Number three
When Jesus went to a Pagan site
John 5:1-18
After this there was a festival of the
Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
Now in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate
there is a pool, called in Hebrew Beth-zatha, which has five
porticoes. In these lay many invalids—blind, lame, and paralysed.
[waiting for the stirring of the water; for an angel of the
Lord went down at certain seasons into the pool, and stirred up the
water; whosoever stepped in first after the stirring of the water was
made well from whatever disease that person had.] One
man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw
him lying there and knew that he had been there a long time, he said
to him, ‘Do you want to be made well?’ The sick man answered him,
‘Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is
stirred up; and while I am making my way, someone else steps down
ahead of me.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Stand up, take your mat and
walk.’ At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and
began to walk.
Now that day was a sabbath. So the Jews
said to the man who had been cured, ‘It is the sabbath; it is not
lawful for you to carry your mat.’ But he answered them, ‘The man
who made me well said to me, “Take up your mat and walk.” ’
They asked him, ‘Who is the man who said to you, “Take it up and
walk”?’ Now the man who had been healed did not know who it was,
for Jesus had disappeared in the crowd that was there. Later Jesus
found him in the temple and said to him, ‘See, you have been made
well! Do not sin any more, so that nothing worse happens to you.’
The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made
him well. Therefore the Jews started persecuting Jesus, because he
was doing such things on the sabbath. But Jesus answered them, ‘My
Father is still working, and I also am working.’ For this reason
the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because he was not
only breaking the sabbath, but was also calling God his own Father,
thereby making himself equal to God.
Not what you expect
Last time I
explained how three of the characters that seek Jesus out near the
beginning of John's Gospel respond in different ways, with the
Gentile being the one who most welcomes the Good News whilst the
Jewish Leader, Nicodemus, is the one who appears least at ease with
Jesus. In this story we see it from another perspective; what
happens when Jesus goes looking for someone who is seeking for help
elsewhere, someone who doesn't know or care who Jesus is?
To my mind this is one of the most
awkward to understand passages in any of the gospels. There are a
number of really quite difficult questions that stand out which we
need to find the courage to give voice to because one thing seems
sure for me; we must not take this passage at face-value with a
western Christianised reading, because without some first century
understanding we will simply get this wrong.
This is also one of those passages
whose understanding has been revolutionised over the last few years
because archaeologists working in Jerusalem have found and excavated
the site where this miracle took place. Whilst work began in the
19th century with its discovery, it is only in the last
fifty years that it has been fully exposed, and in so doing we have
become aware that there is something very important about this site. Despite being within the city walls of
Jerusalem, there now seems to be little doubt that this was not a
Jewish site at all, but was in fact a Pagan place of healing
dedicated to the Greco-Roman god, Asclepius, the god of healing, and
known to his followers as 'Saviour'. Knowing this changes everything
about how we might understand what took place, but it also raises new
questions.
The first question we might ask was,
what on earth was a Pagan site doing within the walls of Jerusalem, a
city dedicated to the monotheistic worship of the Jewish God at the
Temple? Surely the city authorities would never have permitted this?
That certainly seems true, were it not for the fact that the site
was originally built outside the city walls and became what was
called an 'Asclepion' whose purpose was to service the Roman troops
at the Antonia Fortress which was close to the Temple, but just
outside the city walls. Their location would have meant that
they could keep a watchful eye over their healing site, and the city
walls were not expanded to bring the site within Jerusalem itself
until around the time of Jesus.
So the first thing for us to take on
board is that it appears that Jesus had deliberately visited a Pagan
healing site. Now we can deduce that this was probably missed even
fairly early on in the copying and distribution of this Gospel. We
can tell that from the rather odd verse 4 which is in italics and
brackets above. The reason for that is that it doesn't
appear in the earliest manuscripts and seems to be a later addition
by a copyist. We might wonder why someone would add such a verse,
but if someone was copying the text after Jerusalem had fallen, who
didn't know the city, they might have missed the point entirely about
where Jesus was, and so inserted a verse to Christianise the passage
by having an angel stirring up the waters even though, in itself,
that invented mythology is a little odd.
It seems strange to us to add this
because it immediately raises the question of why an angel would stir
up waters so that the first one in, who is probably therefore the
least in need of healing, should be the one to receive it.
Competitive healing doesn't square very well with the Gospel message
of, 'The first shall be last and the last first.'
