God's Written Word (2 Timothy 3.14-17)

Introduction

Quite a few of our young people have left home in the last few years to start studies at University. It’s a time of genuine sadness for us, of real excitement for them and of economic ruin for mum and dad who have to pay for it all.

And of course, as well as being a new and exciting time for the students there’s sudden exposure to a whole new world of temptation. Having their offspring living away from home for the first time and with a million and one worldly distractions makes some parents feel a bit nervous.

One mum took her daughter to one side just before she left for Uni and rattled off a long list of things to be avoided. So she said, “Mum, what on earth did you get up to when you were my age that makes you so worried about me now?”

I heard about one mum and dad who gave their son a Bible as a leaving present before he went off to Uni. They said, “Take this. It will be a great help.” Well, after a few weeks, he began sending texts home asking for money. So mum and dad would text back urging him to read his Bible. Read Matthew 20.6. Look up Isaiah 35.1… And he would reply that he was reading the Bible, and that it was really good but a bit more cash would be really useful too.

When he came home for Christmas, his parents asked him how he had got on. He said, “Well, it was o.k., but to be really honest, I have been short of cash all term.” “Well son,” they replied, “if you had only opened your Bible, you would have found £50 notes tucked into the pages of the verses we texted you about!

See how useful this book can be? A Bible in the hand is worth two on the shelf - especially if it’s been on the shelf for a long time. When was the last time you opened yours? Look at this one… When a Bible’s well used, the devil’s not amused. If your Bible’s all dusty your faith will go rusty.

The Wisdom from God’s Word

Probably the last letter that Paul ever wrote was from death row. He’d just had his final appeal hearing. It was turned down and there was no possible way out of facing the death sentence . He knew he wasn’t going to be around much longer. So he wrote one final letter to hand on the torch to a young leader called Timothy. All the things he could have said to him… but right at the heart of 2 Timothy is a passionate appeal to stick to the Bible whatever anyone says.

People everywhere have opinions and ideas. Everywhere you turn people will tell you what they think about life, the universe and everything. People hire lifestyle gurus and personal coaches. Self help books are best sellers. “Forget all that,” says Paul. What has God said?

As for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, and how from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 

So God’s written word will make you wise. That’s what it claims here and it delivers. Young people go off to University to become clever and to grow in knowledge – and that’s great. But you don’t gain wisdom for salvation in the lecture theatre. Read God’s word - and live it out - and you will have wisdom beyond your years.

I saw Jackie Pullinger this year when she came to Stockton. She has an amazing ministry of signs and wonders amongst drug addicts in Hong Kong never reads anything – except this book. I read the biography of Smith Wigglesworth last month; he had an extraordinary ministry of healing and deliverance as well including several documented resurrections. He was illiterate until he was in his 20s and when he learned to read, he only ever read this book.

The Inspiration in God’s Word

Another thing it says here is that the Bible is inspired by God. “All Scripture is God-breathed.” (v16) It is breathed out by Him.

I know plenty of people reject this, saying that the Bible contains absurdities and mistakes. The 1631 edition of the King James Bible printed the seventh commandment as, “Thou shalt commit adultery.” I can assure you that is a mistake!

When we say that the Bible is God-breathed, do we mean that every edition of every translation of the Bible is absolutely faultless? No. Modern translations, using the best scholarship, get really close and you can accept it as trustworthy. “God-breathed” means that Scripture, in its original manuscripts, never affirms anything that is not true.

But I’m always hearing people say that the Bible contradicts itself. The funny thing is, that whenever you ask someone to name the five verses they find the most puzzling, they tend to reply, “Oh well, I don’t know that many myself, but that’s what I’ve heard.” Ask them to name the one contradiction they most struggle with, and you will tend to find that hardly anyone can name any at all. The truth is this: most people do not reject the Bible because it contradicts itself. They reject it because it contradicts them.

The Authority of God’s Word

So the Bible makes you wise and it is breathed out by God. What else? The third thing is that Scripture claims to have authority. It says it is useful for teaching. The Bible tells you all you need to know about all you need to believe.

One of the Church of England’s Articles (Article 6) says “The Holy Scriptures containeth all things necessary to salvation: so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of the faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation.”

In other words everything you need to know to have a relationship with God is in here. And if it isn’t in here, it can’t be all that important, so you don’t have to believe it.

The Bible tells you the truth about God – it says that he loves you and created you to know him. It tells you the truth about yourself – it says that everyone has sinned by breaking God’s laws and that has created a gulf between us and him. The Bible tells you the truth about how to get right with God again through faith in Jesus and what he has done on the cross. It tells you what is true.

But not only does the Bible lead you on the path of truth, it leads you off the path of error if you wander on to it. That’s what it means here when it says all Scripture is useful for rebuking. In other words, it points out what is false as well as what is true.

So because of this book, I know that all religions do not lead to God as some people say. Reading the Bible, I learn that Jesus is the one and only mediator between God and every believer; so praying to saints is a waste of breath. Reading my Bible, I find that people are not born innocent as many claim. The truth is we can’t stop ourselves going through life without breaking God’s laws. So we all need a Saviour.

Before I was a Christian I read horoscopes, I used bad language and I gambled money. And much more besides. When I became a Christian, by reading the Bible, I discovered that all that I was living wrongly. The Scriptures are useful for rebuking.

So the Bible leads you on the path of truth and it leads you off the path of error.

What else? It goes on to say here that God’s written word is also useful for correcting. That means that the Bible puts you back on the path of truth if you’ve wandered off onto the path of error.

It’s one thing to say “this is wrong.” The Bible does do that but it goes on to say “So this is what you should now do instead.”

The next thing about the Bible here is that it is useful for training in righteousness. What does that mean? Training is an ongoing thing. It means that the Bible goes on leading us, holding our hand all the way down the path of living right.

There was a native of the island of Fiji who proudly showed off his Bible to a GI during World War II. (Many American troops were posted there after Pearl Harbour). The soldier thought back to his Sunday School days and said rather disdainfully, “Oh, I’ve grown out of that sort of thing.” The islander laughed and said, “If it wasn’t for the message of this book, you’d have been tonight’s supper for the whole village.”

It’s a good point. This is from the Guinness Book of Records: “During the 19th century, the world's most prolific cannibal, Ratu Udre Udre…, reportedly ate between 872 and 999 people… According to Udre Udre's son, [he] would eat every part of his victims, preserving what he couldn't eat in one sitting for consumption later.”

But when the Gospel was preached in Fiji, the Word of God trained the Fijian people in righteousness. And it does the same with us in many much less spectacular ways.

This is an on-the-job training manual for living God’s way. Do you want to know how to live for God? It’s all here. This book is all you need.

Ending

Some of you may be thinking; “that’s all well and good, but everything he has said is a circular argument. The Bible is inspired, true, authoritative and useful for all sorts of things because it says so.

So let me offer as my four-minute conclusion five lightning-quick reasons why I believe you should accept the Bible’s claims about itself.

Firstly, we should value this book because of its amazing worldwide relevance. You can give the Holy Scriptures to an Aborigine in Australia, or a financier in Frankfurt, or a mother of six in Mexico or to a plumber in Preston on Tees and they will tell you that they have been challenged, or encouraged or blessed by reading it. I can’t think of any other book that has such appeal, speaking clearly and with authority to people of every culture, generation and social background.

Secondly, we should treasure this book because it has miraculously endured. It has been attacked through political dogma, humanist philosophy, royal decree and mob violence alike. The Bible has been banned, burned, blasphemed and banished more than anything else in print - and yet it remains the world’s best-selling and most read book.

