a holy life.

So let’s look at each of these four truths in turn.

First, we are saints, we are God’s holy people, because the Bible tells us we are.

If you look at the page opposite the page where our reading is, see what 1 Peter 2:9-10 says, addressing ordinary folks in the churches of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia?
"But you are the chosen race, the King’s priests, the holy nation, God’s own people, chosen to proclaim the wonderful acts of God, who called you out of darkness into his own marvellous light. At one time you were not God’s people, but now you are his people; at one time you did not know God’s mercy, but now you have received his mercy."

You see? We are the holy nation, God’s own people. Then look at how almost every New Testament letter begins. They are addressed to different churches. But how are the people in those churches referred to? Let’s just look at three examples – there are plenty of others.

Romans 1:7 "To all those in Rome who are loved by God and called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ."

1 Corinthians 1:2 "To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours."

Ephesians 1:1 "Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God. To the saints who are in Ephesus, and are faithful in Christ Jesus."

We are God’s holy people. We are God’s saints. In the Bible "saint" is the word used to describe every Christian believer – not a title like a knighthood bestowed by the Pope on some kind of breed of "superhero believers." Unless we get away from the Catholic idea of "being a saint" we will never come to true understanding of holiness according to the New Testament.

The true meaning of "saint" is a "holy one" and its primary reference is NOT to the character of the person, but to the relationship of being set apart for and dedicated to God. In other words, being a saint, in the biblical sense, is not really about how much good we do, how devout we are, how much time we spend serving God, it is about how good God is choosing us to be his. It is because of our relationship with God – as his chosen ones, as the ones he has set apart – that our worship and service flows. Holiness is about setting apart our minds to see things God’s way and not how the world sees things; holiness is setting apart our hearts to love God and our neighbour and not loving only ourselves selfishly; holiness is setting apart our actions on loving God and our neighbours, and setting apart our actions to do good and refrain from doing evil. But – and this is the important bit – we can only think holy thoughts, feel holy love and do holy works if we are first holy people. In other words, if we are set apart by God as his saved ones – people saved by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. There’s no other way to be holy than to be a Christian believer.

If we don’t begin at the correct starting place, our understanding of being God’s holy people, will always be compromised. This leads us on to our second point.

Second, our holiness does not depend on our works, but on our status before God because of what Christ has done for us.

It is Christ who makes us holy. We cannot make ourselves holy. If we ever forget this truth, and start to think that there is something in us that makes us better than other people – or that our being holy is something we can be proud of, there is no end to the problems we will have. The biggest problem will be that we start to think we contribute in some way to our salvation.

Instead of acknowledging that we are saved by grace and not because of our own efforts, we’ll start to think that our holiness is somehow increased by the more good works we do. This is totally wrong. We will also become puffed up with pride. We will start to look down on other people who don’t appear to be "as holy" as us. We will turn into Pharisees.

How do we avoid this? By remembering that we are holy because of what Christ does and not because of we do and by remembering that our good works don’t make us any more holy, they only mean that we are living out our holiness better, that we are being true to our holy status. Let me give you an analogy to help explain what I’m saying here. Take this candle that’s burning on the table here. It has the status of being a candle whether it’s not lit at all, or whether it’s wick is glowing and there’s smoke, or whether it’s burning brightly with a flame like it is now. It’s not by the size of the flame or even the existence of the flame at all that it becomes a candle. It already is a candle. But it’s doing what it was created for when it’s burning brightly. It’s fulfilling it’s potential, it’s at it’s most pleasing to us, when it’s burning brightly. Well, we as God’s holy people – as individuals and as a group – are a bit like a candle. Our good works as God’s holy people are like the flame on a candle. It’s not by our good works that we become God’s holy people. But when our holiness is expressed in good works, we are fulfilling our potential, we are at our most pleasing to God. But we don’t stop being God’s holy people, even when we go through dark periods in our lives, when we commit sins, when we fail to love God as we should, when our hearts are cold towards others. We don’t stop being saints on our dark days any more than this stops being a candle if I snuff out its flame.

The reason for this is because our being holy is a result of what Christ has done for us, not what we do for ourselves. It is a status that God gives us, rather than a title we win for ourselves. It is God who makes us holy, and not we ourselves. God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit does it, not us. The Bible is very clear on this point.

Consider the verses we read as our call to worship (Ephesians 1:4):

"Even before the world was made, God had already chosen us to be his through our union with Christ, so that we would be holy and without fault before him."

Hebrews 10:10
"Because Jesus Christ did what God wanted him to do, we are all purified from sin by the offering that he made of his own body once and for all."

Hebrews 13:12:
"Jesus...died outside the city, in order to purify the people [in other words "make the people holy"] from sin with his own blood."

It’s part of the meaning of the passage we read in 1 Peter 1 in verses 18 to 19:

"For you know what was paid to set you free from the worthless manner of life handed down by your ancestors. It was not something that can be destroyed, such as silver or gold; it was the costly sacrifice of Christ, who was like a lamb without defect or flaw."

So, to sum up so far, we’ve seen that we are God’s holy people because the Bible tells us that’s what we are. And we’ve seen that the reason we are holy even though far from perfect, is because we have the status of "holy ones" or "saints" before God because of what Christ has done for us, and not because of anything we have done or can do to win God’s favour.

Third, it is because we are God’s holy people that we should live as God’s holy people. It is not by living holy lives that we become God’s holy people.

If I can deal with negative point first: it is not by living holy lives that we become God’s holy people. I’m sure we’ve all heard it enough times that we know this already in our hearts. We cannot save ourselves. The whole New Testament teaches us that it is impossible for sinful human beings to earn their salvation by their works. It is futile to even try.

Look at Ephesians 2:8-9:

"For it is by God’s grace that you have been saved through faith. It is not the result of your own efforts, but God’s gift, so that no one can boast about it."

This key doctrine of salvation by grace through faith is probably best laid out in a passage from Romans 3 that I want to read to you. I’m reading Romans 3:21-28 from the New Living Translation:

"But now God has shown us a different way of being right in his sight, not by obeying the law but by the way promised in the Scriptures long ago. We are made right in God's sight when we trust in Jesus Christ to take away our sins. And we all can be saved in this same way, no matter who we are or what we have done. For all have sinned; all fall short of God's glorious standard. Yet now God in his gracious kindness declares us not guilty. He has done this through Christ Jesus, who has freed us by taking away our sins. For God sent Jesus to take the punishment for our sins and to satisfy God's anger against us. We are made right with God when we believe that Jesus shed his blood, sacrificing his life for us. God was being entirely fair and just when he did not punish those who sinned in former times. And he is entirely fair and just in this present time when he declares sinners to be right in his sight because they believe in Jesus. Can we boast, then, that we have done anything to be accepted by God? No, because our acquittal is not based on our good deeds. It is based on our faith. So we are made right with God through faith and not by obeying the law."

So, we are saved by grace, through faith alone – not through our works. But does this then mean we can live any way we like? As the question Paul had to deal with in Romans 6 puts it: Shall we sin that grace may abound?

Well the answer of the New Testament is an emphatic "No." We are saved by Christ alone, by grace alone and through faith alone, but our salvation is not to be without good works. Good works are the fruit that begin to be produced in a life united to Christ, the vine. We must remember that at the same time as we are given a new status before God – a status forgiven for our sins, with Christ’s righteousness reckoned to our account so that we are holy saints – we are also given a new nature, a new heart, and a new Spirit within us. Our attitude to sin changes, so that where before it didn’t bother us, now it does bother us. And rather than live lives contended to be sinners, the sinful things we do – and we do sin after we are Christians – annoy us, make us feel guilty and ashamed, make us feel sad. Paul calls this being "dead to sin". John describes the process of getting this new nature from God as being "born again". One of the clearest explanation of what happens when we get this new nature is described by the prophet Ezekiel in Ezekiel 36:25-27:

"I will sprinkle clean water on you and make you clean from all your idols and everything else that has defiled you. I will give you a new heart and a new mind. I will take away your stubborn heart of stone and give you an obedient heart. I will put my spirit in you and I will see to it that you follow my laws and keep all the commands I have given you."

So hopefully we’ve cleared up one thing: we are what we are because of what God has done for us in Christ Jesus, and not what we have done, are doing, or will do in the future, for ourselves. But at the same time, the Bible teaches that because God has set us apart as his holy ones, we should live out our lives as his holy ones.

Look at verses 14 and 15 in our passage in 1 Peter:

"Be obedient to God, and do not allow your lives to be shaped by those desires you had when you were still ignorant. Instead, be holy in all you do, just as God who called you is holy. The scripture says, ‘Be holy because I am holy’."

Here Peter is quoting from a command that God issues to his Old Testament people Israel several times in the first five books of the Bible, the Pentateuch. Back in Leviticus 11:44-45, we find these words:

"I am the LORD your God, and you must keep yourselves holy, because I am holy. I am the LORD who brought you out of Egypt so that I could be your God. You must be holy, because I am holy."

Notice, in passing, that even here in the Old Testament the same principle stands – God first saves his people – in this case by delivering them from captivity in Egypt – and then he calls those who are already his chosen ones to live out their lives in a way that matches their new status and calling as the covenant people of the LORD. They are not to be holy in order to become his people – they are his people delivered from slavery in Egypt and now they are to live holy lives as a result of their deliverance, not to achieve it.

The message of our passage is essentially this: live out your lives in the way that matches what you are. You are saints: live as saints. You are God’s people: live as God’s people. God is holy – you should be holy too, to show you are his.