I suspect that verse 4 has therefore
been responsible for sending generations of people off in the wrong
direction. So the first thing we have had to establish is that Jesus
deliberately went to a Pagan healing site at Jerusalem. In reality the stirring of the waters
was probably caused by the keepers of the site allowing water from
the upper pool to move to the lower pool, but in many ways even
knowing that doesn't actually help us because of the series of
questions that this passage raises.
The next question is, out of all the
people present there, why this one man? John makes it clear that
when Jesus walks in to the area he sees a whole array of people who
are disabled in one way, shape or form. All of them were there
because they wanted healing. So why does Jesus single this man out?
Why not heal the others?
There are a number of possible reasons
for that. John makes a point of saying that the man has been there
for thirty eight years; could that have been the reason? Possibly,
but do we think that God works on the principle that a person becomes
more eligible for healing the longer they have been ill? And why not
heal everyone there? Think about it. Jesus is in the midst
of a big Pagan healing site. Asclepius was known as 'Saviour'
amongst his followers. Wouldn't it have made more sense for Jesus to
have healed everyone in order to show them that actually he
was the real saviour? Well
to our minds, maybe it would, but this is just one more of those ways
that Jesus keeps us guessing by doing things a different way from how
we would do them.
Then
Jesus asks the man
if he wants to be made well? What
kind of question is that? He's
been crippled for thirty eight years; of course he wants to be made
well! Except his reply is evasive... It makes me wonder whether the man had allowed his illness to define him. When asked if he wants to be well, the
man answers with an excuse, not the affirmative answer that we would imagine.
Then
Jesus does something that seems unexpected and raises yet more
questions; he simply heals him. The
reason this is unexpected is first the man doesn't ask him for it,
and
secondly the man has no idea who Jesus is! According
to Mark
6, when Jesus visits his
home village, Nazareth, he can't
do many miracles there
because they had no faith in him. Yet
here Jesus heals a man who doesn't even know who he is! What's
more, he does it without touching him, which is most unusual since in
almost every other account of Jesus healing someone he does so by
physically engaging with them. So without touching him, Jesus heals
a man who hasn't asked for it and who has no idea about who Jesus is
and so cannot put his faith in him!
But
then the mystery deepens even further. You
would imagine, given the location for this healing, that Jesus would
say, as he did to the disciples, 'Follow me.' But
he doesn't even do that. Jesus just slips away into the crowd. So
when the man gets asked who told him he could carry his mat, he can't
answer them. Then,
as events unfold further, we begin to see some of why John included
this passage, together with a few more difficult questions. You
see the next time Jesus meets him is in the Temple. This almost
misses us until we think, 'Hang on a moment. Wasn't the man at a
Pagan site? What's he now doing in the Temple?' And
that may well be a part of the point to the story. Now
we're beginning to get a picture of a man of divided loyalties. I
wonder whether that was why Jesus picked him out from the crowd at
the pool, because he was essentially plucking at every different
spiritual straw.
But
then Jesus says something deeply troubling to him, and which
completely contradicts something he says elsewhere. Jesus
tells him not to sin any more or something worse will happen to him.
This speaks directly into
our mindset of, 'What have I done to deserve this?' when something
goes wrong.
The
answer we almost
unerringly give is,
'You've done nothing wrong. Sometimes things just happen.' Yet
here Jesus seems to be suggesting that his illness is down to his sin
and unless he stops sinning something worse will happen to him.
That's deeply disquieting. It
also seems to contradict what we find in Luke 13 when
Jesus responds to questions about Pilate's brutality and a tower
falling on eighteen people and killing them by saying that they
weren't worse offenders than anyone else, that
it wasn't their sin that caused their deaths. Yet
here Jesus seems to be saying that unless the man changes his ways,
something worse will happen to him than his previous disability. The
man reacts to this by finding some Jewish leaders and pointing out
Jesus as the one who healed him thereby causing them to start picking
on Jesus.
Far from
following Jesus when he runs into him in the Temple, the man turns on
Jesus and I suspect John includes this passage to show us that Jesus
is already clashing with the authorities, and that by doing the right
thing for the right reasons, he is already on the path to Golgotha.
