Home Worship for Sunday 29th March 2020

Introduction

Today is the fifth Sunday in Lent, also known as the First Sunday of the Passion.

Hymn – Singing the Faith 357

Jesus — the name high over all,
in hell, or earth, or sky!
Angels revere, and nations fall,
and devils fear and fly.

Jesus — the name to sinners dear,
the name to sinners given!
It scatters all their guilty fear,
it turns their hell to heaven.

Jesus — the prisoner's fetters breaks,
and bruises Satan's head;
power into strengthless souls it speaks,
and life into the dead.

O that the world might taste and see
the riches of his grace!
The arms of love that compass me
would all the earth embrace.

His only righteousness I show,
his saving grace proclaim;
‘tis all my business here below
to cry: ‘Behold the Lamb!'

Happy if with my latest breath
I might but gasp his name;
preach him to all, and cry in death:
‘Behold, behold the Lamb!'

Charles Wesley (1707–1788)
Reproduced from Singing the Faith Electronic Words Edition, number 357

Prayers:

Blessèd are you, Lord our God:
in your love you create all things out of nothing
through your eternal Word.
We glorify and adore you.

Blessèd are you, Lord our God:
in your love you redeemed the world
through our Lord Jesus Christ.
We glorify and adore you.

Blessèd are you, Lord our God:
in your love you empower your people
through the gift of the Holy Spirit.
We glorify and adore you. Amen.

Holy God God,
we confess that we have rebelled against you
and broken your law of love;
we have not loved our neighbours
nor heard the cry of the needy.
Forgive us, we pray,
and free us for joyful obedience;
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
In Christ we are set free.
Through Christ we are forgiven.

Amen. Thanks be to God.

Most merciful God,
who by the death and resurrection of your Son Jesus Christ
delivered and saved the world:
grant that by faith in him who suffered on the cross
we may triumph in the power of his victory;
through Jesus Christ our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and forever. Amen.

Reading:

John 11: 1-45 (NIV)
Now a man named Lazarus was sick. He was from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. (This Mary, whose brother Lazarus now lay sick, was the same one who poured perfume on the Lord and wiped his feet with her hair.) So the sisters sent word to Jesus, “Lord, the one you love is sick.”

When he heard this, Jesus said, “This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God’s glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it.” Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So when he heard that Lazarus was sick, he stayed where he was two more days, and then he said to his disciples, “Let us go back to Judea.”

“But Rabbi,” they said, “a short while ago the Jews there tried to stone you, and yet you are going back?”

Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours of daylight? Anyone who walks in the daytime will not stumble, for they see by this world’s light. It is when a person walks at night that they stumble, for they have no light.”

After he had said this, he went on to tell them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up.”

His disciples replied, “Lord, if he sleeps, he will get better.” Jesus had been speaking of his death, but his disciples thought he meant natural sleep.

So then he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead, and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”

Then Thomas (also known as Didymus[a]) said to the rest of the disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”

On his arrival, Jesus found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days. Now Bethany was less than two miles[b] from Jerusalem, and many Jews had come to Martha and Mary to comfort them in the loss of their brother. When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went out to meet him, but Mary stayed at home.

“Lord,” Martha said to Jesus, “if you had been here, my brother would not have died. 22 But I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask.”

Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.”

Martha answered, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?”

“Yes, Lord,” she replied, “I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, who is to come into the world.”

After she had said this, she went back and called her sister Mary aside. “The Teacher is here,” she said, “and is asking for you.” When Mary heard this, she got up quickly and went to him. Now Jesus had not yet entered the village, but was still at the place where Martha had met him. When the Jews who had been with Mary in the house, comforting her, noticed how quickly she got up and went out, they followed her, supposing she was going to the tomb to mourn there.

When Mary reached the place where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. “Where have you laid him?” he asked.

“Come and see, Lord,” they replied.

Jesus wept.

Then the Jews said, “See how he loved him!”

But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?”

Jesus, once more deeply moved, came to the tomb. It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance. “Take away the stone,” he said.

“But, Lord,” said Martha, the sister of the dead man, “by this time there is a bad odor, for he has been there four days.”