At its most general, living a holy life means living every part of your life with reference to God. It means there are no sacred parts of life – like going to church, praying, reading the Bible – which are in contrast to secular parts of life – like going to work, socialising with friends and family, or watching the telly. Every part of our lives is to be holy. And please note this doesn’t mean all of our lives need to be spent in church or in church-related activities. That’s not what I mean. No, all of our lives are to be holy – and that means that the way we do our job is to be holy – set apart for God’s glory and in accordance with his will. It means the way we socialise is to be holy – we’re to socialise with our friends to the glory of God. What we watch on telly is to be sanctified – so we watch programmes we enjoy while giving thanks to God for them. God is to be such an integral part of life that he’s almost like a friend or family member who goes through all of life with you like a constant companion. Someone you share things with, who you talk about your problems with, who you have a laugh with, who you ask for advice about things, whose opinion you value and act upon. And yes who you spend special time with, but also someone who you are conscious of being with you in everything you do. That is a holy life.

And that leads us nicely on to our fourth point.

Fourth, the Bible gives us plenty of practical guidance on what it means to live a holy life.

With everything we’ve already looked at, its been the theory of holy living. Now we come to the nitty gritty. The practice of holy living. And here our passage in 1 Peter gives us some very useful principles to follow in our lives.

Verse 13 tells us that if we are to live holy lives – lives that keep God at the centre of things – we need to concentrate and focus to make sure it happens. If we live carelessly, thoughtlessly, it’s hard to live a holy life. It says:

"So then, have your minds ready for action. Keep alert and set your hope completely on the blessing which will be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed."

It’s like we’re in an army at war. Carelessness has no place in the Christian life. We have to keep on the ball, with our minds ready for action. We need to stay alert – to be aware of what’s happening around us – to take opportunities to do good as God leads us, and to see danger coming before we get caught up in it.

Verses 14 and 15 we’ve already looked at. We are to make a conscious effort not to be let our lives be shaped by those desires we had before we were Christians. We need to be aware when we are being tempted by pride, or greed for riches, or jealousy, or revenge, or whatever desires play a part in our particular character – and refuse to let them dominate us or shape our thinking. With God’s help, we need to say to ourselves "no" at times. "No" I won’t do that, even though I want to, because it’s not right. Now that’s not easy. No one is pretending it’s easy. But it is what we are called to do. And let’s be honest, how many of us fall into things simply because we hadn’t been keeping our minds ready and alert. How many of us sin thoughtlessly more often than deliberately having considered it’s wrong and still chose to do it. I think most of us sin before we’ve thought much about it. That’s why this advice from Peter is so practical. Think about it and you’re less likely to do it if it’s wrong.

Then in verse 17 we see that the holy life cannot be lived without what we usually think of as the "holy bits". They are not the only bits that are to be holy, but they are to be things we include in our lives as well as all the ordinary bits. Verse 17 mentions prayer, and having reverence for God. Our lives are to be lives of prayer. How can we keep God close and part of everything we do, unless we talk to him about things? Paul says somewhere we are to "pray without ceasing". And by that he didn’t mean we are to spend all our time praying as such, but that in all we do, we are to have communication channels open to God. Throughout the day we are to have little chats with God. It might only be a few words at a time. The mini prayers might be for help, for guidance, for forgiveness, for strength, for others we meet or think about – all sorts of things. Just take a second. A silent word of prayer to God is sent, and on we go with whatever we’re doing. It makes God much closer to us, and makes us really feel he is part of our everyday lives. Why don’t you try it tomorrow and see how it goes?

The reverence for God should express itself in our desire to worship him. Again that might be something we take some time to do every day, and especially on Sundays when we come to church to worship together as God’s people.

And that leads us to another piece of guidance – a holy life is one with "sincere love for your fellow-believers" as verse 22 says. We care for each other, help each other, show concern for each other. We are sad when our fellow-believers grieve or go through hard times. We rejoice with them when good things happen to them or they celebrate an achievement or milestone in their lives.

And lastly, one of the keys to living a holy life is to make it a life shaped and guided by Scripture. The Scripture is the Christian’s food – it is our spiritual milk as Peter says in chapter 2, verse 2. It is the living and eternal word of God – it is what the God who we are to keep as our close companion through life wants to say to us. How can we be holy as he is holy and not be interested in what he has to say to us? It is the only thing that endures – men and women fade and die – they cannot accompany us through our whole life. The things this earth afford wither and wear out. But the word of the Lord remains for ever. It never changes. It never leaves us. It never goes out of date, because it is God’s truth, God’s holy Word.

And as we try to live our lives in ways that match up with the holy status God has given us, it is the supreme rule of faith and life for us. By it we know true doctrine from false. By it we know good from evil. By it we know God’s promises to encourage us forward, and God’s warnings to save us from harming ourselves in sin.

During the Coronation service for a British monarch, the Moderator of the General Assembly hands the monarch a bible and says these words: "This book is the most valuable thing that this world affords. Here is Wisdom; this is the royal Law; these are the lively Oracles of God."

And so let us grasp the truths that the Bible has taught us tonight. We are God’s holy people because he says we are, not because of how we feel about it. And we are God’s holy people because of what Christ has done for us, not because of what we can do for ourselves. But as Christ has made us God’s holy people, so we are to live as God’s holy people should live. And the way we find out how we should live, is through the Bible.

May we truly see this book – the holy Word of the living God – as the most valuable thing this world affords, believing its teachings and following its commandments throughout our lives.

The Centrality of the Cross

This is the text of a sermon preached to a Guild meeting on 16th January 2007.

The most famous skyscraper in New York City is probably the Empire State Building, which stands in the heart of midtown Manhattan, on the corner of Fifth Avenue and 34th Street. It was designed by an architect called William Lamb and was built during a single year during the Great Depression, giving work to a great many hard-pressed New Yorkers. The excavation of the foundations started on 22nd January 1930 and the building rose at an average rate of four and half stories each week until it was finished on 13 November 1930. The building stands 1454 feet high. When it was finished, it was the tallest building in the world, and it remained the tallest building until 1974 when the Sears Tower in Chicago was built. In November 1932, a searchlight shining from the top of the Empire State Building was used to signal that Franklin D Roosevelt had won the Presidential election. It could be seen by people up to fifty miles away. Even today, the Empire State Building is still the 9th tallest building in the World, and only the Sears Tower has more than the Empire State Building’s 102 stories.

The building dominates the city skyline. People can see it from all over New York City. It’s so big and so famous, so quintessentially New York that it would be hard to imagine the city without the Empire State Building.

That’s what the cross should be like in our lives. It should be something that so much part of who we are, what we are and what we do. It should be harder for us to imagine life without the cross being part of it than it is for New Yorkers to imagine their city without the Empire State Building or the Statue of Liberty.

The cross is absolutely central to everything we do, from when we first became Christians, right through our lives – our Christian lives and our daily lives, and all the way through to when we end our days. In heaven we will see Jesus Christ and he will still have the nail prints in the palms of his hands.

Our passage tells us why the cross is so important. If you have your bible’s open at the passage in Colossians chapter 1 you can see how the passage can be divided into three distinct sections.
The first section tell us, in verses 15 to 19, that the cross is central to our faith and our life because of who the man who died on the cross really was.

The second section tells us, in verses 20 to 22, that the cross is central to our faith and our life because of what Christ’s death on the cross achieved and for whom it was achieved.

The third section, in verse 23, tells us that the cross is central because of the place it should have in our lives, in our thoughts, our actions, our hearts and minds, especially in the light of the first two sections about who He was and what He’s done for us.

I just want to take a bit of time looking at these three sections and trying to bring out what they mean for us as Christians.

We start with the clear teaching of the first section in verses 15 to 19: one of the reasons the cross is of such significance to us is that the person who died on the cross, Jesus Christ, is none other than the Son of God.

If we truly grasp what this passage says about Jesus Christ, never again will we be satisfied with seeing him as just a great teacher, or a prophet, or a brave martyr for a cause, or a revolutionary, or a tragic failure of history who was so misunderstood he paid for it with his life. All of these man-made idols of Christ are shattered by what Paul says here. This passage in Colossians is Paul’s equivalent of John’s great testimony to the deity of Christ at the start of his Gospel. There John writes:

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made through him and without him nothing was made that has been made." And of course later John makes it very clear the "Word" he talks about is Jesus. "The Word became a human being and, full of grace and truth, lived among us. We saw his glory, the glory which he received as the Father’s only Son."

Although there are different emphases and ways of putting things between the different New Testament writers (for example Paul in talking about the Gospel loved to use the picture of a law court and believers being found "Not guilty" – which we call justification; whereas John liked to use the picture of being born again to describe the change in people’s lives when they become Christians), in fact in all the essential things the New Testament writers like Paul and John are absolutely in agreement.

In Colossians 1, Paul’s words echo those of John. "Christ is the visible likeness of the invisible God. He is the first-born Son. superior to all created things [notice not superior to all other created things – he is an uncreated being, as eternal as God the Father]. For through him God created everything...God created the whole universe through him and for him."

Let’s look at what is said here in a little more detail.

Verse 15 puts is in no uncertain terms: "Christ is the visible likeness of the invisible God."
Do you know that saying "Oh, he’s his father’s son all right". I’m usually on the receiving end when I do something my mother doesn’t approve of. But basically it means that there’s no doubt that the two men are father and son because the son thinks and acts just like his dad. That’s really the same thing that’s being said here between God and Jesus. "Christ is the visible likeness of the invisible God." And of course this is not just Paul’s view, this was Jesus’ own view as well. In John 14. Jesus makes the amazing claim: "I am the way, the truth and the life; no one comes to Father except by me. Now that you have known me, he said to them, you will know my Father also, and from now on you do know him and you have seen him." At which point the apostle Philip pipes up with what he must think is a helpful comment: "Lord, show us the Father; that is all we need," he says.

And then Jesus tells him of before continuing with these amazing words: "Whoever has seen me has seen the Father...I am in the Father and the Father is in me."

