Panelled Houses and a ruined Temple: Renewal of Community focus in Haggai 1

In the Church today we may wrestle a bit with Habakkuk, be challenged a bit by Jonah even though we find parts of it a fishy, dust off a couple of verses of Joel at Pentecost, mention Malachi's first fruits when we want to talk about tithing and money issues, confuse Amos’ best line as Martin Luther King Jr’s and haul out Haggai when a church is looking at a building project. But all in all the minor Prophets are not often the focus of preaching in Churches these days. We may see the minor to mean not important, far from it, they are called Minor not because they are lesser in significance, but smaller in size, compared to the major; bigger works of Isaiah, Ezekiel and Jeremiah. Your always telling me you want shorter sermons. The Jews get round this minor major thing by simply calling them the twelve. Over the month of August we are going to be working our way through one of the twelve: the book of Haggai.

Let me start by saying relax, it does not mean we are venturing on a building programme. But we are looking to Haggai to build us up as the Church.  Haggai was a significant prophet who ministered during the time of the return of the exiles from Babylon. The people of Jerusalem had been taken into exile in 587bc and after seventy years when the Persian empire conquered Babylon, they were allowed to come back and rebuild the city and live there.

I’m calling the series Haggai: Renewal in the Ruins… because it is about a group of God’s people rediscovering, the presence of God and focusing on God’s pleasure and the Glory of God as central to their community. For the people of Haggai’s day that focus was the temple, a very real and tangible expression of God dwelling with them, for us it is in the very real and tangible presence of Jesus Christ, his purposes and mission for us as a church community. As Justin Welby, the arch bishop of Canterbury, puts it, renewal comes as we once again find ourselves captivated by Jesus Christ.

The Book of Haggai is a series of four messages, each given at a specific time and place. The reading we had today is actually two messages, given twenty-three days apart, but they are seen as a unit because they start and finish with the dating, they start and finish with the mention of the same specific people, and by structure. In verse 2 We have what the people say, then what God says, the people’s actions in response to Haggai appears as a narrative in verse 12 then we have God’s reaction in verse 13-14.

The year we are given is the second year of king Darius. Darius came to power in 550bc in a time of turmoil in the Persian Empire and his first period of reign was full of dealing with rebellions, it was also a time of economic hardship caused by heavy taxation. It was the first day of the sixth month, which is the beginning of the grape, fig and pomegranate harvests in Judea, the first day would have been the new moon festival, and the civic leaders represented by  Zerubbabel, a descendant of the Davidic kings and the governor of the region and the religious leaders, Joshua the high priest and all people would have gathered to pray for the pending harvest and it is at this gathering that Haggai speaks.

He starts by what the people are saying, “The time has not yet come to rebuild the temple”. They would have been gathered amongst the ruins at the site of the temple to worship. The state of the temple would have been obvious to them. They had come back from Babylon specifically to rebuild the temple and to once again constitute themselves as God’s people, a worshipped and witnessing community. They would have had many good reasons, why it wasn’t time to rebuild the temple. They were struggling to make ends meet, there was political and economic turmoil, would it be seen as a sign of revolt against Persia. The harvest was due, then the planting and the tending and all the other things that just seemed to demand their time. They had to get a head, was it really a priority. It is easy for us as well to make those kinds of decisions about the priority in our life where we place our faith and identity as God’s people. It is not the right time. We can find so many things competing for our time and attention… in fact the people gathered there had been saying the same thing for about eighteen years at this stage, as various small groups had started to come back to Jerusalem with their focus on re-establishing the city and the temple and their religious identity, but it was never the right time…  

Then Haggai tells the people what God says. God asks the question is it right for the people to live in their panelled houses while the temple is in ruins? Have they got their priorities right? Now the idea of panelled houses can mean that the houses had roofs on them that they were living in finished houses and the temple wasn’t even started let alone finished. But panelled houses could also mean a degree of luxury was starting to manifest itself in those houses, they were wood panelled houses, and the temple wasn’t even seen as a necessity.

God asks ‘them to think carefully about their ways’. The focus was on their own material wellbeing, not on God and in a series of four images that feel so relevant for today, this is seen as not satisfying them at all. They eat and drink but never seem to have enough, they pile on the clothes but are still cold, they earn wages only to put them in purses with holes. It is a great picture of our own twentieth first century consumer society, that offers us so much fulfilment but in fact does not deliver. Individually it is based on having more to fill the hole inside, and it can simply be a purse with a hole in it that just seems to get bigger and bigger to fit our incomes. Societally, trying to keep that standard of living consumes all our effort and resources and the hole through whish so many people are falling into poverty seems to be growing.

Tom Sines a Christian thinker and futurist talks of the current cost of housing and says that the generation growing up today, and he is talking of the ones at university today will be the first post world war 2 generation who will not be able to afford the same standard of living that their parents did. And if they want to live that same lifestyle in the same kind of house they were bought up in it will shut down all their other options it will consume all their time and resources and even then may be out of reach. You just have to look at the fact that for most people it takes two incomes these days to simply run a household. Sines says for this next generation of Christian young people they will have to make some radical choices between lifestyle and their faith. His challenge is like that of Haggai that we consider our ways very carefully, what is the dream and priority and faith centred life that we pass on to them.  That provides a genuine alternative for the increasingly unobtainable and unsustainable western dream.

Haggai goes on to ask them to again think carefully about their ways. He calls them to go up to the mountains and bring down the wood to start building his house. He uses the imagery of curse and blessing from the Torah to explain what was happening to them. That drought and low crop returns  were things that their covenant relationship at Sinai had said would happen if God’s people did not keep the covenant. He says that the people had been focusing on their own houses their own pleasure and honour, rather than building a house for God’s pleasure and honour. At the heart of their identity as a people and a community was the presence of God, in the wilderness this had been seen as God dwelling in the tabernacle, then the temple was the focal for that. The glory had come down on the temple as Solomon had dedicated it. It was the meeting place between God and his people. As the exiles were taken away to captivity, Ezekiel has a vision of the presence of God leaving the temple and going with them into exile. God had never abandoned his people, now the call is to rediscover that presence and the pleasure and glory of God as the central focus of their community and being a people. They were focused on their own houses, their own pleasure, honouring themselves rather than God. In doing that they were depending on their own resources their own know how, on themselves and it wasn’t working out. They had forgotten that rain and harvest and abundance was a blessing from God. We can try and find fulfilment in life in trying to fill up our lives and focus on our own needs and wants and dreams and expectations and forget that as God’s people, and Haggai was speaking to God’s people, that meaning and purpose and fulness of life, comes not from what we have but from putting God and God’s glory first in our lives. Jesus said we were to put first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things would be added unto us.  We can easily focus on the added on’s hoping they will add up to enough and miss the core.

