A Christmas psalm

 

Halleluiah!

Praise the Lord.

 

Now my soul praises the Lord,

My spirit rejoices in God my saviour.

 

The Christ Child is born,

The liberator has come.

 

To bring good news to the poor,

And let all the captives go free.

 

To bring God’s kingdom down to earth,

His reign of justice into all the earth.

 

Where all people will be treated fairly,

And everyone is a child of God.

 

A world where love will abound,

And self-sacrifice will be normal practice.

 

In that day the dead will be brought to life,

And all rejoice in the resurrection of Jesus.

 

Praise the Lord,

Halleluiah!

Hezekiah

 

Hezekiah: Humble prayer and true repentance.

 

“if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”

2 Chronicles 7:14

 

There are so many similarities between the time of Hezekiah and our own. A time of national crisis, people trembling behind closed doors in fear of a terror stalking the land. A time when many people had wandered away from the worship of the true God to many false Gods. A time when those false Gods no longer have an answer to our deepest needs. A time when hope had been replaced by doubt and despair.     

The history of Judah after the reign of Solomon had been pretty disappointing: forever straying from the worship of Jehovah to the latest fashion in idol worship. Hezekiah inherited a land riddled with Asherah poles and high places, with total disregard for the creator God whose Holy presence could be found centred in the Holy of Holies in the Jerusalem temple. Hezekiah remembered the words of Jehovah to his great forefather Solomon. He reinstated the worship in the Temple, and set about fortifying the city which surrounded it, preparing for the inevitable siege that would come from the world superpower which was Assyria, steamrolling its way towards them.

Finally, we see Hezekiah in a position where any lesser leader would have been driven to despair and surrender. All his fortified cities have been ground to rubble, and he is surrounded by the mighty hoards of the cruel and merciless king of Assyria. Not only that, but he is faced with a constant barrage of hostile propaganda and fake news. A world so very like our own.

His brilliant engineers have fortified the city and secured the water supply with an amazing tunnel. He has emptied the Temple of all its silver and wealth to pay off the attacker. All to no avail, as hunger and fear assault the besieged city.    

However, we find that the overarching pride of the Assyrian king becomes his downfall. He sends a letter with an ultimatum offering Hezekiah surrender and deportation or death. He also mocks Hezekiah’s God, a very foolish act to mock the Holy name of Jehovah.

 Perhaps in this dark time Hezekiah is reminded of one of the songs of his ancestor David.

Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High
    will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.
² I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress,
    my God, in whom I trust.” ……

¹⁴ “Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him;
    I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.
¹⁵ He will call on me, and I will answer him;
    I will be with him in trouble,
    I will deliver him and honour him.
¹⁶ With long life I will satisfy him
    and show him my salvation.” Psalm 91 (ESVUK c 2001)

Hezekiah come with total humility and trust into the Temple and spreads out the letter before his God, in perfect trust. Praying not just to save the city, but to vindicate the name of Jehovah, who had been mocked.

2 Kings 19:14-19

NLT

14 After Hezekiah received the letter from the messengers and read it, he went up to the Lord’s Temple and spread it out before the Lord. 15 And Hezekiah prayed this prayer before the Lord: “O Lord, God of Israel, you are enthroned between the mighty cherubim! You alone are God of all the kingdoms of the earth. You alone created the heavens and the earth. 16 Bend down, O Lord, and listen! Open your eyes, O Lord, and see! Listen to Sennacherib’s words of defiance against the living God.

17 “It is true, Lord, that the kings of Assyria have destroyed all these nations. 18 And they have thrown the gods of these nations into the fire and burned them. But of course the Assyrians could destroy them! They were not gods at all—only idols of wood and stone shaped by human hands. 19 Now, O Lord our God, rescue us from his power; then all the kingdoms of the earth will know that you alone, O Lord, are God.”

The next morning, Hezekiah looked out over the city walls to the sight of 185,000 dead in the Assyrian camp. Sennacherib, king of Assyria, departed with His army utterly defeated, finally suffering the ultimate humiliation of being assassinated in his own temple, by his own sons, his idols looking on unable to protect him. 

