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Thy Kingdom Come 2024
Running from Ascension Day on Thursday 9th May until Pentecost on Sunday 19th May, Thy Kingdom Come is a global prayer movement for God’s mission in our world. We join with Christians from more than 100 countries in supporting this. There are two sets of Daily Reflections, so you are warmly invited to use the Novena Reflections (novena means ‘9 days’) or the Prayer Journal during this season.
Daily Inspiration in the Gospel of John returns on Monday 20th May.
Ascension Day 2024
Ascension Day (coming up on Thursday) is the great forgotten festival of the Church. To help redress the balance, in the days leading up to it, we’ll look at the passage in Acts where Jesus ascends into heaven, and ask ourselves: why does this matter? And how can we be inspired today?
Wednesday 8th May – Acts 1:8-11 ‘To the ends of the earth’
As a family we’ve been enjoying watching ‘Race across the world’ again on the TV over the last few weeks. The idea is simple: five pairs of people, with limited budgets, have to travel a huge distance. In last year’s series – our favourite, I think – the race was from one end of Canada to the other, which, with huge deviations north and south, totalled more than 16,000km. Along the way, that series in particular showcased the kindness of strangers (many of whom were quite obviously Christians) and some lovely healing in fraught family relationships – in other words a huge amount of grace amidst the race to be first.
We also saw some extraordinary landscapes. I must confess Canada has gone straight into the upper echelons of my ‘most want to visit’ list – both for the people and the amazing scenery. And it was a powerful thought to remind myself, as I watched one fantastic location after another: there is nowhere we can go on earth where Jesus cannot say, ‘this is mine’. It’s all His!
Apart from the escape to Egypt as an infant, as far as we know Jesus never travelled outside the land of his birth. All of his work was done, and his words were uttered, within approximately a 150-mile radius. And yet he is a global Messiah, his message is for the whole world. How can he spread his loving and merciful rule everywhere?
We need the Ascension: so that Jesus’ kingship can be declared to the ends of the earth. And this declaration will principally be through his followers, empowered by his Spirit. For as long as Jesus is limited by his human body, his message can only spread effectively as far as he can, within human constraints. But the ascended Jesus can empower his followers to witness on his behalf everywhere.
History from the time of Jesus’ Ascension is essentially a race across the world – to share the gospel, to make disciples of all nations, to declare the love and reign of Christ to hungry hearts. All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to him; and thanks to Pentecost, he is powerfully with us, even to the end of the age. As we look forward to celebrating Jesus’ Ascension tomorrow, let’s give thanks that we do so from every corner of the globe. And as we join with Christians in over a hundred countries to pray for Jesus’ mission as part of the Thy Kingdom Come prayer movement, may the Lord grant us grace to keep running our race, for His glory.
Tuesday 7th May – Acts 1:4-8 ‘Wait for the gift’
Today’s title is one that could often be said about my present-arranging skills. I’m not much good at remembering birthdays, I’ve lost count of the times that I’ve had to fess up to friends (or even family) that a gift was definitely coming – they just had to be patient, and wait a few days for it!
Probably my best/worst moment in this regard came when Alise and I got engaged. I had designed the ring myself (very romantic); but the ring took longer than planned to arrive, so wasn’t ready on the weekend when I had hoped to propose (not so romantic). After some stern words from one of my best friends, who told me in no uncertain terms that the act of proposing was far more important than whether the little box was ready, I did the deed the very next day, atop a mediaeval castle (romantic brownie points restored!). Alise just had to wait for the gift. (As a postscript, when the ring did arrive 2 weeks later, the fitting looked perfect, but was the wrong metal, so it had to be sent off again… d’oh!)
Nevertheless, the best gifts are worth waiting for. Today, Jesus tells his disciples to wait for the best gift of all (v4) – his very self, poured out into our hearts, by his Holy Spirit. It’s easy to forget that, when Jesus says these words, the disciples don’t know how long they will have to wait. Hours, days, weeks, months, years? All Jesus told them was to wait – and that the wait would be worth it: ‘you will receive power…’ (v8)
I wonder if that ten-day period of waiting felt interminably long, or refreshingly short? We’re told that they remained constantly in prayer (v14), which is tiring, so am guessing that by the Feast of Pentecost, they were starting to flag a bit. Waiting is hard.
If you’re anything like me, you’ll also have experiences of waiting for something from the Lord: sometimes it comes very quickly; and other times, it seems to take forever. We are God-chasers, but the chase can be a variable length. If you find yourself waiting on the Lord at present, let today be an encouragement – may it raise your faith to trust that the Lord will respond. You may or may not get the answer you long for: but he will certainly give you his powerful, soaking presence, sufficient for whatever life throws at you.
We need the Ascension: to call us to wait for the greatest gift of all. It’s a gift Jesus loves to keep on giving. ‘Keep being filled with his Spirit…’ (Eph 5:18) – may that be the reality for each of us today.
Monday 6th May – Acts 1:1-3 ‘Began to do’
In 2007 Alan Hirsch published a book called ‘The Forgotten Ways’. It posed the powerful question: when Jesus ascended back into heaven, he left just 120 active followers; when the Emperor Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire in 312AD, the Christian faith numbered approximately 10% of the entire population of the empire – or about 20 million people. During that 280 years, followers of Jesus had been heavily persecuted, their faith was essentially an underground movement. It had no buildings, no public officials and thousands of its followers had been executed during periodic pogroms.
So – and here comes the question – just how did this tiny group go from 120 to 20,000,000 (a 166,000-fold increase) in less than 300 years, with all those odds stacked against them? His follow-up question, and the reason for the book, was obvious: what can we learn from them today? What are ‘the forgotten ways’?