Then Jesus said, “Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?”

So they took away the stone. Then Jesus looked up and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me.”

When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face.

Jesus said to them, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”

Therefore, many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary, and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him.

Sermon

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.”

These are familiar words of Jesus; familiar because as Christians we have often heard them read out in church or pondered on them in our Bible study; words that accompany an event that seems so fantastic that some Christian people struggle to believe it and some dismiss this whole account as a kind of parable that has no basis in historical reality.

This is not the only account of Jesus raising a dead person back to life in the gospels. In Mark 5: 35-43 we read of the raising of the daughter in Jairus. In Luke 7: 11-16 we have the account of the raising of the Widow of Nain’s son. Going back to the time of the prophets, God used both Elijah and Elisha to raise people from the dead. None of those other accounts are seen as particularly controversial; unless of course you dismiss outright the whole possibility of miracles, but the raising of Lazarus is!

There are big differences. In the other accounts the people concerned have only just died; yet we are told that Lazarus has been in the grave for four days. To put it bluntly, his body would be starting to decay and decompose. In the other accounts it is possible that the people concerned were just deeply unconscious, so deeply unconscious that with the limited knowledge of the time they were thought to be dead: here it is clear that Lazarus is definitely dead!

There is also another aspect to this miracle that we, as modern people, might not pick up on. It was believed in 1st century Judea that the souls of the dead stayed near the body for three days in the hope that it might be resuscitated. After that the soul departed and there could be no hope of resuscitation. The person was considered well and truly dead!

The raising of Lazarus was, before his own resurrection, the greatest miracle Jesus performed. I say that with faith; because despite all the doubts and academic scholarship that casts doubt on this miracle, I do believe that it happened, just as John records it. I see no reason why Jesus, God incarnate in man, should not be able to raise somebody from the dead, no matter how long has passed. More on that later.

Some of you may take a different view to me on this; but whatever your view of reality of the raising of Lazarus, this passage has much to teach us as Christian believers in the twenty first century, and that is as least as important as whether it actually happened.

The first thing this passage teaches us is that God loves us!

God loves us! We hear that a lot in sermons, but deep down do we really believe it when life’s circumstances seem to say that there is no God or that if there is he really isn’t all that bothered about what happens to us.

When Jesus heard that Lazarus was ill and near to death he stayed two days longer where he was. He gave his reason to his disciples; “This illness does not lead to death; rather it is for God’s glory, so that the Son of Man may be glorified through it.”

This is all very well and it is indeed a good reason to delay: but of course Mary and Martha knew none of this. They had sent a message to Jesus that they needed him at once to come and heal Lazarus; and Jesus hadn’t immediately comer to them.

How upset they must have been! How bewildered! How confused! We can almost hear the resentment in Martha’s voice when Jesus arrived in Bethany: “Lord, if you had been here my brother would not have died. But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.” There is both a faith in Jesus that he is able to do anything and still can, and a bewilderment that he hadn’t acted sooner.

We all have moments in our lives like that, don’t we? Moments when we have complete faith in God that he can do whatever we ask of him and bewilderment that he doesn’t; or doesn’t do it immediately.

God has good reasons for making us wait when we want something from him; just as God had good reasons for making Martha and Mary wait for their brother could be restored to them.

God loves us, never doubt that, but it is important that we understand the nature of God’s love for us. Bruce Milnes expresses it this way in his commentary on John’s gospel: 

“It is not the love of an indulgent parent who gives in to every whim of the child. Despite the massive propaganda to the contrary, our Lord’s purpose for us is not to make us happy, but to make us holy. He loves us too much to leave us part-saved, part-remade, part-sanctified.”

Or to put it another way, God loves us just as we are but he loves us too much to leave us just as we are.

The second thing this passage teaches us is the sympathy of Jesus. It reminds us forcibly that although Jesus was indeed fully divine; he was and is fully human and experiences everything that we experience as human beings. Jesus sympathises with us. Jesus understands us.

When Mary came to where Jesus was and saw him, she knelt at his feet at said to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. He said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus began to weep.

