Losing Confidence in Earthly Things

“Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him. A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?” He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.” (Mark 4:36-39).

Before you go to sea, you enjoy life on land. You are in control, and the ground beneath your feet is sure. But then a Destiny calls you into a boat. Hope summons you, and bids you leave the Known behind. That which is Sure and Dependable disappears from view.

The final Shoreline is heaven, and the hope of Glory does put us to Sea (after all, it caused Abraham to dwell in tents and Moses to forsake the treasures of Egypt).  But there is a closer Goal that causes you and I to leave the Known behind – we call it “the Call of God”. As with Jesus’ disciples then, so now we are looking forward to “the other side”. The weather is fair; the boat is seaworthy; the ocean is behaving itself.

We are enjoying the Ride. We feel a holy uniqueness. A great sense of Significance settles upon us, as we set out on the Unknown. We caress an inner Pride, that we are the true Pioneers, unlike those who have settled for land.

The Reality though is that we are just enjoying God’s grace in a changed Form. It was on land, and now it is on water. Then He gave us a facebrick house, with peace and pleasant neighbors. Now He has given us a trimmed boat, with gentle waves lapping against its sturdy hull.

Then...the wind and the waves come up. At first, we trust in the Boat. What is the Boat, if not our natural skills and reflexes, and our fellow human friends? To some, it is family. To others, their job. To many in the church, it is the Church herself.

We take a glance over the stern to see if we can head back. No land in view! So, we trim the sails, tighten the rigging and peer over the prow in the hope that New Land might just be a short swim away.

But no such luck. Because luck has nothing to do with it. God has not taken us on a Grand Journey as much as He has taken us aside to deal with Unbelief. As with Christ and Philip, God could transport us to the Next Stop in the blink of an eye. This time-space universe holds no bounds for the God Who created It.

No, as with Moses in Midian, David in Gath, Elijah in the cave and Jonah under the vine, God has You in a storm-tossed boat.

Now, the next decision is vital. God has initiated it already, by hiding His immanence in the incarnational body of Jesus. As then, so now - Jesus is Here in the boat. He seems unconcerned, uncaring, uncommunicative. But these are mere appearances.

He is waiting for you to make the next move. The same Lord bluffed the Syrophonicean woman, ignored the cries of the deaf man, pretended to walk further on the Road to Emmaus. That same Jesus sleeps - or seems to - while you weep, cry, panic.

The Question is, will you at last turn to Jesus, and cast your Final Hope upon Him? Your trust in dry land is gone. The glories of the Other Side are forgotten. The Friendly Sea has betrayed you. Your Sailing Skills are all but exhausted.

And still the storm does not abate. You sense nothing of the favor of Christ. There seem to be no Divine Transactions. The Skies rage, but Heaven is silent.

And then, from deep within our gut, the cry comes forth. “Master, careth Thou not that we perish?!”.

Your Master careth much! He shall not fail His Word, to bring you to the Other Side! All He is doing with us in our battered boats is stripping away our confidence in the earth, the sea, the sky and mankind’s clever inventions. The Father wants you and I to know and look to the Son. And become more like Him.

And as for you, maybe you would say today, “I failed the moment, and I have leapt overboard. I have forsaken my calling”. But I say to you, is not Christ also the great Whale that swallowed and kept Jonah safe beneath the Sea? No-one remembers you right now, but the God Who saved you will never forget nor forsake you – you are in His Son!

In the midst of the tempest, the disciples knew nothing of the Other Side. In the belly of the Whale, Jonah knew nothing of where they were going. But both knew the faithfulness, power and deliverance of God and His Christ.

So, may you find His grace in the storm, which is sufficient for you and I.

Nick

Fullness

"’I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly’. John 10:10

So, we are picking out this theme because this is, after all, what Christianity means, this is the Christian offer, the Christian possibility. Our whole trouble, surely, is that we fail to realize this: we are ever reducing the gospel, making something small out of it, something that we do, our practice of religion. The tragedy is that we think of our own selves, and our busy-ness, and our own activity instead of realizing that there is the wonderful possibility of receiving His fullness and more and more of it, ‘grace upon grace’, ‘springing up into everlasting life’. And this failure, it seems to me, is the greatest tragedy of all.

It was by its quality of life that the church conquered the ancient world, and that is how she has always conquered during times of reformation and revival. It is revival that has been the greatest means of evangelism, and revival means Christian people, members of the Christian church, suddenly being awakened by the power and the enlightenment of the Spirit to the possibilities of the Christian life. And there is no doubt, I repeat, that the trouble at the present time is that we are living so far short of what is offered us here and of what is possible to us.

Have we received of the Lord’s fullness? Are we receiving of it progressively? These are the all-important questions”.

DM Lloyd Jones, “The Possibilities of the Christian Life”, 1967.

Compassion's Passion

We live in a world full of knowledge and knowledge transfer. Power goes to him who receives and transfers the most and the fastest.

But Darwin has invaded our church relationships when discipleship boils down to teaching, when pastoring reduces to advice, when friendship shrinks to an Ideas Gallery.

And then come the valleys and potholes of life. The Crisis Moments. The private 9-11s. Now a friend is on the floor bleeding; then a church member is wounded deeply. Abuse, job loss, disease, death, inner torments.

And now and then we see how pale a shadow our loveless words and actions cast. O woe is me! How often I have felt myself to be a friend in need, a solid confidante, only now to see how often I gave the cold only a photo of a blanket, and the hungry only a drawing of a feast!

Jesus was genuinely and deeply “moved with compassion”. In Matthew chapters 9, 14, 15 and 20 He was stirred with this emotion, which literally means “to feel someone else's pain in one’s bowels, in the very seat and pit of love”..

And now Christ lives in me. His compassion is compressed within me.  The Person of the Holy Spirit is Resident. This is not something that needs to fall from the sky. Our faith, made manifest in God-inspired repentance, is what unleashes the force of heaven within us and about us.  What do I mean by "God-inspired repentance"? Well, scripture says in Acts 11 and 2 Tim 2 that God "grants repentance".  And as we embrace this,  our faith releases the Spirit’s power and fruit.

 
Yes, compassion is not listed specifically as a “Spirit fruit” in Galatians 5:22 - but kindness, goodness and gentleness are! Imagine a church with these fruit being given and eaten daily!! Imagine a world enjoying this from many Christians! This is revival!

Tender hearts, full of empathy, understanding - hearts quick to listen and slow to speak.

I stand convicted today. Lord, make us more compassionate for one reason only – because Christ dwells in our hearts through faith. Shine the Christ-light from us, that the broken and battered may come and find rest with us. May they not firstly find more teaching and good advice, but the love and power of God - the Kingdom come!

Now I understand a little more why the prostitutes and tax collectors loved being with Jesus. Even (especially?) for sinners, we need love them for one reason only – because the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge is at home in us. And wants to burst out of the front door of our lives with a smile on its face.

I close with the words of the Irish poet George William Russell, taken from his poem entitled “Love”:

Not alone, not alone would I go to my rest in the heart of the love:

Were I tranced in the innermost beauty, the flame of its tenderest breath,

I would still hear the cry of the fallen recalling me back from above,

To go down to the side of the people who weep in the shadow of death.

Many are asking for an opportunity to participate in the miracles of Jesus. May the miracle of Christ’s compassion be included heartily in such requests.

Nick