The great thing is that the people listen to what God brings through Haggai and they begin to build. It starts with a change of heart. The leaders and the people listen and obey, and they once again fear the LORD. Which does not mean that they are afraid of God, but rather they once again have a sense of wonder and awe and reverence for God. Jesus says at the end of the sermon on the mount if you love me you will hear my words and obey them put them into action in your life. That is the person who builds on a solid foundation.

There is a change here between how the people are viewed or how they view themselves. Haggai had started by calling them not God’s people but ‘these people” but now they are called the remnant, there is a sense that they are seen and see themselves as the people God has bought back to Jerusalem, they have owned their identity as God’s people and their priorities and purposes have changed accordingly. They now see that they are a people by grace saved for the purposes of God, rather than a rag tag group of returnees.

Historically, when the church has seemed to move away from its focus on Christ his glory and become simply assimilated into the worldview around them a there have been those who have been willing to step aside and reconstitute themselves in terms a new community. The desert fathers and the Celtic monks were a response to the compromise they saw in the imperial church, they developed practices and routines as a community that reprioritised them on knowing and following Christ. You can see it in the Wesleyan revival and its focus on small groups as a way of maintaining and developing disciplines for a Christ centred life, beyond Sunday worship. Today there is a growth of what’s called new monasticism, communities who don’t necessarily live together, but who hold a shared set of spiritual practices and routines and rhythms through which they want to grow in a Christ honouring way. Simplifying their lifestyle and shared resources and shared sense of mission and outreach is part of that. It is ways they have built a new community together, reflecting that change of priorities that comes from seeing Christ’s presence and Christ’s pleasure and glory as what is at the heart of being a faith community.

The passage finishes with God’s response. As the people have taken the time to carefully consider how their ways, and with the harvest out of the way, They still needed to do those essential things as we all do, but they started to respond by rebuilding the centre of their community together, and  God does two things. God speaks and reassures them that …“I am with You”… The temple was a symbol of that, but the reality of God’s presence is reaffirmed. The abiding presence of God. It’s interesting that the temple they rebuilt here would be the one Jesus entered into the one that at his death the curtain would be ripped in two as a symbol that God’s presence as not longer simply tied to that local but was going to be with God’s people in Christ where ever we are. It was Jesus last words as he commissioned his apostles to be his witnesses and lo I am with you to the end of the age, it was the starting point of the church as the holy Spirit came and filled all the believers gathered in that upper room at Pentecost, and did the same thing with the gentile gathered together at Cornelius’ house in Acts 10. It is what we experience in our lives as God’s people in this time and place as well. 

The second thing that God did was to stir up the spirits of Zerubbabel, Joshua and all the people to build the temple. As they responded to God, God responded to them and re-ignited that passion within them. We’ve just finished looking at 2 Timothy and I can’t help but thing of Paul telling Timothy to fan into flame the gift with him, the presence of God in Jesus Christ, by the Holy Spirit. How are we to respond to the passage today?   It is a call to think carefully of our ways? Which way are we going. Are we focused on our own houses, our own pleasure and honour, do we need to turn around and look at our priorities? Are they God’s pleasure and God’s Glory, are they about a life and community built round the presence of God with us. As we do that we will find that God is with us, Christ is with us, the Holy Spirit is present, and as we change direction, our spirits will again be stirred up , we will focus again on the pleasure and the glory of God, and seeing his kingdom built up. We will find fulfilment and purpose and meaning in knowing and being known by the God who loves us and showed that love through Jesus Christ.

Reflections on Finishing well from Paul's Final Remarks in 2 Timothy 4:6-22.

Are you a destination person?  or a journey person? Are you all about getting there: achieving the goal or “the getting there”: all about the process.  

Today marks an end for our journey through both the book of 2 Timothy and the pastoral epistles. We’ve been looking at Paul’s letters to his co-workers, Christian leaders in difficult pastoral situations, to give us insight in what it means to be Christian leaders in our own time and our own place. The passage today gives us keys to evaluate where we are in life and to move on in maturity and ministry in Christ. 

We don’t know if Paul is a destination person or a journey person, Statistics tells us more people are more journey orientated, I personally find going on holiday that one of the best parts for me is the driving there, the open road, window down, wind blowing in my hair (well two out three ain’t bad) and this passage does not help us to answer that because Paul reflects both on the destination and the journey, the goal and the process to evaluate his life.

The context is Paul is in prison in Rome awaiting judgement. He had finished giving Timothy a charge to take up his ministry of preaching the word and doing the work of an evangelist in a world of seasons, he is passing on the baton to Timothy. Paul describes his pending death in two ways. The first is “He is being poured out like a drink offering”. A drink offering in the Old testament accompanied a sacrifice, to make a fragrant offering to God.  Secondly Paul sees his death as a departure. This word comes from the military and means the leaving of a naval vessel of an army unit on the order of its commander. Paul sees all his life under the sovereign control of God. We may not like thinking and speaking about death but its is comforting to know that just as we have put our trust in Christ that from beginning to end and on into eternity is in the trustworthy embrace of God’s plans and hands. 

In verse 8 and 9 Paul moves to assess his life. He uses four metaphors from the field of athletics to look at the journey, the getting there. In chapter 3:14 he started his final charge to Timothy  by presenting his own teaching and life as a model for Timothy, he finishes that charge with his life as an example. Just like we might look to a famous athlete for inspiration for our own sporting endeavours.  