Here we see the sheer humanity of Jesus unveiled as we do perhaps nowhere else in the New Testament. Jesus reacts to the grief of those around him, he feels their pain, their distress and their confusion and he weeps along with them.

I must confess that sometimes when I take a funeral service I shed a few tears myself. It isn’t particularly because I’m upset about the person who has died because most of the time I don’t know them and never met them: it is because I see and feel the grief of those who are in mourning and I cannot help but be moved by it.

Through Jesus God knows what it is to grieve, he knows what it is to undergo emotional pain and trauma. God knows and understands and is with us when we too are in emotional pain or in mourning. Our God is not some far off distant God but one who is right beside us, crying with us when we cry.

The third thing this passage teaches us about is the authority of Jesus.

From the moment he hears that Lazarus is ill Jesus knows exactly what he is going to do: he is going to raise Lazarus from the dead. Remember his words to his disciples, “This illness does not lead to death; rather it is for God’s glory, so that the Son of Man may be glorified through it.” He also later said to them, before reaching Bethany, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to awaken him.” There is no doubt in Jesus’ mind that he will raise Lazarus from death.

We see this again in the words Jesus prays out loud when Lazarus’ tomb is opened, “Father, I thank you for having heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe you sent me.” When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus. Come out!”

No doubt, no hesitation. Jesus’ authority was such that he knew he had power over life and death. He had already told them, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.” Now he demonstrated the truth of that; not just to one or two people but to a crowd. He showed them that he was indeed the resurrection and the life when the resuscitated Lazarus walked from his own tomb.

As Christians we may fear the process of dying, but we shouldn’t fear death itself, because Jesus is our Lord and Saviour and has authority over death, he has the authority to resurrect us from death and give us eternal life. In case you doubt, remember that Jesus raised himself from death after being crucified and entombed.

Jesus own resurrection from death confirms his promise to us; that when we become his disciples we receive the inheritance of eternal life. It is Jesus’ promised gift to us if we fully give ourselves to him.

I will leave you with the words of Jesus.

Jesus said, “Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”

Hymn – Singing the Faith 345

1 And can it be that I should gain
an interest in the Saviour's blood.
Died he for me, who caused his pain?
For me, who him to death pursued?
Amazing love! How can it be
that thou, my God, shouldst die for me?

2 'Tis mystery all: the Immortal dies!
Who can explore his strange design.
In vain the first-born seraph tries
to sound the depths of love divine.
‘Tis mercy all! Let earth adore,
let angel minds enquire no more.

3 He left his Father's throne above —
so free, so infinite his grace —
emptied himself of all but love,
and bled for Adam's helpless race.
‘Tis mercy all, immense and free,
for, O my God, it found out me!

4 Long my imprisoned spirit lay
fast bound in sin and nature's night;
thine eye diffused a quickening ray —
I woke, the dungeon flamed with light,
my chains fell off, my heart was free,
I rose, went forth, and followed thee.

5 No condemnation now I dread;
Jesus, and all in him, is mine!
Alive in him, my living Head,
and clothed in righteousness divine,
bold I approach the eternal throne,
and claim the crown, through Christ, my own.

Charles Wesley (1707–1788)

Reproduced from Singing the Faith Electronic Words Edition, number 345

Blessing

The love of the Father enfold us,
the wisdom of the Son enlighten us,
the fire of the Spirit enflame us;
and the blessing of God, the Three in One,
be upon us and abide with us now and forever,
Amen.

Devotion for W/C 22nd March 2020

Weekly Reflection
W/C 22nd March 2020

This evening as I was browsing through Facebook I came across a Virtual Choir recording of one of our best known modern worship songs, “In Christ Alone” by Stuart Townend & Keith Getty.  It is one of my favourite songs and the choir sung it beautifully.  If you want to listen you can find it here: https://youtu.be/RY4CW5pte98 .

It struck me as I was listening that part of the first verse is particularly appropriate for our current situation:
In Christ alone my hope is found,
he is my light, my strength, my song;
this Cornerstone, this solid Ground,
firm through the fiercest drought and storm.