So
what can we learn from this? You'll
notice that I deliberately haven't tried to give you cut and dried
teaching in this passage. Part
of the reason for that is because I think the various questions and
contradictions are vital for us in understanding that we cannot put
God in a box. Jesus does
not always do the same thing. He is unpredictable, but our rational
twenty first century minds struggle with that. But
what we find here is that, whilst stuff just happens in general,
sometimes we can bring it on ourselves by our behaviour. We find
that Jesus heals some people and not others, and he has his own
reasons for it. And
we find the grace of God in
that, despite knowing the man, knowing his background, knowing his
history, knowing how he will respond, Jesus still heals him. We
don't have to be good for Jesus to work in our lives.
So
these are some of the things that arise from the questions and
contradictions, but there are four
specific lessons that I want us to take away from this.
First
it reinforces what I said
last time, that signs and wonders on
their own are no guarantee of a living faith.
This man was miraculously
healed by Jesus but all he did with that healing was attempt to turn
Jesus in to the authorities! The
miracle did not lead him
to faith.
Secondly,
do not be disheartened at people who see your lively and active faith
and aren't convinced by it. I think part of the reason for this
story is John reminding us that not every one, even when confronted
with a miracle, is going to believe.
Thirdly,
this is a reminder to all of us that when we think we have a word
from God to do something, and we act obediently on what we think God
is calling us to do, it may not turn out right. That's
really important.
We
have a faith that often says, 'Knock on the doors and the one that
opens is the right one.' But
the reality is, if we find the right thing to do, if
we open the right door and walk through it, there is no guarantee
of a happy ending on the other side.
Remember
that Jesus was called to crucifixion, and the seeds of that were, at
least in part, planted in this episode. The
right thing to do may not look like a good thing to the onlookers and
it may not be something that we would choose for ourselves.
And
the fourth
thing here, which is the
one most likely to have an effect on our everyday lives, is
one of awareness. An awesome miracle took place by the pool but
nobody noticed because nobody was looking. All
eyes were focussed on the pool, waiting for the right moment to go
in, hoping you might be healed. And
then, sneaking in to the
Pagan place by the back
entrance, along comes Jesus who heals someone who has been ill for 38
years, and then sneaks out before anyone sees. He
doesn't call the man to faith or anything. There's
no altar call. This is just Jesus being where he thinks he should
be, helping someone who needs help. He
just goes, does what he intended to do, and leaves.
I
wonder what is going on in
our lives where Christ is seriously working away and we are
completely unaware of that because we're looking in the other
direction, maybe at our children or grandchildren, maybe at our jobs
or our social lives, maybe even at the work we do for the church.
Jesus may be doing
something miraculously wonderful for us, but we haven't noticed
because we're looking in the wrong direction.
There
are many lessons
we could take from this passage but I think this is the most
important for us. We need to ask the question, 'Are my eyes open to
what God is already doing in my life?' May
the Great Healer remove our blindness so that we can can see where he
is already at work.
Number four
What does the Father do? What does the Son do? What should we do?
Reading
John 5:19-30
Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly, I
tell you, the Son can do nothing on his own, but only what he sees
the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, the Son does
likewise. The Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself
is doing; and he will show him greater works than these, so that you
will be astonished. Indeed, just as the Father raises the dead and
gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whomsoever he wishes.
The Father judges no one but has given all judgement to the Son, so
that all may honour the Son just as they honour the Father. Anyone
who does not honour the Son does not honour the Father who sent him.
Very truly, I tell you, anyone who hears my word and believes him who
sent me has eternal life, and does not come under judgement, but has
passed from death to life.
‘Very truly, I tell you, the hour
is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the
Son of God, and those who hear will live. For just as the Father has
life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in
himself; and he has given him authority to execute judgement, because
he is the Son of Man. Do not be astonished at this; for the hour is
coming when all who are in their graves will hear his voice and will
come out—those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and
those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation.
‘I can do nothing on my own.
As I hear, I judge; and my judgement is just, because I seek to do
not my own will but the will of him who sent me.
Address
This
is not a universal given, and
I don't know if it holds for daughters and mothers, but
there is a tendency of sons to want to emulate their fathers,
provided their fathers give a good role model. To be honest, even if
their fathers are poor models, the sons may well follow in their
footsteps. This can
especially apply to the jobs we take. As a child I can remember
being fascinated by the world my father inhabited. It
was a world full
of atoms and molecules and of big noisy machines that plumbed the
depths of chemistry and physics. At every opportunity I would
question my dad and he would answer me. I
recall one occasion in a public library where he had to quite
pointedly, but very gently, tell me to stop asking questions so
loudly.