He says I have “fought the good fight”, something he had already told Timothy to do. In the ancient Olympiad, competitors had to commit themselves to a nine-month period of training before they could compete, if they didn’t they wouldn’t win and the games would be of a lower standard. Athletes has to make a promise to fight the good fight keep the rules.  Paul is evaluating his life in terms of integrity. That his life, His actions, reactions and words line up with his beliefs. Throughout the pastorals Paul talks of sound doctrine and godly living going hand in hand. Godly living meant a life that reflected the God you worshipped. He had talked of faith, that invisible vertical relationship with God, having it outworking in love, visible horizontal relationships with other people and he sees that his life is an example of that for Timothy and for us. A key as we evaluate our lives is the idea of integrity. Do our lives and faith and beliefs line up?

“I have finished the course”. The tour de France is on at the moment, and each year the race follows a different course through France, some pieces are the same others are different, to win the race you have to stay on course, no short cuts, no detours or distractions or you may not finish. It’s the tour de France not a detour in France.  Paul looks back on his life and sees that he has been faithful to the mission and purpose he has. He has kept the course God had set him. He looks back to his conversion on the road to Damascus, and sees from there on he has been following Christ and Christ’s commission to be an apostle to the gentiles. He can look further and see that as a continuation of his life as a Jew, as the fulfilment of the hope of Israel. A key to evaluating our lives is meaning and purpose. Staying the course that Christ calls us to follow. 

“ I have kept the faith”. Scholars question whether this means that Paul has held on to the content of the faith, the sound doctrine and apostolic teaching, as opposed to the false teachers, or that he is talking of that invisible relationship with God, made possible in Christ. Either way paul is talking of being faithful: A consistent holding on to and guarding the values at the heart of his life. Are you keeping those central core values and beliefs? Are they sufficient like Pauls were for life? 

“Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness”. Paul can see the champions laurel which was placed on the head of the winner of the race. He can see the gold medal. It’s not that he sees he has made it by his own endeavours. The reward comes from Jesus the righteous judge. Paul is not setting himself up as some super athlete here, setting an unobtainable goal for the rest of us. In Romans Paul talks of righteousness as a gift given to us in Christ, we are made right with God through faith, made complete as he is with Christ. He finishes his evaluation by acknowledging that this reward is for all who long for, or put first, the kingdom of God. We too need to evaluate our journey and see how we are travelling, our integrity, our purpose and our core values are they aligned with Christ’s kingdom.

In verse 16-18 Paul evaluates his life in terms of the destination., instead of looking back at the way he has come he tells Timothy about where he is now. He has had a trial, at least a first hearing before the emperor or in the legal system. It is the last chapter of his life. He evaluates that last destination in terms of Jesus Christ. 

 Paul sees his present situation in light of Christ’s life and death. His friends deserting him at his trial, a reflection of Jesus trial. The imagery of God saving him from the lion’s mouth comes from Psalm 22 which from an early time was associated with Christ’s suffering and death. For Paul life was the Christ life and here he finds himself standing where Christ had stood. Christ had said if they rejected him and persecuted him, they would do the same for us. He had lives with integrity, purpose and faithfulness and even in this ignominious end Paul can see his destination is not in defeat but in Christ. 

 Paul knows Christ’s presence with him in that situation as well, Paul’s destination is with Christ. Both as he faces his final suffering but also trusting that Christ will bring him safely to his heavenly Kingdom. If psalm 22, which Jesus quoted on the opening line of on the cross “my god my god why have you forsaken me”, was on Paul’s mind as he wrote this, the fact that it is a psalm that finishes with a great affirmation of God salvation was also on Paul’s mind.

Paul sees that his destination is through Christ as well. That through Christ he has come to completing his mission of sharing the gospel to all gentile nations. Here was Paul able to proclaim the gospel in this trial, at the very centre and core of the gentile world, the very cosmopolitan nature of his audience at court may have made him realise that the message would go out to all peoples. In his news about his co-workers we also see that the gospel was going out to more and more places. He sees that Christ has allowed him to complete his mission. Through Christ he could trust that God would lead his safely through the last chapter as well to his heavenly kingdom.  

Paul finishes this section with a doxology, to Him, Christ, be glory for ever and ever amen. For Paul the destination is seen in bringing God glory. As we evaluate our lives we ask the question is that our focus, our desire. The destination not that we get the Glory but our lives will point people to Christ.

There is a third way to evaluate our lives, to put it in a very kiwi way that is ‘te tangata, te tangata, te tangata… it’s people, people, people. Leonard Sweet puts it like this 

“The real meaning of life is not a journey question or an arrival question. It’s a relationship question. Your journey and your destination are both important, but neither is possible without an answer to this prior question: who do you have with you?”

Paul’s final instructions to Timothy are full of information about and greetings from and for other people. Paul’s life and ours can be evaluated in people. Maybe we shouldn’t be surprised by that as Paul in the pastorals talks again and again of faith that is worked out in love.

 Pauls list includes people whom he has invested time into and seen them grow and develop into ministry and maturity. His son in the Lord Timothy, who he wants to see once more. While Paul had said they all deserted him, Paul had sent out a lot of those people to further the gospel Titus whom we know a lot about and Erastus and Trophimus who we don’t and Crescens who is only mentioned in scripture here. Luke who stayed with Paul, and may have written this letter for Paul. Tychichus whom Paul sent to Ephesus, possibly with this letter and to be Timothy’s replacement.

Paul is aware that he had not succeeded with all people. He warns Timothy about Alexander the metalworker, who had done Paul great harm. Paul does not seem to bear a grudge here but as he has come to this stage in his life has simply left that in God’s hands. Always with the hope that there will be opportunity for grace. Demas, seems to have left Paul and gone home, because he loved this world more than the kingdom of God. But Paul does not write him off,  he probably has hope he will return. Paul asks Timothy to bring Mark to him, because he useful for his ministry, in Acts 15, Paul and Barnabas had gone their separate ways because Barnabas wanted to Take john mark with them and Paul didn’t think he was up to it as he had left them when the going got rough before. Now he is reconciled with Mark and there is hope for Demas.

 Paul also mentions people who have ministered to and with him. Pricilla and Aquilla, tent makers and fellow apostles who Paul had spent time with. The household of Onesiphorus is mentioned and at the beginning of the letter Paul had talked of  Onesiphorus refreshing his soul, and not being ashamed of Paul’s chains, but coming and finding him in Rome and ministering to him. The fact that his household only is mentioned may mean he had died. Paul asks Timothy to get his cloak, his warm outer garment, scrolls and parchment’s he had left with Carpas at Troas. Scholar wonder what was on the scroll and parchments, but they all agree to Paul’s being given hospitality by Carpas. While Paul’s mentor Barnabas is not mentioned in this passage the fact that Mark is shows he is still benefiting from Barnabas’ ministry. Paul finishes with the people he is simply enjoying fellowship with now, those in leadership like Eubulus, Prudens, Linus and Claudia and all the brothers and sisters.