This song is a good reminder that as Christian people our hope is found in Jesus Christ and in him only.  Hope is something we need at this current time as the numbers of those infected with the Coronavirus Corvid-19 grow and as the death toll sadly rises.  Hope in Christ means believing that all he promises is true; it is living as if everything Jesus said is true.

In Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians the Apostle writes, “But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away……  And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”   Faith, hope and love will remain when all other things have passed away; to have hope is to have faith in the eternal love of God, shown in Jesus: such hope is never a false hope because it is an eternal hope.

The song reminds us who Jesus is for Christian disciples.  He is our light.  Jesus called himself the Light of the World and the opening chapter of John’s gospel reminds us that ‘The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”  No matter how dark things may seem in the next few weeks the light of Christ will help us to overcome the darkness.

Christ is our strength too.  In Philippians 4:13 we read, “I can do all things through him (Christ) who strengthens me.”  This is something we often say in assembly at Hippings Methodist School.  There will be times for us all in the coming weeks that will be difficult.  Already some of us are finding it quite difficult being basically confined in our own homes and there will be other tests of our personal mental and spiritual strength in the coming weeks.  When our own strength is exhausted, we can turn to Jesus in prayer and he will strengthen us and help us to keep going.

The song talks about Jesus as a Cornerstone, an allusion to 1 Peter 2:7: “To you then who believe, he is precious; but for those who do not believe, ‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the very head of the corner.’”  The cornerstone was the most carefully chosen piece of stone in an ancient building.  Jesus is the cornerstone the church will be built on.  He is its very foundation.  Once the cornerstone in a building was set it became the basis for construction and everything was measured and aligned with it.  Jesus is our standard of measurement and alignment.  If we look to Jesus, as individuals and as a church, if we rely completely on him, nothing can stand against us spiritually.

Jesus is also referred to as solid ground.  Jesus told a parable about a man who built his house on the sand and another who built his house on solid ground.  When the storm came the house built on sand collapsed, but the house built on solid ground stood firm.  The firm foundation of our faith in Jesus will help us to stand firm as the storm of our current situation tries its best to batter us, because, as the song says, Jesus is “firm through the fiercest drought and storm.”

There will be challenges to us all over the coming weeks, and perhaps even months, there will be challenges and times of fear, but if we hold onto Jesus, if we keep our spiritual eyes fixed on him as the rock and foundation of our lives then we overcome the difficulties life can bring.

Home Worship for Sunday 22nd March

INTRODUCTION

Today is the fourth Sunday in Lent, also known as Mothering Sunday.  The Lectionary gives tow sets of readings for this day, and I have chosen to focus on those that relate to the fourth Sunday in Lent.

 A Mothering Sunday service is being transmitted on BBC 1 at 11:45am this morning.



 HYMN – Singing the Faith 186

   1    Tell out, my soul, the greatness of the Lord!
            Unnumbered blessings, give my spirit voice;
        tender to me the promise of his word;
            in God my Saviour shall my heart rejoice.

   2    Tell out, my soul, the greatness of his name!
            Make known his might, the deeds his arm has done;
        his mercy sure, from age to age the same;
            his holy name — the Lord, the Mighty One.

   3    Tell out, my soul, the greatness of his might!
            Powers and dominions lay their glory by;
        proud hearts and stubborn wills are put to flight,
            the hungry fed, the humble lifted high.

   4    Tell out, my soul, the glories of his word!
            Firm is his promise, and his mercy sure.
        Tell out, my soul, the greatness of the Lord
            to children’s children and for evermore!

Timothy Dudley-Smith (b. 1926)
Based on the Magnificat
Reproduced from Singing the Faith Electronic Words Edition, number 186
Words: © Timothy Dudley-Smith in Europe and Africa; © Hope Publishing Company for the United States of America and the rest of world.  Reproduced by permission of Oxford University Press.  All rights reserved.



PRAYER
Eternal God and Father,
you are the source of all life,
the fount of all wisdom,
the well-spring of all grace.
Your days are without end,
your loving mercies without number.
We depend on you:
and we remember your goodness to us
and to those who have gone before us.

We tell your story in every generation:
God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob,
God of Sarah, Rebekah and Rachel,
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
God of a pilgrim people, your Church.

