Tag Archives: Gospel

by

Radical inclusion

Click here to listen to the audio recording of this 12-minute message. Or watch the video on Facebook (the message starts at about 29 minutes). Or read the narrative summary that follows.

Today we celebrate Epiphany – the revelation or revealing of Jesus Christ to the non-Jewish world, specifically, to the Magi. Traditionally, these were the three wise men or the three kings. The readings set for today (for Epiphany) tell the narrative of a great opening up (or revealing or understanding) of God’s salvation for all humankind.

We start in Isaiah with several prophecies of the nations (Gentiles, non-Jews) coming recognise the special call of Israel to be a light to the world. For example, Isaiah 59:19 says, “From the west, people will fear the name of the Lord, and from the rising of the sun [that is, from the east], they will revere his glory”. In Isaiah 60:3, we read, “Nations will come to your light and kings to the brightness of your dawn”. And Isaiah 60:6 seems to prophesy the coming of the Magi (the traditional ‘three kings’ or ‘wise men’), “All from Sheba will come, bearing gold and incense and proclaiming the praise of the Lord.”

In the times of the First Testament, God had chosen to work with the Jewish people. They were his chosen people – the people of the covenant. But throughout that Testament, we see references, like those in Isaiah, to Israel leading everyone towards God. They were to be a priestly nation who would mediate God to the world.

Then, in Matthew 2:1, we read, “After Jesus was born in Bethlehem … Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, ‘Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him’.” When they found Jesus, “they bowed down and worshipped him” and “presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh” (Matthew 2:11), in fulfilment of the prophecy in Isaiah 60:6.

The importance of the Magi is twofold. First, they recognise Jesus as a king – not merely as a child. He was a person of great significance. And secondly, because they came from the east (probably somewhere in Persia or even further east) and were not Jewish, they represent the gentile nations. Their visit to Jesus and their recognition of him as King is the fulfilment of the First Testament prophecy, that the Messiah of the Jewish people would be a Messiah for all people. This is the epiphany – the revelation of Jesus to those outside of the Jewish faith.

Jesus’ ministry, as recorded in the Gospels, was primarily to the Jewish people. Jesus says as much (e.g., Matthew 10:5-6). However, there are numerous examples of Jesus reaching beyond the Jewish people to Gentiles. Still, the Good News that Jesus preached was primarily good news for Jews.

The outworking of the fulfilled prophecy comes with Paul and is explained very clearly in his letter to the Ephesians. Speaking to the Gentiles, Paul says “you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world” (Ephesians 2:12). Paul is reiterating the First Testament position, that only the Jewish people were God’s chosen.

But Paul then shares his “insight into the mystery of Christ, which was not made known to people in other generations as it has now been revealed by the Spirit of God’s holy apostles and prophets” (Ephesians 3:4-5). And what is this mystery? It is that “through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise of Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 3:6).

Paul proclaims the great opening up of the Gospel message to all people, as was prophesied in the First Testament and according to the sign of the magi from the East. God’s chosen people are no longer only the Jewish nation, but anyone who believes in Jesus Christ. “In him and through faith in him, we may approach God, with freedom and confidence” (Ephesians 3:12). “The barrier, the dividing wall of hostility” (Ephesians 2:14) has been destroyed. The doors to the Kingdom of God have been flung wide open and all are welcome to enter!

What does this mean for us today? It means that our church doors must also be flung wide open so that all feel welcome to enter. There should be no barriers to people coming to Christ and coming to church. Every person, no matter who or what they are, should feel that they are welcome, loved and included when they meet us. We should be generous and inclusive.

If we are honest, we will admit that Christians can be some of the most judgemental, critical and exclusionary people on earth. And often also hypocrites – saying one thing but doing another. Christians frequently do not put into practice the open and inclusive Gospel that Jesus proclaimed, which was prophesied in the First Testament, and which we see unfolding throughout the Second Testament.

Jesus’ ministry was one of radical inclusion. He seems to go out of his way to embrace those who the world would regard as sinners and marginalised – prostitutes, tax collectors, Roman oppressors, lepers, demon possessed people, women, Samaritans, the dead and dying, and so on. Jesus repeatedly positions himself with those who one might think could not be the ‘chosen people’. He does this show, unequivocally, that the Gospel is a generous and inclusive message and that doors to the Kingdom of God are wide open.