As we evaluate our lives the riches part is in the relationships we have forged. Of people who have ministered to us and invested into our lives and the people we have invested into and seen grow and develop to take our place.

Are you a destination person or a journey person. Is it about the arriving or the getting there… I suspect that like Paul  its not either or, rather its  “both and” right and wrapped in the rich tapestry of people who Christ has bought into your life. Paul finishes with what could simply be seen as a formality, skipped over like the “yours sincerely” at the end of a form letter. But in the journey and the destination and the relationship here is the hope and promise and the thing that makes the journey possible. “The Lord be with your spirit. Grace be with you all”. The abiding presence and undeserved favour of God shown in Christ’s life death and resurrection, in us and with us by the presence of the Holy spirit, to lead and to guide, the hope for the future, that it is with Christ. As we evaluate and walk through our lives this is what makes the journey possible, that empowers the finishing well the integrity, purpose and faithfulness, that allows us to trust it will be bought to fulfilment in Christ, and is behind the people ministering to us and whom we minister to.

Are you a destination or journey person… in the getting there, the arriving and the relationships along the way the grace of God be with you individually, and with us all as God’s people.

God's grace in history now and as a hope for tomorrow: A Prayer of Thanksgiving and Confession

A reminder of God's promise from my kitchen window 

Loving God,

We come before you this morning to acknowledge your great love,

Shown to us in Jesus Christ, the word made flesh,

his life, death and resurrection, Your gracious forgiveness and new life  

Experienced by us through the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit

Providing hope in the darkness, as we await Christ’s return

Eternal God,

From before beginning, you were, and are

You spoke and all was created, made and fashioned

You made us in your image for relationship with you

But we turned away and went our own way

You have worked in history, to draw us back to you

Gracious God,

You chose a people for yourself, giving your law

You Spoke through the prophets

Then In Christ you stepped into this world

In Christ we beheld your grace and truth

Christ died win us back, and was raised to give us life

Faithful God,

AS you promised you poured out your Holy Spirit on your people

You dwell with us still, through all of life’s seasons

By The spirit’s presence we are lead into all truth

Christ words are bought to mind and they speak too and through us

You lead and guide us and enable and empower us to show Christ’s love

Righteous God

You are faithful and just, and forgive us our sins,

We confess we have done wrong, and are sorry

We admit we have left your good undone

That our lives fall short of your love and justice

We thank you that you forgive and that we are forgive

Alpha and omega beginning and end

 We place our lives in your hands

We trust you to lead and guide us

Please fill us afresh with your hold Spirit

That we may witness to our hop-e in Jesus Christ to your glory

With a sure and certain hope in the resurrection

A short devotion on 2 Timothy 4:22 for a gathering of ministers and elders.

a couple of ordinary ducks are joined by a royal spoonbill a majestic and wonderful bird. Just as we are joined as we move through our lives by the grace of God. (sorry a bit cheesy...how the sentiment is phrased not the Spoonbill). 

I don’t know about you, but the verse I just read out is one that is easy to overlook or forget or even disregard. We can see it simply as the "yours sincerely" that skip to see who the letter is from. Paul uses it in one way or another at the end of all his letters except Romans and Colossians. Often when we preach through a book we will stop before we get to it and in doing so we miss something of the greatest importance. We can miss the blessing of the grace of God.

Going through the letters to Timothy, the thing that stick out to me is the number of imperatives that Paul give Timothy. There is a lot of encouragement, but Paul is very definite about ministry and life expectations. Timothy is sent to Ephesus to counter false teaching, see that things were done in good order, leadership structures set in place, preach sound doctrine and godly living, deal with pastoral issues and social justice, looking after himself spiritually and physically.

Ministry and Christian leadership can feel like a whole list of imperatives of must dos. In our papers tonight we have reports from MSB’s and with one of them there is a good list of ministry expectations. It’s great to have them written out, out in the open and listed, but you and I know that there are a whole lot of expectations for ministers and elders that are never written down on paper or even spoken, but you certainly feel their weight. In fact at the ethics refresher course, which I attended as a result of another imperative, they said the key reason for complaints against leaders was unmet expectations.   In a  small parish they can run from putting the rubbish out, being the church secretary, visiting and pastoral care, leading the band and the worship and the awesome and wonderful  privilege of preaching the word of God... and .. and… on and on…and elders along with that leadership role and all its imperatives have other functions and tasks you do in and for the church.

You can get burned out, caught out, feel put upon, resentful of the time away from family and life, even when you have good boundaries in place…

In the midst of that we need to hear the wonderful life giving message of that final formal short verse. The Lord be with your spirit. Grace be with you all.

The grace of God in Jesus Christ is the thing that transforms it, that makes it more than simple a to do list.

The grace of God shown to us in the sending of Jesus Christ, his life, his death on the cross and his resurrection. God’s great love shown for us. How we are graciously forgiven and welcomed back into relationship with God and given new and abundant life. The good news that we as ministers and elders are called and set side for, to witness to and proclaim.

The grace of God, because of Christ and through the sending of the Holy Spirit, God’s abiding presence with us. A sure help; as the word paraclete that John uses of the Holy Spirit, tells us a learned friend who draws alongside. At the end of his letter and his life, Paul says that at his trial he was deserted by everybody, but the Lord stood by him and even though he is facing a death sentence he can say he was able to complete his task of preaching the Gospel to the gentiles and that God will bring him safely into his kingdom. The grace of God: God’s abiding and empowering presence.

The grace of God. That future hope of Christ’s return and ultimate victory. In 2 Timothy 4:7-8 Paul uses athletic metaphors to describe how he has lead his life, he has fought the good fight, run the race, kept the faith and he is able to look forward to the winners laurel as well, what he calls the crown of righteousness, Christ’s righteousness made compete in him. The same reward Paul says that is for all who long for Christ’s appearing, who long for and put first the kingdom of God.

