I Have a Friend Who...

I want you to meet "James", "Hannah" and "Bill." They are three completely imaginary friends of mine. How would you say they look from their faces? … Yeah, happy, contented, cheerful. You’d say by looking at them that they seem to be doing more or less OK. But there is something I should tell you about my 3 friends.

Not one of them is a Christian believer. None of them go to church. None really seem interested in doing so any time soon. Why? What objections do they have to Christianity? Are they strident atheists dogmatically opposed to any form of belief? Are they perhaps members of another religion? Have they just never come across the gospel before?

Let’s start with James.

James has no big hang-up about suffering. (We looked at this subject 3 weeks ago). You won’t find James puzzling over why a God of love allows cancer and war and child abuse and tsunamis.
He doesn’t understand it but he doesn’t lose sleep over it either. No, for James the problem of suffering is not the reason that he is not a Christian.

Here’s why James is not a Christian. James is a friend who says ‘It’s OK for you that you believe - but it’s just not for me.’ Do you know someone like James? Hands up if you have ever heard that kind of remark, ‘It’s OK for you - but it’s not my sort of thing’?

OK, what about Hannah?

Hannah has no big objection about evolution and creation (which is what we looked at last week). She can understand that if there is a God, he could make the universe and, to be honest, complex life forms spontaneously evolving from nonliving matter requires a certain degree of faith too. The truth is that Hannah doesn’t really have an opinion about science and faith either way. No, for Hannah the debate about science and faith is not the reason that she is not a Christian. Here’s why Hannah is not a Christian.

Hannah is a friend who says “I just don't feel any need for God; my life is fine as it is.” Now, again, have you have ever heard anyone say something like along those lines? Personally, I think it is much more common than things like
· “What about suffering?”
· “What about other religions?” and
· “What about science?”

All right, now for Bill.

Bill is not one of those people who say that all Christians are hypocrites and that church is boring. He won’t go on about being forced to attend church as a boy. He doesn’t say that Christians are always anti gay or anti women…

In fact, he might be quite open to mixing with Christians. He might encourage his children to go to a church school or youth group. He thinks the church does good work. He even got married in one many years ago. But he wouldn’t really call himself a believer in Jesus and he never prays.

Bill is a friend who says “I’ve just got too much going on in my life to bother about faith.”

James, Hannah and Bill put things slightly differently but they are all basically saying the same thing. None has a principled objection to Christianity, they just can’t see the answer to this question: What’s in it for me?

James says ‘It’s fine for you - but it’s just not my kind of thing.’ Hannah says ‘I don't feel any need for God; my life is fine as it is.’ Bill says I’m too busy for all that.’

I have two questions that I would like you to discuss in groups.

In Colossians 4.3 it says “Pray for us, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ.”

So here’s the first question:
How would you pray for friends like James, Hannah and Bill? What kind of things would you ask God to do in their lives?

The second question is this: How would you share your faith with them? What approach would you take to interesting them in the good news about Jesus? What sort of things would you say to them?

We’re going to take about 10 minutes and then we’ll come back together again...

...Feedback on flipchart...

Let me tell you how I pray for people like James, Hannah and Bill.
It says in Acts 16 when Paul, Timothy and Silas were in Philippi, “The Lord opened [Lydia’s] heart to respond to Paul’s message.” Until the Lord opened Lydia’s heart she was unable to respond to the gospel that demands a response. It demands repentance for sins. It demands trust in the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross. It demands obedience in baptism and a life of following Christ. All this is possible once the Lord opens someone’s heart. It was not just Paul's eloquence or persuasiveness that was having such a transforming influence in Lydia’s life. It was the Lord opening the heart. First of all then, for people like James who say “It’s OK for you that you believe - but it’s just not for me” I ask God to open hearts.

Secondly, I pray that God will bring to their consciousness their need of a saviour. This is what I pray for people like Hannah who say “I just don't feel any need for God; my life is fine as it is.” People will never believe that they need to be saved until they really feel lost and that is the work of the Holy Spirit.