It
was about that time that my parents discovered the Ladybird series of
books about how things worked, and I was soon hooked. Of course
whenever one question is answered, it gives rise to another. It
came as no surprise to my parents, therefore,
that I chose a career in science because that was what my father did.
I did what I saw my father doing. But
of course that wasn't all, and of course it wasn't just about
emulating my dad. In other ways I emulated both parents. I
saw them being loving to each other and trying hard to create a
stable home for us. I saw them give their time to the school I
attended, with my mum becoming the treasurer and my dad becoming the
chair of the PTA.
I saw them
involved in their church and also having their own choir. They
looked out for people and had a sense of fairness. I'm not saying
that following in their ways was easy or even necessarily what I
always wanted to do, but they gave me a good role model and they
helped me to follow that too.
So
in some ways it comes as no surprise when Jesus responds to criticism
with the words before us, as he says, “...for whatever the Father
does, the Son does likewise”. The
context of this is a follow on from the reading we looked at last
week when the Jewish leaders began their persecution against Jesus
for healing a man on the Sabbath. Jesus is essentially saying that
he is simply doing what God the Father is doing. However,
it's actually a statement
that is more far-reaching
than it initially appears because
in saying this he
is implying that he is the
agency by which the things of heaven are being enacted on earth.
What that means, and you
can understand the Jewish leaders being upset with him, is that he is
declaring that he is the
one through which we can know what God is like.
This
is where our relationships with our parents begin to diverge from
Jesus and the Father. I
am not simply a blend of my parents. Whilst
they rightly tried to influence me so that I made good choices, and
those choices would certainly have been influenced by my genetic
inheritance, I have made a number of choices that they would not have
made. I'm
not a rebellious son. But I have my own mind. Many of my
beliefs about life and values differ from theirs. Given a particular
set of circumstances, there is no guarantee that we would make the
same decisions. We are
similar, but we are different.
But
Jesus is saying something else,
something more. He
is saying that he will only
do what he sees the Father doing. In
some ways this is a rebuke to those who persecute them. He
is essentially saying to them, 'You call yourselves followers of God?
Yet here am I doing exactly
what God does and you are trying to kill me because of that.' Now
for us this is deeply important. It
means that we no longer
need to stumble around in the dark asking, 'Is God like this? Is God
like that? Is God always angry? Is God never angry? Is
God loving?' We
need no longer question whether
God is trustworthy. The
person of Jesus reveals the nature of God. Do
you want to know what God is like? Then look at Jesus. Do
you want to know what God values? Look at Jesus. Do
you want to know what God despises? Look at Jesus.
And
when we look hard at Christ, what do we see?
We
see a mixture of questions
and clarity. Jesus
himself says that he gives life to whomsoever he wishes. We've
just seen that demonstrated when he healed one disabled man in a
crowd of disabled people. We
don't know why he chooses to heal some and not others. I
have a friend
who has
a marvellous testimony of her own healing, of
being completely bedridden for several
years, yet who was prayed
for and healed. Yet
many of us, myself included, have stories of family and friends who
were not healed. He has
his reasons, and we may not like it, but he is God and
we are his creation.
But
whilst we might have
questions about the decisions God makes, it strikes me we
do, at least, have
clarity over what God
values by the way Jesus
behaves around people.
Whose company did Jesus
seem to seek out? Those
who were most in need.
And who were his friends?
They were a mixture of small
businessmen, such as Peter the
fisherman,
political collaborators
like Matthew the tax man, freedom fighters like Simon the Zealot,
independent women like Mary Magdalene or Mary of Bethany,
housekeepers like Martha of Bethany. He
sought out those who were rejected because of their lifestyles, like
the Samaritan woman at the well
who'd had five husbands
and was a moral outcast. We can also see quite clearly who he
criticised; it was the religious leaders who claimed moral
superiority for themselves whom
he labelled hypocrites, and it was the rich and powerful who used
their own wealth for their own desires and the desires of their
friends.
These
are the values that Jesus lived by, and so, if he does what he says,
which is to only
do what the Father does, then Jesus shows us exactly what God is
like. But
there is one more thing to add to this. Jesus
is the Son of God, but he is also the son of Mary. Isn't
there a hole in my argument? Could we not make exactly the same
argument from a genetic point of view about doing what he sees Mary
doing. After
all, she makes up a big part of who he is. Why
does he make claims only about God the Father and not about Mary his
mother?