So, what can we learn from this story, in this time of not just national but worldwide disaster?

Surely it is to come back in trust to the one true God, Jesus Christ, who can save us. To not put our trust in natural means alone, but to come humbly before the only God, who can summon up all the forces of the heavenly armies to come to our aid.

 

My Redeemer Lives Hillsong Worship

 

NOAH

 

As children, we all loved the story of Noah, beautifully coloured books with pop-up animals going into the ark, all the animals going in two by two, waiting in safety until the white dove comes back with the olive branch in its beak to signal the end of the flood.

However, as we got older, it slowly dawned on us that this was a far darker and deeper story than we were told as a small child.

Turner The Deluge National Gallery

Was there really ever a flood that covered the entire world? How would all the animals fit onto the ark? Would the God of love we read about in the story of Jesus really destroy all humankind from the face of the earth?

Would we just dismiss this as some primitive myth, or would we find a way of reading it, which was full of promise and meaning?

Myth is often thought of these days as an ancient story that is not true, when in fact myth is a vast resource for explaining the world. We find that every people group on earth has its own flood story, and something so universally remembered is probably true.

 

Most people on earth have experienced their own flood story this year. The COVID-19 pandemic has indeed deluged our world, and we have all been cast adrift in our own little arks of self-isolation. Instinctively we have painted rainbows in our windows. Again, a folk memory of the sign of hope given to Noah, usually painted by children who are much more aware of the spiritual realities of our world than we more “sophisticated” grown-ups.

However, we have to remember that COVID is just a minor distraction in our lives from the real threat of flooding caused by global warming that could overwhelm all low-lying lands, and even total wipe out some low-lying islands. Whole populations could be displaced.   

We have been given fair warning of this disaster facing the whole earth. The question is: are we going to be wise like Noah and listen to what we are being told? We have committed the sins of greed and disregard for the wonderful creation which God has placed us in. Are we going to change the way we treat the world?

 I am sure that if the people of Noah’s day had repented, as the people of Nineveh did in the time of Noah, God would have relented from sending the flood. Let us quickly learn from this current pandemic how fragile our world is and change our ways before again it is too late.

Jesus Christ is indeed, “Mighty to Save”

Youtube: Hillsong " Mighty to save"

The wall demolished

 

Ephesians 2

¹¹ Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called “the uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands— ¹² remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. ¹³ But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. ¹⁴ For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility ¹⁵ by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, ¹⁶ and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. 

 

The wall demolished

We are the bearded ones hammering on the gates of the inner temple.

Not allowed a seat on the bus.

A policeman’s boot across my throat

“I cannot breathe”, even the clouds of tear gas that smother me.

 

All my hope dashed and trampled, by the little mark on my chromosomes

that make me, “outsider”, the cockroach worthy to be crushed.

My life imperilled in a flimsy storm-tossed boat,

a rubber dinghy of hope sinking in a raging sea  

Like Jonah entombed at the bottom of the sea.

 

I sink, but at the last moment a strong hand grasps me

The man once in a grave far deeper than mine,

But now unleashed upon this stricken earth,

Triumphant, risen, to bring His new life.

To unite the two warring rivals into His one body of love.

Ian Hempshall 07/10/20

 

 

 

Wrestling with God

Epstein Jacob and the angel Tate Gallery

Holy Sonnets: Batter my heart, three-person'd God

Batter my heart, three-person'd God, for you

As yet but knock, breathe, shine, and seek to mend;

That I may rise and stand, o'erthrow me, and bend

Your force to break, blow, burn, and make me new.

I, like an usurp'd town to another due,

Labor to admit you, but oh, to no end;

Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,

But is captiv'd, and proves weak or untrue.

Yet dearly I love you, and would be lov'd fain,

But am betroth'd unto your enemy;

Divorce me, untie or break that knot again,

Take me to you, imprison me, for I,

Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,

Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

Jacob Wrestles With God

22 That night Jacob got up and took his two wives, his two female servants and his eleven sons and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. 23 After he had sent them across the stream, he sent over all his possessions. 24 So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak. 25 When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob’s hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man. 26 Then the man said, “Let me go, for it is daybreak.”