Madonna once said “I was what you would call at the top of my world. I’d won a Golden Globe for Evita, I was pregnant, I had fame, I had fortune, everything that you would perceive a person would want in life. But I’m sure everyone’s had that out-of-body experience where you say to yourself, and it might happen at 28 or 38 or 68, why am I here? Why am I inside of this body? What am I doing?”

The third thing I pray for is that people like Bill will have an encounter with God. That is what most needs to happen for people who say “I’ve got too much going on in my life to bother about faith.” In the book the Grace Outpouring that Julia mentioned last week there is a story of a couple of atheist ramblers who wandered past this Christian centre in Wales where there is a revival style awakening going on.

They come under the conviction of sin, fall to the ground and ask “What is going on here? We feel different. We feel like this is what we’ve always wanted.”When people encounter the presence of God they never say “I haven’t got time for this.”

So much for prayer then. How should we share our faith with the likes of James, Hannah and Bill? Or, put it another way, why do we think it would be better for them if they become Christians?

A former vicar of this church, David Osman, was once asked why he believes in Christianity and he replied “Because it’s true.”

On one level what James says seems reasonable. Remember what he said? “It’s OK for you that you believe - but it’s just not for me.”

But the point is that if Christianity is true it is true for everyone. To say, “That’s fine for you but it’s not for me” is illogical. If it’s true then it is true for me, and it’s also true for everyone else. If it’s not true then it’s not true for me, and it’s not fine at all that I believe in it because that would mean I’m deluded and wasting my life.

So I would gently challenge James and say to him “If Christianity is not true then no one should believe it, including me. If it is true then everyone should believe it, including you. How sure are you that Christianity is not true?”

The second reason James, Hannah and Bill should become Christians is this; It works.

Talk about the change that came into your life when you first believed in Christ. Talk about times when you have seen amazing healings or when God has lifted you in times of sadness and tragedy. Talk about walking miracles like Gram Seed.

Hannah says “I just don't feel any need for God; my life is fine as it is.” But everybody has a Madonna moment from time to time. That’s when the illusion of self-sufficiency is lifted and you get to see the real state of the soul without God. Testimony is really powerful – and the greatest testimony is not in what you say but in how you live.

The final reason why should James, Hannah and Bill become Christians is this; It is urgent.

I read a book by a guy called Scot McKnight last week. He talks about how he became a Christian when he was 6 years old. He said to his mother, “Mum, I want to accept Jesus into my heart so I can be forgiven of my sins.” He had heard the gospel, understood that God loved him and had sent his Son for him to die so he could be forgiven. All that was left was his decision. His mother said slightly hesitatingly, “Don’t you think you should wait till your father gets home?” He replied that he was afraid he might die before she got home.”

For people like Bill who say “I’ve got too much going on in my life to bother about faith at the moment” we need to get to a point where we can say (and you have to find the right moment to say this kind of thing) “If you were to get run over by a bus tonight, Bill – and honestly I hope you don’t – but if you did, would you be sure of going to heaven?”

I have a friend who thinks they are fine without God. If only they knew how much better off they’d be with him.

Let’s pray…


Sermon preached at All Saints' Preston on Tees, 28th December 2010

Remembrance Sunday Sermon (2 Samuel 23.8-17 and John 15.13)

Introduction

Ever since the Armistice Treaty in 1918 churches have held services of remembrance to give thanks to God for the freedoms we enjoy and that were won at so high a price; the lives of 16 million soldiers and civilians, plus 21 million wounded to say nothing of the pain endured by many millions of loved ones when they learned that their husbands, fiancés, sons and fathers would never come home.

We do this for four reasons; which I’ll call regard, recognition, remembering and repentance.

Regard

What do I mean by regard? I mean this; whatever our feelings about the rights and wrongs of war, it is proper for us to show due regard for those who are most affected by its destruction. Many wars have been fought since World War I and each has been tragic. Since the First World War it has been estimated that about 120 million people have been killed in armed conflict.