I won’t reprise his answers here; but as we look forward to Ascension Day on Thursday, I’m always struck by this little phrase at the beginning of the Book of Acts: (v1) ‘all that Jesus began to do and to teach.’ Surely Jesus had done plenty? More than just ‘begun’…?
But that’s the point: yes, he’d performed dozens of miracles – hundreds or thousands probably, of which 37 were recorded. Yes, he’d taught like no other teacher in history, and loved with a selfless, unconditional heart of humility that both amazed and scandalised those who saw it. Yes, he’d risen from the dead, the most extraordinary act of all.
And yet… and yet… it was just the beginning. What Jesus was limited in doing by the confines of a single human life – no matter how amazing that life was – would be limited no longer, once he ascended into heaven. After that, he could send something even more extraordinary: his very self, in the form of the Holy Spirit – the Spirit of Christ. Once this Spirit was poured out, then all followers of Jesus would be able to live as he lived. That’s what ‘Christian’ means – little Christ, little Jesus.
Now there are hundreds of millions of little Jesuses, trying to do and to teach, just as Jesus did and taught. We may each of us feel but a pale shadow of the Master. And that is true, up to a point – but even our small contributions, our loaves and fishes, make a difference.
We need the Ascension: to continue all that Jesus began. May the Lord graciously continue that (ascended) work in us, and through us, today.
John’s Gospel – Easter Season 2024
As we begin a new Sunday sermon series on the ‘I am’ statements of Jesus in John, our Daily Inspirations will likewise focus on this wonderful gospel for the next few weeks…
As our week closes, on Friday and Saturday we take another brief stroll in the Psalms (scroll down for Friday).
Saturday 4th May – Psalm 43 ‘The Postscript’
‘These two psalms [42 and 43] are certainly one and we cannot tell why they are divided.’ So begins the New Bible Commentary reflection on this psalm. We don’t know the answer to that one: if we treat them as one psalm, then what you have are three balanced stanzas – 42:1-5, 42:6-11, 43:1-5 – each of which finishes with the same refrain, and each of which has common phrases and elements: ‘why have you forgotten/rejected me?’; ‘why must I go about mourning?’; ‘how I used to go to the house of God/then I will go to the altar of God.’
Perhaps, today, I can suggest one reason. It’s only a guess, so this is not ‘gospel’: but maybe, just maybe, it’s because the message of this psalm is so vital, so powerful, and so common, that it deserves repetition.
Israel’s pattern of worship used daily psalms, as many Christian traditions do now. As we saw yesterday, the psalmist cries out to God in hope, but recognises that the answer – the satisfaction of his or her thirst – may not come immediately: ‘I will yet praise him.’ So why not return and ask again tomorrow? Why not acknowledge that this is a prayer we need to keep on praying?
This (pair of) heartfelt psalms is an internal dialogue of despair and hope. It recognises that finding or seizing real hope is hard, and needs repeated claiming. Just as v5 of Psalm 42 is followed by v6 – in other words, the call to put our hope in God is followed by another lament – so splitting off the third stanza into another psalm (to be said/sung/prayed another day or another time) allows for that dialogue to continue, and also allows for that repetition of the key call which concludes each ‘conversation’: to put our hope in God.
We are all weak, all prone to swings of despair and hope, doubt and faith, sadness and joy. The psalmist’s internal dialogues feel much like our own. Let’s not be ashamed of that, but rather acknowledge it, and keep repeating the message we need to claim, however falteringly. We may have said it yesterday, but we still need to hear it today, and for as long as it takes:
‘Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me. Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Saviour and my God.’ Amen, and amen.
Friday 3rd May – Psalm 42 ‘The Thirst’
July last year saw record temperatures across much of Europe, and in many other places around the world, too. In fact, a period of week or so early in the month was the hottest set of days on earth since detailed recording began, and 4th July was estimated to be the hottest day on earth for 100,000 years. I don’t propose to reflect on the causes or consequences of that, but the dominant image of thirst which begins this psalm has a certain amount of currency in our world at present.
Our climate in the UK is more temperate, but many of us remember 40C the previous July (2022), and most of us know what a raging thirst feels like. I think back to playing sport in the summer and the desperate need to rehydrate. Although the time I accidentally put washing-up liquid and not lime juice into a bottle of Soda Stream (remember those?) didn’t help me much! Tip: definitely don’t try that one at home.
Thirst is not just a physical thing – as today’s psalm makes clear. There is such a thing as spiritual thirst; and if physical thirst feels like a compulsion, then the same can be true spiritually as well. We can sense the desperation of the psalmist in the opening lines: (vv1-3) ‘As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go ands meet with God? My tears have been my food day and night….’
Like an animal pants, the psalmist cries, so they pant, too. They are desperate for God – particularly to sense the presence of God, to encounter him directly (v2). The context is a spiritually hostile climate, where people mock the reality of God (v3) and where worship has withered (v4). This causes a deep depression (v6, v9), experienced as practically a physical pain (v10), where weeping is normal (v3).
We all experience similar dry times in our spiritual lives. Times when God seems on mute, when we feel overwhelmed either by our own troubles, or by the sense of living as strangers in a hostile culture. I love this psalm because it gives voice to those feelings, those experiences. It names the pain, and the sensation of spiritual thirst.