Thirdly, we should take this book seriously because of its stunning track record of accurate predictions. There are 735 distinct prophecies in the Bible. 596 of them have already been fulfilled. Most of those remaining concern the return of Christ and the last judgment.

Fourthly, we should cherish this book because it was endorsed wholeheartedly by Jesus. He called the Bible “God’s word,” he read it, called people to obey it, taught from it and said that people were in error because they didn’t know it. If it’s good enough for Jesus, it ought to be good enough for us.

Fifthly and finally, we should believe this book because the Holy Spirit testifies to our hearts that it is God’s word. No one can prove that in a laboratory, but any Christian who’s read it can tell you about treasured moments when they encounter the living God by reading this book. When you feel your faith boosted, or your complacency challenged or your mood lifted by reading these words - that’s the Holy Spirit breathing the fresh air of God’s truth to the stale room of your life.

From infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that all God’s people may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. 


Sermon preached at All Saints' Preston on Tees, 20th November 2011

The Church Family (James 2.14-26 and Matthew 12.46-50)

Some churches are decorated with engraved tablets on the walls commemorating former members who have died in wars. In fact, there are some such plaques on the walls here at St Mary’s. We remember the bravery and sacrifice of those (and other) men today - Remembrance Sunday. 'For our Tomorrow, they gave their Today.'

You may be familiar with the story of the vicar who was showing a small boy round his church. He was explaining all the different parts of the building including the memorials on the wall. And he pointed to one particular plaque and said to the little boy, “These are the names of all the people who died in the services.” And the little boy relied, “What, the morning services or evening ones?”

Before my faith came alive, all the associations that I had with church I have to say were bad ones. Church, for me, was not just a place you could expect to die of boredom during the services; it was an institution with more than its fair share of stuffy people and artificial behaviour.

Well, we are coming towards to the end of our little series on how we relate to each other. We’ll be thinking about family life next Sunday, but before we get there what about the church family? Are we boring, stuffy and artificial? (That’s a rhetorical question – you don’t have to answer).

Actually, is “family” even the right word to describe relationships in the local church? The word “family” is used 17 times in the New Testament and perhaps only once at most is it used to describe the church; it’s in Galatians 6.10 and it says this -

“Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.”

I think that means the church, but it doesn’t say so exactly. So some people might argue that the church isn’t really like a family at all. There are other metaphors in the Bible that certainly are used express what church is. For example, the church is compared to a healthy body, a holy temple, a beautiful bride, a royal priesthood, even a trained army. (And I have to admit I’ve met a few battle axes in my time in the church)!

But when we come into a relationship with God through Jesus the Bible often uses family language to describe what has happened to us. When we come to faith, God is no longer a remote and unfriendly being outside our experience. No, we experience him as our heavenly Father and Christians are called children of God.

And relationships between Christians are given family-like words too. Paul called Timothy his son in the faith.

And in Romans 16, when Paul is saying “hello” to a list of acquaintances before signing off, he says “Greet Rufus, chosen in the Lord, and his mother, who has been a mother to me, too.”

God does not want us to be on formal terms, addressing one another as Rev. Lambert or Doctor Taylor or Mrs. Palmer-Jones - but as brothers and sisters.

A Sunday school teacher was discussing the Ten Commandments with her five and six year olds. After explaining the commandment to honour father and mother, she asked, “Is there a commandment that teaches us how to treat our brothers and sisters?” Without hesitation one little boy answered, “Oh, yes. Thou shalt not kill!”

But nevertheless, in 1 John 4.19, we are given the vision of church being family. God is our Father; therefore (like it or not) that makes us spiritual siblings.

This is how John puts it in that verse: “We love because God first loved us. If we say we love God yet hate a brother or sister, we are liars. For any of us who do not love a brother or sister whom we have seen, cannot love God whom we have not seen. And he has given us this command: Those who love God must also love one another.”

It is a wonderful thing that when we come to Christ, we are born into a family of brothers and sisters. The church throughout the world is my family. It’s an amazing thing, you know, you can travel to any part of the world and there you will find believers in Jesus Christ and you have this filial relationship with them as soon as you meet them.

Even in Wales! I was in Wales on holiday in July and went to the local Baptist church near to where we were staying. Kathie and I immediately felt completely at home. We sing the same worship songs, we read the same scriptures, we love the same God. These people understand me. I remember thinking “I don’t know a soul here but this is my family.”

They say you can choose your friends but you cannot choose your family. Take a look around you this morning. These are your brothers and your sisters!

If you’re not a Christian yet, they are your potential brothers and sisters! I don’t know whether that encourages you to become one or not! I’m sure it does… But we are one big family and the language we speak is love.

Now of course, brothers and sisters sometimes fall out. Most of my childhood was spent persecuting, and being persecuted by, my sister (who was bossy because she was the oldest) and my brother (who got away with murder because he was the youngest). We would watch Tom and Jerry together and totally relate to the violence they meted out on each other.

Christians fall out too sometimes because they are brothers and sisters. Gill Clayton once told the story of a vicar who was grumbling about his congregation. “The only thing that’s harmonious in this church” he said, “is the organ!”

Thank God that I never have to say that here. But we do need to be vigilant. The Bible says that we need to work hard at maintaining the unity of the spirit.

In the world, we talk of big families, small families, dysfunctional families, happy families, single-parent families, extended families, weird families, together families, rich families, poor families and so on. So what should the family of God be like?

Our reading from James suggests that it should be a community that believes and a community that acts. And James paints a vivid picture of what that might look like. Let’s look at James 2.14-18 again:

What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if people claim to have faith but have no deeds? Can such faith save them? Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it?

The preacher and sociologist Tony Campolo tells of the time he was walking down a street when his eyes were met by a tramp looking on from a bench. Dirty old overcoat, long matted beard with bits of food stuck in it, he was covered in grime from head to toe, and drinking from a paper cup... The guy called out, “Hey mister, you want some of my coffee?” “That’s kind of you but...”

Then he thought that’s wrong. So he said, “O.K., I’ll take a sip.” So he drank some of the coffee. Then he said to the tramp, “You’re getting pretty generous giving away your coffee. What’s got in to you?” The man said, “Well, the coffee was especially delicious today. And I think that when God gives you something good, you ought to share it around.”

Campolo thought to himself, “Here I am - a preacher - and this tramp has expressed what Christian love is about more eloquently than 1,000 of my sermons.” So he said, “Well, is there anything I can give you?” He thought the guy was going to ask for £10. The man said, “Yeah. You can give me a hug.” When he said that, Tony Campolo was thinking, “Oh great, why didn’t he just ask me for £10...”

But they put their arms around each other. Then this smartly dressed academic realised that this tramp was not going to let him go. He just held on to him for what seemed like forever. And people were passing in the street, staring at this sight.

And then Tony Campolo said this; “My embarrassment, little by little, turned to reverence and awe. Because I realised that this was not a tramp I was holding in my arms. I heard a voice saying ‘I was hungry, did you feed me? I was naked, did you clothe me? I was sick, did you care for me? I was the tramp you met on Chesterton Street, did you hug me?’ I had Jesus in my arms,” he said.

That’s what God’s family can look like. I think it’s one of the most beautiful things on earth.

We’ll talk about our blood families next week but before we do, and as I close, what about Jesus’ words in our Gospel reading?

While Jesus was still talking to the crowd, his mother and brothers stood outside, wanting to speak to him. Someone told him, “Your mother and brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you.” He replied to him, “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” Pointing to his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.”

Michael Green, in his commentary, is really helpful, so I'll leave the last word to him.