The
answer to that is to do with the two natures of Christ; that he was
both human and divine. We cannot separate the two and say, 'Well
that was his human side' or 'that was his divine side'. But
what we can say is that, as a human he was in total submission to
God, and as God he was the Son of the Father. In
both ways he was active in his decision to do the will of God.
Ultimately
what it comes down to is prayer.
Over
and over again we see it recorded about the amount of time Jesus
spent in prayer, dwelling in the presence of the Father. I
don't think this is the intercessory type of prayer. I think this is
the simple spending of time quietly in the presence of the Father,
listening and learning, observing and waiting.
How
did Jesus know what God was doing? Partly because divinity was in
his nature and partly because, as a human, he had to pray. So
he watched, he listened, he learned and then he acted.
This was why, as both human and God, he could say, “I seek to do
not my own will but the will of him who sent me.”
The
question it raises for us is, what about our actions? We
are not divine, but we have divinity within us, united to our spirits
in the person of the Holy Spirit. This
is one of the greatest miracles of all. We
are adopted as children of God,
as
St. Paul wrote in Galatians, so the same is open to us as we see in
Jesus. We
may not naturally, instinctively know the Father's will, but because
the Holy Spirit is within us, we can nevertheless, through prayer and
waiting, come to know what the Father would do. The challenge for us
is to have the courage to do that, and then to act.
Number Five
The Effect of Integrity
Readings
Malachi 3:1-4
See, I am sending my messenger to
prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly
come to his temple. The messenger of the covenant in whom you
delight—indeed, he is coming, says the Lord of hosts. But who can
endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears?
For he is like a refiner’s fire and
like fullers’ soap; he will sit as a refiner and purifier of
silver, and he will purify the descendants of Levi and refine them
like gold and silver, until they present offerings to the Lord in
righteousness. Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be
pleasing to the Lord as in the days of old and as in former years.
John 7:1-13
After this Jesus went about in Galilee.
He did not wish to go about in Judea because the Jews were looking
for an opportunity to kill him. Now the Jewish festival of Booths was
near. So his brothers said to him, ‘Leave here and go to Judea so
that your disciples also may see the works you are doing; for no one
who wants to be widely known acts in secret. If you do these things,
show yourself to the world.’ (For not even his brothers believed in
him.) Jesus said to them, ‘My time has not yet come, but your time
is always here. The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I
testify against it that its works are evil. Go to the festival
yourselves. I am not going to this festival, for my time has not yet
fully come.’ After saying this, he remained in Galilee.
But after his brothers had gone to the
festival, then he also went, not publicly but as it were in secret.
The Jews were looking for him at the festival and saying, ‘Where is
he?’ And there was considerable complaining about him among the
crowds. While some were saying, ‘He is a good man’, others were
saying, ‘No, he is deceiving the crowd.’ Yet no one would speak
openly about him for fear of the Jews.
Address
When I was a
teenager there was a comment that was often thrown disparagingly at
rock bands who had managed a reasonable degree of success, and this
was that they were 'Big in Japan' There was some truth in this in
that a number of the British or European bands I really enjoyed had
indeed managed to have a big success in Japan. They could go there on tours and sell
out venues, yet back here many people had never heard of them and so
people generally thought, 'Well so what?' The reason for that was
that you couldn't be counted as a superstar unless you made it in the
US. And if we're honest we still see the same thing today, although
these days it's more about film stars and TV hosts. So in the UK the comedian James Corden
was pretty successful and well known, but when he began to make it
big in the US as well, people took him more seriously. The same
could be said for the actor Simon Pegg. Originally best known for
the UK series 'Spaced', he appeared in a number of critically
acclaimed British films. But what made people take notice was when he
started getting major roles in Hollywood films.
What we seem to be seeing with this
story is more or less the same thing. To someone in the rural north
of Galilee it was no big deal if you made a stir there. So what?
Who cared about a few thousand country bumpkins. What really counted
was if you could make it big in the Hollywood of Jerusalem. That was
what really counted. So this story follows on from the
remarkable feeding of the five thousand on the shores of the Sea of
Galilee, with that being insufficient for Jesus' brothers, who don't
yet believe in him. So, perhaps mockingly, they tell him to go to
Jerusalem so everyone can see him.