You are our God,
ahead of us, leading us,
guiding us and calling us;
you are the Lord God,
the all-wise, the all-compassionate.

To you we lift up our hearts
and we worship you,
one God for ever and ever.
Amen.


READING
Luke 15: 1-3, 11b-32 (NIV)

Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus.  But the
Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”

Then Jesus told them this parable: “There was a man who had two sons.  The younger one said to his father, ‘Father, give me my share of the estate.’ So he divided his property between them.

“Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living.  After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need.  So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs.  He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything.

“When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death!  I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you.  I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired servants.’  So he got up and went to his father.

“But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.

“The son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’

“But the father said to his servants, ‘Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet.  Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let’s have a feast and celebrate.  For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’ So they began to celebrate.

“Meanwhile, the older son was in the field. When he came near the house, he heard music and dancing.  So he called one of the servants and asked him what was going on.  ‘Your brother has come,’ he replied, ‘and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.’

“The older brother became angry and refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him.  But he answered his father, ‘Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends.  But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!’

“‘My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours.  But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’”



SERMON

Prodigal Son, Forgiving Father, Angry Brother

It could be a plot straight from Coronation Street or Eastenders.  A rebellious son who cons his father out of money and enjoys prostitutes, drinking and gambling; an elderly father who desperately wants his son to mend his ways and come home and an angry brother who doesn’t want anything to do with the sibling who has disgraced his family.  Finally there is a cliff hanger ending leaving us wondering what will happen next.

It could be a soap plot, but it isn’t!  It is one of the parables of Jesus; a parable that has been called the greatest short story ever written. It is a story that feels real and that could easily be told today in twenty first century Britain; the people in the story feel like real people and their reactions are true to life.

Perhaps we feel that we can identify with one of the three people in the story.  This morning we’re going to look at the three people and what we can learn from them.



The Son

The first person to look at is younger son.  He is selfish and self-centred.  By asking his father for share of inheritance he was treating is father as if his father was dead.  He had rejected father and his father’s authority over him.  He had no thought for feelings of his father, he was only interested in pursuit of own pleasure.  The younger son, we are told, then left his family and spent all his money on ‘dissolute living.’  We are not told exactly what his did.  Most commentators suggest he indulged in drink and prostitutes, but whatever he did he clearly lived a sinful lifestyle.   When his money ran out, he was forced to take job looking after pigs and was so hungry that even their food tempted him.  Finally, he realised how far he’d sunk, he was about as low as he could get, and he decided to throw himself on his father’s mercy.

The younger son represents those who are lost in their sin, those who have no relationship with their Creator God because of their selfishness.  The parable tells us how sin affects our relationship with God.  Sin takes us away from God.  In the story the father stays at home with his family, it is the younger son who goes off to enjoy a decadent lifestyle.  When we sin, when we go our own selfish way, we open a gap up between us and God, but it isn’t God who moves away from us.  God would never do that; he loves us too much.  It is us, by sinning, who move away from God.

The parable tells us something else about sin, the effect it has on us.  The son went away rich, having sinned against his father by demanding his inheritance.  Then he continued to sin by enjoying riotous living.  Once we start to sin, once we give in to temptation, it can be very hard to pull back.  Often we have to reach rock bottom, as the son did, before we come to our senses.

The younger son had got as low as he could get.  He was even thinking about eating the food of pigs and to even be associated with pigs was anathema to Jews.  He realised the state he was in and resolved to go to his father, admit that he was wrong and ask to be taken on as a servant.  So, he set off and we can imagine how slowly he walked, especially as he got near his home.

I remember when I was at school and got into a fight with a friend.  A prefect caught us fighting and told us we have to go and see the headmaster.  I don’t think I’ve ever walked more slowly than I did that day as I headed towards the headmasters office.  Even when we know we have to do something unpleasant, even when we’ve resolved to do it, we put it off for as long as we can.

So, we have the son heading home, ready to confess all the things he’d done that were wrong, ready to throw himself on his father’s mercy.  He is like us when we realise that we have been selfish, when we realise that we have gone our own way rather than God’s way; when we come to the point where we are ready to come before God and repent of our sins.