The grace of God in the beginning, with us now and awaiting us as our future hope, through Christ, with Christ, in Christ.

Did you notice Paul gives the grace twice. One as a personal blessing to Timothy The Lord be with your spirit, and the other a more general blessing “grace be with you all”. So tonight know the grace of God is for each of one of you individually, hear it in the midst of the imperatives and ebb and flow of life. The grace of God be with you, Christ is with you.

Let’s hear it corporately as well  as a church called to make Christ known, the grace of God is with us all, his presbytery, his region, his mission, his church and people his presence, his grace … Grace be with you all… grace be with us all.

Lets Pray…

1 Corinthians 13 In A Time Of Grief

This was originally a sermon for a funeral where the family chose 1 Corinthians 13 as the reading. 
I've made it gender neutral and taken out references to the person whose funeral it was for  and simply post it as encouragement from 1 Corinthians 13 for a time of grief. 

We are more used to what is known as the Love chapter in 1 Corinthians being read at the celebrating of a wedding not as we contemplate a funeral. As Inspiration for the start of relationships, not a way of providing comfort as we say farewell.  They are words that give Lessons for life, not so much to lessen our sorrow. But you know I think this scripture is so fitting and powerful for this occasion.

Firstly, as we come to celebrate a, a much loved and loving person’s life, a child, a spouse, parent and grandparent, a  friend and person of faith that it encapsulates the values and the virtues we cherish and will remember most.

In context Paul was speaking of gifts and talents that God had given to his body, the church for the common good, to serve and build one another up. And as we gather we look back and see the gifts and talents and achievements a person has had, and what they have contributed, as God has enabled them, in their own sphere and context. Beyond that as Paul says we remember a more excellent way… the way of love, the best of the character of a person….the characteristics Paul calls love.

The passage speaks of the highest attributes of love… Patience and kindness; commitment and loyalty shown in practical caring. Forgiveness: committed to a relationship even in the midst of hurt and when we get it wrong. Seeking truth: wanting what is best and good for the other person, humility and selfless service; putting the other first. Never failing; being committed to the very end; a love Paula gave and which he also received in return. The qualities of love that find their origin in the Love of God, shown in Jesus Christ.

Secondly, these are the characteristics of love that in times of grief, in the face of the harshness of life and sorrow bring comfort. What helps us get through it is to know that we are loved and surrounded by people, a community, who care and will be there for us. Who support us by kindness, a willingness to forgive and give space on days when we just don’t have it all together, to speak truth when we find ourselves unable to work through the process in a healthy manner. When we just need a hug or someone to be there and listen to that same story again.

But they are also words of comfort because they are a description of Jesus and of his great love for us. The love and abiding presence of Christ that we can know in our own lives… Jesus who said and Low I am with you to the end of the age… who invites us to cast our burdens on him because he cares for us. Who said blessed are those who mourn for they will be comforted.

My father died when I was 21 and as palangi we didn’t really have the rich traditions of culture and family to surround and embrace us and help us in our grief. Us Pakeha tend to leave a grieving family to their own devices.  But three friends came the night after he had died. They sat down and one of them said “ we are here for you Howard. If you want to be alone we will go and leave you. If you just want to sit and be quite we will sit with you, if you want to talk we will listen, if you want to do something we’ll go with you. In their love, there willing to be present with me not only did I feel friendship and experience the quality of love Paul speaks of in 1 Corinthians 13, I caught a glimpse of Christ’s presence and Christ’s comfort and love for me. The same love that is present as this community and family gather night by night.  

Finally this passage is relevant to us because of the hope it brings. Paul moves on from speaking about the qualities of love to talk of the passing nature of knowledge and prophecy, which were things the Corinthians wrongly valued above the gospel, and as he talks of them passing away he  begins to speak of a time when instead of seeing like a reflection in a mirror that we will see face to face, and while we know in part now there will be a time when we shall know as completely as we are known. He is looking at the Christian hope, that the love of God shown in Jesus Christ, his life his death and his resurrection, mean that those who believe in him will find eternal life with him. Will be with Christ, as Jesus said in John chapter 14 “ I go to prepare a place for you, and I will come back for you and you will be where I am”.  In 1 Corinthians chapter 15 Paul will move on from looking at gifts and talents and love to speak of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. He will say that we have assurance that we too will be raised to life in Christ, because Jesus rose from the dead.  That we have confidence in that fact because Jesus was seen by many witnesses, he ate with them and was touched by them, and because of that we too can have confidence that we will be raised to eternal life with Christ, as Christ had said. Paul sums it up by quoting the book of Hosea “Where o death is your victory, where O death is your sting” and finishes by affirming we have the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

The hope is that the love of God, from which the list of qualities we value in each other in our reading today comes from. The Love of God, that we experience in the love of family and friends and in Christian fellowship. The love of God shown in Jesus Christ, his life death and resurrection, is a love that invites us into relationship with the eternal God, through Jesus Christ, a relationship that goes beyond the grave to eternity.  It is a love that in death gives us assurance that we will be  with Jesus Christ in a place of no more decay or death. It is the love we to can know as we come to put our trust in Jesus Christ.

The Word of God in a world of seasons (2 Tinothy 4:1-6)

We live in a world of seasons.  Earths seasons We are in the middle of Winter now … You can tell because when we get together conversations usually start by complaining about how cold it is. It’s great its not raining this week but its cold. You know only a few months ago, it was summer, and we were complaining about just how hot it was.

Life’s seasons. It is a metaphor that we use to talk about the starkly different periods in our life. Fruitful times, joyous times, times of new growth…birth and death, barren unproductive times, times of sadness and grief that feel as cold as the depth of winter. Silly seasons full of business and holiday seasons when we can get away and unwind. In the book of Ecclesiastes, the preacher sums up the lot of humanity by saying that there is a season and a time for everything under heaven.

History’s seasons It’s one of the ways we talk the times in our world. The winter of discontent in the mid-seventies in the UK… a time of civil unrest, strikes and protests. The summer of love in the nineteen-sixties, flower power and the hope that a new generation just might change the world. For some it feels like the west is in danger of falling into an autumn if not a winter season at the moment.