However righteous the cause, however noble the objective, war always leaves heartbroken widows, fatherless sons and daughters and grief-stricken mothers who have to do what no parent should ever have to do; bury their own children.

On this day, our nation shows all those who are grieving their loved ones the regard we have for them and the heartache we share for their loss. We join together and say “You are not alone. We want to stand with you in your loneliness, your grief, your pain.”

That is a vital part of who we are and what we stand for. It is part of our soul.

Recognition

Secondly, this day is also about recognition. In our first Bible reading we heard about the bravery and courage of David’s mighty warriors; men who stood their ground and who defended their people and land from invading forces and against great odds.

Today we recognise the valour and courage of men and women who serve in the armed forces. In Afghanistan today our servicemen and women are laying their lives on the line diffusing explosive devices, defending schools which are giving an education to boys and girls, training local people to stand up to bigotry and intimidation, safeguarding the dignity of women and crippling the heroin trade at its source.

We recognise their courage with pride and gratitude today.

Remembering

Thirdly, and obviously, Remembrance Sunday is about remembering.

The Battle of Britain website has a letter that was first published on 18th June1940 in the Times. It was found among the personal belongings of a young RAF pilot who was reported ‘missing, believed killed.’ The letter was to be sent to his mother in the event that he died in action and I have abbreviated it because it is a little long.

Dearest Mother,

Though I feel no premonition at all, events are moving rapidly, and I have instructed that this letter be forwarded to you should I fail to return from one of the raids which we shall shortly be called upon to undertake…

First, it will comfort you to know that my role in this war has been of the greatest importance. Our patrols far out over the North Sea have helped to keep the trade routes clear for our convoys and supply ships, and on one occasion our information was instrumental in saving the lives of the men in a crippled lighthouse relief ship.

No man can do more, and no one calling himself a man could do less. I have always admired your amazing courage in the face of continual setbacks… without ever losing faith in the future. My death would not mean that your struggle has been in vain. Far from it. It means that your sacrifice is as great as mine…

Today we are faced with the greatest organized challenge to Christianity and civilization that the world has ever seen, and I count myself… honoured to be the right age and fully trained to throw my full weight into the scale. For this I have to thank you. Yet there is more work for you to do. The home front will still have to stand united for years after the war is won...

The universe is so vast and so ageless that the life of one man can only be justified by the measure of his sacrifice. We are sent to this world to acquire a personality and a character to take with us that can never be taken from us…

I count myself fortunate in that I have seen the whole country and known men of every calling. But with the final test of war I consider my character fully developed. Thus at my early age my earthly mission is already fulfilled and I am prepared to die with just one regret, and one only – that I could not devote myself to making your declining years more happy by being with you; but you will live in peace and freedom and I shall have directly contributed to that, so here again my life will not have been in vain.

Your loving Son

Today we say “Thank you” to such fallen, “Thank you” for the lives that they gave in order to protect and defend the freedoms and the peace that we enjoy; freedom to worship (including wearing a cross in the workplace), freedom of speech (including ideas that are inconveniently lacking in political correctness) and many other liberties that are a blessing to our land.

We honour the memory of the many brave men and women who died too young in the fields of armed conflict – and we choose today to live in peace with one another to demonstrate that they died purposefully and not in vain.

Repentance

Finally, repentance. Patriotic summaries of World War II portray righteous allied forces liberating the world from Nazi tyranny. And of course they did, at great sacrificial cost. But we must remember too with humility and tears that allied leaders too will one day give an account to God for the carpet bombing of Dresden, where 25,000 civilians were burned alive in just three days, and for the decision to drop atomic bombs on the civilians of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Good must triumph over evil, but there is darkness, as well as light, in every human heart.

Jesus said “Greater love has no one than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” He said it just hours before he died, laying down his life not just for one nation but for the whole world to liberate it forever from the tyranny of sin and death. His suffering and death too were purposeful. He laid down his life not to win peace from a wicked dictator who is here today and gone tomorrow, but to secure for us an enduring peace with God.