But it also focuses our eyes beyond the thirst to the thirst-quencher. The psalmist takes himself/herself in hand in v5 and v11 – for all that their pain is real, it is not the end of the story. We are not on our own: we have somewhere we can put our hope, or rather Someone in whom we can put our hope. And the declaration is that we will yet praise God again. Note the ‘yet’ – it may take time, but like all things, this too shall pass. We will know the Lord’s presence again, our thirst will be satisfied, we will yet praise Him.
If this psalm speaks particularly to you today, claim the whole of it; name the pain, the thirst, but hold onto v5 and v11 – because, despite everything, we will yet praise him, our Saviour and our God.
Thursday 2nd May – John 9:1-3 ‘Displaying the works of God’
Human beings are innate meaning-makers. Unique in all creation, we do not accept things as they are – we ask ‘why’. We are wired to make order out of chaos, to find and create meaning. This often brings huge benefits; but, when faced with things outside our control, we often struggle, or attempt to impose a meaning. Think of Job’s friends: for a week they did everything right – they sat with Job in supportive silence. But then… they couldn’t resist trying to work out why Job had suffered. There must be a reason, someone must be to blame!
Job’s friends are much like us – and much like the disciples in today’s passage, as we begin chapter 9 and reflect on another outstanding miracle of Jesus. Despite the basic lesson of the book of Job, a sense persisted among God’s people that any form of disability must be some sort of curse or judgement. It was partly a misinterpretation of God’s original promises in the Books of the Law (the Torah): whilst the Lord made it clear that obedience brought blessings and disobedience brought curses, this was primarily applied to the land and to the nation’s security, not to individuals. It was the later rabbinic traditions that took this principle beyond its biblical limits, to teach that individual afflictions must have a root cause in something.
So, although it might seem shocking to us, it was perfectly natural, within the context of the time, for the disciples to ask the question that they did: (v2) ‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? Someone must be to blame! Jesus’ answer was remarkable, even revolutionary: (v3) ‘Neither.’ Before we get onto the next part of Jesus’ answer, let’s pause there; in one word, Jesus is radically challenging the way their faith was being badly taught, what we might call ‘folk religion’ today. It’s the wrong question, Jesus is saying – no-one is to blame, no-one is being punished. Let’s look at this the other way round…
And so he continues: ‘… but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.’ The obvious direction of this reply is to do with the miracle Jesus is about to perform. No blindness, no miracle. Jesus takes the man’s situation and transforms it – because that’s what Jesus does.
But we can go further. The risk of thinking of Jesus’ reply only in terms on the miracle is that it limits the ‘works of God’ in this man. Jesus is also challenging his friends to look beyond the man’s disability. This man is perfectly capable of displaying the works of God, whether he is blind or not. Blindness is no barrier, either to the kingdom of God or to a fruitful, godly and Spirit-filled life.
Whatever we carry, whatever we bear, God is able to display his work in us. Our fallen nature (v2) does not rule it out, because we worship a God of grace and of transformation. May the Lord continue that work of grace and transformation in us – and in all whom we pray for today.
Wednesday 1st May – John 8:48-59 ‘Before Abraham, I am!’
The Christian doctrine of the Trinity is one we’ll never full get our heads around. The idea that God is 3-in-1 and 1-in-3 – one being, three natures. I get asked a lot about it, and why it matters so much. And the way I generally reply is that, since we live our physical lives in three dimensions, I want to worship a 3-dimensional God.
The Trinity gives us a rich vision of God. It allows us to worship a God who is both transcendent and intimate – he’s not just ‘up there’ or ‘down here’, he’s both. It also explains how we know that God is love. The truest form of love in the biblical sense is not a feeling, it’s a practical word – it manifests itself in action. We know that God is love because he has relationship within himself: three natures, each of whom love and serve the others in a perfect interdependent community of love. God’s love for us and for all creation flows out of what exists within himself, as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. (As an aside it also helps to explain why we as humans have a unique capacity for building community and a unique desire to love and be loved – it’s at the heart of what it means to bear the image of God.)
So, although the understanding of the Trinity developed over time, it was there at the beginning. It was not a case that God was alone, and then along came Jesus (making two) and then the Spirit (making three). God was always 3-in-1, from eternity.
John has a unique insight into this: he begins his gospel by telling us that the Word (Jesus) was there with God at the beginning – along with the Spirit, which is already attested in at the start of Genesis. And now, in today’s passage, Jesus declares it openly. He continues his debate with his opponents, whose own contributions have, by this stage, descended into lies and slander – note he is accused in v48 of being a Samaritan (untrue, he was born in Judah, grew up in Israel and is descended from one of the twelve tribes) and demon-possessed i.e. that he gets his spiritual power from the wrong source.
And the debate hinges on two inter-related topics: whether there is eternal life, and who inherits the blessings given to Abraham. It’s worth noting that the idea that there is life after death only developed clearly in Jewish thinking quite late. There are hints throughout the scriptures, but even in Jesus’ day, many did not believe in it as a reality for all God’s people; they were led by the Sadducees, who tried to argue with Jesus about it elsewhere (see Mark 12:18-27).
Jesus is accused of undermining, not just traditions which go back to Abraham, but even Abraham himself (vv52-53). And Jesus contests this in two ways: first he insists that Abraham ‘rejoiced at the thought of seeing my day’ (v56). And second, and more explosively, that he pre-existed Abraham: (v58) ‘Before Abraham was born, I am!’ This is dynamite – a clear assertion by Jesus that he has divine status, that he is not just sent by God, but is God himself. He is using a Greek form of God’s holy name, and indicating that he already possesses (eternal) life within himself.