The Father

The father saw his younger son approaching and didn’t give him chance to reach home.  The father ran to the son, put his arms around him and kissed him.  The son confessed his sin an offered to be a servant.  The father would have none of it; he forgave the young man completely and restored to him the status of son.

The father, as I’m sure you all know, represents God who is our Heavenly Father and Mother; who loves us so much that he is just waiting for us to come back to him and will rush to meet us when we do.  God does this because God loves us with a love that completely eclipses all human love.  As soon as we turn to God he showers us with the extravagance of his love.  Charles Haddon Spurgeon put it this way in one of his sermons on ‘The Prodigal Son’:

“Oh, how God loves sinners! You who repent, and come to Him, will discover how greatly He loves you. There is no measuring the love He bears towards you. He has loved you before the foundation of the world, and He will love you when time shall be no more. Oh, the immeasurable love of God to sinners who come and cast themselves upon His mercy!”

As a Christian I love hearing the stories of those who’ve repented and given their lives to Christ.  One story that moved me was that of Nicky Cruz, whose story is partly told in “The Cross and the Switchblade”.  Nicky was a member of a New York gang for whom violence, casual sex and drug dealing were a way of life.  He was, by his own admission, evil.  He was perhaps as low as a human being can be.  Then he went to an evangelistic crusade given by David Wilkerson and gave his life to Jesus.  A few years ago Nicky Cruz came to the UK to tell his story and I went to hear him.  This man had been bad, even evil when he was young yet as he spoke I could see the love of Christ shining in his life.  Nicky spoke of how God had welcomed him with open arms and had discovered just how much God loves him.

Those who emphasise the wrath and anger of God, whose picture of God comes largely from the Old Testament, need only to look to this parable to see how wrong that picture is.  Yes, God is angered by sin because of its effects on the beautiful universe he created, because sin destroys lives and hopes and dreams; but God loves the person who sins and desires nothing more than that the sinner turns to him in repentance.    God is just waiting with aching heart for the sinner to repent and turn towards him again.  When that happens, God reaches out in love, to embrace the repentant sinner and shower them with his love.


The Brother

A third person now comes into our story, the eldest son.  The eldest son had remained at home with his father; he had not demanded his share of the inheritance and had worked hard.  We can easily imagine his anger when he sees his wastrel younger brother treated like a king when he had nothing to show for all his hard work.

Not only that, everything that his father had left was the brother’s inheritance and now his younger brother, who had wasted his share, was getting even more!

The older brother supplies the real punch line of the parable.  It is Jesus response to the Pharisees who were so focussed on the wickedness of the tax-collectors and sinners, and on Jesus eating with them, that they couldn’t see the love of God at work in Jesus’ life.  These people were being healed and changed and their lives were being transformed and all the Pharisees could see was sinners to be avoided at all costs.

I would also suggest that for us today the older son represents those in the church who have maybe been attending their church for years and resent newer members gaining positions of authority and influence that they think should belong exclusively to long serving members.  If you think that isn’t you, just ask yourself for a moment how you’d feel if somebody who had been a member for only a few months was appointed as a Church Steward over somebody who has faithfully attended church for many years.  There is a little of the elder brother in all of us.

 I’m ashamed to say I’ve been guilty of this myself; I’ve been that older brother.  A few Christmases ago our then minister at Poulton Methodist Church decided to invite one family each week to light the Advent ring.  The four families chosen were all new to the church in the past few months.  The Minister was absolutely right to choose them and yet I will confess I felt resentment at the time; my family had attended that church faithfully for years and never lit the Advent ring:  why hadn’t we been asked?

There is a little of the older brother in all of us and the older brother needs to repent and seek forgiveness every bit as much as the younger brother.  In the parable the older brother showed he had no real respect for his father, refusing his plea to come into the party.