You see the holy Trinity consists of three persons in one essential unity. They always act together and in agreement with each other, even though they don’t exactly do the same things. There’s a tremendous mystery here. From eternity God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit existed together, but they were invisible. God is a Spirit. That was, until Jesus Christ came to earth that first Christmas, to show us God in a visible form, in the presence of a human body and with a human as well as a divine nature.

And because Christ is God and not a creature of God, he is superior to all created things as verse 15 says.

In the light of the cross especially, how amazing are those words in verses 16 to 19? This Christ is God. He is the creator of all things. God the Father planned the universe, but the Son built it. "God created the whole universe through him" verse 16 says. This ties in with what the Psalms teach. Psalm 33 says that God created the heavens and earth by his Word. Genesis 1 tells us that too. Each time something was created, it happened as soon as God said it. "Let there be light" and there was light and so on. And from John’s Gospel we know that Jesus is the Word of God. So through Jesus, God created everything, by the power of his Word, his Son. But the bit of this verse that really blows my mind is the last three words of verse 16. Not only did God created the whole universe – everything that exists or ever existed outside of God – not only did God create that through Christ, he created it for Christ.

It really is amazing to think about that. Things don’t just exist for no reason. There’s nothing chance about anything in our universe. It’s all here for a reason – and here the Scriptures actually say what the reason is: it all exists because Jesus built it and it all exists for Jesus’ pleasure and purposes. It’s not here primarily for us, although in his grace, God does give us the use of the world and its resources for our pleasure and enjoyment. But it’s really for him.
This is why in verse 17, Paul can make a claim that is either supremely profound or completely outrageous. He says that everything in the universe can only be seen in its true perspective and in its proper place to the extent that we grasp its relationship with Jesus Christ. The example he gives is the church in verse 18. Jesus is the head of the church, not any human leader or any church office, such as popes, archbishops or even earthly monarchs.

Okay, now let’s come back to our focus this evening: the cross. The first reason the cross should be of profound interest to us, and why it should influence every part of our life, is because it was on the cross that this Christ – the true Christ of the Bible, the visible image of God, God himself become a human being, the Creator of the world and the one for whom the world was made – this Christ, died on the cross.

Imagine it. The one for whom the world was made. The one who fashioned the blueprints of the very trees themselves finds himself nailed to a wooden cross and left to die by the creatures he made. It is like a horror story. Frankenstein maybe. The creatures turns against their creator and kills him. It also says a lot about human nature and human sin, that we could turn against our maker and slay him. It is hard to imagine anything more ungrateful, more perverse than that.

But of course, unlike any human equivalents, the events of the cross came as no surprise to God. He knew that it would be necessary for Christ to die in order to accomplish his plans for the world.

It would have done us no good had Peter or John or Paul been crucified rather than Christ. It was precisely because Christ is God, a being of infinite value and worth, and a being without sin himself, that his death can save a multitude of sinners, people like you and I.

And this brings us on to the second part of the reading. The cross of Christ is central to our lives because of what Christ achieved for us on the cross.

In verse 20, "Through the Son, God decided to bring the whole universe back to himself."
After Adam and Eve sinned, the universe started to go wrong. Not just human beings, although it is true that we do "go wrong" from birth. It’s what the Bible calls sin. It’s because we are sinners – because there’s something bad inside us – that we do the things we call sins. This is what Paul is talking about in verse 21: "At one time you were far away from God, and were his enemies because of the evil things you did and thought."

But the entrance of sin into God’s perfect creation, had other knock-on effects. Death entered the world. The physical world began to go wrong causing everything from disease and disabilities, to the extinction of many animals and plants, natural disasters like earthquakes and volcanoes, and a hundred other things. From Eden onwards, the whole universe has been going off the rails.

But God has decided it won’t always be this way. Through his Son, he’s going to undo all the wrong things and restore the universe to its original condition.

I don’t know if any of you are familiar with computers. When a computer is brand new, just out the box, it works perfectly. But as time passes, it begins to go wrong. As more information is added to it, files start to corrupt. Maybe it picks up viruses from the Internet. Eventually it wears out. Well what God’s going to do with the universe is like a computer engineer taking an old computer full of bad memory space, corrupt files, viruses and all the other junk programs running on the computer and completely cleaning out the hard drive, resetting the computer back to it was when it was new. That’s God’s purpose for the universe.

And the way he’s going to do it is through the cross. Verse 20: "God made peace through his Son’s physical death on the cross and so brought back to himself all things, both on earth and in heaven."

In other words, although the greatest thing the cross achieved is the salvation of God’s people, this is not the only thing it achieves. Now, we mustn’t take a verse like this out of context and try to claim that this means that God won’t condemn anyone to hell. The Bible says very clearly on dozens of occasions that those who do not accept Christ will go to hell.

So here, when Paul talks about God bringing all things to himself, he means the whole universe – the physical and spiritual realms, the animals and plants, the planets and stars, and of course humanity. All of it can only be renewed and will be renewed in the new heavens and new earth because of the cross. Without the cross, the only thing God could do with the universe and still be true to his own holy and just nature, would be to condemn it to hell. Because of the cross, God can not only redeem people to populate the new heaven and earth for all eternity, he can actually bring the whole of creation back together in peace and harmony with Christ as its head, and restore creation to the way it was in the beginning.

Christ’s achievement on the cross is central to our lives because it was there, on the cross, that he dealt with sin once and for all. He took the punishment that sin deserves from a just God upon his own shoulders. That was why on the cross he cried out before he died, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" Because he felt cut off from God by the weight of human sin.

Like a sacrificial lamb, he took our sins away. He died that we might have eternal life, and where once we were God’s enemies, by taking sin away, the relationship between God and human beings can be restored and renewed, and we can be God’s friends. Verse 22: "But now, by means of the physical death of his Son, God has made you his friends, in order to bring you, holy, pure, and faultless, into his presence."

We can never let the cross drift towards the edges of our life if we remember this one simple fact. It is only because of the cross that we can actually be friends with the almighty God! And if we have come to Christ by way of the cross, then he is our God and we are his in the eternal covenant of grace. Psalm 25:14 says: "The friendship of the LORD is for those who fear him, and he makes known to them his covenant." God’s covenant with his people is essentially a bond of love and friendship with them. That bond cannot exist between a holy God and a sinful people. It can exist, even for a God of love and grace, only where the problem of sin has been dealt with. It can exist and thank God it does exist between a holy God and a redeemed people (in other words a sinful people who have had their sins paid for by the blood of Christ). And the only way sin can be dealt with is through the cross. There is no other way. You cannot sort out the problem of sin for yourself. You don’t have the right to say your sins don’t matter. That’s God’s place. And God says sin does matter. It matters so much that only by sending his own Son to die for sinners, could the problem be sorted out. Think of it for a second. If there was another way to save us, why did Christ have to die? Why did God not just tell us the other way and not allow his beloved Son to suffer? There was no other way: only the way of the cross. "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life."

And so we come to the third section of this passage in verse 23. And the point being made here by Paul is the main one I wanted to focus on tonight. The cross matters supremely because of who died on it, and what that death achieved, and the cross must remain the supremely important thing in our Christian lives always. In other words, we must never make the mistake of thinking that we need the cross to become Christians, or even that we need the cross to get to heaven, but in between those two events, we can forget the cross and get on with living some other way. It doesn’t matter what that other way is. For some people, it might be a way doesn’t pay much attention to what we do is right or wrong. It might be the free-and-easy life whereby we tell ourselves that anything goes because we’ll be all right in the end. At the other extreme, the way we want to go might be to live by exact conformity to certain moral laws or standards. That everything we do must be right and correct. That although we might need the cross to become a Christian and once we’re trying to get into heaven, for the rest of the time, I’ll please and win his approval by good works and all my outward show of being a "good person". Yet another, unfortunately a way that many Christians in pentecostal and charismatic churches go, is to seek to go beyond the experience of the cross to some deeper, more "spiritual", more exciting, more dramatic experience of the Holy Spirit.

I’d just like to say one thing about all of these positions – they’re all equally and totally wrong. The Christian life is neither a licence to sin, nor is it living under the burden of laws in fear that if we don’t do enough good, God will stop loving us, and nor is it a quest to seek one mystical experience after another. The cross of Christ – the gospel of Christ and him crucified - remains at the heart of the Christian life throughout all our time on this earth. This is surely what Paul is referring to in verse 23 when he writes: "You must of course continue faithful on a firm and sure foundation, and must not be shaken from the hope you gained when you heard the gospel." And what is this firm and sure foundation? What are they to continue faithful in? It can only be the magnificent truth laid out in the previous verse, where the cross of Christ is lifted high as the one and only way of salvation, the way whereby God’s enemies are changed into his friends and made pure and holy to live forever in God’s presence.

The cross remains the focal point of our lives, and must remain so if we are not to go astray. It was because many in the Galatian church turning aside from the gospel of the cross to other teachings that the apostle Paul came down harder on them in Galatians chapter 1 than he does at any other point in his letters. Listen to Paul’s words in that chapter: "I am surprised at you! In no time at all you are deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are accepting another gospel. Actually, there is no other gospel, but I say this because there are some people who are upsetting you and trying to change the gospel of Christ. But even if we, or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel that is different from the one we preached to you, may he be condemned to hell."

And what is this gospel that Paul wants to protect so fiercely? He tells us: "In order to set us free from this present evil age, Christ gave himself for our sins, in obedience to the will of our God and Father. To God be the glory for ever and ever!"

So instead of thinking it doesn’t matter how we live, the cross stands to tell us that sin is very real and very costly. Rather than thinking it doesn’t matter if we sin, the cross tells us the price that was paid for our sins, our past sins, our present sins and our future sins. And when we stand in its shadow, and see how much sin does matter, surely we are less inclined to take a cavalier attitude to how we live.