Jesus’ suffering and death have power to cleanse of all guilt, all sin everyone who turns to God in repentance and sorrow.

So let us use this day to repent, before God, of our jealousies, our pride, our feelings of vengeance, our lack of love, our vanity and our hatred.

Jesus too did not die in vain for, as the Bible so wonderfully testifies, “God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”


Sermon preached at All Saints' Preston on Tees, 14th November 2010

Praying Like the First Christians (Acts 4.1-31)

Introduction

We’ve been looking these last few weeks at how people pray in the Bible. Abraham haggled with God over judgement he had planned for Sodom and Gomorrah. Do you ever haggle in prayer? Moses unloaded his exasperation on God when it all got too much for him. Jeremiah poured out his raw emotions and personal grief. Are you real with God when you pray? Simeon and Anna prayed faithfully every day and were finally rewarded at the end of their long lives by seeing the answer to all their longings. Reverent prayer. Exasperated prayer. Passionate prayer. Faithful prayer. Today; audacious prayer.

“Audacious” and “prayer” are not words you usually associate with one another… The word “audacious” is more suited to the world of extreme sports than to prayer meetings. When brave people jump out of airplanes with parachutes or fall from bridges with an elastic band round their ankles that is what we call audacious.

But God wants us to pray outrageous, audacious, daring, risky prayers like the one in Acts 4. Peter and John have just released from custody, but they have been given a gagging order, strictly forbidden to say anything in public about Jesus. Put yourself in their shoes. You have been ordered by your local authority to keep the peace and not speak to anyone under any circumstances about what you believe. You’ll stir up trouble. You’ll be responsible for causing a public nuisance. It’s a private matter. It’s the law.

But Peter and John prayed not for the council to change its mind but for the nerve to disobey the law even more insolently than before.

This is the prayer equivalent of bungee jumping or parachuting. The wearing of safety helmets is recommended – literally in fact – because v31 tells us that the house where they prayed was shaken. You know you’ve had a good prayer meeting when you have to measure it on the Richter scale!

There’s a story I like to tell about a businessman who opened a casino and strip club opposite a school. So a group of concerned Christian believers got together and organised a night of prayer and fasting. They prayed until dawn asking God to stop the moral rot in their town. Two days later there was an electrical storm. The casino and strip club were burned to the ground. Praise God! But not for long, because the businessman decided to sue the Christians, claiming that they were liable for the damage because their prayer meeting caused the storm! The believers decided to defend themselves against the allegations, pleading that they could not be held responsible. Ironic isn’t it? Before a judge and jury the businessman suddenly believed in the power of prayer and the Christians vigorously claimed there was no connection at all and it had all just been a coincidence!

Do you really believe in the power of prayer? Recent research in the USA reveals that church leaders (in any case those who participated in the study) pray on average about three minutes every day. I hope on average we manage a bit more than that. But for people like us, busy, tired, distracted, and with a spiritual enemy who hates it when we pray, praying is a battle. So God has given us in Acts 4 five secrets for a powerful life of prayer.

1) Pray Together – Not Just Alone

The first is in v23. “On their release, Peter and John went back to their own people.” There is no trace in any page of the New Testament of solitary Christians. No one manages fine on their own. No, it says “They went back to their own people.” They knew that together they were much stronger than the sum of their parts.

I remember an old Peanuts cartoon where Lucy (the bossy one) tells Linus (the dozy one) to switch channels on the TV. Linus says, “And what makes you think you can just tell me what to do?” Lucy says “My five fingers. They’re not much on their own but together I can make them into a fearsome weapon.” Linus thinks for a minute and says “What channel do you want?” And then, he looks at his fingers and says “Hey, why aren’t you as organised as Lucy’s fingers?”

The unity these Christians had wasn’t about getting together over a cup of tea. God wants us to go further than social friendship; his plan for us is spiritual fellowship. They carried each others’ burdens. They prayed together. “When they heard (about the threats), they raised their voices together in prayer to God” says v24.