No wonder they got mad! But as we read this extraordinary encounter today, we can joyfully affirm the truth of what Jesus declared to the crowds: that he is the Son of God, who has life within himself. He didn’t just appear ‘out of nowhere’ – he was, and is, and is to come. He is the Alpha and Omega, there at the beginning, with us now, and reigning for all eternity. Before Abraham was born, he is. Before we were born, he is. And for generations to come, he is. Before your day began, he is, and when it ends, he is. He is your eternally present source of life. Of course he will sustain you today!
Tuesday 30th April – John 8:34-47 ‘Disputed parentage’
In 1854, aged 25, Roger Tichborne, heir to his family’s title and fortunes, was presumed to have died in a shipwreck. His mother never accepted that he was dead and advertised extensively in the press, offering a reward for information. Twelve years later, a butcher known as Thomas Castro came forward, claiming to be Roger Tichborne himself. The case caused a sensation – amazingly he was accepted by Lady Tichborne as her son, but not by other members of the family, who sought to expose him as an impostor. Years of legal wrangling followed – the claimant was eventually charged with perjury and sentenced to 14 years in prison in 1874 – the jury declaring him to be a third person – neither Roger, nor Thomas, but Arthur Orton!
It’s a fascinating piece of history, but the question that lies at the heart of the case is exactly the same as the one posed by our passage today: how can you prove who your parents are? Although the context is very different, the answer to the Tichborne case and to Jesus’ dispute with the Pharisees in John 8 is the same: it’s your behaviour which gives it away. The assumed ‘Roger Tichborne’ was apparently coarse and uneducated, which seemed very odd for the heir to a noble family. No amount of protesting that years as a butcher in Australia had changed his manners fooled people. The gentle-born, privately educated young gent who disappeared could not have changed so much.
And Jesus makes the same point to the Pharisees: if God was really their Father, they would live differently – they would embrace Jesus’ teaching (v38), they would love him (v42) and listen to his testimony (v43), and they certainly would not try to kill him (v37, v40)! Deliberately attempting to frustrate the work of God is behaviour that comes from an entirely different source: the devil (v44).
This fairly blunt assessment, of course, does not go down well. But in saying these things Jesus does tease out one very clear message: he tells the truth, whereas the raison d’etre of the devil is to lie – indeed, he is ‘the father of lies.’ I find it challenging that in our typical hierarchy of sins we tend to put lying quite a long way down the list. Violence, abuse, sexual sin, theft and slander would come near the top of most people’s lists, and lying is often downplayed as fibs, whoppers, spin, alternative facts or – in a phrase attributed to Winston Churchill – ‘I did not lie, I made a terminological inexactitude’!
But Jesus, it turns out, takes lying a whole lot more seriously. Indeed, he sees it as the critical distinction between living God’s way or the alternative. Let’s be clear: life has grey areas and differences of opinion, and there is nothing wrong with honestly agreeing to disagree. But today’s passage remains a powerful word to our ‘post-truth’ culture: Jesus is definitely not ‘post-truth’!
Holding fast to the truth in all situations is incredibly hard – today’s passage causes me to cry out in prayer for more grace, more divine assistance to live with this kind of transparency and authenticity. Perhaps it does the same for you, too. Take heart: Jesus is the truth, he gives us a permanent place in the family of God (vv35-36), and he is in the business of setting all of us free. May God grant us all grace to live in the truth, by the truth and with the glorious truth in our hearts that if the Son (who speaks all truth) sets us free, then we will be free indeed. Even us. Even today. Amen.
Monday 29th April – Psalm 34 ‘The Taste’
I’ve always loved my food. I don’t have a big appetite, but I enjoy eating pretty much everything – finding as much joy in cheese and beans on toast as a gourmet dish. At school it became a lunchtime ritual for my friends to dare me to taste a bit of everything together, including mains and pudding. Like Remy in the film ‘Ratatouille’, you’d be amazed what surprising flavour combinations you can experience!
Today’s psalm reminds us of another kind of taste, albeit in many ways a spiritual version of tasting a bit of everything together in life: (v8) ‘Taste and see that the Lord is good.’ It was written after a particularly dramatic moment in David’s story (you can read the whole saga in 1 Samuel 21): fleeing from King Saul, and effectively under arrest with the Philistine king Achish (introduced in the starting notes to the psalm by the royal name Abimelek or Abimelech, depending on your translation) he pretended to be mad and was eventually run out of town.
What is instructive about David’s take on this escape is that he attributes its success not to his cunning, but to the Lord’s intervention and protection: (v6) ‘This poor man called, and the Lord heard him; he saved him out of all his troubles.’ In other words, although David took initiative, he knew that unless God changed the heart of King Achish, he was done for. David was rightly afraid (v4); but he recognises another, fruitful ‘fear’ – better translated as ‘awe’ or ‘reverence’ – the fear of the Lord. It is this reverent awe which invites both the Lord’s protection (v7) and provision (v9).
On this occasion, David wants to use his experience not just to testify but to teach (v11). He has learnt invaluable lessons, but, in the second half of the psalm, he wants to make sure we learn them, too. He is candid that even the righteous will have many troubles (v19), many challenges in this life – but we can trust the Lord to deliver us.
And so, back to the key verse of this psalm: to anyone who faces challenges, David’s advice is simple: ‘taste and see that the Lord is good’. In other words, give trusting God a try. Taste and see. See what happens, see what the Lord is able to do.