Or maybe at the other extreme, we’re caught up in thinking we have to obey perfectly every law and commandment otherwise God won’t accept us. This time the cross stands as an emblem of God’s grace and God’s love. It was not because of our own efforts that we were first saved, and it is not because of anything we do that we will end up in heaven, so our lives here on earth need not be burdened down by guilt and the hard effort of trying to be perfect and failing all the time. We need to look at the cross here and remember that when Christ said "It is finished!" on the cross, everything that would contribute one iota to our salvation was already right then and there complete and perfect. Paradoxically, we can actually do more for God, and live better lives, when we stop trying to be good in our own strength, acknowledge we are sinners saved only by grace, and then live in thankfulness for what God has done for us, rather than fear of what God will do to us, if we aren’t obedient enough.

And to those who want to go beyond the cross to something more exciting and dramatic, the warning to the Galatians comes most strongly of all. To think that there’s something better than the cross out there to discover or experience only shows you haven’t understood the wonder of the cross properly at all.

That’s why the cross, rather than the manger, or the empty tomb, became the universal symbol of Christianity. Because it is the most important thing that ever happened. And it’s entirely right that the cross should be at the heart of the Guild badge. But much more than that, it must be at the very heart of our lives, at that secret place deep inside where we treasure what is dearest and closest to our hearts.

If the cross isn’t there for you tonight – perhaps because you’ve never come to Christ at the foot of the cross and looked up and saw the Son of God crucified for you, then that same Christ, now risen to glory and with all authority in heaven and on earth is saying to you right now, "Come to me, believe in me, trust in me and I will save you. I can do it because I died on the cross."

And if you have already come to Christ, but have maybe been stuck in a rut in your faith, or if you’ve got caught up in other things and put the cross to one side, then now’s the time to come back to the very heart of the faith, and acknowledge again the central and abiding place the cross deserves in your life.

In another letter, Paul put it this way: "As for me, however, I will boast only about the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ."

Later in Colossians he writes: "God has now brought you to life with Christ. God forgave us all our sins; he crucified the unfavourable record of our debts with its binding rules and did away with it completely by nailing it to the cross."

And in this passage, Paul ends up with this simple confession: "It is of this gospel that I, Paul, became a servant – this gospel which has been preached to everybody in the world." May we all be servants of this gospel, and keep the cross of Christ central to everything we do.

The Joy of the Lord

This is the text of a sermon preached on Nehemiah 8:1-12.

A survey asked people how they felt about eight different aspects of modern life including their marriages and other family relationships, their children, their work, their health, their neighbourhood, their finances, and so on. In every category, those who felt pessimistic, worried or fearful for the future were in the majority.

It’s a sad fact that the more advanced and sophisticated our world seems to get, the less happy we seem to get. Joy is a pretty rare commodity in the modern world.

That’s not the way life is supposed to be. Our Bible reading tonight culminates in a great affirmation that the lives of God’s people are to be filled with a special kind of joy that strengthens and protects us as we make our way through life. One of the most distinctive things about the life of the Christian when compared to the lives of those who don’t know Christ and the good news of salvation, is that our lives should be full of joy, where theirs is so often filled with misery, guilt, dissatisfaction, pointlessness, worry and fear in between periodic spells of empty happiness.

So how do we receive this “joy of the Lord” that Nehemiah mentions in verse 10? How do we come to have it in our hearts? Well, the whole of this passage from verse 1 onwards describes a spiritual journey that any person has to make to find the joy of the Lord. There are three stages on this journey, described in this passage. They are:

Discovering the Word of the Lord
Leading to a period of spiritual grief
Finding the joy of the Lord

In one sense this is a journey that we only make once, when we first put our faith in Christ and accept him as our Saviour and Lord. And since that becoming a Christian can never be undone, the joy of the Lord in being saved can never totally be lost. But in another sense, the three stages of this spiritual journey are repeated over and over again in the Christian life as we discover or remember again that something we’ve been doing is wrong in God’s eyes, and then we feel bad inside that we’ve failed and haven’t lived in a way that pleases God, and then as we come back to God sorry for what we’ve done or not done, we receive fresh assurance of God’s love and forgiveness as a son or daughter, and the experience of joy returns again.

We’ll explore each of these stages in turn as we make our way through this passage. It would be useful for you to have the order of service open at the Bible reading so you can follow me as we go.

We begin with: Discovering the Word of the Lord

This passage in Nehemiah chapter 8 gives a remarkable picture of what happens when people take God’s Word seriously and gather to learn from it. It is no accident that having completed the rebuilding of the city’s infrastructure, the people are now led to the even more important work of spiritual renewal. Discovering or rediscovering God’s Word is usually the first step when God’s brings about a reformation or sends a revival to his people. The first step in our spiritual journey from sin to salvation, from death to life, from misery to joy, is to discover or rediscover the Word of God.

In the first seven verses of the passage we see the people in Jerusalem gathering to hear the Word of the Lord. And in these verses there are a number of aspects to their rediscovery of God’s Word that should resonate with us. In these verses, the people give us a number of useful lessons about how we can know God’s Word better as individuals and especially as a church.

The people were already in the city to celebrate the Feast of Trumpets, a festival that the people of Israel were commanded to keep on the first day of the seventh month of the year. But in verse 1 the people ask for something different from the normal festival observance to be done. They tell Ezra to read them the Book of the Law of Moses. The meeting was not held because the leaders demanded that the people listen to God’s Word; it was held because the people demanded that the leaders read them God’s Word. There’s no surer sign that God is at work to bring people to faith and salvation than when there is a spontaneous renewed interest in and demand for the Bible and sound biblical teaching. Many things the church does can be popular with people – things like social events, entertainment, all kinds of meetings and forums and so forth – and though all of these kinds of things have a place, it’s quite possible for people to want to come along to them for reasons that have nothing to do with an interest in God. But when people have a desire to hear the Bible preached, when people are crowding in to a Bible study or prayer meeting, that’s a much better indication that they are open to the things of God, because by nature, people would rather do anything other than gather round God’s Word to learn from it.

The next thing to notice about the people’s eagerness to discover God’s Word is that they are of one mind in this matter. The people of Israel were just as diverse, just as different from each other as people are in Scotland today. They would have been just as likely to be interested in different things in life, to be different kinds of characters, to be unable to agree about everything, but in at least one thing they are agreed: they all wanted to hear God’s Word. Verse 1 says that “all the people gathered as one man.” That’s very important for us today too. Are we single-minded in our desire to hear God’s Word and learn from it? Any kind of genuine Christian unity must draw its fuel from this common desire to know God, to learn his Word, and live as God’s Word commands. Otherwise it’s doomed to failure, because those who love God’s Word could never have unity with others calling themselves Christians who don’t care if God’s Word condemns what they believe or what they do in their churches.

The third aspect of the people’s rediscovery of God’s Word is to note who was in the gathered assembly. Verse 2 says the assembly included men, women and children. The phrase “all who could understand what they heard” refers to children old enough to grasp what was going on. Personally, I always been in favour of children over the age of about 12 staying in for the whole of our services. I think one reason why we lose so many young people in their teenage years is the fact that they are not used to being in church to hear a sermon during the whole of their childhood. They go out to Sunday school or the youth church, in theory right up to the age of 16. At which point we then expect them to suddenly stay in for the whole service, which they haven’t got used to doing. And by that point it’s too late. The good habit of listening to a sermon has not been formed.

The assembly in our passage does things better. If the children were old enough to understand what was going on, they were old enough to listen to God’s Word being read and expounded for three hours! From early morning to midday according to verse 3. Surely our children above the age of twelve can sit through a 20 or 30 minute sermon? They have no problem concentrating for that amount of time watching television or films, or listening to their favourite music!

The fourth thing to note is that the people wanted to be taught. Verse 3 says that the people were “attentive” during the reading of God’s Word. Verse 4 says that they made a wooden platform, or more literally, a tower, for Ezra to stand on as he read from the scrolls. It’s easy to overlook this aspect. But unless we as members of the congregation expect to hear God’s truth proclaimed and eager to receive it, it doesn’t really matter how good the quality of the preaching we “aren’t really listening to” is. If we as hearers don’t “have ears to hear” as Jesus liked to put it, God’s Word can never make a home in our hearts. We need to be enthusiastic and attentive hearers, listening actively and looking for God’s Word to affect us and change us as we listen. It’s a great mistake to think of listening to God’s Word being read and preached as something we passively listen to. We should be listening actively and feel as if we’re involved in the preaching, not just an audience.

The people in the crowd have the right attitudes and are examples to us all. Notice in verse 5, the reverence the people show to God’s Word – they stand as a mark of respect as Ezra opens the scrolls. In our church we stand as the Bible is brought in at the start of the service. We should remember we are not standing as a mark of respect to the minister or preacher, but out of reverence for God’s Word.

And in case anyone is thinking that showing reverence to God’s Word is a form of idolatry, verse 6 makes it clear the reverential attitude of the people wasn’t towards the sacred scrolls, as if they were relics due veneration. No, the reverence comes from knowing whose Word the Bible is. “Ezra blessed the LORD, the great God, and all the people answered, Amen, Amen.”

They realised that hearing the Bible taught was not an add-on extra to the worship of God – it is at the heart of the worship of God! It is where God speaks to us most clearly in this gospel age. It is an indispensable part of the true worship of God. Our forefathers knew this. That’s why unadorned by gold and fancy works of art, Presbyterian churches tend to be kept simple and plain – because the focal point of worship is not on the building, or even on the communion table, but on the Word of God, heard and preached from the pulpit.