One of the most painful things in Jesus’ life was that members of his family misunderstood him and even opposed him. John’s gospel reveals that his brothers did not believe in him. Mark’s gospel says that they thought he was mad. We know that that changed after the resurrection and his mother and brothers were amongst those in the upper room at Pentecost.

The incident in our Gospel reading tellingly finds Jesus’ family ‘outside’ while Jesus is ‘inside’. They weren’t interested in Jesus’ agenda. They wanted him to follow them – and that’s the wrong way round. So Jesus used the situation to teach about who his real family is. The truth is this; it is possible to be physically related to the Messiah and still not be part of the kingdom of God.

Every one of us needs to acknowledge who Jesus is and make a settled decision to follow him as Lord and Saviour. That alone is what brings people into a relationship with Christ that is closer than that of a mother or a brother.


Sermon preached at Saint Mary's Long Newton, 13th November 2011.

The Suffering Servant (Isaiah 52.13 – 53.12)

Introduction

Most children in church get to know that when someone asks a question it’s usually a pretty safe bet to give one particular answer. When a Sunday School volunteer asks her children, “Now then boys and girls, hands up who can tell me what is red, cute, eats nuts, and has a big fluffy tail?” she will be surprised that none of the kids look like they know the answer. So after an embarrassing silence she might pick out one little boy and say, “What is red, cute, eats nuts, and has a big fluffy tail? Do you think you know the answer?” And he’ll probably reply, “Well I know the answer must be Jesus - but I think it’s a squirrel!”

When you read Isaiah 53 and ask who it is that the prophet is writing about, this time it is Jesus. It is unmistakably him. There can be no doubt. Written over 700 years before his death, it describes Jesus’ afflictions and atoning death and ultimate vindication so accurately, so unerringly, in such detail that nobody else in human history comes close.

Susan Pearlman, who is a Jewess who believes in Jesus as her people’s Messiah once talked about a survey that was carried out on the streets of Tel Aviv. The survey asked “Who do you think the 53rd chapter of Isaiah describes?” She said that most people interviewed were unfamiliar with the passage. When they were given a copy of it to read, many answered that they did not know who it referred to, but some said it sounded a lot like Jesus.

I want to recommend a book by RT Kendall on this passage of Scripture. It’s just been published, it’s called Why Jesus Died: A Meditation on Isaiah 53 and I think you’ll find it very profitable read. The details are on the back of the pew sheet if you want to order it or you can ask Caroline who’ll get it for you on the bookstall if you prefer.

I read it a couple of weeks ago and found myself deeply stirred by the Holy Spirit at times as I walked through the depths of this prophecy again and just marvelled at the glorious sufficiency of the cross.

Before it tells us anything about Jesus, it tells us a lot about the authority and clarity and trustworthiness of God’s word. Isaiah 53 is such a faithful portrait of Christ’s passion that people have wondered if it was tampered with by unscrupulous Christians after Jesus died.

But in 1947 someone accidentally discovered nine hundred ancient parchments in a desert cave dating back to about 100 BC – we know them now as the Dead Sea scrolls.

The Isaiah parchment was intact and practically identical to the oldest manuscript they had known until that time (which went back to about 600 AD). So any doubts about the time these words were written were settled than once and for all. The Bible is God’s word. It tells the truth about Jesus and tells the truth about you and me.

What does Isaiah 53 tell us about Jesus? Oh man, where do I start?

His Glorious Exaltation

I’m going to start at the beginning. ‘My servant’, says God in 52.13, ‘will be raised and lifted up and highly exalted’.

For centuries, the Jews had imagined that their royal Messiah would rise head and shoulders above a watching world and would be gloriously exalted. They still do. They’re still waiting. But none of them imagined that their saviour and king would be humiliated and bruised and crushed. But it was written down! It was staring them in the face. God says that he would be raised up - but only after he had suffered.

Even a quick survey of this chapter reveals many clear truths about this suffering servant, all of which were strikingly fulfilled when Jesus was arrested, put on trial, flogged, crucified and raised.

His Ordinary Appearance

Isaiah 53.2 says that there was nothing about the way Jesus looked that would cause you to take a second look. He was no handsome Hollywood celebrity. He had neither beauty nor majesty. There is no physical description of him in the entire New Testament.

We don’t know if he was tall or short, blue eyed or brown eyed, clean shaven or bearded, curly haired or bald. He looked Jewish – because he was born Jewish. But his face and physique weren’t what you noticed about him at all. People flocked to him not because he was fine-looking or eye-catching. It was because he was anointed by the Holy Spirit.

His Humiliating Rejection

In v3, it describes a man who will be turned upon and rejected.

Have you been rejected in life? It’s a devastating experience. I know people who, as children, were told by their parents, “We wish you’d never been born.”

The pain of rejection by an unfaithful husband or a hard-hearted wife is the loneliest place on earth.

Some parents suffer painful rejection from their own children who turn against them. It is a lonely grief to bear.

We know people who are excluded from the “in crowd” at work or bullied by peers. Some of you come to this place today weighed down by heartache and rejection. This is a day to lay your burden down at the foot of the cross. It was for you that Jesus…

…was despised and rejected by others,
a man of suffering, and familiar with pain.
Like one from whom people hide their faces
he was despised, and we held him in low esteem. (Isaiah 53.3)

The Gospels tell us that Jesus was rejected by his own siblings who did not believe in him at first. He was deserted by his band of followers, he was disowned by his most loyal spokesman, he was betrayed for money by a trusted friend. What humiliation! What injustice!

But he took upon himself the indignity of being despised and rejected so you can find healing for your rejection and your public disgrace.

His Unfair Trial

What about his arrest and trial? Isaiah saw that it would be a scandalous miscarriage of justice.

By oppression and judgment he was taken away
yet who of his generation protested? (Isaiah 53.8)

No one protested did they? Pilate couldn't find a single fault in him and pleaded weakly with the crowd but then washed his hands of him. He was held in contempt by his own people who gladly released an unrepentant and violent murderer while they bayed for his blood. Everyone passed the buck. No one could be bothered.

He had done no violence,
nor was any deceit in his mouth. (Isaiah 53.9)

He was clearly innocent of every charge laid against him. His trial was a joke. The witnesses couldn’t even get their testimonies to agree. They kept changing the charges against him, making it up as they went along. It was totally illegal.

Never, before or since, was one man found guilty by so many by the evidence of so few. Never has a punishment been more severe and for an offence less proven.

His Disfigured Form

What of the physical details of his death? What did Isaiah see 750 years before the cross?

He saw that the gruesomeness of his beatings would be so savage and bloodthirsty that people wouldn’t recognise him anymore.

Many… were appalled at him -
his appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any human being
and his form marred beyond human likeness. (Isaiah 52.14)

His flogging was an unrelenting tearing of his back, his arms and legs. His crown of thorns would have masked his face in blood.

He was pierced… (Isaiah 53.5)

Isaiah saw that his death was not going to be the result from poisoning or hanging or drowning or burning or suffocation - but from wounds punctured in his flesh. There would be blood and it would be ugly and messy.

His Silent Obedience

What of Jesus’ attitude to his suffering? Isaiah saw a man who went silently and willingly to his execution. At no point did Jesus try to argue his way out of trouble.

…He was oppressed and afflicted,
yet he did not open his mouth;
he was led like a lamb to the slaughter,
and as a sheep before its shearers is silent,
so he did not open his mouth. (Isaiah 53.7)

Luke’s Gospel tells us that Herod plied him with questions but Jesus gave him no answer.

John’s Gospel tells us that Jesus died at the same time that Passover lambs were slaughtered in the temple to symbolically take away the sins of the people for another year. But Jesus was the Lamb of God slain to actually remove the sins of the world forever.