In the passage that we read today, Paul tells Timothy to preach the word in this world of seasons. To always be prepared in season and out of season to rebuke, correct and encourage. To do the work of an evangelist and fufil all the duties of his ministry. While the passage we are looking at today is regularly used in commissioning and ordination services for preachers and ministers, as we all grow into maturity and ministry in Christ, we need to ask what it means for us to proclaim God’s word in a world of seasons?

This passage is Paul’s last instructions to Timothy. Paul is in prison facing a sentence of death and he is write to encourage Timothy working in Ephesus to counter false teachers. Paul is passing on the baton; calling Timothy to take up his ministry, its succession planning.

Last week in 2 timothy 3:10-17 Paul had encouraged timothy to stand on the word of God in a world of woe, to hold on to and be built up by the apostolic teaching and life example that he had received from Paul and the God breathed scriptures that he had learned from an infant from his mother and grandmother, Lois and Eunice. Paul was saying that Timothy and we needed that word of God in our lives to give us strength to carry on in the faith, and now Paul is telling Timothy that he also needs to let that word of God go out of him in ministry as well. Just like a healthy life is dependant on the right diet and the right amount of exercise.

Paul gives Timothy a charge, a solemn commission. Not like  Timothy’s boss giving his job description, rather an army commander rallying his men to follow him to take an objective. (click for words) The solemnity of this instruction is reinforced by the fact that Paul invokes divine witnesses, God and Jesus Christ, it is not just Paul that is calling Timothy to carry out his ministry, but it a divine call. The same god who calls Paul and Timothy also calls us to witness to Christ and be part of God’s mission in this world.

Paul goes further to speak of Christ as the judge of the quick or the living and the dead, a way of talking about the fact that Jesus is the judge of everyone. Knowing Jesus is ultimately the judge of all people would have been a source of encouragement, comfort and hope for Paul as he awaited the judgement of Caesar. Seeing Jesus as Judge, is not about doing things out of fear of punishment or hope of personal reward but that as Timothy carries out his ministry of preaching the word that God will show his mercy, goodness and justice to those who listen and respond. Moral development talks of stages people go through, younger children will do things they are told are right our of fear of punishment, later it will be hope for reward. You see that in the anti-smoking adverts, the threat of lung cancer and the reward of having more money if people quit, but the higher moral development is doing things out of a sense of the common good.

In view of his ‘appearing and kingdom’, both looks back to Christ’s incarnation and the inauguration of his kingdom in his death and resurrection, the very basis of the word that Timothy is being called to preach and the means by which he knows Christ’s righteous judgement, it speaks of the present time where the Holy Spirit is at work to bring about the kingdom and reign of God in the realm of humanity, and also looks forward to the time when Christ will come again and his kingdom will be consummated, the hope of God’s ultimate righteous reign. Timothy’s motivation for carrying out his calling is the presence and the purpose of God, shown in Jesus Christ.

Paul gives the charge in a series of five imperatives.

 “Preach the word”- Timothy’s primary role is to declare and proclaim God’s word. Word is shorthand to encapsulate the gospel that in chapter 3 Paul says timothy had received in Paul’s teaching and example. Karl Barth possible the most influential theologian in the twentieth century, talks of a threefold understanding of the word of God, God’s self-revelation. The first is Jesus Christ, the word of God made flesh, here is God’s revelation in human form, secondly the self revelation of God in the scriptures, the word of God, that witnesses and attests to Jesus Christ the word of God; the old testament is fulfilled by Christ, the new testament, shows Christ and the outworking of his ministry in the lives of his new people the Church, finally the word of  God in preaching as God’s self-revelation in Jesus Christ attested to by scripture is proclaimed by a human voice, through the presence and power of the Holy Spirit.

Be prepared in season and out of season:- It almost feels like the scouting motto doesn’t it… be prepared, be ready. The words used for season here can simply mean when it convenient or even when its not convenient. When you read through the gospels Jesus is going about his ministry of teaching and he is interrupted by people who need him, but he speaks and ministers God’s word into those peoples lives. I often have what I call carpark appointments, people will come in un announced or I’ll bump into them when I’m out in the carpark, and in the business of my day it will be those encounters which are opportunities to share Christ.

But in season and out of season can also talk of the different times in our life as well. At Joy Bain’s funeral I shared how Joy’s son Michael had ministered to me when my mother died. I had gone to church the day before I had to speak at my mother’s funeral, and Michael was preaching and shared about speaking at his father’s funeral and shared how psalm 22 and 23 had helped him and could help us through, the valley of the shadow of death.  It might have felt like out of season for Michael, but it was God speaking into my season for sure.

The last three imperatives go together “correct, rebuke and encourage”, as we saw last week these are what the Scriptures are useful for. We can see correct and rebuke as negative, but here Paul is talking of a positive process. Remember God’s desire is that all come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, that even Timothy’s task of countering false teachers is not to see them condemned but for them to return to the truth, and to correct rebuke and encourage is the process of inviting us to repent and turn again to God: To turn us around and move us in a Godward path. Timothy is to do that with great patience and careful instruction. Those of us who are parents will know what Paul is talking about, in teaching children something as simple as riding a bike or ting a shoe lace right through to equipping them to make good choices in life, and Timothy who Paul saw as his true son in the faith will have experienced it from Paul as well as Lois and Eunice. In 1 Thessalonians 2:7, Paul describes his ministry as being like a nursing mother looking after her child.

Seasons can have a bigger meaning and in verse 3-4 Paul talks of a time coming when people will not want to hear sound doctrine. The word time here is not chronos which means a specific time but Kairos which means a certain season. There are times when the gospel is fruitful, and we see it bring change and transformation, you could see things like the Wesleyan revival or the Billy graham crusades in the 1950s-60’s, where people respond to God’s word, but there are other times like the one Paul describes where people will just want to listen to things that will give them pleasure, that will tickle their itching ears. But we are to be faithful in proclaiming God’s word, witnessing to Christ, speaking God’s truth in such seasons. For many mainline churches in western society it can feel like a winter season, a barren time, of loss and decline, where it could be easy to lose confidence in the gospel. But it God’ word faithfully preached and proclaimed and lived out that the Spirit can and does use to bring new growth and change.