Finally we should briefly look at verse 8. It is a remarkably clear statement of what a Bible-based teaching ministry is all about. It’s in three distinct parts. The first thing is to make sure the we “read from the book…clearly.” Our services are not be built around the latest news headlines, or a few funny stories, or beautiful poems, but around the book, the Bible. In every service, God’s Word should be read, and it should be read loud and clear for everyone to hear. One aspect of this is that it should be read in a language that the people understand. Secondly, it is the preacher’s job to “give the sense” or in other words to explain the reading to his hearers. Whatever else a sermon is, at its most basic, it should explain and make it easier to understand God’s Word. If it fails in that, it’s failed as a sermon, no matter how good it is otherwise. Thirdly, it is the congregation’s job to understand the reading. It’s no good if the Bible is clearly read, and clearly explained, if the people refuse to pay heed to it, or don’t make any effort to understand and remember what they were taught. When these three things happen together then remarkable things can happen.

In our passage something remarkable does begin to happen, but the middle step is the most difficult to go through. Though it will not always be to the same degree for everyone, or be manifested in the same way in everyone, there is a process of going through spiritual grief. We see this in our passage in verse 9. “All the people wept as they heard the words of the Law.”

The grief and sadness that wells up in us as God’s Word is understood in a deep, personal way - expressed by the people in our passage as weeping, perhaps by us in ways we keep hidden inside - is the first reaction that people often have and it’s actually a good sign when people feel that way! It’s a sure sign that people’s consciences have been touched. Theologians tend to call it being “convicted of sin.”

By nature, the Bible tells us in Ephesians 2:1, we are dead in sin. One aspect of that is that before we are Christians, when we sin, we are a bit like a patient under a deep anaesthetic on an operating table – we don’t feel the pain of what we’re doing. When we come to understand the Word of God in a deep personal way, it’s as if the anaesthetic wears off and we see ourselves and our actions as they really are, and it hurts. We become conscious of how different our lives are to how they should be. We see our failures and some people can find that deeply upsetting.

Looking in God’s Word is like looking in a mirror, the Letter to James tells us. Firstly we see the mirror itself dazzling with light and brilliance, then we see the world around us reflected in its light, then if we look closely, we see ourselves as we really are. When we read or hear God’s Word, we see what God is like, in all his glory, his love and mercy, his justice and holiness and we recoil because he is so different, so much better than us in every way. Then we see the world around us and how far removed it is from how God wants it to be. We see how bad it is. And finally, we see ourselves and see how far removed we are from how God wants us to be, and how sinful we are.

It is this revelation of human sin and failure that moved the people in Jerusalem to tears as they heard Law of God read out, revealing his character, his commandments and showing up their utter failure to live as God’s people should live.

But thanks be to God, for when he brings people to that dark place of realising our sinfulness, our guilt and our helplessness before a holy God, he then floods that place with light and love, peace and joy, for the same Word which condemns us as sinners also reveals to us the good news, the gospel, that sinners can be saved through trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ.

God’s Word diagnoses the heart disease at the core of the human condition, which is sin; but it then prescribes the remedy for that disease, which is to come to Jesus, and trust in him to save you. Jesus said, “If anyone comes to me I will never cast him out.”

And when we come to Christ, and know that we have been forgiven by God, the darkness lifts and the weight of sin and shame falls away, and we begin a new life in the light, a life that is everlasting.

Our passage in Nehemiah takes place at a time before Jesus Christ came to the earth. But the same process occurs. When the Levites say to the people in verse 9 “This day is holy to the Lord your God, do not mourn or weep,” they’re saying far more than just that as it’s a special day the people should “put on a happy face” and forget the mournful feelings they had. Some commentators say that’s all the priests were doing, but that doesn’t ring true to me. No, what they are doing is reminding the people of who God is – he is the LORD – the covenant God who chose them and will always remain faithful to his people. They’re reminding them that he is not just God, he is their God.

And in verse 10, when they tell the people to go ahead and have a celebration feast – “eat the fat, and drink sweet wine…” – they are telling the people they can celebrate because God has forgiven them and they are still His covenant people.

Having come through the darkness of being convicted of our sins, and having trusted in God for deliverance, and found his forgiveness, we can then rejoice and celebrate. Surely one of the most beautiful verses in the Psalms is Psalm 30:5:

“For his anger is but for a moment, and his favour is for a lifetime. Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning.”

And that brings us to the third step in our spiritual journey:

Finding the joy of the Lord

Verse 10 is one of my favourite verses in the Bible. I come back to it time and time again. “Do not be grieved, for the joy of the LORD is your strength.”

Let me just say in passing that the grief being talked of here is the grief for sin that has been forgiven. It is not a blanket command that Christians should never grieve about anything. Most especially, this verse does not teach that Christians shouldn’t grieve for the death of their loved ones. The Bible is very clear that it is right and entirely understandable for Christians to grieve at certain times. Ecclesiastes 3:4 says there is “a time to weep.” In Romans 12:15, far from condemning those who mourn, Paul exhorts Christians to get alongside those who mourn – “weep with those who weep,” he says.

No, the “do not be grieved” in verse 10 is not a general command covering all situations. It is a particular command to those who have grieved for their sins but received God’s forgiveness. Do not grieve over sins that God has forgiven, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.

This joy that is mentioned is a very special thing as we’ll see as we consider where it comes from, what it is and what it does in the life of the Christian believer.

Since it is the joy of the Lord, we know it is a joy that comes from God. It is not something that we can manufacture in our own lives. It is a gift. And it is not something that any other source can provide. It cannot be found in money, or possessions, or in sex, or in drink and drugs, or in success, or fame. It is the joy of the Lord, and is only given to those who know the Lord. In Jeremiah 31:13, the LORD says:

“Then shall the young women rejoice in the dance, and the young men and the old shall be merry. I will turn their mourning into joy; I will comfort them, and give them gladness for sorrow.

In Galatians 5:22-23, Paul writes:

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.”

The Spirit only produces such fruit in those who belong to Christ Jesus.

So what is the joy of the Lord? We know it comes from God, but what is it? Well, since this joy comes from God, it is to be distinguished from mere human happiness. Happiness comes from the same root as the word “happen.” Happiness is feeling good when good things happen. It disappears when bad or sad things happen to us. Joy is a different. It is a much deeper, stronger, more robust, more steady feeling of pleasure, gladness and contentment that nothing can take away from us. It persists within us even through times of pain, suffering, loss and mourning. It persists through all these things precisely because it is not only an emotion, a feeling generated solely within us, but because it comes from God, outside of us, as a divine blessing and gift. This is why God’s Word can command us to always be joyful:

Philippians 4:4 says: “Rejoice in the Lord, always; and again I say, rejoice!”

Other verses tells us that going through troubles, cannot affect our joy. Look at what the prophet says in Habakkuk 3:17:

“Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the LORD; I will take joy in the God of my salvation.”

Or what Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 7:4:

“In all our affliction, I am overflowing with joy.”

Even if it "all goes pear-shaped," we can still rejoice in God and know the joy of the Lord, is the promise of the Bible.

We may not feel as if the joy of the Lord is still there in hard times, but even in hard times it is there, like the faint glow of embers in a fire that looks as if it’s about to go out. And like embers it is always ready to be fanned into full flame again if we kindle it by keeping on trusting in the Lord and waiting for the wind of God’s spirit to blow through us again.

The second thing to remember is that the joy of the Lord not only comes from the Lord, it is a joy found in the Lord.

It is a joy that increases the more we come to know about who God is and what he has done. In other words, it is a joy that is increased as we learn about God from his Word. Psalm 119 is the longest in the Bible and its all about God’s Word. Verse 111 of that Psalm says this:

“Your testimonies are my heritage forever, for they are the joy of my heart.”

God’s Word is what gives the Psalmist joy in his heart. Why?

Joy wells up in us as we consider what God is like. As we think about his character – his love, his grace, his faithfulness, his truthfulness, his kindness, his compassion and all his other attributes.

It is a joy that wells up in us as we consider what God has done: when we think about the grandeur and beauty. Or maybe when we consider the intricate order and total control God holds over all things by his sovereign power. And yet he tells us that all of that power, all his sovereign will, works all things for our good.

Most of all, this joy wells up inside us when we consider God’s salvation. As Isaiah 12:3 promises us:

“With joy you will draw waters from the wells of salvation.”

If we know Jesus Christ as our Saviour and Lord, how can we think about the cross and the resurrection without joy flooding into our hearts? When we know that when we stand before God in heaven, he will look upon the righteousness of Christ, which is ours through faith, and we will hear the words, “Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world,” how can we not rejoice in what he has done for us?

The third aspect of this verse is the realisation and experience that this joy that comes from God and is found in God “is our strength” as we go through life.

Partly that means that the joy of the Lord gives us strength to do what God calls us to do. In our passage as the people are filled with joy and begin to celebrate, they then begin to share the food and wine of their feast with others who don’t have these things. Verse 12: “All the people went their way to eat and drink and to send portions and to make great rejoicing, because they had understood the words that were declared to them.”

But when you consider that the word translated “strength” in v.10 has its root meaning in the Hebrew word for a stronghold or fortress, I think the main point is that the joy of the Lord is our defence against the hard and painful things that life throws at us. The joy we carry around with us, deep inside, is like a shield that protects us and enables us to do things we otherwise couldn’t do.

I’m wondering if anyone is sitting here tonight and is saying to themselves, “What is he talking about? I don’t know this joy of the Lord.” Well the thing is this. You can’t know the joy of the Lord until you know the Lord himself. Jesus said in a prayer to his Father:

“This is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” (John 17:3)

The question is, do you know Jesus Christ? Not as a figure in history, not as a great moral teacher, not even as the man that other people believe in. The question is, do you know Christ? Have you met him for yourself? Have you trusted in him as your Saviour and Lord? Can you truthfully say what the apostle Paul wrote in Philippians 3:8

“I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.”

If not, God is calling you to himself tonight. He wants you to know Christ and know the joy of the Lord. Don’t miss out on it. Because as the chorus of our closing hymn puts it:

Knowing you, Jesus, knowing you,
There is no greater thing.
You’re my all, you’re the best,
You’re my joy, my righteousness,
And I love you Lord.