And thanks be to God for that! Because this is what enables most of us – who are Gentile – to be included among God’s chosen people. Let us then walk in the footsteps of Jesus and of Paul, in the way we as individuals engage with people around us – always welcoming, always generous, warm, kind, tolerant, inclusive. And let us as a church – the parish of St Stephen – similarly be a church with wide open doors that welcomes anyone and everyone into the presence of God.

Featured image “Adoration of the Magi” by Albrecht Dürer (1504), from https://artsandculture.google.com/asset/adoration-of-the-magi/zwFGJLYuIszRRw?hl=en-GB
by

Seeing Jesus

John 12:21 tells us about a group of Greek seekers who come to Philip saying, “Sir, we would like to see Jesus”. And so begins a story of one person introducing another person to Jesus, in a chain of people seeking to see Jesus.

Click here to listen to the audio of this 5-minute message. Or watch the video below.

 

 

by

Doing mission

Click here to listen to this 23-minute message.

Our Gospel reading for today is Luke 10:1-11, 16-20. It is the story of Jesus sending out 72 of his followers (having previously sent out the 12 disciples at the start of Luke 9) to do missionary work. It’s an important narrative, because it provides insight into Jesus’ teaching and training of his followers in missionary work. In this recording, I do an almost verse-by-verse Bible study of the passage, to tease out what happens, what Jesus says and how Luke conveys Jesus’ teachings to us.

I start by disclosing that I am a useless evangelist. I was trained in and did cold-calling as a university student, while a member of Campus Crusade for Christ. But, being a naturally shy and introverted person, walking up to strangers to share the Gospel with them was the hardest thing in the world for me.

I wrap up with three main points (RAP):

  1. Our Responsibility. We are responsible to be faithful to God, to make God known in the world. But we are not responsible for how people respond to us. Our responsibility is to lay a foundation and prepare the way for Holy Spirit to continue Christ’s work in the life of other people.
  2. Our Attitude. We are invited to enter the lives of others with an attitude of peace – to be calm, quiet, respectful and deferential. And we are invited to accommodate them and their ways, not to impose ourselves on them. Paul writes at length about this in 1 Corinthians 9:19-23.
  3. Our Presence. We are assured (and reassured) that since Christ dwells in us – has taken up residence in us – wherever we are, Christ is. And wherever Christ is, the Kingdom of God is (since Christ is King of the Kingdom of God). Thus, merely being among people who do not know God brings the Kingdom of God near to them. This, ultimately, is what Jesus emphasises to his followers (Luke 10:8-11):

“When you enter a town and are welcomed, … tell them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’ But when you enter a town and are not welcomed, go into its streets and say ‘… be sure of this: The kingdom of God has come near’.”

Whether we realise or intend it or not, the truth is that we are always Christ’s ambassadors. We are always revealing Christ to the world. We are always preparing the way for Christ’s coming. We are always doing mission. But we could be doing mission in a way that better aligns with Jesus’ teaching on mission and that does indeed prepare the way for him.

2019.07.07_Mosaic of Jesus Christ in Florence Baptistry

Featured image is a 13th century mosaic of Jesus Christ from the ceiling of the Baptistry across from the Duomo (Santa Maria del Fiore) in Florence. https://www.flickr.com/photos/bbmaui/719415433/

by

A Community of Faith Seeking Christ

Click here to listen to this 24-minute message.

Today, being the first Sunday after Easter, we have the classic reading from John 20 about Thomas, the one who wanted first-hand evidence that Jesus had, in fact, risen from the dead. Thomas is my favourite New Testament character – I identify fully with his pattern of doubt seeking faith.

But John 20:30-31 lets us know that John’s Gospel is written, primarily, to introduce unbelievers to the Gospel message: “these have been written that you might believe”. So, Thomas is less an example of doubtful-faith for Christians, as he is an example of a faith-seeking non-Christian.

In light of this I help my congregation to re-read this passage from that perspective, and particularly to consider what this passage tells us about being a community of faith that creates a receptive space for those who are not Christians. I make three points:

  1. Not everyone who comes to our church is a Christian, let alone an Anglican Christian. This means we need to to make our services more seeker-friendly.
  2. People living in our area today are modern, questioning, skeptical, not impressed with authority and open to a plurality of truths. This means we need to be accommodating, open to various views, comfortable with difficult questions, comfortable with not having answers to those questions and comfortable with multiple answers to those questions.
  3. People are, nevertheless, looking for answers. This means we need to have thought carefully and deeply about some of the important questions of our time.