In verse 6 Paul tells Timothy how he is to exercise his ministry in that Season. He’s not to lose his head and to endure hardships. Often hard unfruitful seasons can be discouraging and can cause us to make rash and unwise decisions. But they are also times when we need to sit down and ask the right questions . While we faithfully proclaim the word, how we do it, the words we use and the things that go around that need to be examined, the strategy that worked back then in that other season may not be appropriate now. How we present the gospel and live it out is wrapped in cultural expression, but the culture has changed. Paul used different methods to preach the gospel in the different settings and cultures he found himself in, in cities that has synagogues he would go and speak there, and speak from scripture, in Athens he took advantage of the public space set aside for sharing of ideas and philosophical debate, and started from Greek poetry and art. In each setting his approach was different, but the message was the same. He was able to clearly think through how he proclaimed the gospel.

Paul tells him to do the work of an evangelist, while in Ephesus Timothy’s focus was involved in countering false teaching, but Paul reminds Timothy his key role and mission is to Preach the good news in a way that those who have not heard it will respond. Timothy is to take up Paul’s purpose of seeing the nations come to follow Jesus Christ. It easy to get caught up in what goes on inside a church and forget that God’s call on us as God’s people is to witness to the hope we have in the risen Jesus Christ with the world out there. That our primary call as God’s people is to bear witness to be missional, about God’s work in the world…The world that God loves. It does not mean that we neglect what goes on inside the church, the health of our witness is based on the health of our relationships, and Paul finishes by telling Timothy to discharge all the duties of his ministry.

And I want to finish with that point as well, because it is what links Paul’s charge to Timothy to all of us. The call on Timothy’s life is as a preacher and evangelist, in the New testament evangelists were seen as those who followed on from apostles, they took the teaching of the apostles and carried on the work of the apostles in taking that into new places and towns and context. But the reality is that as part of Christ’s body that as well as having a place where we belong, we have a role to play, we are a ministry of all believers and for the church to function and fulfil its mission of making Christ known we need to carry out our ministry, our service, the duties of our calling the charge we’ve all be given in Christ. At the centre of that is the word of God, as it saturates and builds up our lives, but also that it flows out of us, in loving sacrificial service and acts of Kindness, it is demonstrated, in teaching and nurturing our children it is passed on, in speaking up and out in social issues, it is prophetic and can bring societal transformation, in simply telling a friend about our faith, it is life transforming. We live in a world of seasons and in that we are called to proclaim the word of God.

Standing on the Word of God: the world of God in a world of woe (2 Timothy 3:10-17)

Kris and I had been married for about a year and living in Tauranga and a local Presbyterian Church was looking for an assistant minister/youth pastor. So we went to the church to check it out and sat close to the front and as the time for the service came round, a door to the side of the front of the church opened and the choir started to file in and as we were close to the front it took us a moment to realise everybody behind us had stood up. Now I’d been bought up in a Presbyterian church all my life and never experienced this, we must have been a very informal lot. But I’d been bought up right and thought that yeah it was the right thing to do, to stand up as women, particularly older women, entered the room. That is what these people are doing I thought. So rather belatedly we got to our feet. I didn’t really notice that after the choir came in that someone carried the bible in as well. Well, I ended up working at that Church for two years, and it took me a while to figure out what was going on was like at the beginning of our services people were standing because the bible not the choir was coming into the church and the standing was a symbolic way of acknowledging the importance and centrality of God’s word in our worship and our lives.

When I mentioned this experience to the eldership at that Church, they laughed, But they were gracious enough to change their practise so that the Bible came in to the church first, then the choir and in the printed order of service we told people that we stand and why we stand.

In the passage we had read out to us today from 2 Timothy chapter 3, Paul is encouraging Timothy to live out the reality behind that ritual of standing for the bible. To continue in what he has learned and been convinced about. He is to live by the gospel of Jesus Christ, that has been taught to, and modelled for him by Paul and the scriptures, what we call the Old Testament that he has learned from infancy from those wonderful women of faith, Lois and Eunice, his mother and grandmother.

We are working our way through what are known as the pastoral epistles, Paul’s letters to his co-workers in difficult pastoral situations, to learn about being Christian leaders, as we all grow into maturity and ministry in Christ. Paul’s encouragement for Timothy is for us as well in a world that is not conducive for our Christian faith that the way to keep going and growing is through allowing our lives to be saturated in, shaped and guided by, lived out of the bible, the word of God.

The passage starts “but you” and previously Paul had been talking about the false teachers in Ephesus and he had looked forward in time and seen that this would be a problem that would always face God’s people. That many in the world would continue to be hostile to the gospel. There would always be people who would reject good teaching and doctrine and focus on the love of money, and pleasure, that would have the outward form of religion but not be lovers of God. He lists a whole series of negative qualities like being unforgiving, slanderous conceited, without self-control. people who would be try and draw others away from the Gospel.

And with the words “But You” Paul tells Timothy to stand on the word of God in a world of woe. Paul is encouraging Timothy to live a different way. While we might see Paul’s description of the world as dark and a bit over the top, negative, his hope for Timothy and for his readers is that in Christ they will move in another direction, a way lead and guided by the gospel and scriptures, a way that results in Timothy and us being equipped for every Good deed in Christ. That is where this passage finishes.

Paul starts by reminding Timothy of what he has learned from Paul. Paul lists nine things that Timothy would have learned, his teaching, which would have been the apostolic proclamation of the gospel. In first Corinthians 2:2 Paul tells the church at Corinth that when he came to them he preached Christ and Christ crucified. All his teaching is Christ and how what Christ has said and done for us is to be lived out.  “ his way of life’, Timothy was to see that Christ likeness in the way that Paul lived his life. My purpose: Timothy knew Paul’s mission of proclaiming Jesus to the gentiles, because we also have experienced the risen Jesus Christ we are called to be witness of that to the world around us, because God desires all people to come to a saving knowledge of Jesus. Paul’s faith; in the pastorals the word faith has to do with that vertical relationship with God, Timothy would have seen Paul’s devotional life. Patience; A Christian virtue of persisting in the faith, the keep on keeping on of Paul.  Love; In the pastorals the out working of faith is love, sacrificial service to others. Endurance, again that perseverance in these things of Christ despite opposition, and Paul goes on to mentions those things in two ways. Persecutions: facing direct opposition because of faith in Christ. And Suffering, a word which encompasses a whole raft of hardships Paul has endured for the sake of the gospel. we might ask the question weather Paul is asking Timothy to follow him rather than following Jesus,  but in this list we see that Paul is saying that his whole life would reflect Christ’s life. Christ’s purpose, Christ’s, faith, patience, love endurance, Christ’s suffering. In 1 Corinthians 11:1, Paul can say to his readers, become an imitator of me and thus become imitators of Christ. We have these things of Paul as well as we have the apostolic teaching in the gospels, we see the apostles lives lived out by the Holy Spirit in the book of acts, and the application of Pauls teaching for those who would follow Christ in the epistles to the churches. We have it in the written form of the New testament books and we too can know these things and become convinced of their truth.