His Assumed Guilt

Beyond his rejection, Isaiah goes further saying that, in his distress and crucifixion, people actually believed that he was getting his just deserts.

We considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted. (Isaiah 53.4)

His Preordained Destiny

The irony is that they were right. It was no accident. It was God’s plan from beginning to end.

Yet it was the Lord's will to crush him and cause him to suffer. (Isaiah 53.10)

But the fact that people believed that Jesus was being stricken by God explains why there was so little open sympathy for him.

In the Gospels, people say things like, “He saved others, let him save himself if he is God’s Messiah.” We’re told the crowd jeered as he carried his cross.

The leaders sneered at him. Men insulted him and spat in his face. Soldiers poked fun of him and played dice for his clothes.

His Gracious Intercession

What did they think when he began to pray for his executioners as he hung there dying? “Father, forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.” Isaiah foresaw that too.

He made intercession for the transgressors. (Isaiah 53.12)

But, even then people just wrote him off.

His Undisputed Death

Isaiah also makes it absolutely clear that his vision of a suffering servant was more than an ordeal of agony and anguish; he faded and then stopped breathing.

For he was cut off from the land of the living. (Isaiah 53.8)

He died of his injuries. The Gospels describe how his death was certified beyond doubt. Tests have now proved that the copious flow of blood, followed by the copious flow of water described in John’s Gospel are evidence of cardiac rupture. He died literally of a broken heart.

His Distinctive Burial

The Gospels also explain that Jesus died between thieves and his lifeless corpse was buried in the tomb of a wealthy man called Joseph of Arimathea. Isaiah saw that too.

He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death. (Isaiah 53.9)

His Atoning Sacrifice

But all I have said so far is almost incidental. The main burden of Isaiah’s vision is the spiritual meaning of it all.

No less than ten times between v4 and v12, Isaiah says that in his death, the suffering servant will somehow take upon himself all our sicknesses, sorrows and sinfulness. He himself will bear the punishment of death that our sin fully deserves. He himself will suffer the torment that is separation from God by his death. For example:

Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering… (Isaiah 53.4)

He was crushed for our iniquities… (Isaiah 53.5)

By his wounds we are healed… (Isaiah 53.5)

The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. (Isaiah 53.6)

For the transgression of my people he was punished. (Isaiah 53.8)

The Lord makes his life an offering for sin… (Isaiah 53.10)

This is what it’s all about. We cannot save ourselves. Even our good works cannot save us, they are filthy rags and we must renounce all hope in them.

Only the blood of Christ cleanses sinners, discharges debtors and saves souls from hell.

Sin is so routine for us, we’re so used to it, that we forget just how serious it is to God. But the truth is this; every sin we commit is a refusal of God's authority over us.

Sin is serious for another reason: it brings heartache and brokenness into our lives.

Sin cuts us off from God and spoils our relationships with others. Because we are all born unable not to sin we cannot save ourselves.

The good news is this; God so loves us, and because he so loves us he so hates what sin does to us.

But, thank God, Jesus was willingly crushed, bruised and punished for our sin. All our sins and transgressions were transferred over to Jesus as though he were the guilty one.

2 Corinthians 5.21 explains it this way:

God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Think of it: We thoroughly deserved to die for our sins - but he died in our place.

1 Peter 3:18 puts it like this:

For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God.

You must believe Christ died and rose again for you, you must receive him into your heart by faith, and you must commit your life to him as our Lord and Saviour. If you haven’t already done that – let me urge you to give your life to him today.

No decision you make in life will ever be as important as that one. Why delay it any longer?

His Triumphant Resurrection

Did Isaiah see anything else? Was it just an appalling vision of undeserved suffering? Is there anything more? Yes, there is one last thing.

750 years before the events, Isaiah was given the revelation that after his trial, his suffering, his death and burial, the Messiah will live again and be greatly exalted.

Though the Lord makes his life an offering for sin, 
he will see his offspring and prolong his days. (Isaiah 53.10)

After he has suffered, he will see the light of life and be satisfied. (Isaiah 53.11)

Therefore I will give him a portion among the great…
because he poured out his life unto death. (Isaiah 53.12)

Ending

As I draw to a close I want to conclude by summing up briefly what the cross means to God, what the cross meant to Jesus and what the cross means to us.

We use the word cruciform to describe an object in the form of a cross. Cruciform means cross shaped. (It’s from the Latin crux, crucem, crucis) from which we also get the expression the crux of the matter.

The crux of any matter is its decisive, pivotal point. That’s what the cross is to God; it is his decisive action on sin, it is his final statement on salvation. It is the pivotal point of human history.

Another word that comes from that same Latin root is the word excruciating. There are many adjectives we use to describe pain; painful, aching, throbbing and sore but even agonising comes short of what Jesus experienced on the cross. Enduring the rejection of a whole nation, bearing your sin and mine and absorbing the wrath of God our sins deserved was absolutely excruciating. The word means literally “out of the cross.” This is what the cross felt like for Jesus. It was an excruciating experience for him. And he did it for you.

Finally, the word crucial. This is what the cross means for us. Nothing in your life and mine is more critical, more vital, more imperative than our response to the cross of Christ.

That response settles our eternal destiny one way or the other. It seals our forgiveness from sin or it keeps us stuck forever in guilt. It opens up a brand new relationship as adopted children of God or it confirms us as children of the devil. It alone determines whether we spend eternity in heaven or in hell. This is crucial. It is fundamental. It is key.

So, as we get ready to come to the Lord’s Table this morning I want to urge you to weigh up in your spirit the excruciating agonies Christ endured for you. Crucially, renounce all hope in your good works to save you.

Draw near to God – and he’ll draw near to you. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.


Sermon preached at All Saints' Preston on Tees, 23rd October 2011

Harvest - Blessings to Share (Luke 12.13-21)

Introduction

An old miser who made his fortune in mining for precious metals is lying on his death bed and he calls in the local vicar (who he has never met in his life). He says, “Vicar, can you say some encouraging words in my hour of need. I have worked so hard all my life for everything I have. And it pains me to have to be parted from it. Oh, if only I could take all my precious gold with me beyond the grave.” The vicar replies: “Oh, I wouldn’t worry if I were you. The place where you’re going, it would only melt anyway.”

That’s from the Clergy’s Guide to Comforting Deathbed Advice…

Well now, in Luke’s gospel there’s a story Jesus told about a rich man who is about to die. We had it acted out for us a few moments ago. The shocking thing is, to be brutally honest, God’s comments to the rich man at death’s door in the parable were not all that different to the vicar’s in the little story I just told you.

What would God say to you if today was the last day of your life? What would he say to you about the stuff you have and the way you use it?

Background

The teaching of this parable is a matter of life and death. So let’s take a good look at it, starting with the background.

Question: Who did Jesus tell this story to? Answer: Two brothers (v13-14).

Question: What do we know about them? Answer: almost nothing at all. We don’t know where they’re from, what their names are, how old they are or what they look like. We don’t know anything about them - except one thing. We do know that they’ve just come into a bit of money.

Question: Was there anyone else that Jesus told this story to? Answer: yes, a crowd (v13).

Question: What do we know about the crowd? Answer: It numbered “many thousands” (v1). So there’s a big crowd and Jesus is teaching.

Ears to Hear God’s Word

Do you know that when you preach, you can tell when people are listening? I was giving Kathryn Belmont a bit of feedback this week about the talk she gave at the evening service last week. And she told me how unnerving it was to look at people as you preach, from the first minute, give no indication from their body language that they actually want to be there. Some are visibly indifferent. If you’re not used to it, it can be a bit unnerving. She wondered if she was saying anything wrong. (She wasn’t, it was an excellent talk).