In all creation the humble snowflake is among the most fragile of things. They are very small, they weigh next to nothing, they readily melt and they are easily crushed. But together with other snowflakes they can form avalanches capable of burying a village. Prayer is like that. It is so much more powerful when there is agreement in the Spirit and we all say “Amen” with conviction. The world can refuse our invitations, it can despise our teaching, it can oppose our arguments, it can patronise our good works and it can ridicule our values but the world is defenceless against our prayers spoken out in faith, in unity and in the power of the Holy Spirit.

This is why we encourage people to pray together in home groups, that is why we have started prayer partnerships (are you in one? – get into one if you’re not, see Sylvia and she will do the rest). It’s why we love to do prayer ministry, it’s why we have arranged prayer evenings for sung worship and children’s and youth ministry this month. We believe in the power of prayer together. It changes things. It makes a difference.

2) Look To God, Not At Problems

The second secret comes in v24-28. “They raised their voices together in prayer. ‘Sovereign Lord,’ they said, ‘you made the heaven and the earth and the sea, and everything in them.’”

What are they doing there? They are focusing on the power and authority and supremacy of God; not on the scale and complexity of their immediate difficulties.

And they go on; v25… “Lord, you spoke by the Holy Spirit…” God knows that. Why did they say that? They are reminding themselves that God is the God of real revelation, he has spoken his true and authoritative word, he has already disclosed his mind to us and it is breaking into the realm of our experience.”

And then they say this; v28… “Herod and Pontius Pilate met together … to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed. They did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen.”

Again, God knows all this. They’re declaring the truth that God is in charge of history because there is power in speaking out truth that nothing takes him surprise. He will accomplish his plan, he will do what he has said. Even allowing for the free will given to all people, he are sovereign in the affairs of nations and nothing will frustrate his will.

Whenever I begin my praying by rattling on to God about how unfair life is I pray with no perspective, no authority and no power. That’s why these people start by focusing their attention on God. Before asking anything at all, before they present God their real and numerous problems, they remind themselves just who it is they are addressing.

3) Start With Praise, Not Petition

The third secret flows from the second. Spend time in praise and worship before bringing a list of stuff for God to sort out. The basic reason is obvious. God absolutely deserves high praise. He is unquestionably worthy of adoring worship. It’s just the right thing to do. But it’s more than that. Praise and worship make fertile ground for increase in faith. Praise and worship pull down strongholds of fear and unbelief. Praise and worship lead us into the presence of God where there is fullness of joy. That’s a good place to pray.

So start by exalting and magnifying the greatness of the Lord and speaking out truth about him. The first Christians did. “Sovereign Lord,” they said, “you made the heaven and the earth and the sea, and everything in them.” Start with praise. Only then, renewed by God’s presence, confident in his grace, should we move on to petition.

4) Pray Specific Prayers, Not Vague Ones

The word of God reveals a fourth secret in v29-30. When they present their requests to God what they actually ask is very precise, very exact. There’s no waffly church language in there; no droning, repetitive flannel. They say “Lord, consider their threats” and then theyask God to do two specific things.

First, “Enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness.”

Second, “Stretch out your hand to heal and perform signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus.”

One of the first things I learned as a young Christian is that specific prayers get specific answers and vague prayers get vague answers.

Helen Roseveare, who was a missionary in Zaire, once told the story of a baby who was born prematurely. Her mother died in childbirth so they brought the baby and its sister to the orphanage where she worked. This is what she wrote:

“We tried to improvise a homemade incubator to keep the baby alive but our only hot water bottle was leaking. So we asked the children in the orphanage to pray for the baby and its sister. One of the children stood up to pray, ‘Father, please send us a hot water bottle today. Tomorrow will be too late, the baby will die. And Father, please send a toy doll for the baby’s sister so she doesn’t feel so lonely and sad.’

That same afternoon a parcel arrived from England. The children looked on impatiently all the time we were unpacking the parcel. To their great joy, surrounded by piles of clothes, there was a brand new hot water bottle.