“The people went their way to eat and drink and to send portions and to make great rejoicing, because they had understood the words that were declared to them.”

May that be as true for us tonight, as it was for the crowd in Nehemiah’s day, for the joy of the Lord is our strength, this night and forever.

It's the thought that counts

The editorial from our Church's Magazine for December 2006

There's a saying you often hear around Christmas: "It's not the gift, it's the thought that counts." How very true that is. Let’s look at it in two ways to show it’s true! Firstly, we value the time and thought that someone put into a gift, we prize the love behind the gift far more than the gift itself. When I think back to Christmas as a child I received many lovely presents. I remember one year receiving a set of little plastic farm animals and farm equipment and the farmer with a shotgun tucked under his arm. That was what enthralled me then. Now thinking back, I appreciate even more the wooden farm with hills and little loch, the barn and farmhouse my father made himself from wood. It must have taken him a long time to make and paint it. On the other hand it was only plywood, papier-mâché, bits of sponge and paint. It was worth almost nothing. But that’s the gift that came to mind when I sat down to write this. Why should that be? Because the thought behind it revealed how much my father loved me in a very special way.

On the other hand, how do we feel if we know no real thought went into a gift, even if the gift itself is expensive? There’s a scene in the film Dead Poets Society where it’s the birthday of one of the schoolboys and he’s sitting up on the roof looking very depressed. Another boy sees the expensive desk-set his parents gave him as a present and asks what’s wrong. “They gave me exactly the same set last year,” he says. If no thought went into it – if someone gives us clothes in a size that’s obviously too big or small for us, or if someone gives us a box of chocolates and earlier in the year we told them we’re diabetic (I’m not by the way before you ask!), it inevitably creates disappointment in the giver’s lack of thought.

Another aspect of the thought behind the gift is where the person makes a big deal of the “thinking about you”, but the gift never comes through at all! All thought and no gift isn’t really much thought at all is it? I’m not talking about people who cannot afford a gift here. Please don’t think that. I’m talking about people who like to appear generous but in practice are pretty mean. James in his New Testament letter writes about people like that. He writes at one point (James 2:15-16): "If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, 'Go in peace, be warmed and filled,' without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that?" There's something phoney about good wishes that aren't backed up by kind practical actions.

What’s all this got to do with the real meaning of Christmas? Well, the point I wanted to make is that Christmas shows not only God giving us the supremely valuable gift, but it also shows that he gave the gift out of the deepest love, and in doing that he was keeping his promises made in the Old Testament over more than a thousand years. Let’s look briefly at these now, in reverse order.

Unlike people who promise the earth but don’t deliver, God keeps his Word. In the Old Testament he promised to send the Messiah. And he didn’t just leave it as a wonderful idea, a set of fine promises, never followed through and delivered. God is not a politician! When he promises it, he does it. The Scriptures promised many things about him. They tell that he would destroy the devil when he came, that he would be conceived in a virgin, that he would be a descendant of Abraham and King David, that he would be born in Bethlehem, that he would be a Redeemer, a Saviour of his people, and possibly most astounding of all, that it would be through his death that his people will be saved, but that his death will somehow not be the end of his life. Look at Isaiah 53:5, 9-10: “He was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed…And they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth. Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for sin, he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days; the will of the LORD shall prosper in his hand.”

The second thing to remember is that in sending us his Son, God sent us a priceless gift, the most valuable and precious thing he had, the thing he loved most. Probably the most famous verse in the Bible says it most clearly: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son so that everyone who believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.” (John 3:16). God’s gift is no mere “stocking filler” if I can dare to put it that way. He gave us his beloved Son! From eternity, the holy trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit had existed in a perfect bond of unity and love, knowing and loving each other more deeply that we can ever imagine. And that first Christmas, God the Father sends God the Son down to such a world as this, to save us.

That leads us to consider the thought in the Father’s mind behind the gift of his Son Jesus Christ. The “thought that counts” most supremely of all at Christmas is the Father’s strongest and deepest saving love for his chosen people. A lot of people treat God’s election of his people as the dirty secret of Christian doctrine, something we should hide or be embarrassed about. Well we shouldn’t be and I’m not. I rejoice in it and I don’t care who knows it. From before the beginning of the world he knew and loved us. Paul wrote in 2 Timothy 1:9 that God “saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began.” Or as he put it in Ephesians 1:4 “He chose us in him before the foundation of the world.”

How can we begin to conceive of such a love as this? A love that has been working since before time, and all through human history, to order all things for our good (Romans 8:28) and to save us through Jesus Christ (Romans 8:30).

If John 3:16 is the best known verse in the Bible, it should be joined by Romans 5:8, where Paul writes: “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” While all the wonderful verses about predestination fill all who believe in Jesus Christ with joy, those who don’t yet know Christ may feel excluded, wondering if God didn’t choose them. But that’s where verses like this are so important. It was while we were sinners, Christ died for us. If you are not a Christian, you don’t need to worry about whether God chose. God is calling you to come to Christ and believe in him. It’s that choice, whether to accept God’s gift or not, that should concern you. There is no qualification required to come to Christ other than to accept you are a sinner in need of a Saviour, because it was for sinners like you and me that Christ died to save.

This Christmas may we all see that in Christ both the gift and the thought count. And may we never despise or reject either.

How to Choose Your Friends

There’s a verse I was reading recently in the book of Proverbs that stuck with me. Proverbs 13:20: "He who walks with the wise grows wise, but a companion of fools suffers harm." (NIV).

It’s so simple, so straightforward, and so true. But what is wisdom you may be asking. Well it’s not intelligence. That’s quite different. Some of the most intelligent people I met at university were the biggest fools when it came to living their own lives. Then I’ve known other people who weren’t what you’d call "an intellectual", but they had wisdom to spare. And it’s not knowledge either, though knowledge does play a part in being wise. The computer I’m writing this on has more knowledge (i.e. information) stored in its memory banks and available on the Internet than my brain could ever hold. But it’s not wise. It’s just a machine. It can’t really think for itself. No, wisdom is something else. Wisdom is a down to earth, practical knowledge of about how to live and practical skill for living life.

In that light, the verse in Proverbs is true for everyone reading this, whoever you are. And it’s not a difficult concept to grasp. It’s almost self-explanatory. If you spend your time with wise people, their wisdom will rub off on you. If you spend time with fools, their foolishness will rub off on you and you are likely to suffer as a result.

In Bible times, the proverb mainly concerned actually spending time with people. And that’s the most important aspect of this proverb, but if we take the principle this proverb lays down and update it for other time spent with people, it also applies to the authors of the books we read, the makers of the films and television programmes we watch, the singers in the music we listen to, the columnists in the newspapers and magazines we read, and so on. And when we read it in that light, how much more challenging is it about how we spend (or should that be waste!) our time? In our daily life, if we even considered for a minute the question "Will this leave me a wiser person?" how many of us would make different choices about what we read, watch and listen to? It reminds me of Paul’s advice in Philippians 4:8:

"Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable – if anything is excellent or praiseworthy – think about such things."

Yet having said that, clearly the main thing this verse teaches is about who we spend our time with. The fact is that those you spend your time with not only reveals a lot about you, it affects you much more than you might want or realise. For example if you spend all of your week, except one hour on a Sunday, basically in the company of people who don’t know Jesus Christ and don’t worship our God, or worse who hate and ridicule him and don’t mind telling you so, you will find yourself much more open to being influenced to think the world’s way, to take a secular view of life, to take a materialistic view of life, and to be subtly encouraged to forget God during the week and get on with your own life. You may even find yourself, like Peter, denying Christ and doing things you know are wrong, simply to avoid being ridiculed or disliked yourself. That’s surely one aspect of "suffering harm" as a companion of fools?

Now clearly I’m not advocating the setting up of monasteries, and retreating from the world physically. But on the other hand, if you spend time with your fellow believers not just on a Sunday morning, but maybe on a Sunday night too, on a Wednesday night at our "Unlock" Bible study meeting, maybe at an organisation like the Regnal or Guild during the week, then you keep just that little bit more in touch not just with each other, but as God’s people, with God too.
There is a whole strand of teaching throughout the Bible that makes it very clear that although we are to live in the world, be good neighbours, live peaceably with everyone, get to know people outside the church, be good colleagues of those we work with and so on, we are not "of the world," or be "friends" with the world, and should not live as if we are. Jesus says to his disciples "You do not belong to the world." (John 15:19). In Romans 12:2 Paul says "Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind."

Although we will have friends and acquaintances outside the church, we should be careful of how much influence they have over us. And we should try wherever possible to make sure our best and most trusted friends should be in the church. They should be the ones we spend much time with and learn from. Our closest companions should be those who fear the Lord, who hold him in awe and wonder, who love him, who trust in him and will help us in our walk as we seek to do so too. After all, if we are to walk with the wise, we must walk with those who fear the Lord, for Proverbs teaches that "the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." (Proverbs 9:10).

The most important application of this verse from Proverbs that I can think of is the way it should encourage us to spend more time with Jesus in our own private times of prayer, Bible study and worship. After all, 1 Corinthians 1:24, Paul says that Christ is "the wisdom of God." It follows then that he or she that walks with Christ will grow wise. We will become wise in the things that matter most: in the knowledge of what God is like as he reveals himself through Christ and his written Word, the Bible, and in how we can live a life that will glorify him and enable us to enjoy him forever.

So let him be your teacher as you walk through life. There is no greater teacher. And his lessons are the easiest to remember, even though the practical work can be hard at times. His school is always open to take new students and no one who joins his classes will ever be expelled or sent home. You only need one textbook too. Best of all, once you sign up for his classes you can’t fail the exam at the end of term. You see, the teacher has already corrected all his pupils mistakes and answered all their examination questions correctly, well before the exam is marked. He did it a long time ago for them at a place called Calvary.