It’s great advice, and one which increasingly I offer to those who ask me. My years of Christian leadership and training have given me lots of arguments to persuade people; but in the end, what turns a person’s heart to the Lord most often is simply to ‘taste and see’. If God is real – as we know he is – then he’ll come through, we will experience that reality for ourselves. So, whatever you face today, may that be your reality, too. And as we recognise that the Lord’s eyes and ears are turned towards us (v15), let us exalt his name together!
Saturday 27th April – Psalm 19 ‘The Voice’
No, not Tom Jones this time! As great a singer as he is…. Here’s a quote from St. Augustine instead:
‘Some people, in order to discover God, read books. But there is a great book: the very appearance of created things. Look above you! Look below you! Read it. God, whom you want to discover, never wrote that book with ink. Instead, He set before your eyes the things that He had made. Can you ask for a louder voice than that?’
Today’s marvellous Psalm – one of many people’s favourites – is all about the voice of God; and it reminds us that God really has two voices (or, you might say, one voice which speaks in two different ways). The first is the obvious one: his Word. Verses 7-11 are a beautiful exposition of the power of God’s Word, and our delight in them. As the Psalmist says: (v10) ‘they are more precious than gold…. they are sweeter than honey.’ In essence, it’s why I write these inspirations day-by-day: because this psalm is true, and my desire is to keep treasuring the voice of God, and the sweetness of its insight.
But there is a second voice, which forms the first half of the psalm. It is the voice of creation. Take, for example, the awesome experience of looking up into the vast sky, to see the clouds or the stars: (vv3-4) ‘they have no speech, they use no words; no sound is heard from them. Yet their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.’
We are in a season when we can appreciate the full ‘voice’ of creation. Today, let’s set aside a few moments to contemplate and celebrate both ‘voices’ of the Lord: his Word, and also his other voice: the Voice of creation. And may the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer. Amen.
Friday 26th April – Psalm 30 ‘The Exaltation’
In February 2023 a 19-month old toddler was rescued safely from a 50-ft well in Thailand. The well had been newly dug, but had been carelessly left uncovered after it failed to strike water. The toddler spent 18 hours at the bottom before being lifted to safety, thanks to a huge team, careful digging and a strong red rope. Her successful rescue made news around the world, and thankfully she suffered only minor injuries.
Today’s Psalm is all about lifting, too. Two liftings, in fact. What occasioned the Psalm is David being ‘lifted out of the depths’ (v1) – by God. We’re not sure if David is referring to specific physical danger, or if the image is primarily spiritual. But, like the toddler, David sees himself as helpless unless it is God who lifts him out: (v2) ‘Lord my God, I called to you for help and you healed me… you spared me from going down to the pit.’
The pit is an ancient way of understanding death, and thanks to his survival, David too does some ‘heavy lifting’ of his own. The word exalt means to ‘lift up’, and what David wants to do is exalt (lift up) the Lord himself. As David has been lifted by God, so now he lifts up God’s name, and his glorious qualities: his capacity for healing (v2) and for mercy (v3), his holiness (v4), and most significantly in this psalm, his favour (v5).
What David says about God in v5 is such an important message for us to hear. We often think of God as being, if not angry, then mostly disappointed with us. But David says that the opposite is actually true: (v5) ‘his anger lasts only a moment, but his favour lasts a lifetime.’
The Puritan writer Thomas Goodwin draws the contrast between God’s ‘strange work’ and his ‘natural work’, when describing the text in Deuteronomy that God’s punishment passes down three or four generations, but his love lasts for a thousand generations. In other words, as Goodwin interprets, God’s strange work is punishment, but his natural work is love. Or, as David says here in this psalm: ‘his anger lasts only a moment, but his favour lasts a lifetime.’
Wherever you find yourself today, take heart from this beautiful truth. If it is a time for weeping, remember that, in the Lord, rejoicing comes in the morning (v5). If it is a time to wail, then eventually we will find ourselves able to dance (v11). May this wonderful thought cause our spirits to exalt the Lord, too, that our hearts may sing his praises and not be silent (v12). Amen!
Thursday 25th April – John 8:31-36 ‘True freedom’
If you were to pick one word which defines our worldview in the West, it might well be ‘freedom’. It runs through much of our culture, in many guises (and disguises). But freedom is a slippery word, it can mean lots of things. In modern Western society, we usually mean individual rights and the opportunity to do what I/we want (within legal limits, though not always). It is essentially freedom from – from constraints, whether imposed by government, religion or just other people.
But does this make people free? Imagine taking a journey across a barren landscape: perhaps you’ve experienced a wilderness area in your own travels. How do you know where you’re going? What we need are the ‘constraints’ of roads (or paths) and signs. These ‘restrictions’ imposed on our journey actually make us more free, not less.
Freedom, it turns out, is only experienced within healthy boundaries. When God gave Eden to the first humans, he only gave them one boundary – don’t eat from this one tree – and we didn’t like it, we rebelled against the idea of any restrictions and, tempted by the seductive lie of power as freedom, we crossed that boundary, too. The result was less freedom, not more.
So where is true freedom to be found? Jesus’ answer is very clear: (v32) ‘the truth will set you free’. Our culture surrounds itself with seductive lies: just as in Eden, just as in first-century Israel. But it is the God-created ‘boundaries’ of truth which enable us to be truly free. This truth is found in Jesus, and Jesus alone: (v36) ‘if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.’ As the true human, he knows what enables humanity to flourish. It’s not ‘do as I say and not as I do’ – but live as I live and you will be truly free.
So much of our culture asks: ‘where is the power to live well?’ Today we have the answer: the power is in the truth, the truth found in Jesus Christ, Son of God, the Word made flesh, the author of life. And anyone who finds this truth finds real freedom.