Paul expands on his sufferings by mentioning three specific instances, from his first missionary trip. Antioch, (acts 1313:52) where the believers were persecuted, life was made hard for them,  Iconium (Acts 14:1-7) where Paul and Barnabas were threatened with death, Lystra,(Acts 14:8-20) where Paul was dragged out of the city and stoned and left for dead. Paul may have used these because they would have been known to Timothy, as Timothy was from Lystra, but also because they encompassed a whole spectrum of different persecution and suffering, tough treatment and discrimination, threats and actual physical violence. But in all those things Paul can say he experienced God’s help and rescue, he suffered but Christ lead him through and in each place a church was established which Paul would later go back to encourage. He then opens the idea of suffering from his own life, to the paradox of God’s people in history, that those who wish to live a godly life in Christ will be persecuted, while those who do not will prosper. This has been what God’s people have wrestled with, why do good people suffer? It’s the basis of much of the wisdom literature in the Old Testament like the book of Job, and in the psalms and even in the prophets like the book of Habakkuk, where the prophet wrestles with God using the Babylonians as the instrument to judge Israel. Christ told his followers that it would be the case, if they rejected and persecuted Him, they would do the same to Jesus followers. The hope was that we can and do know God’s help and rescue, and God’s purposes and mission are not thwarted.

Then Paul again focuses back on Timothy, But you he says at the beginning of verse 14, continue in what you have learned and been convinced of. Timothy had come to believe in Jesus Christ and through Paul knew what it was to follow him and this is Paul’s encouragement that Timothy would keep on in that way. He encourages him to do so because he can rely on the people who have bought him to that place. For Paul has taught him the gospel and he has known the scriptures, because his grand mother and mother have taught it to him since he was an infant.

Paul now moves to speak to Timothy of the importance of the Holy Scriptures, for Paul and Timothy that would have been the Hebrew scriptures, the Old Testament. The question is often asked about the connection between the old testament and the New for Christians. Often people will see the Old testament as not as important or relevant. The God of the Old Testament is this angry God, or as one teenager put it “ it’s about god before God became a Christian’. But here Paul, tells us that the scriptures of the Old Testament can make us wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. The Old Testament sets the God frame for us to understand Jesus Christ, his incarnation and mission, it points us to Christ he is the high point of that story of God and his people, and we are to view those scriptures through the lens of Christ. In the sermon on the mount in Matthew 5:17 Jesus says “I did not come to do away with the law or the prophets but to fulfil it”.

In verse 16 and 17 Paul goes on to tell Timothy how the scriptures are useful. They are verses that are most often used as proof texts for the inspiration of scripture. That the bible itself claims to be God’s special revelation of himself. Paul uses a special word and says that “all scripture is God-breathed”, it’s God word because in a process we are not totally able to comprehend, it is the breath of God through the hands of humanity. Of many people writing a library of different books, and editing and discerning what is inspired over a thousand year period. I wonder if Paul used this word we translate God breathed to differentiate the Hebrew cannon of scriptures, the books that the Jews had discerned were inspired from the myths and geologies that in 1 Timothy 1:4 he said the false teachers used and got obsessed with. Down through the years what God breathed, and inspired means has been the matter of much theological debate and differing opinions.  But being God breathed means they can be trusted to give us the truth we need about God and how to live our faith in God out…

When it comes to the books of the New Testament, there came a time when the church had to decided what it believed of the many writings, about Christ and of the apostles were inspired and authoritative and trustworthy. A man called maricon thought that as Christians we shouldn’t have anything to do with books that were tainted by Jewish though, so he claimed that we could only trust most of Luke’s gospel and Acts. The church had to sit down and work out what it believed was god breathed, one of the criteria they used was that it came for a trustworthy people, as Paul tells Timothy.

The fact that it is God breathed is what makes it useful for us. Paul used four words to describe what it is useful for. Teaching; its content tells us of God, the father, son and Holy Spirit, it tells us of god’s relationship with his people, God’s care and God’s love and God’s righteousness, God’s purpose and kingdom. It tells us God’s story and how we fit into that. It is useful to “rebuking”, it shows us where we are going wrong, we often think we read scriptures but the bible reads us, as God is light it shines in our lives and reveals the shadows and dark places that need be sorted. It is useful for “correction” the rebuke is the stop of repentance and correction is the guiding one back on the right path, like an illness it is the remedy by which we are  made well again. Bought back to the right path. Useful for Training in righteousness, teaching talks of right belief, right doctrine, training in righteousness is about right practise as well: Faith with its out working in love… as we have heard through the pastorals. The end result of this is that the servant of God, the person committed to Christ, will be equipped for every good deed. For maturity and ministry in Christ.  As Jesus said “if you love me you will keep my commandments”.

At the beginning of our services we stand as the bible is bought into the church and at the end of our service we stand as it is taken out into the world ahead of us, that’s just tradition it is a symbolic way of acknowledging the centrality of the scriptures of the new and old testament in our worship, what we do in here, and our lives, what we do out there. The challenge and the call of the scripture we had read today is that it goes beyond symbolism, that it becomes a reality, that everything we do and say and hold to be true comes from God’s word, our lives are saturated and lead and guided, rebuked and corrected, influenced by God breathed scripture. It means we have to let it influence us, more than media and the messages of this word, it’s and essential part of our day, we need to study it, one of the best ways of doing that is being part of a small group where we have people who can help us wrestle with it and be alongside as we try and put it into practise, part of our strategic plan is that we want to develop small groups for our congregation. That it is at the fore of our thinking and core of our doing. It is the means by which we are able to stand in and with Christ.