The child who had prayed for a doll started to furrow down into the package saying, ‘If God sent us a hot water bottle, he has sent a doll too.’ And she was right! Our heavenly Father knew in advance that that child would ask for those very things. Five months earlier he had led a group of women in a small English church hall to place those particular items into that particular package.”

Specific prayers get specific answers and vague prayers get vague answers. I want to encourage you, when you pray, to ask God for precise things.

5) Know That God Answers In His Time, Not In Ours

The fifth and last secret , in fact it’s not a secret at all, because we know this very well it’s just that we find it hard to accept… sometimes God answers our prayers quickly - and sometimes he delays.

In v29 the believers pray “Now, Lord… enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness.” And in v31 it appears that God answers their prayer straight away. “After they prayed, (or as the ESV translates it ‘when they had prayed’) the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.”

They asked God for boldness and God gave them what they asked for immediately. God’s answer to their prayer was live, before their eyes. I love it when that happens. Kathie and I once prayed for a friend who had had a stomach bug for two weeks and kept being sick. Immediately after we prayed she rushed to the toilet. I don’t know what went on in there. It sounded like a firework display! But she came out, said she felt much better and was fine from that moment on.

But we know that it’s not always like that, don’t we? Why?
· Is it because we don’t have enough faith?
· Is it because we are too sinful?
· Is it because we are resisting the Holy Spirit?
It could be - but not necessarily.

Sometimes God just answers later. Look at v30 for example. They pray “Stretch out your hand to heal and perform signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” But you need to wait until chapter 5, verse 12 before you read “The apostles performed many signs and wonders among the people.”

So please don’t be discouraged if God doesn’t answer your prayers straight away. Two weeks ago we saw that Simeon and Anna waited a whole lifetime before they set eyes on the Messiah they had been praying for and waiting for.

C.S. Lewis once said that God is exceptionally kind to us when we are young in the faith. I spoke with an experienced Christian recently and he said to me, “When I was a young believer I had loads of clear and prompt answers to prayer including some that I can only explain as miraculous.

My own experience is exactly the same. For many, if not most, Christians I think that is the case. At the beginning of your faith journey, just before conversion and just afterwards, God seems to do amazing things every week. But as you get older in the faith that sort of thing seems to get more and more rare.”

It doesn’t seem right does it? Shouldn’t spectacular answers to prayer become more and more common the more we progress in faith and knowledge of God?

It seems not. The New Testament gives two very clear examples of prayers that were not answered. Jesus (who didn’t lack faith and who was guilty of no sin) begged his Father to remove the cup of suffering from him the night before he died. And his Father said, “no.” Oh how glad I am that that prayer was not answered!

If God had said “yes” instead of “no” Jesus wouldn’t have died, he would not have risen from the grave, we would still be lost in our sins, we would still be without God and without hope in the world, and destined for hell – an anguished and everlasting separation from God.

The other example is Paul (he was no spiritual pygmy either). Three times he begged the Lord to take away the thorn in his flesh. Was it a physical sickness or weakness or was it persecutors or something else? I don’t know. I just know he asked God to take it away and God said “No. My grace is going to have to be enough for you.”

Sometimes, in exceptional circumstances, and for reasons that belong to him alone, and even when the stakes are high, and when he knows that by his grace we can live with his silence, God sometimes says “no” or “wait.” Mature Christians understand that God answers in his time, not ours.

Ending

The very first Christians on the African continent each had a little place in the bush outside the village where they spent time with God alone and prayed their audacious prayers. After a while the routes that led to their prayer spots got worn down and became real paths. So it became obvious which Christians were praying daily and those who were not. Those who really believed in the power of prayer used to say to the others, “Friend, why is grass growing on your pathway?”

I want to grow in boldness and I want to see the Lord stretch out his hand to heal and perform signs and wonders. Do you? Well let’s not let the grass grow on our path.


Sermon preached at All Saints' Preston on Tees, 7th November 2010