But Jacob replied, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”

27 The man asked him, “What is your name?”

“Jacob,” he answered.

28 Then the man said, “Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.”

Genesis 32 NIV

Last Sunday our vicar, preached on this subject at our Sunday Service at Trinity He used it as an allegory for the way that we enter into the Kingdom of Christ. It is all by Christ's grace for us. God invites into His kingdom but there may be many struggles with Him along the way. It reminds me of a poem by Frances Thompson, rather long but the first verse gives a flavour:

The Hound of Heaven   

I fled Him down the nights and down the days

I fled Him down the arches of the years

I fled Him down the labyrinthine ways

Of my own mind, and in the midst of tears

I hid from him, and under running laughter.

Up vistaed hopes I sped and shot precipitated

Adown titanic glooms of chasmed fears

From those strong feet that followed, followed after

But with unhurrying chase and unperturbed pace,

Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,

They beat, and a Voice beat,

More instant than the feet:

All things betray thee who betrayest me.

The full poem can be found: Here

The only reason that anyone becomes a Christian is that Jesus sets His love upon them, what theologians call irresistible Grace, He then sets His bloodhound, figuratively speaking, the Holy Spirit, onto His beloved until He is captivated by Jesus. Does this mean that people do not have any part in bringing a new disciple to faith? "No way", Jesus uses His friends on earth, each one motivated in their turn by the Holy Spirit to work on an individual. 
Going back to the Golf club analogy in the last blog every time that an individual reacts with a Christian there is a small propulsion towards the Kingdom of God for that individual. It may be a prayer, a kind word, a befriending, a book lent, or an introduction to a church service or, better still an Alpha course. Each one of us is on their own Spiritual journey, which we can share with many people along the way.
In my own Spiritual journey, I had many such helps, I was brought up in a Christian household supported by the prayers of my parents and a very Godly great aunt. I was sent to Sunday school were I heard the bible read, and many of the stories I could commit to memory. However as I studied science at secondary school, I thought that the faith of my parents was simplistic and out of date, yes this was the swinging sixties.  I became convinced that the scientific principle was what would govern my life and I plunged into my medical studies at Barts hospital.
However I was far from happy in my new environment   and soon became very depressed and felt the need for something else in my life. I was very attracted to a group of students who always had coffee together and seemed to always be full of laughter and merriment, I was quickly attracted to them.
They were always very welcoming, and I noticed that they often talked about having a personal relationship with God, something I had not really come across before. I really wanted whatever this group had got, and one day one of them  took me aside and explained that all I had to do was ask Jesus into my life, say sorry for my previous rejection and rebellion and I would be what he described as, "be born again". I said a simple prayer and yes there was a change; my depression and sense of frustration went, and I had  an insatiable desire to read the new testament again. I had found a copy in my flat in a new translation. Suddenly the scriptures which I had learnt as a boy burst into light. Jesus did indeed  have hold of my life. He has never left me even though at times I have drifted away from Him. He is always pursuing and rescuing me just as Jesus told in the story of a Good Shepherd who left 99 sheep in the wilderness to go after and retrieve the one lost sheep.  

     
 

One for mouse, and one for crow, one to rot and one to grow

The little saying in my title was passed on to me by my grandfather and must be very old.
He used to say it while planting bean seeds in his garden. During this lockdown anyone with a garden or even a window box seems to be planting and sowing like mad at the moment. Perhaps it is some collective memory of the, "dig for victory", campaign during the second world war, or an instinct which is deeply ingrained in each one of us.
 The cultivation of plants was a major factor in how we developed as a civilisation. It was the means by which hunter-gathers were able to stay in one place for any length of time, without moving with the source of food. Once agriculture had developed, Towns and cities could develop and with that people could start to do other trades, rather than just spend the majority of the day looking for food.
It was thought until recently that agriculture developed 12,000 years ago, however  a site has been discovered on the shore of the Sea of Galilee where there was evidence of experiments in cultivation nearly 23,000 years ago. It started  in some hunter-gathers who were also fishermen and able to lead a more settled lifestyle. Perhaps a piece of earth had been cleared to store some grasses they had collected and someone observed that some of the seeds, which had fallen from the grasses had grown.
Soon the idea of sowing seed in an area of land, which had been cleared and cultivated developed. Someone with a bag of seed, walked slowly up and down, scattering seed in a regular way as he walked. The seed fell randomly on whatever the man or woman walked past.