But every preacher in every church knows that some are hungry to hear truth and others aren’t. Are you hungry to receive truth this morning?

Even Jesus found that. Even the Lord Jesus Christ, the greatest preacher there has ever been, who spoke with authority and power, who confounded his critics with his wisdom, who delighted children with his stories, even he could not keep everyone’s attention when he was preaching.

Because, in Luke 12.13, someone in the crowd seems to interrupt Jesus. In any case, he completely changes the subject, indicating he hasn’t been listening to a word Jesus was saying. And he comes with a problem. There’s a family feud about a will. And, as you know, where there’s a will, there’s arguing relatives. But the man doesn’t really ask Jesus for advice on what would be a fair split of the family assets; instead he makes demands. “Hey, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.”

It’s not a good idea to order Jesus about. Jesus is Lord. He is not an errand boy at our beck and call. “Lord, give me good health. Lord, get me a job. Lord, make my train come on time. Lord, I’ll take it black with two sugars. Lord, come here, Lord go there...” Do you ever pray like this? It’s the wrong way round isn’t it?

On Guard Against Greed

So in reply, Jesus (as always) answers on his terms. He doesn’t get into a discussion about inheritance law. Jesus doesn’t say, “Well now, if he gets the house, you should at least get the furniture, the car, the jewellery and the coin collection.” No; Jesus (as usual) goes to the heart of the matter.

You see, Jesus (as ever) sees right through all the talk. He knows that this question about the inheritance is just the public face of materialism and greed.

Jesus replies, “Man, who appointed me a judge or an arbiter between you?” Then he says to them, “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; life does not consist in an abundance of possessions.”

If you were having to fend off a ferocious pit-bull “Watch out!” is what you would shout to people around so they took up a defensive posture and “Be on your guard” is what you would say to warn people that they need to be armed with sufficient hardware to beat the animal back.

“Watch out! Be on your guard,” says Jesus because nothing is more deadly to your spiritual health than a consuming focus on worldly wealth and possessions. There is a world to be won to Christ before he returns in glory; he has not called his church to a life of ease and comfort.

So Jesus tells these men that the really important thing here is not for him to solve their little problem. The really important issue is for them to change their hearts.

How often do we go to God asking him to change our situation rather than asking him to change our hearts?

Who Owns All Your Stuff?

And so Jesus tells them a story about a rich landowner who has a massive harvest. In fact, there is so much wheat, barley, corn and oats that he doesn’t have space to store it all. So he thinks, “My barn is not big enough. What I need is a hangar.”

It does not even occur to him that all the abundance and blessing from God might be shared with others. When it comes to giving, do you stop at nothing or do you stop at nothing?

The American author and pastor Gordon MacDonald once said, “One of the greatest missing teachings in the church today is that nothing we have belongs to us.” That’s what’s so important about harvest. All we have; family, friends, job, house, car, food, happiness, freedom… is a gift from God to be shared.

But that’s only half the truth. The full truth is that, in the economy of the Kingdom of God, your enjoyment of blessing is multiplied, not diminished, by giving it away. And the reverse is true; the more you try to keep blessings to yourself, the less pleasure you get from them.

Blessings from God are like manure; if you spread them around all over the place they help everything else grow better but if you hoard them in a big pile indoors they begin to stink.

This man supposed that everything he had was his. Wrong! That’s a common misunderstanding – even in the church.

Nothing shows more vividly what we think of God than the way we spend money and use our possessions. Nothing speaks more eloquently about whether we are God centred or self-centred than the way we handle our stuff and talk about our bank balance.

Look at v17-18 again.

What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops. Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store my surplus grain. And I’ll say to myself…“You have plenty of grain laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.”’

That’s 6 uses of the word “I” and 4 uses of the word “me” in just 5 short sentences. The man in the parable is embarrassingly self-centred. Even when he uses the word “you” he is talking about himself and, tellingly, there is not one mention of God and not one mention of anyone else.

What If This Day Were Your Last?

Kathie was driving on the autoroute A10 out of Paris about 15 years ago. We were heading off on holiday down to the Vendee coast. I was in the passenger seat. Anna, Nathan and Joseph were in the back. Ben had not been born at that time.

We were travelling at 130km/hour in the middle lane of the motorway when the car started handling a bit strangely. Just as we were talking about that and wondering if it was the road surface or something, suddenly the car veered sharply toward the hard shoulder. Kathie desperately tried to steer straight and avoid an accident but the car just spun out of control, right across the carriageway, turning a full 180°.

It’s strange how life seems to go into slow motion at times like that. Everything must have taken about 3-4 seconds, but I remember thinking to myself, “Well, this is it. This is where I die. I’ve often wondered what it would be like and here it is. Oh my, we’re all going to die together; my wife and my three children as well. I only hope it’s over quickly and doesn’t hurt too much. Lord, have mercy on us all.”

It was a burst rear tyre. We ended up pressed against the central barrier and facing the oncoming traffic. Miraculously, none of us had a single scratch. The car took a slight hit when it struck the barrier – but even that was nothing much.

About half an hour later we were being towed away, a little shaken, to a garage and I remember thinking to myself what it says here in v20. “This very night your life will be demanded from you.”

A close shave with death puts everything into perspective. Winston Churchill once said “We make a living by what we get; but we make a life by what we give.”

Aristotle Onassis was a shipping magnate and financier born in 1906. He owned stocks and shares that secured control of 95 multinational businesses on 5 continents. He owned apartments in London, Paris, New York, Monte Carlo, Athens and Acapulco as well as a castle in France. He owned the entire islands of Scorpios and Sparta. He had deposits and accounts in 217 banks worldwide.

Everyone wanted a piece of his wealth. People could retire in opulent luxury on just 1% of his assets.

But Onassis just kept adding to his astronomic fortune. Shortly before he died in 1975 he said this: “I’ve just been a machine for making money. I seem to have spent my life in a golden tunnel looking for the outlet which would lead to happiness. But the tunnel kept going on. After my death there will be nothing left.”

‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’ “This is how it will be with those who store up things for themselves but are not rich toward God.”

As they say, there is no prize for being the richest man in the cemetery.

Ending

I’ll end with some good news, some bad news and the truth – and I’ll give you the good news first.

The good news is this; Jesus has given us an absolutely clear, explicit and unambiguous warning of what’s to come. We have been told. We can read it here in black and white. Nobody will say, “Well, I didn’t know, nobody told me, this isn’t fair.”

The bad news is this; Jesus says here that this is how it will be (not might be or could be in a worst case scenario). This is how it will be with those who store up things for themselves but are not rich toward God.

The truth is this; everybody here today is rich (by New Testament standards). We are all in the wealthiest 1% of the world’s population. The rich man in the parable is not just a City fat cat or dotcom tycoon. He is me and you. Only you know in your heart, as you open it to the Lord, if you are going to be rich towards him.


Sermon preached at All Saints' Preston on Tees, 16th October 2011

Search and Rescue (James 5.19-20)

Introduction

Well now, we’re coming to the end of our exposition of the letter of James this morning. We’ve spent 12 weeks together reading and engaging with what God has to say to us through it.

Have you learned anything? Has God’s word challenged you over the last three months? If it has challenged you, has it changed you? The Lord has given us the letter of James in order that our faith would be down to earth and shown to be genuine by what we do.

From what we can make out reading James, the original recipients of the letter were evidently believers who knew their theology well enough, but who struggled to put faith into practice. There are two clues that this is the case.