I remind my congregation that we are an Anglican church. Part of what that means is that we have a generous orthodoxy. We are like a large tree with expansive branches that provide shade for many people. Within the Anglican communion are charismatics, evangelicals, fundamentalists, social gospelists, liberals and sacramentalists (Anglo-Catholics). It is not that we Anglicans don’t know what we believe; it is rather that we are humble in our belief, acknowledging that we might be wrong, and thus open to others believing differently.

I suggest that this Anglican stance may be because, while we believe that truth (doctrine) is important, we believe that relationship is a bit more important. Thomas’ statement of faith (My Lord and my God) was not prompted by the evidence he got from Jesus, but by his encounter with the person of the risen Christ. It was his relationship with Jesus that stimulated his faith. And so it should be for us.

So, we we’re aiming to be a church that learns from Thomas. We aim to be a community of faith that creates safe relational space for others to seek and find Christ.

by

A compelling calling

Click here to listen to this 16-minute message.

In 1 Corinthians 9:16, the Apostle Paul says that he is ‘compelled’ to preach the Gospel. This expression is fascinating, as it gives us some unique insights into Paul’s psychology and spirituality, namely, how he experienced God’s calling on his life. By gaining some insights into Paul’s experience of being called by God, we can gain some insights into our own experiences of being called.

I draw some parallels between Paul’s experience of a compelling calling and my own experience. I myself feel compelled to preach. And when opportunities to preach are lacking, I feel discombobulated and distressed. I think there is a difference between God’s call, which is an objective calling from God, and the compelling call, which is our subjective experience of God’s objective calling pressing upon us.

And so, I am calling on Christians to seek the compelling call – that sense of God’s call being insistent and persistent, irresistible and urgent.

Drawing on an expression used in Isaiah 40, I ask: Do you not know? Have you not heard?

  1. That you are deeply and passionately loved by God.
  2. That God has a unique purpose for you in the world, that draws on the whole of who you are.
  3. That the Holy Spirit of God equips and empowers us to live out this purpose, together with God and within a community of faith.
  4. That God desires us to have a deeper and more profound subjective experience of that compelling calling.
  5. And that God deeply and passionately loves the whole world, and desires to be reconciled to everyone, and wants us to participate with God in achieving that.

It is my prayer that we – Christians – become a more purposeful and invested community, working in partnership with God, to spread the Gospel message of the Kingdom of God.

In this message, I recite a poem, which has been meaningful to me for more than a dozen years. It is called ‘What is this seed?’, in a book by Edward Tyler entitled Prayers in Celebration of the Turning Year (1978).

What is this seed that thou has planted in me
that I must bring to fruit
or pass my life in sterile waste?

What is this gift that thou hast given me
that I must in turn pass on
or it will destroy me?

What is it you are asking me to do
that I must do
or know my life defeated?

I ask, in Christ’s name
Amen.

by

What the Gospel Says about Decoloniality

Click here to listen to this 24-minute message.

Decolonisation and decoloniality are huge topics in contemporary South Africa, demanding that we engage with the legacy of centuries of oppression of African people by Dutch and British colonial powers and the Apartheid government. The question I explore in this message is what the Gospel has to say for Christians about decoloniality, that is, about living in a post-colonial society.

Matthew 22:15-22 is a well-known passage where Jesus says that we must “give to Ceasar what is Ceasar’s”. It has often be used to say we must support the government of the day. It is one of the most political narratives in the Gospel texts, and forces us to engage with political issues.

This narrative took place against the first century backdrop of the Jewish people being under the oppressive colonial rule of Rome. A key part of Rome’s rule was a tax, called Census, that every Jewish person had to pay simply for having the audacity to be born Jewish. It was a deeply humiliating, subjugating and repugnant tax for Jewish people.

The tax was paid with a silver coin that had Tiberius Ceasar’s portrait engraved on it. Such an engraving was idolatrous to many Jewish people at that time, because it conflicted with the second commandment. And the inscription on the coin effectively said that Tiberius was the ‘son of God’ and ‘high priest’. Paying a ‘sin tax’ for being Jewish with such a coin was outrageous.

In this message I break open some important points that Jesus makes to determine what he really thought about how Jews at that time should live under colonial rule. These thoughts are useful for Christians today who live under a colonial government or under the rule of an oppressive or corrupt state, as well as those, like us in South African, who live in a post-colonial society, coming to grips with the present legacy of colonisation and coloniality.

This is a chewy message, requiring a close reading of the Gospel text, and careful application in its original and present day contexts. I hope that you may take the time to listen to this podcast and to engage with these thoughts.