Slowly agriculture developed and started to become mechanised. In 1700 Jethro Tull introduced the  horse hoe and seed drill, the manual sowing of seed broadcasting the seed over a wide area rather randomly depending on the skill of the sower was replaced by plants growing in neat rows, with much less left to chance.

Slowly the majority of people became distanced from all food production with people having very little idea of  where or how food was produced. However the desire to produce food with our own hands which we can see grow and harvest is a very satisfying occupation especially in this time of lock down when there is very little else to do.

As I mentioned earlier there was a very long history of sowing in Palestine and Jesus used the image of the sower a number of times most famously the parable of the sower. 

Again he began to teach beside the sea. And a very large crowd gathered about him, so that he got into a boat and sat in it on the sea, and the whole crowd was beside the sea on the land. 2 And he was teaching them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them: 3 “Listen! A sower went out to sow. 4 And as he sowed, some seed fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured it. 5 Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it did not have much soil, and immediately it sprang up, since it had no depth of soil. 6 And when the sun rose, it was scorched, and since it had no root, it withered away. 7 Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain. 8 And other seeds fell into good soil and produced grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.” 9 And he said, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.” Mark4:1-9 ESVUK

Jesus explains that the seed represents the word; basically the words of Jesus, now written down in the bible. The seed falls on various soils which represent the state of different people's hearts and how well the word in received.   So this is suggesting that our character and way of life is influential in whether or not we become a Christian, so if salvation is the sovereign will  of God then basically how we respond to the message must be shaped by Him. So not just in the moment of salvation but in a steady influence throughout our lives. However Jesus gives us the privilege of sowing the seed. 

This weekend I have been on our church weekend for our Trinity Lewes men's group, not originally as planned at Bowles.conference centre , but virtually online. Our main speaker talked about sowing seeds how we get to scatter the seed sometimes in  small ways but slowly and after a long time there may well be a harvest. Another image he used was of a game of golf. Each person is a golf club in the hands of Jesus every time we meet somebody as the golf club hits a ball we are bringing the ball nearer to the "hole" of trusting in Jesus as their Lord and Saviour. We are all different as are the golf clubs and each club is used in a different part of the field. No matter what our individual contribution we can all play our small part in the plans of the Saviour if we are prepared to put ourselves totally into His hands.
So happy sowing everybody and may we all reap a bountiful harvest.  

Peter, Jesus and a fish sandwich

Afterward Jesus appeared again to his disciples, by the Sea of Galilee.[a] It happened this way: 2 Simon Peter, Thomas (also known as Didymus[b]), Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two other disciples were together. 3 “I’m going out to fish,” Simon Peter told them, and they said, “We’ll go with you.” So they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.

4 Early in the morning, Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus.

5 He called out to them, “Friends, haven’t you any fish?”

“No,” they answered.

6 He said, “Throw your net on the right side of the boat and you will find some.” When they did, they were unable to haul the net in because of the large number of fish.

7 Then the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, “It is the Lord!” As soon as Simon Peter heard him say, “It is the Lord,” he wrapped his outer garment around him (for he had taken it off) and jumped into the water.  John 21 NIV

This passage reminds me of a men's houseparty years ago at Ashburnham house, when the tradition was to go down to the usually freezing lake before breakfast for a swim across the lake.

The leader had asked me to cook some little fish on a barbeque and make a fish breakfast. The smell of barbequed fish wafted across the lake as the hungry swimmers were surprised by fish in a bread roll as their breakfast treat. We sat together munching our fish as this story was read to us.

The breakfast that Jesus had prepared for Peter and the rest of the disciples must have been even more special than this breakfast which I still remember vividly.

The smell of the cooking fish and the charcoal fire and a smiling risen Lord Jesus offering them breakfast must have been etched on their minds, as was the amazing catch of fish. Many years later, when he was writing his gospel, John remembers that there were 153 of them. He was an eye witness who had personally counted them out.