Firstly, think about what James doesn’t write about. There isn’t anything doctrinal in the letter at all. There are no heresies warned against and no vigorous defence the gospel. There’s nothing here about who God is, or why Christ died, or how we receive the Spirit. There’s nothing about the second coming, or the Trinity, or predestination and free will, and nothing about creation or redemption…

Why did James miss out so much teaching? The answer is that he didn’t need to include it. His readers must have known it all already - which is great. The problem is they knew their stuff, but it made little or no difference to the way they lived in the world.

Secondly, think about what James does write about. He challenges them over and over again about what they’re doing – or not doing, in particular;

· Sins of the tongue; gossiping, quarrels, boasting, bragging, cursing, criticism, grumbling, slandering.
· Sins of the heart; fights, bitter envy, selfish ambition.
· Sins of the wallet; meanness, hoarding, covetousness, greed, frittering.

He wrote about these things, not because he thought they might be interested in that sort of subject. He did it so they would start living right.

And the whole point of James’ letter is that genuine faith has to be practical and it must not become merely theoretical.

If you’re the kind of Christian who needs to put your faith into action, James is a great letter to read, pray through and act on. Following Christ is radical stuff. But, as the last two verses of this letter point out, it’s more than that; it’s also a matter of life and death.

I heard a story this week about a man who applied for a job as an usher at the cinema. As a part of the interview process, the manager asked him, “What steps would you take In the event of a fire?”

The young man thought about for a moment and replied “Well… big ones I suppose.” That was the wrong answer!

But the boss gave him the benefit of the doubt. “No, no” he said, “what would you do if a fire broke out?”

The young man answered, “Oh! Don’t worry about me. I would know where the emergency exits are and I’d get out fine!”

He didn’t get the job. But that little story leads us very tidily to James’ final thought.

My brothers and sisters, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring them back, remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from the way of error will save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins.

And that’s the end of the letter. Let’s break down these two verses into three easy to chew morsels.

1) If one of you should wander from the truth

First of all, “if one of you should wander from the truth.” The word translated “One of you” here is also used in v13-14. “Is anyone among you in trouble? Is anyone happy? Is anyone sick?” It’s the same Greek word, “tis” and it just means anyone. This is the word Jesus used in John 7.37. “If anyone is thirsty, let them come to me and drink…” Here James is saying “If anyone among you should wander from the truth…

Here’s the shocking thing; drifting away from God or backsliding in faith can happen to anyone.

Notice I didn’t use the expression “losing your faith.” There’s a reason for that. Losing your faith is an expression you find nowhere in God’s word.

The Bible talks about backsliding, falling away, rejecting your faith and a good conscience, wandering from the truth, drifting away and suffering shipwreck with regard to the faith – but losing your faith is not a biblical idea.

You don’t lose your faith in the same way that you leave an umbrella on the bus or misplace your car keys. Let me assure you of that. No, when someone who was walking with Christ stops doing so they’re never an unknowing victim of a misfortune.

But listen, anyone can wander away from the truth.

Most of us have seen it happen. The first signs of it are when the good habit of frequent fellowship begins to wane. Gathering together with other Christians on Sunday just gets crowded out by everything else.

Why is church so important? In 1 Timothy 3.15 Paul says that the church of the living God is the pillar and foundation of the truth. That’s why when people drift from fellowship they usually wander from truth at the same time.

This morning Scotland are playing Argentina in the Rugby World Cup. The match is crucial for both sides if they hope to progress to the Quarter Finals of the competition (which, incidentally, New Zealand will win). But there’s a Scottish prop-forward called Euan Murray who isn’t playing today. When Murray became a Christian he announced that he would not be available for selection on Sundays. He said: “It's all or nothing, following Jesus.” So he is setting aside today for the Lord - to be at church, to meet with other Christians, to hear the word of God preached, to build himself up in faith and give glory to Christ.

This church thing is serious business. In the New Testament, the church - filled with the power of the Holy Spirit - turned the world upside down. They risked their lives to gather together in Christ’s name. Because it was often illegal to gather publically to worship Christ and break bread, believers had to meet secretly at 4:00am in underground catacombs – and then head off to do a day’s work afterwards. Sunday didn’t become a day of rest until the 4th Century. It was the first day of the working week.

How is it that the Body of Christ in the West has come to take church so lightly? How in the world did we get to a point where many Christians look at church as something that exists just to meet their needs?

How did church ever become just a place to go to, when we get around to it, like Cine World or Tesco’s or Ropner Park?

This is where we meet together to exalt Christ and magnify his greatness with one voice. Above all else it’s for him. This is where we minister to one another with spiritual gifts. It’s an expression of love to our brothers and sisters that we turn up and minister to them. And This is where we declare the word of God with authority so that we get built up in the truth and become resistant to the devil’s deceits. This is where we get right with God and feast on Christ at Holy Communion.

When we come to Communion, as we will later, it’s a unique and special and holy moment. It’s about opening our lives completely to God.

Communion is about saying to Jesus, “Lord, I hide nothing from you now. I lay my soul open before you. Test me and see that there is no falsehood in me. Be Lord and Master of every corner of my being. I choose to live in peace with all my brothers and sisters for your sake. I let go of all bitterness for any offence committed against me. I forgive as Christ forgave me. I receive your cleansing in my life. And as I come to you to eat and drink, you pour rivers of living water into my thirsty soul.”

We come back to the cross where Christ delivers us from the gates of hell and the prospect of eternal separation from God. It’s where he pours out grace upon grace in our lives. This is a serious business and it has eternal consequences.

If anyone should wander from the truth...

What do you think it means to wander from the truth? Does it mean you just forget bits of the Bible? Does it mean you are less good at understanding doctrinal propositions and creedal statements than you were? No, that’s not what it means.

Titus 1.1 talks about knowledge of the truth that accords with godliness. Knowledge of the truth accords with godliness. We need to understand that truth and godliness belong together. They are inseparable. As Alec Motyer says, “Truth is a living thing; when it grips our minds it changes our lives.”

We live in a nation that for decades has been rejecting truth. And as it has done so, we have experienced an erosion of godliness in our society.

Attendance of Sunday school has plummeted across the nation since the Second World War. It is no coincidence that juvenile delinquency, binge drinking and drug use have increased over the same period.

As people have turned their backs on God, represented in declining church membership, dishonesty and greed have increased. It has been exposed in recent times. Reckless trading by investment bankers. Phone hacking by the press. Cover ups at the Police. Expenses fraud in Parliament. These are symptoms – but, as any doctor will tell you, you’ll never stop a serious disease by treating the symptoms – you’ve got to deal with the underlying cause. And all this goes back to truth. When a once Christian country rejects biblical truth, morals and standards in the nation decline accordingly.

That’s at a national level. At the local level, James here urges us to watch for anyone who is losing a grip on truth and wandering in the way of error - because for individuals the consequences are just as catastrophic as they are for the country. Drifting from truth always steers us away from godliness.

2) Someone should bring them back

Just as the Bible says that anyone can drift away from truth and godliness, it says that anyone can be used by the Holy Spirit to bring them back into a right relationship with God again.

That word “someone” in v19, if someone should bring them back is yet again the same word as the one used already in v13-14; “Is anyone in trouble? Is anyone happy? Is anyone sick?” And in v19, “If anyone among you should wander from the truth…” And then here; “If anyone should bring them back.”

So it’s not just accredited pastoral assistants or the ordained ministers or members of the pastoral team or specially trained evangelists that James is addressing. James mentions elders in v14, but not here. This is a ministry that the whole body of Christ should be involved in, not just the specialists. God wants everybody here this morning to be attentive to the urgent importance of this work.