And how do you get into this remarkable teacher’s class? You just knock and the door will be opened to you. Ask him, and he’ll let you in. Put your trust in him, and you’ll never regret it. It will be the wisest thing you’ve ever done.

Encounters with Jesus: The Crippled Man

There's a true story of a Spanish father and son who had become estranged from each other. The son ran away, and the father set off to find him. He searched for months to no avail. Finally, in a last desperate effort to find him, the father put an advert in a Madrid newspaper. The advert read: "Dear Paco, meet me in front of this newspaper office at noon on Saturday. All is forgiven. I love you. Your Father." On the Saturday 800 men named Paco turned up, looking for forgiveness from their fathers.

The point that true story makes very graphically is that the need for forgiveness is a very strong human emotion. And the burden of guilt is one of the worst things that can afflict a person’s life. Feeling guilty about something can eat a person up inside and ruin their life. Knowing forgiveness, on the other hand, heals broken hearts and restores inner peace.

This passage of Scripture we’re going to look at tonight has some really important things to teach us about forgiveness. We can break it down into three aspects and we’ll spend a bit of time on each of these. The three main lessons for us are:

Firstly, spreading the gospel of forgiveness to sinners is the most important purpose of the church.

Secondly, the Lord Jesus Christ, who forgives sinners, is the most important person who has ever lived because his actions prove he is no less than God incarnate.

Thirdly, coming to faith in Christ, so that we can receive God’s forgiveness, is the most important choice any of us can make in this life.

So let’s work through this passage as we see each of these aspects in turn. As always I would suggest you keep the passage before you as we go through it as I will be referring to the text quite a lot as we progress through the story.

Verse 1 follows right on from the passage we looked at last week. You may remember that after Jesus healed the two demon-possessed men and sent the demons into the pigs that were drowned, the people of that place came out to meet Jesus and they begged him to leave their region. Verse 1 tells us that Jesus did exactly that.

"And getting into a boat he crossed over and came to his own city."

His own city is Capernaum back on the other shore of the Sea of Galilee. We know this from Matthew chapter 4, verse 13, which says:

"And leaving Nazareth he went and lived in Capernaum by the sea in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali."

That’s why Capernaum is referred to as "his own city." People tend not to realise this. But the fact is that although Christ was born in Bethlehem, and grew up in Nazareth, it was actually in the seaside town of Capernaum in Galilee that he made his home, and he used it as a base to conduct most of his earthly ministry.

And then in verse 2, we are told that "some people brought to him a paralytic, lying on a bed." As is often the case with Matthew’s Gospel, most of the details are stripped away from his account of the events and just the bare bones of the story are told. We get much more vivid detail about exactly what happened from the parallel accounts in Mark’s and Luke’s Gospels. Listen to the picture Mark gives of the same story, and notice not only the lengths the crippled man’s friends went to in order to bring him to Jesus, but also notice the circumstances of this encounter, which explains why there were scribes there to witness everything. This is Mark chapter 2, verses 1 to 4:

"Several days later Jesus returned to Capernaum, and the news of his arrival spread quickly through the town. Soon the house where he was staying was so packed with visitors that there wasn't room for one more person, not even outside the door. And he preached the word to them. Four men arrived carrying a paralyzed man on a mat. They couldn't get to Jesus through the crowd, so they dug through the clay roof above his head. Then they lowered the sick man on his mat, right down in front of Jesus." (NLT)

So there was a quite a meeting going on in the house where Jesus was staying. The place was jam-packed with people inside and outside, all there to hear Jesus preach to them. Mark points out that there wasn’t room for any more people to get in through the door. And this crippled man’s friends come up with a unique solution to the problem. They climb up on the roof – remember the houses in Israel at that time would have flat roofs covered with a kind of mixture of dried clay and straw thatch rather than slates or tiles that we have – and they make a hole in the covering and then they lower the crippled man down on ropes, still in his bed until he lands right in front of Jesus in the room below. What an amazing thing to do! It’s such a remarkable detail that it’s maybe surprising that Matthew doesn’t mention it. But Matthew really wants his readers to focus on what happened once the crippled man was in the room, rather than how he got there.

This man’s friends really go the extra mile on his behalf, don’t they? They go to enormous lengths to make sure that their friend is brought to hear Jesus’ teaching. I think they challenge us. What are we doing to bring our friends and family to Jesus? In a different sense to this story perhaps, but with equal importance, what are we doing for those who can’t "walk through the door of the church" to bring them to hear the gospel? Are we capable of coming up with ideas as ingenious as this crippled man’s friends came up with to make sure he didn’t miss out from hearing the Saviour’s words for himself?

Well surely this autumn we will all have a marvellous opportunity to do something when our church will be putting on the Christianity Explored course. Of course, we should pray for this, but we should also think carefully if there’s someone we know who we could bring to Jesus because they either can’t or won’t walk into this church on their own.

But to get back to our passage, once the crippled man is in the room, lying right in front of Jesus on his bed, Jesus sees what has happened and he sees both the faith of the friends, probably peering down from their vantage point through the hole in the roof, and the faith of the crippled man too. There’s certainly no indication here that the crippled man was brought to Jesus against his will. Quite the opposite. It seems obvious to me that the man on the stretcher was probably the driving force that persuaded the able-bodied men to do what they did. At the very least we know he did not object to it. But I think he was desperate to meet Jesus.

What we don’t really know is why this man and his friends went to such lengths to come before Christ. It is possible he was merely wanting to hear Jesus’ teaching and not at all looking for his paralysis to be healed. But it seems more likely that the possibility of being healed played at least some part in his motivation to be brought into Jesus’ presence. Whatever he was expecting, Jesus’ completely ignores the fact that the man is a cripple. He cuts to the chase and immediately gets to the man’s most pressing need by saying to him, "Take heart, my son," (which could also be translated, "Be of good cheer, my child," – it is a term of endearment and kindness), "Take heart, my son, your sins are forgiven."

Jesus’ words, though very gentle and loving, are also quite shocking. He doesn’t say to him, as we might have expected, "Take heart, my son, you’re faith has made you well." No! "Take heart, my son, your sins are forgiven."

As so often in the gospels, Jesus cuts through all the baggage and dross, all the peripheral things. And he get to the heart of the matter. "Your sins are forgiven." Notice that no one has asked Jesus anything at this point. Certainly no one has raised the subject of sin at all. Bringing a crippled man to the most renowned healer in Palestine might have spoken for itself we might suppose. The most obvious assumption would that this cripple must be looking to be healed. But Jesus knows this man’s deepest needs. So he purposely switches the incident around and makes it about the forgiveness of sins.

And this is where I think the first of the three main lessons I mentioned is made apparent by Christ. I think a principle is laid down for us here and it’s this: the main purpose of the Church is to spread the gospel of forgiveness. To preach the good news that forgiveness, salvation, eternal life is offered to all sinners who will come to Christ in faith and repentance. It’s a crucial principle for the church to grasp. Telling people about God’s salvation through Christ Jesus is the primary – I might almost say the paramount – mission for Christ’s church. You see there’s a temptation to get bogged down in a "social gospel" of social work, health care, famine relief, drug rehabilitation, housing the homeless and so on. Now I’m not decrying any of these things. Of course I’m not. The church’s practical ministry of mercy to the poor, the sick and the needy is a vital part of a healthy church’s life. A church that has all its doctrines right, and pure worship according to the Word of God, and so forth, but which doesn’t show practical love to those in need is travesty of the church God calls his people to be. But the point I’m making here, is that it is also a travesty if a church thinks that as long as it does the practical things it is getting the most important things right. Because it isn’t. It’s far too easy to get sucked into that social gospel mentality which seeks to help people on this world’s terms first, with the idea being that after that, those we help will automatically become Christians because we have shown them love. Or else we say, let’s sort out their earthly lives first and then we can they’ll listen to the gospel later. Only in reality, "later" never comes and somehow proclaiming the gospel is missed out like an optional extra.

I can’t overstress how wrong I think this kind of approach is. The correct, biblical approach is for both practical help and gospel teaching to go hand-in-hand, both coming together. But of the two, the most important is spreading the gospel. If it doesn’t have primacy, we’ve got it wrong. Practical only lasts for this life. Bringing someone to faith in Christ lasts forever. Remember that Jesus didn’t say to the crippled man, "Your faith has made you well," nor did he say to him, "I will heal you first and then we’ll see about your sins." No, the Saviour lays down the principle for his church. First and foremost, the church’s "business" is telling people how they can find forgiveness for their sins and how they can find a new life in covenant relationship with God through faith in Jesus Christ. All the social action we can do we certainly should do, but only to back up our mission to "Go into all the world and make disciples of all the nations…teaching them to obey everything that Jesus commanded." Only to back this up, never to replace it.

The second significant lesson for us to take away from this passage is the obvious conclusion Matthew expects readers of his gospel to come to: Jesus Christ is the most important person who has ever lived. He is no less than one true God come to earth as a human being.

As soon as Jesus says the words, "Your sins are forgiven", some of the hearers pick up on this and the alarm bells start to go off in their minds. In verse 3, some of the scribes in the room start saying to themselves "This man is blaspheming."

In the gospels we hear quite a lot about "the scribes." When we use the word scribe we usually mean a writer – particularly someone who writes things down for other people. But in the Bible, the scribes are the scholars of the law of God. They were students of the Old Testament, experts in applying God’s law to every situation in life. They are sometimes called "lawyers" or "doctors of the law" or "teachers of the law" in some translations.