Conclusion

Who are you in this morning’s parable?  Are you the elder son who needs a change in attitude so that you can accept the wonderful and sometimes seemingly incredible love of God?  Are you the father in the story, ready to forgive others their sins even as God our Heavenly Mother and Father forgives us our sins?  Or are you like the younger son, looking back on a life of sin and knowing that it is time to come before God in repentance and seek the forgiveness he is just waiting to give you; so that you can come home to a restored relationship with him; just as the prodigal son’s relationship with his father was restored.

Like any good soap opera episode, the parable ends on a cliff hanger, will the older son hear his father’s wisdom and forgive his brother?  We will never know!

 What we do know is that we all need to seek God’s forgiveness sometimes and that as God is willing to forgive us, so we must be willing to forgive each other.



HYMN– Singing the Faith 503

1      Love divine, all loves excelling,
        joy of heaven to earth come down,
        fix in us thy humble dwelling,
        all thy faithful mercies crown.
        Jesu, thou art all compassion,
        pure, unbounded love thou art;
        visit us with thy salvation,
        enter every trembling heart.

   2    Come, almighty to deliver,
        let us all thy life receive;
        suddenly return, and never,
        never more thy temples leave.
        Thee we would be always blessing,
        serve thee as thy hosts above,
        pray, and praise thee, without ceasing,
        glory in thy perfect love.

   3    Finish then thy new creation,
        pure and spotless let us be;
        let us see thy great salvation,
        perfectly restored in thee:
        changed from glory into glory,
        till in heaven we take our place,
        till we cast our crowns before thee,
        lost in wonder, love, and praise!

Charles Wesley (1707–1788)
Reproduced from Singing the Faith Electronic Words Edition, number 503


BLESSING
May the road rise up to meet you;
may the wind be always at your back.
May the sun shine warm upon your face;
may the rain fall soft upon your fields.
And until we meet again, may God hod you
in the hollow of his hand.

Amen

Devotion for the Week 15th March 2020

In addition to home worship resources for each Sunday I am also hoping to post a weekly devotion relating to what is going on with the Corvid-19 Coronavirus and anything else significant that is happening in the world.


Scripture
Mark 4: 35-41 (NIV)

That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, “Let us go over to the other side.”  Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him.  A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped.  Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?”

He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.

He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?”

They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!”



Reflection 

“Fear is the path to the dark side.  Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering.”

Of course, these words though full of wisdom, do not come from Jesus.  They were spoken by the Jedi Master Yoda in one of the Start Wars films.

Fear is a very natural human reaction and one we are all prone to.  The most primal fear is the loss of life, of our own or that of a loved one.  It is this primal fear that Jesus’ disciples faced in that fragile wooden boat on the Sea of Galilee; fear that they would drown and lose their lives.

That seems odd to us.  Jesus was in the boat with them.  Jesus was relaxed and asleep.  Surely, they should have known they had nothing to fear.  Yet they were afraid, which was why Jesus said to them, “Why are you afraid?  Have you still no faith?”

Fear is a very real reaction at the moment, not only in our country but in our world, fear of the coronavirus and of all its potential consequences.  Some of us are fearful because we are in the vulnerable category because of our age or underlying medical conditions, others of us are perhaps fearful for loved ones or worried about their business or job over the next few months.  People are stripping supermarket shelves because they are afraid of running out of things.  We might even fear the effect the Coronavirus will have on the future of our Church now we have been required to suspend services and other activities.  Will people come back?

Fear, uncontrolled irrational fear can, as history has shown many times, lead to anger, hatred and suffering.

“Why are you afraid?  Have you still no faith?”

Jesus’ words to his original disciples and Jesus’ words to us, his disciples today.  Of course, it is natural that we feel some fear and it is natural that we exercise due caution in our lives; but we should not be fearful because Jesus is with us, just as he was with those disciples on the Sea of Galilee around 2000 years ago.

So, as we make our decisions in our lives in the coming weeks and months let us not be motivated by fear, but by faith: faith in Jesus Christ as our Lord and Saviour.



Prayer

Gracious and Loving Lord,
Only when we are weak, are we strong:

as we pass through the vale of suffering

grant us the gift of your safety and peace,

the gentleness of your spirit

and a sense of your mercy and love.

Through Jesus Christ our Lord.
 Amen.

Jeremy Taylor (1613-67)