Today, give thanks that Jesus comes to set us free. May we rejoice again in the life-giving freedom of his truth, and, whatever seductive lies our culture whispers in our ear, let’s ask (and keep asking) for more grace to live in this freedom. For if the Son sets us free, we will be free indeed. Amen!
Wednesday 24th April – John 8:21-30 ‘From above’
Anyone who reads newspapers online will be familiar with the terms ‘above the line’ and ‘below the line’. For those of you who still read an actual paper (and we all need things to line our food recycling bins!), ‘above the line’ refers to the articles printed by the journalists themselves; ‘below the line’ refers to comments which readers can submit in response to the articles. It’s like a conversation generated by reading the article.
In many ways, you could summarise the task of online journalism nowadays as being to inform, and where necessary persuade, those ‘below the line.’ Needless to say, anyone who reads the comments below the line will see a variety of responses: from thoughtful reflections and sometimes helpful corrections, to bile and blatant prejudice, where it’s quite clear that the person hasn’t read the article properly, or maybe has read it but hasn’t wanted their own view challenged – they hear only what they want to hear, anything that backs up what they thought all along.
In many ways, this idea of ‘above’ and ‘below the line’ is very much the context for today’s passage. Jesus is debating with his opponents (the Pharisees) most of whom, it seems, have already decided against Jesus, and therefore are determined to hear only what they want to hear. They have long since abandoned any pretence at an open mind; the questions they ask are more designed to catch him out than a genuine attempt to learn something new.
The fundamental sticking point is whether Jesus really has been sent from God. Numerous times Jesus has referred to his Father (recently in v16, v18 and v19) as the one who has sent him, and also the one who testifies on his behalf (via the scriptures and Jesus’ miracles) and to whom Jesus is accountable. In that sense, Jesus is – as he says here – ‘from above’ (v23). In other words, he has come from God (the Father): he is the Word made flesh, as John so beautifully puts it at the start of the gospel.
But the Pharisees reject this, refusing to admit either the evidence of Jesus’ miracles (signs), or the references to God’s anointed in the scriptures. This is why Jesus describes them as ‘from below’. They are bound to earthly thinking, rejecting what you might call ‘heavenly’ evidence. As a result, Jesus warns them strongly of the consequences of this (v21, repeated in v24).
There is, though, one final proof which Jesus refers to, one which is yet to come: (v28) ‘When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am he.’ Remarkable as it sounds, the ultimate proof of Jesus’ heavenly identity is his scandalous execution – the ultimate self-giving sacrifice paid by our glorious self-giving God.
This self-giving God turns the values of our world upside-down. The One from above inverts the wisdom of the world below. And, despite fierce opposition, the passage finishes in hope: (v30) ‘Even as he spoke, many believed in him.’ The glorious truth is that in doing so, those ‘from below’ are united with the One ‘from above’. This is our truth, too: may the Lord grant us grace to hold fast to the One ‘from above’ – and, like Jesus, may we know the abiding presence of the Father with us (v29) – today, and every day.
Tuesday 23rd April – John 8:12-20 ‘The Light of the World’
Light is one of the universal religious metaphors in our world. Jews have Hanukkah, or festival of lights; Hindus and Sikhs have Diwali; Buddhists talk about the path to enlightenment. Light is one of the few images to have almost universally positive connotations. 1.5 million people each year even take about 12 million trips to Blackpool for its illuminations, and other attractions, making it the second most popular single European tourist destination after St Peter’s in Rome. Strange but true.
So, what is it about the Christian understanding of light that makes it so distinctive? What have we got to say about it that sheds any unique, well, I have to use the word, light on the subject? Or is today’s passage just a Christian version of something which all religions can aspire to?
It all comes down to the source: lots of religious teaching on light says: ‘this is the light’. Only Jesus says: I am the light. And not just for my followers, for the whole world: (v12) ‘Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.’
In saying ‘I am the light,’ Jesus is not just pointing to his divine identity, he is saying some other vital things as well: first, I am the source of life. Matter needs light to grow – the ancients didn’t have the scientific proof of photosynthesis, but they knew it all the same. As chapter 1 of John says: ‘in Jesus was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.’ We don’t just need sunlight, we need Son-light. Today’s word from Jesus is an invitation to life, life in all its fullness. Where is Jesus inviting you to enter more fully into his life?
Second, Jesus is telling us that he is the source of truth. Returning to ch1, the Light is also the Word, or as Psalm 119 famously puts it: ‘your word is a lamp to my feet and a…? light to my path.’ Light and truth are connected – think of the phrase ‘to shed light’ on things. Jesus’ light is there to guide us, to direct our paths. So, our second invitation from Jesus for today is: is there something in your life where you need Jesus’ light for your path? Why not ask him to shine his light, to help you see the way ahead?
Finally, Jesus is telling us that he is the source of goodness. This is the more challenging aspect, one which Jesus refers to in chapter 3 of John: ‘Whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God.’ When we come into Jesus’ light, it both causes us to grow, but also shines a light into the dark places, it exposes things which Jesus wants to heal or to change. So, our third invitation from Jesus for today is: is there something ‘dark’ in your life where you need Jesus’ light?
Jesus invites us, today and every day, to come into his light. To experience his life, to shine his light on the paths of our life, and to expose the things which need to change or heal. By God’s grace, will you accept that invitation today? Whoever follows him will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. Amen.