It’s a group of these Old Testament legal scholars who hear Jesus saying to the paralytic "Your sins are forgiven." And though they don’t say anything out loud, in their hearts they say to themselves "This man is blaspheming." Or as some translations put it "This fellow is speaking blasphemy." And there is certainly a note of contempt for Jesus in their choice of words.
Here we should note that from their point of view there is a sense in which they are right, or at least their feelings have some justification. If Jesus is just a good man, or a great teacher, or whatever other humanistic label is put on him, then he is was sinning when he claimed to have authority to forgive sins against God. Technically speaking, the scribes were wrong to call it blasphemy. That crime was recognised in the Jewish law as only applying when the name of God was misused by the blasphemer – and the penalty was death by stoning. So the scribes are pushing it a little in calling this blasphemy, but it is certainly sinful for a mere man to claim the authority to forgive someone else’s sins. Only God can forgive sins because sin is an affront to God and a breaking of God’s laws. As Psalm 51:4 makes clear, when David prayed to God:

"Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight."

In Psalm 32:5 the psalmist says, addressing God directly:

"I acknowledged my sin to you and I did not cover my iniquity; I said, ‘I will confess my transgressions to the LORD’, and you forgave the iniquity of my sin."

In Isaiah 43:25 the LORD says:

"I, I am he who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins."

So for a mere man to say he has the authority to forgive sins, when the Bible testifies that forgiveness is the sole prerogative of God, is indeed a terrible wrong.

But of course there is a very good reason why Jesus could say to the crippled man "your sins are forgiven" and yet was not guilty of any wrongdoing in saying so. Probably no one present at the house that day realised it – not even when the extraordinary events of verses 4 to 6 took place. The crowd certainly gets it wrong in their explanation which we find in verse 8. They come up with the conclusion that God had changed and had now decided to give the authority to forgive sins to at least one mere man, rather than reserve it to himself. The phrase "who had given such authority to men" in verse 8 should not be read as implying they though every man now had this authority. Nothing in the passage suggests they thought that. No, their amazement was that any man at all could be given this power. But they were forced to conclude that Jesus and only Jesus had it.

But all these are wrong explanations. The real reason why Jesus can forgive sins, even though the Bible teaches that only God can do that, is because Jesus is God. This is what the New Testament teaches in many many passages. Let me read a few of them to you.

John 1:1: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."
And of course John leaves us in no doubt that "the Word" is Jesus Christ.

John 8:57-59: "So the Jews said to him, ‘You are not yet fifty years old, and have you seen Abraham?’ Jesus said to them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am.’ So they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple."

Here the reason the crowd act so violently to what Jesus said is because they understood that he was claiming to be God here. Not only does he claim to have been in existence before Abraham lived, which was of course more than two thousand years before Christ was born, but when he says "I am" the crowd realises he is taking God’s covenant name for himself. Remember when Moses asked God what his name was at the burning bush? God said his name was "I am." Jesus here says he is "I am."

Romans 9:5 very clearly states that Jesus is God:

"Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them [that’s the Jews] is traced the human ancestry of Christ, who is God over all, for ever praised." (NIV)

And finally, Paul’s great affirmation of the glory and deity of Christ in Colossians 1:15-19:

"He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities--all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be pre-eminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell."

So yes, the Old Testament does teach that only God can forgive sins. But the New Testament teaches that Christ is God. And that’s the reason why when Christ says to the crippled man "Your sins are forgiven" he had every right to say it.

And by what happens in the rest of our reading after Jesus says these key words, he proves that his words are true and he proves that he does have the authority of God, and is God, in three ways:

Firstly, he can tell what the scribes are thinking, even when they don’t say a word or give any outward indication. In verse 4, Jesus says to the scribes: "Why do you think evil in your hearts?" Almost as if he could hear the very words about blasphemy that they only thought silently to themselves. And he is right to call what they were thinking evil because they were actually accusing God himself of blaspheming against God! But by this display of knowledge, he shows himself to have the knowledge of God.

Secondly, he states again that he can indeed forgive sins. He does it in an oblique way though. He doesn’t come right out and say it again. Instead, he says in verse 5, "Which is easier, to say ‘Your sins are forgiven’ or to say, ‘Rise and walk?’" And of course what he’s practically saying is that if he can say the second and prove it to be true, what reason can anyone have for doubting the first statement. He’s saying to them, "Look, the proof of the pudding is in the eating." He’s saying, "Okay, you want me to put up or shut up? Then watch this!"

Thirdly, he then goes on to actually heal the crippled man. In verse 6 he says this is "that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins." And then he speaks the word, and it is done. And doesn’t that remind you of the very beginning of creation, where God speaks: "Let there be light, and there was light." He says it and it happens.

He bids the crippled man rise and walk, and he does. And here he shows such power, such miraculous power than no mere man could have, that he is showing the people there and us by his actions, that he is God. Imagine what it would have been like to be in that room and see that happen! Verse 8 tells us that the crowd there were afraid. And no wonder! The healing here was truly miraculous. No medical procedure, not even such as we have today could achieve what Christ achieved by his word alone.

The reason I say that is because of the particular word that Luke uses to describe this man in his Gospel. He doesn’t just call him a cripple, or a paralytic. He calls him a paraplegic. His condition was of long standing and degenerative. His bones were deformed. His muscles were wasted away. There was just no way medicine could help him. And no natural explanation for how such a man could ever stand on his own two feet never mind walk home.

But that’s what happened. He rose and walked out of the room, carrying the very bed he had been carried in on. And Luke adds in his account that he went home that day glorifying God, not just because of his miraculous healing, but even more so because of he knew the burden of his sins had been forever taken away by Christ and he had Christ’s promise from his own lips that he was now forgiven. You see that as well as showing that his forgiveness was real to the scribes, Christ was also re-assuring the crippled man that his sins really were forgiven.

That brings us to the third of the main lessons we should draw from this passage. Coming to faith in Christ, so that we can receive God’s forgiveness, is the most important choice any of us can make in this life.

The passage tells us that Jesus Christ has the authority to forgive our sins. And that is such a wonderful thing in itself that we must never forget it. Amazing though Jesus’ miracles of healing and his ability to cast out demons are, the fact that Jesus can take our sins away is even more amazing! This passage is the first time in the gospel that the issue of forgiveness of sin is mentioned. As William Hendriksen says in his commentary on this passage: "So far Jesus has healed. He has dealt with many human afflictions. But now he deals with the worst affliction suffered by men and women – sin."

Because it’s here in the forgiveness of sin that Jesus gets to the very root of all misery, which is human guilt and pollution. In forgiveness, Christ deals with the evil that separates man from his Maker. Sin unforgiven is Satan’s best friend, man’s worst enemy.

We know that the crippled man came to Christ in faith and received forgiveness and healing. What about us?

A Sunday School teacher had just concluded her lesson and wanted to make sure she had made her point. She said, "Can anyone tell me what you must do before you can obtain forgiveness of sin?" There was a short pause and then, from the back of the room, a small boy spoke up. "Sin," he said.

Well that little boy had a point didn’t he? Although obviously his answer wasn’t what his Sunday school teacher was looking for, he wasn’t wrong. Unless there is some wrong done to us, unless someone has done something to us, there’s nothing for us to forgive. Forgiveness just doesn’t come into it unless there’s something that has caused some kind of breakdown in the relationship between the person who is guilty of the wrongdoing and the person against whom the wrong has been done. Forgiveness goes hand-in-hand with guilt. Where there is guilt there is the possibility of forgiveness, and without guilt there is nothing to forgive.

In the case of the relationship between mankind and God there is always guilt because we are all sinners. The Bible could not be clearer on this point.

Romans 3:23 "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God."

1 John 1:8 "If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us."

So according to the Bible, all of us, every single one of us needs God’s forgiveness, because all of us are guilty of sinning against him.

But the Bible also teaches that forgiveness is no easy thing for God. It’s not just a matter of saying the words. And Jesus knew that very well. Indeed, he knew it better than anyone else. For God to forgive anyone’s sins, his justice still had to be satisfied. Atonement had to be made. For God to forgive a sinner, a substitute had to be punished in the sinner’s place. For Christ to forgive the crippled man took no less than for the Son of God to shed his blood on the cross.
Paul writes in Ephesians 1:7: "In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace."

Now the point is this: the only way to be forgiven, to receive God’s pardon, to have your sins blotted out and carried away is through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. To receive God’s forgiveness there is nothing you can do and nothing you are asked to do by God except come to Jesus Christ, even though crippled by sin and loaded down with guilt and ask him to forgive you. Come to him, trusting and relying on him to be your Saviour and you will be saved. And no one who does this will ever be disappointed.

Think of this crippled man who was saved by Jesus. He began that day crippled not only physically but also spiritually. He went home that night not only able to walk but knowing his sins were gone, forgiven and forgotten by God. And he glorified God because his sins were washed away by the blood of the Lamb.

To accept God’s offer of salvation through Christ is to have eternal joy in heaven. To reject Christ is to face eternal woe in hell. That’s why the choice to accept or reject Christ is the most important decision you will ever make.

Jesus said in John 5:24: "Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life."

He also said in John 3:36: "He who believes on the Son has everlasting life, and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides upon him."

And the choice is before all of us. A choice and a question.

As an old gospel hymn asks:

"Have you been to Jesus for the cleansing power?
Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?
Are you fully trusting in His grace this hour?
Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?

"Lay aside the garments that are stained by sin,
and be washed in the blood of the Lamb;
there’s a fountain flowing for the soul unclean,
O be washed in the blood of the Lamb!

"Are you washed in the blood
in the soul-cleansing blood of the Lamb?
Are your garments spotless?
Are they white as snow?
Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?"

There is no more wonderful thing than to be able to answer "yes" to that question. It is the first step that takes you from being a sinner crippled on a bed of sin and guilt to being a saint whose journey will end entering the gates of the holy city in heaven. May we all rise up and walk there through the grace of our God and Saviour, Jesus Christ.