Over the course of my 30 odd years as a Christian, I’ve seen that people have two responses to this notion of watching out for others.

Some people are thrilled with the idea. A little too thrilled actually. The thought of meddling in the affairs of others makes their pulse race with excitement. They can’t wait to identify a problem in somebody’s life so they can tell them what to do about it. To people who love pointing out others’ faults Jesus said, “Make sure you deal with the plank in your own eye before you go round picking the speck of sawdust out of your neighbour’s.” That’s one extreme.

But I think the other extreme is more common. Most of us tend more towards the “live and let live” way of thinking. This philosophy says that the way other people live their life is up to them. Who are we to interfere? We need to keep friendships open and avoid alienating people by being too pushy.

But remember my story earlier about the cinema usher; it isn’t enough just to get out of the burning building ourselves. We are responsible for making sure others get out too. God will ask us to give an account to him for those we have known and who have drifted away from the truth.

When you think about people you haven’t seen around in church for a while - what if that’s the Holy Spirit bringing them to mind, prompting you to pray for them and then seek to bring them back?

I went to see a backslidden Christian this week. We had a drink together and I spent a bit of time finding out what was going on in his life. And then I mentioned these two verses from James and I told him that this was why I had come to see him. He’s been away from church for several years now and, in that time, though he bumps into Christians fairly often, he told me that only two have ever really asked him about his soul and where he is with God.

I asked him whether he would have found it intrusive if more people had done so and he said no, he would totally expect it.

My brothers and sisters, if one of you should wander from the truth and, someone should bring them back remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from will save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins.

I want to challenge you today. This is God’s word. God is the Father of the prodigal son and the Shepherd of the lost sheep. Ask him to give you his Father heart, his shepherd heart. Pray about one person you have seen drift away from the truth and then go and challenge them to return to the Lord.

3) Save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins

And now, briefly, the last point.

Verse 20 says Whoever turns a sinner from the way of error will save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins.

Here’s the thing; James never imagines that wandering away from the truth is just taking a path leading to sadness or loneliness. No, it’s a highway to spiritual ruin and James says that bringing people back from the kind of drift we’ve been thinking about is a matter of life and death. “Save them from death” he says.

And James never imagines that this is just about a lapsed member coming back to the club house. He calls a spade a spade and says that it is a sin to wander away from the truth and turning someone back from their error covers a multitude of sins.

It’s a strange expression, that. We tend to think of covering sin as if it were papering over cracks in the wall or sweeping things under the rug. That’s not what it means though.

Think about how we use the word “cover” for financial transactions. Our daughter Anna announced her engagement last week to our great delight. This week we arranged a transfer of money that we had set aside long ago to pay for the wedding and I said to Anna “that ought to cover it.” (Between me and you, it better do!)

Covering it means that when the bill comes in the wedding will be paid in full and the expense forgotten. To cover means a totally sufficient payment. The bill is taken care of. The debt is settled. James is thinking about what Jesus did to completely deal with our sin, every last sin paid on the nail in full, (including VAT).

Ending

That is the beautiful thing that God does when we enlist in his search and rescue team. Anyone can wander off and lose their way. Anyone can sign up to go and look for them and bring them back safe.

Let’s pray…


Sermon preached at All Saints' Preston on Tees, 25th September 2011

9/11 - Ten Years On (Genesis 11.1-9 and Luke 13.1-5)

Introduction

We’re taking a little break from the letter of James this morning and we’ll pick up again next week.

As I’m sure you’ll have noticed in the media this week, exactly ten years have elapsed since the terrorist attacks in the United States; an event that both shocked and changed the world. Shortly after the attacks I heard an excellent Christian response from the Baptist minister David Pawson and so much of what he said then is still relevant today, so I'm using his talk as the inspration for much of this one with some new insights that could only have come with the passage of time.

In one decade, much has changed. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed the alleged principal architect of the 9/11 attacks, is in custody awaiting trial. Osama Bin Laden, the figurehead of Al Qaida at the time of the attacks is dead. There have been controversial wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. And the Arab Spring this year has shown that across the Muslim world people are choosing democratic rule and not global jihad as the means of advancing their interests.

And yet September 11th has become perhaps the most haunted date on the calendar. The mere mention of this date immediately brings to mind newsreels of a visibly horrified crowd watching a vast fire rage in the north tower of the World Trade Center, only to see another airliner slam into the south tower.

I expect everyone here this morning can remember where they were when they heard the news and watched TV reports about it. It was a pivotal event in world history and it still commands access to primetime viewing ten years on.

In the days and weeks following the tragedy, the media, politicians, philosophers and artists tried to find meaning in all this. Christians too. Many opened their Bibles and asked, “What was God doing that day?” And “If God is all powerful and perfectly loving, how can he have allowed something so dreadful to happen?”

These questions are not new, of course, but in the aftermath of September 11th 2001 they were raised again with a new intensity. Some Christians raised another question. “Does God have something to say to us through this disaster?”

And I think, even ten years on, three themes stand out; things that were written down in Scripture long ago but still speak with resonance and authority now at times like this. And I’m going to take them in turn.

1) The Tower of Babel – Pride and Prestige

I think, first of all, that God speaks into the issue of human pride. What vanity is this competition to construct iconic skyscrapers that rise ever higher! The World Trade Center measured 527m high (including the antenna of the north tower). The Sears Building in Chicago surpassed it soon after, but the twin towers were the tallest building in the world at the time of their inauguration. This construction was one expression of an ancient ambition to build the tallest structure on earth. The current record belongs to the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, which stands at 828m tall.

Where does this drive to build ever higher come from? Is it just that humankind likes an engineering challenge? That may be a factor but I think a big part of this aspiration is to do with the pride of the human heart - and its origins go back to the cradle of civilization. The first trace of it is found in the Bible, in Genesis 11.4 where men say, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves.”

Genesis 11 tells us that the project of building a tower that reached the heavens was essentially an expression of human arrogance. That is to say the tower of Babel was not a building designed and built to the glory of God, as cathedrals in the Middle Ages were. The Tower of Babel was rather an icon of human prestige. It was a monument to the glory and greatness of man.

At the end of the 19th century the New York skyline was dominated by church steeples, which honoured God, pointing to the heavens.

But the 20th century saw a renaissance of the Babel aspiration - and the World Trade Center was part of that drive. Today it is almost impossible to see one church steeple on the Manhattan horizon, overwhelmed as they all are by these buildings erected to the glory of man.

Of all these skyscrapers, the twin towers were perhaps especially symbolic and representative of the confidence that people place in money, in wealth, in the projection of their own importance.

Listen to the words of its architect Minoru Yamasaki (who, believe it or not, had a fear of heights). “The World Trade Center should, because of its importance, become a representation of man’s belief in humanity, his need for individual dignity, his beliefs in the cooperation of men, and through cooperation, his ability to find greatness."

That the World Trade Center was such a spectacular monument to human pride is perhaps one reason why God allowed this attack.

I do not mean to say that God was the author of the tragedy of 9/11, and please don’t hear that. Let me be quite clear that God is never the instigator of evil and the Bible says he takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked, let alone the innocent.

But God’s word says repeatedly that “He gives grace to the humble and resists the proud.” Pride is the worst sin of all according to God, for it lies at the root of all sin.

Sometimes pride and human arrogance peak so alarmingly that God permits a sobering corrective before even more damage is done. That is the message of Genesis 11 and the tower of Babel. Think how human confidence in the greatness of man was shaken when the Titanic, a ship that God himself could not sink, plunged to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean on its maiden voyage. The collapse of the twin towers constructed to the glory of man had a similar effect. “God gives grace to the humble and resists the proud.”