Monday 22nd April – John 7:53-8:11 ‘The divine balance’
Well, this is good way to start the week – with one of the most hotly contested passages in the whole of scripture! The majority of the early manuscripts of the bible don’t have it, so the million-dollar question is this: was it originally part of John’s gospel but was taken out because it was too scandalous to include it? (There were whispers that people might incorrectly conclude that Jesus appeared to be condoning adultery.) Or was it not part of the original text but was added later – invented or otherwise – as an example of Jesus’ radical compassion?
The truth is that we can’t be sure, this side of heaven. However, very few bibles are brave enough to leave it out altogether – it usually appears in italics or brackets! My own personal view, for what it’s worth, is that, if the story in its original context would have shocked its readers, it’s more likely to have been taken out than put in. Why include it otherwise?
So, if we tentatively conclude that this was a real encounter, then what do we learn? At this point we hit the second reason why this is such a hotly contested passage: here we see Jesus as both radically compassionate and radically holy. Sadly, our culture has too many voices which want binary answers, even in the church: we have to be either this or that, we can’t be both. It is a particular shibboleth in our current discourse that we can’t love people and challenge them. Compassion and holiness are put on opposite sides of an ideological chasm, with people shouting at each other across the divide.
And this is one of those passages most used as a peg for people’s hobby horses, especially in this particular debate – which is a tragedy because what we see here is one of the best examples in all of scripture of what a God who is both perfectly holy and perfectly loving actually looks like.
When faced with the woman’s accusers, Jesus responds first with compassion. He points out their hypocrisy and abuse of power. Much easier to point the finger than to examine our own hearts! But he doesn’t ignore the sin which led to her accusation, either. Having defended and protected her, he also challenges her to change the way she lives: ‘Go now and leave your life of sin.’ Great compassion and great conviction. Radical love, radical holiness.
How we need this divine balance today! Real discipleship involves both radical compassion and radical challenge. Jesus’ heart always tends towards mercy – and praise God that it does! But, having embraced us as we are, he loves us too much to leave us as we are. We are called to a new life, which conforms to the divine blueprint the Lord has laid out for us. So, today, if you’re aware of a part of your life that falls short of what God desires for you – first, receive his forgiveness and loving embrace. And then, hear his voice calling you to leave it behind. Pray for grace to keep going, and growing. That is the way of Christ. Amen.
Saturday 20th April – John 7:45-52 ‘Heart-warming’
The journey to faith takes many forms. Occasionally it is instant – someone hears the good news and responds with joy. Sometimes God intervenes miraculously – many years ago I was asked to organise a group which included a young woman who’d come to faith on an Alpha course. This was not uncommon in our church; however, she had found out about the course in an amazing way. Her partner had been given a flier whilst walking through the train station on the way home from work. He’d got home and thrown it in the bin – later that evening, she too had gone to put something on the same bin and had noticed the flier. She picked it out of the bin, decided to attend, and came to faith in Christ. And all because her partner had thrown a flier in the bin!
Most often, however, our journey towards Christ is precisely that – a journey. Research suggests it takes an average of four years from someone first hearing the message to putting their faith in Christ. In today’s passage, we see part of that journey in one individual, someone we’ve already met in John’s gospel: Nicodemus. This was the Pharisee who came to see Jesus secretly at night in chapter 3. He wanted to know more – but he was scared to be seen doing so, and struggled to understand what Jesus was teaching. The encounter ends and we’re left wondering what Nicodemus made of it.
Today, we get evidence that God is very much at work in Nicodemus’ heart – while his colleagues are busy slandering Jesus (v47) and anyone who believes in him (v49), Nicodemus sticks up for Jesus and reminds them of the principles of their law (vv50-51). Even if he is not yet ready to nail his colours to the mast, he has clearly moved towards Jesus since his late-night encounter, and has also overcome his initial fear of being seen to be doing so.
Nicodemus is on the journey – and in fact he appears one more time, in remarkable circumstances: by the cross, helping Joseph of Arimathea to take Jesus’ body down. In three episodes – the night encounter, the defence here in chapter 7, the witness by the cross – John marvellously sketches out the journey of one man towards his Lord.
Your story may be different – but it is also a story of God at work. Like Nicodemus there will be important episodes. Like Nicodemus, the Lord is drawing you to himself. As we close our week, give thanks that, like Nicodemus, you have a story. Maybe take a few moments to reflect on that story: of how God made – and makes – himself real to you. And wherever you are on your journey, may the Lord continue to draw you to himself.
Friday 19th April – John 7:37-44 ‘Living water’
In the time of Jesus, the Festival of Tabernacles – or Sukkot – was essentially what we would call a Harvest Festival, taking place in the autumn. On the last day of this festival, which was (and is) celebrated in Jerusalem every year, it was traditional to enact a water ritual, one connected with the need for rain the following year. We need water for life, and the festival reminded every devout Jew of this truth.
Jesus knew that, too – but at this particular Festival of Tabernacles, he stood up a declared a radically different interpretation, one which would change the world: (v37-38) ‘Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.’
For all that we need physical water, Jesus insists, we need spiritual water, too. And we find this water in Jesus. Indeed, we find more than that: once the life of Jesus flows within us, it has the capacity to flow out from us, too. A year or two later, John experienced this for himself, gathered with the other disciples seven weeks after Jesus had risen from the dead. The Holy Spirit – the living water – was poured out on them; and, just as Jesus had promised, not only were they filled, the ‘water’ poured out into the community as well. New languages were given, new boldness to declare the good news flourished in their hearts, and new followers were baptised.
So, John is confident to add his interpretation to what Jesus said: (v39) ‘By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive.’ The same Spirit available to us now, and to all who confess the name of Jesus. Hallelujah!