This event must have been very significant in many ways for the first disciples. They must have recalled their first encounter with Jesus by the lake, where he again ordered them to cast their nets into what had been waters empty of fish, to catch another amazing hoard. This had been their first commissioning, Jesus had invited them to leave their nets, there and then, and become,"fishers of men".  They had seen Him heal people, preach the good news, and even cast out demons, then He sent them out two by two, and they were amazed that even The spirits obeyed them. Then it all started to unravel, Jesus started to draw vast crowds and He came up against the jealous religious authorities. When He rode into Jerusalem on a donkey, drawing the crowds like a glorious messiah, they gradually realised how it was all going to end. They had promised to stick by Him. Peter had vowed to die rather than betray Him, and yet when the soldiers came in the dead of night, they just scattered, like so many frightened dogs, and Peter had even disowned Him just as Jesus had predicted before the cock had crowed three times. Perhaps the smell of the charcoal fire had provoked guilty thoughts in Peter of that night when he had huddled around that charcoal fire in the courtyard of the high priest and, just as the cock crowed, he saw Jesus being led across the other side of the courtyard and exchange that look, not of anger or disgust, but of compassion and love for His friend, despite his betrayal.
Then after the meal came the walk along the beach, and the three fold question: "Do you love me?"
"Of course I love you," was Peter's threefold response.
Each reply negating his threefold denial.
After the question, the commission: "Feed my sheep." Peter, the one who had denied His Lord, had been forgiven and promoted to be the leader of the newly formed worldwide body of Christ, left on earth after Jesus ascended into heaven, empowered and  motivated by the Holy Spirit of God, which was poured out on them at Pentecost. So, just like Peter, each one of us has had their sins forgiven, if we declare our love and commitment to the risen Lord Jesus, to live a life empowered by His indwelling Holy Spirit, and to bring His Kingdom down to our needy world.

          

Christ in a time of lock-down

Jesus Appears to His Disciples

19 On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jewish leaders, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” 20 After he said this, he showed them his hands and side. The disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord.

21 Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” 22 And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. 23 If you forgive anyone’s sins, their sins are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.”  John 20 NIV

This was our reading set for Easter Tuesday, and it seemed more than usually appropriate in a time of lock-down. The disciples were fearful for their lives, they had all deserted Jesus in His hour of need, all the teaching that Jesus had given them about His resurrection had been forgotten, and their faith had evaporated. However, Jesus' love for them was the same as ever, death could not hold Him, and the most amazing event in history had happened. All the mighty power of the Godhead flowed back into the dead body of Jesus, and He was wonderfully brought back to life. The disciples' fear was turned into joy as they saw their beloved friend alive again. 

  

I wonder what the conversation was in that upper room before Jesus appeared. There would have been fear, anguish, recrimination,regrets, circular arguments of what could have been done, self-guilt and doubt; or perhaps just a gloomy silence as minutes and hours passed. I wonder how that compares with how you are feeling during lock-down.

Everything was changed in that room with the appearance of Jesus. Fear and gloom were dispelled by the return of their friend, and lives were instantly transformed as Jesus breathed back into them the breath of His spirit. 

Slowly, Jesus restored the little band of disciples, with Peter now as their spokesperson after his recommissioning by Jesus, after that miraculous catch of fish by the lake. Finally, when all had been achieved, Jesus ascended into heaven, watched by His friends. However, yet more patience was required, as they again waited in that upper room. Not now in fear but in obedient expectation, awaiting the promised power that was going to fall upon them. Constantly in patient prayer. Then a whole forty days later, during the feast of Pentecost, harvest came with a rushing mighty wind and tongues of fire. The gospel of Jesus broke out of lock-down in a mighty tidal wave of love, healing and evangelism which within a few years engulfed the whole known world, and a flame was lit which will never be extinguished. 

So let us wait patiently in our little rooms and houses, expectant that the risen Jesus will appear to us; let us pray for the Holy Spirit to fill us anew so that once this period of exclusion has finished, we can go out into a new wave of revival that will flow throughout the whole world.