In the late 20th Century there was a dizzy euphoria amongst bankers, financiers and entrepreneurs, who imagined that they could create prosperity at will.

But listen to what God says in Deuteronomy 8.17; “You may say to yourself, ‘My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me.’ But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth…”

It’s very moving to read the testimonies of those who survived the attacks on the World Trade Center, as we have had opportunity to do this week again.

9/11 happened when I was ministering in an international church in Paris. One member of that church, JFR, lost his first wife on Pan Am flight 103 that exploded over Lockerbie in December 1988. He married again and in September 2001 his second wife was working in New York – in the World Trade Center. She was driving to work that morning and was just about to descend into the underground car park at 8:46am when she heard a noise, looked up and watched the first plane hit the north tower. She backed up and thought “I’m not going to work today.” These events had a profound effect on JFR and many others directly affected by the attacks. They changed his value system because they forced him to re-evaluate what is important in life and what is not.

One international banker who survived, but whose close colleagues perished, gave up his career in high finance saying “I’ll never again live for the pursuit of material things.”

God’s word speaks to us with clarity and insight about what matters in life and what doesn’t. The Bible shows how ephemeral, how vapour-like, wealth is. Mammon promises more than it delivers and the pursuit of money (symbolised if you like by the World Trade Centre) is vain.

2) The Fall of Babylon – Reminder of Ultimate Reality

In the weeks that followed September 11th 2001, several Christian websites and magazines asked the question: “Is this the beginning of the end of the world?”

Why did they ask that? Was it because the sight of New York City engulfed in smoke looked like a scene from an apocalyptic disaster film? Possibly.

But most of the fuel for those questions came from the fact that the description the fall of Babylon at the end of time in the book of Revelation bears a startling resemblance to what happened in New York.

David Wilkerson, author of The Cross and the Switchblade, and the then pastor of Times Square Church, one of the churches closest to the disaster, told about a reporter who said on TV “In just one hour these symbols of great wealth have been totally brought to ruin.” And Wilkerson remarked at once that the journalist quoted the Bible almost word-for-word without knowing it.

In Revelation 17-18 there is a description of a great city built by the sea. This city, is codenamed as Babylon. We know it’s a symbolic name because in reality Babylon is nowhere near the sea. The city is personified as a prostitute because the two great vices there are money and gaudy pleasure. Prostitution of course brings those two things together. This Babylon is also a global exporter of godless culture and values​ and it’s a center of world trade. The prophecy of Revelation 18.19 states that it will be destroyed in just 60 minutes.

“Woe! Woe to you, great city, where all who had ships on the sea became rich through her wealth! In one hour she has been brought to ruin!”

I remember thinking about that passage at the time of the attacks and wondering if this was indeed the beginning of Armageddon. It sent a shiver down my spine.

It is clear now with 10 years’ hindsight that September 11th 2001 was not the end of the world. But I believe it was an anticipation or prefiguring of it for those who have ears to hear.

In the last days a global figure the Bible calls the Antichrist will pursue and persecute all who are faithful to Christ. It will be heavy and persistent - but brief. Today, says the first letter of John, there are many ‘antichrists’ who attack believers on a local level so where we see persecution of believers it’s a prefiguring, if you like, of what’s to come. Many antichrists now. The Antichrist at the end.

In other words, what will happen at the end of the world, we already experience now in miniature. September 11th 2001 saw the demise in one hour of a World Trade Center in a city of money and pleasure. But the demise in one hour of the global centre of trade, of money and of gaudy pleasure will surely come at the end. We’ve already seen it in miniature. And it is frightening.

The warnings about the end of the world in the Bible are not given to arouse our curiosity or to fascinate our imagination but to concentrate our minds on getting our lives right with God. And so to my third point.

3) The Tower of Siloam - Call to Repentance

The last point I want to make comes from our second reading.

September 11th 2001 serves as a sober and stark reminder that our life here is the only opportunity we get to seek God and to accept the salvation he offers freely in Jesus Christ.

Life can be brief. But, however long we have to live, we will all face our Judge at the end of it. How prepared would we be if, like the 2,979 poor souls who perished on 9/11, our days were suddenly cut short and we faced Almighty God tonight?

The week following the attacks of September 11th 2001, people asked, “Why did God allow so much suffering to those innocent victims?” “It’s so random. Why did some survive and others perish?”

It’s a matter people asked Jesus to comment on in Luke 13. And I think it’s worth reading it again.

“Now there were some present at that time who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices. Jesus answered, ‘Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish. Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them - do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish.’”

Jesus refers here to two separate disasters: the first was an act of violence and the second was the collapse of a tower that led to people dying.

The first atrocity was committed by Pontius Pilate and it seems to have been an act of state terrorism if you like. He murdered in cold blood a group of ‘innocent’ Galileans who had committed no other offence than gather together for Sabbath worship. It was a brutal act that was totally unjustified. Not only did it senselessly end the lives of these men, it insulted and defiled their religion.

The second disaster was the collapse of a tower in Siloam. The fall of this building crushed and killed a random group of people who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Maybe the architecture was flawed or the construction was poor. We don’t really know the reason why it fell. But it did fall and people died.

Two different events but Jesus asks the same question about both. Was it because the Galileans were worse sinners than everybody else that Pilate singled them out? Were the victims of the collapse of the tower guiltier than those who survived?”

In both cases, Jesus says, “No, they were no worse than anyone else. But unless you repent,” he says, “you too will all perish.”

Dying without accepting the salvation God graciously offers us will be worse than the foretaste of the hell we all had on 9/11.

Jesus says something very unpalatable here to modern ears. He is pointing out that everyone shares, not a collective innocence, but a common guilt.

Yes, of course it’s true that the victims of the attacks were innocent compared with the hijackers. They were ordinary people like you and me - and it’s heartbreaking that so many of them had to suffer such a harrowing end.

But I’ve got to be honest with what I read here; The Lord Jesus did not direct his words to Pilate or to the architect of the tower in Siloam. He clearly said that if we do not repent, we will likewise perish.

The reason why that sounds so shocking to us is because the secular humanism of the Enlightenment preached the false gospel that everyone is basically good.

But the Bible says the truth about human nature: “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” And “the [human] heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?”

In other words, we are sinners by nature, and capable of good only by the grace and mercy of God.

I remember first reading this in the Bible and thinking “No, it can’t mean that!” And then I had children. I discovered that even young children tell lies and torment their siblings and defy authority and refuse to share. I discovered that in order for my children to tell the truth, live in peace with others, respect authority and share nicely Kathie and I had to break my back training them to adopt a different course than the one they instinctively chose. Then I discovered that my parents had the same issues with me – only I was worse. Then it hit me; this goes all the way back to the first man and woman. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

The tragedy of September 11th - even ten years on - sounds a wake-up call to repentance, not just for the citizens of New York City or the American people, but for the whole world, because none of us here today are more innocent than the victims of those atrocities were.

C.S. Lewis once said “God whispers in our pleasures but shouts in our pain.” And God does cry out to the world at times of crisis like this. Is anybody listening?

Ending

Despite the heavy tone of my talk today, I want to finish by saying that the gospel is good news not bad news.

The good news is that “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

• If you’re not right with God this morning
• if you do not have the peace with him that he freely gives
• if you relate to the pride of the builders of the tower of Babel
• if you have bought into the values ​​of Babylon (the city without God)
• if you’re tired of living outside God’s will for your life

Come humbly before him now, return to the Lord your God, and seek the forgiveness, the cleansing and the salvation that he so wants to give our broken world.


Sermon preached at All Saints' Preston on Tees, 11th September 2011