Now there is another good reason for
why this is mocking. At the end of the previous chapter, the
teaching that Jesus gave to accompany the feeding of the five
thousand had been deeply challenging to those following him. The
result of that had been that vast numbers had left. Jesus had
questioned the twelve as to whether they were going to go as well, to
which Peter had replied, 'Where else could we go? You have the words
of eternal life.'
So Jesus had thinned down the crowd of
followers quite considerably by not holding back on the truth about
following him. When they began to take on board what he was teaching
and its radical nature, they had drifted away. Verse 1 of today's
reading explains that Jesus '...went about' in Galilee. That verse
tells us that for some period, possibly a reasonably long time, Jesus
worked as a rabbi around Galilee. But maybe his brothers had seen how his
initial support had bled away. So they mock him, saying, 'Go on
then, make it big in Jerusalem instead. Show the world what you can
do.' The response that Jesus makes is quite telling with regard to
his belief in the way he was conducting his ministry. Were he an
insecure performer he might have thought to himself, 'Maybe they're
right. Maybe I'm only ever get noticed if I go to the bright lights
and the big city.'
But Jesus doesn't do that, and his
response says much to us. 'You go because any time is good for you.
My time isn't here yet. And anyhow, it comes as no surprise that
people reject me because I am telling them the truth about good and
evil. I'm not looking for fame and fortune.'
This, then, is the key issue for us
here. Jesus is not controlled by outside influences but by an inner
conviction. He doesn't allow himself to be pressurised by others
into doing what they think is the correct thing to do because
he knows, in the depths of his being, the right way to act and the
right thing to do. In other words he has a vision that sustains his
direction and he will not be turned to the right or the left.
The way that John describes Jesus then
travelling to Jerusalem in secret is very important. I have often
spoken about how John's Gospel has lots of layers within layers, and
the same is true here because it seems he is drawing our attention
back to the last book in the Old Testament, the prophet Malachi, who
foretells a time when God will send a messenger ahead of him to
prepare the way.
That sounds rather like John the
Baptist doesn't it. And then the prophet declares how the Lord God,
whom they seek, will suddenly and unexpectedly appear in the temple.
So it is that Jesus, who the Gospel writer has made quite clear is
divine, travels secretly to Jerusalem, not taking part in the many
celebrations surrounding what was in effect their harvest festival. The very next verse after this reading,
which comes next week, shows Jesus suddenly appearing in the Temple
and beginning to teach, thus beginning to fulfil the prophecy of
Malachi.
So what we have seen is Jesus not being
tempted by his brothers to seek recognition, but instead to wait for
the right time, and instead of travelling openly, which would
probably have got him killed, he goes in secret, in God's timing and
according to his vision, and then appears in the Temple quite
unexpectedly, just as Malachi had foretold.
This is how the strength of conviction
works its way out. This is what it means to not be swayed by the
opinions of others. This is what it means to stick to your guns even
when others tell you that you're wrong.
This raises a number of questions for
us. As individuals, how good are we at doing what we think is the
right thing to do when others criticise or belittle us? There is a
temptation amongst the meek to do as they're told; anything for a
quiet life. We become afraid of the opinions of others who seem to
be more strong willed than we are. So in the first instance this is why I
try to encourage each of us to seek a vision from God as to what we
should be doing in our own lives. Noah was ridiculed, but he
persisted because he knew what God called him to. Let us do
likewise, and have the courage to do what we think to be the right
thing, or simply to say the right thing, or defend someone because
it's the right thing to do.
A second question that this raises for
us is how the Church responds to this. This is one of the reasons we
have concentrated so much on developing a vision for the future.
Proverbs 29:18 says that without a vision, the people perish. There
is a huge amount of truth in this. We have to know the direction
we're taking so that when we encounter difficulties we will have the
courage and the resolution to press on.
We can also see the way the integrity
of Jesus to his vision bears fruit after his earthly ministry is
complete in the life of Jesus' family. At this point in time they
seem to be ridiculing him. Yet turn the clock forward and we
discover that the head of the Jerusalem church, after Peter leaves on
mission work, is James, the Lord's younger brother. I wonder at what point he became
convinced? We don't know and nor can we, but for most people it is
the little things that we notice in the lives of others that draw us
to share opinions with them, and maybe to follow them.
I suspect that James saw in Jesus a
resolution to follow his vision, and so gradually accepted him for
who he was. This is the power of having a vision from God for our
direction in life, and then staying with it. Not only do you do the
right thing, but others are drawn to it too. And in being drawn to
us, so they are drawn to Christ.
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