What is more debated is which scriptures Jesus was referring to. Is it partly a reference to the Exodus miracle of water gushing from the rock (Exodus 17)? Or a reference to God’s great invitation through the prophet Isaiah (55:1)? Possibly – my own view, for what it’s worth, is that the background is found in Ezekiel 47, and the wonderful vision of water flowing from the temple. Since Jesus ‘is’ the new temple (see John 2:19-22), then these are the streams of living water Ezekiel foresaw. And when the Spirit comes to dwell in us – and not just with us (John 14:17) – these streams can flow from within a human soul out into our families and community, flooding the streets of our world with the grace of Christ.
The message divided people then (vv40-43) – and still does, today. But it is our glorious reality. The water of life is there for us to drink. May the Lord grant us all grace to drink deeply today, and so to find grace not just for streams within, but also flowing out to the world around us. Amen.
Thursday 18th April – John 7:25-36 ‘Identity check’
Nowadays much of life relies on proving our identity – there are many things we can’t do without it: get married, open a bank account, fly on a plane. And we’ve mostly got used to having ‘photo ID’, like a passport or a driving licence, to demonstrate that we are who we say we are.
And that last observation goes to the heart of today’s passage – it’s full of questions (six in just twelve verses), but could be summarised with this one question: Jesus, how do we know that you are who you say you are?
Jesus’ answer picks up where we left off yesterday. His identity as the Messiah is validated ultimately through the experience of following him: it’s a step of trust and obedience which, as he promises, will demonstrate that he is the Anointed One: (v17) ‘Anyone who chooses to do the will of God will find out whether my teaching comes from God, or whether I speak on my own.’
In contrast, the debates among the people are limited either to unscriptural myths, like the one we see in v27 – ‘when the Messiah comes, no-one will know where he is from’ – or from the excitement generated his miracles (v31). And, of course, the miracles are important signs: they point to his identity. But Jesus is clear that signs alone are not enough. His authority as one sent from God (v28), his mission (v33) and his message (v26) underpin the very visible confirmation provided by the miracles.
The problem is: it is those fundamental things that are being doubted or opposed – and this explains why Jesus appears to contradict a famous verse in Luke: ‘seek and you will find’. Here, he says the opposite to those debating with him: (v34) ‘You will look for me, but you will not find me.’ The word ‘look’ in this verse is the same as the word ‘seek’ in Luke – what’s going on?
It all comes back to trust. Jesus’ famous promise in Luke was made after he gave his followers the Lord’s Prayer. To those who have prayed ‘your kingdom come, your will be done’ all the wisdom and provision of heaven is available – those who seek will find. But to those who refuse to acknowledge God’s revelation of his Anointed One (Messiah), then the door will remain closed until they take that step of trust.
Today, choose to take that step of trust – it is a daily call, whether we’ve never taken that step before, or done it thousands of times over many decades. The promise is the same: Jesus invites you to receive all that he has for you, to seek and to find. For the kingdom, the power and the glory are his, now and forever. Amen.
Wednesday 17th April – John 7:14-24 ‘The right education?’
Of the 57 British Prime Ministers since Robert Walpole first served in this office in 1721, 44 studied at Oxford or Cambridge; for their schooling, 20 attended Eton, a further 26 another private school – just 11 had a non-fee-paying education. 9 attended both Eton and Christchurch College, Oxford.
However, if you think this is just an extreme example of the vagaries of the British class system, think again – this kind of link between education, privilege and power is nothing new. Go back 2,000 years and you’ll see a similar version of it operating in Israel during the time of Jesus. Wealthy families provided most of the rabbis, and the system self-perpetuated as other wealthy families sent their bright children (boys, inevitably) to train under the best-regarded rabbis. It was an elite circle; not quite a closed shop, but when a rabbi with a northern accent (and Nazareth was the geographical equivalent of Sheffield) starts making waves it’s no surprise that the first thing people start asking is: (v15) ‘How did this man get such learning without having been taught?’
The question is loaded, of course: it’s not that Jesus hasn’t been taught, it’s just that he hasn’t had the right education or gone to the ‘right’ schools. He’s an outsider, the equivalent of the academically brilliant comprehensive lad at Oxford who suffers put-downs because he doesn’t know how to hold a fish-knife or pass the cruet correctly. And Jesus has met this attitude before – even one of his own disciples, when first hearing of Jesus, had the same instinctive response: ‘Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?’ (1:46)
Jesus’ reply addresses the question in three different ways. First, he makes it clear that his wisdom comes direct from God (v16). Second, he points out that this is not just something that has to be taken on trust – if they really knew the law, they would know that his teaching has divine wisdom embedded in it. The problem is that they don’t really know their scriptures as well as they think they do. Centuries of interpretation, layer upon layer, have blinded them to what some of their law was intended to mean – for example, they’d missed the point completely on matters of the Sabbath (vv22-24).
Third, the truth of what Jesus teaches only becomes obvious when you try to actually live it: (v17) ‘Anyone who chooses to do the will of God will find out whether my teaching comes from God.’ And again, the issue here with his critics is that ‘not one of you keeps the law’ (v19). This is not a question of ‘interpretation’ but obedience. Jesus calls us not just to believe but to ‘repent and believe’ – i.e. to follow, to change our lives (which is what ‘repent’ really means). Then his wisdom becomes embedded with divine authority and blessing in our lives.
Today, give thanks that God doesn’t care what school you went to! Jesus looks at the heart; and beyond that, to the life. Those who follow Jesus know the true value of his teaching. May the Lord grant us all grace to follow today, and so to find abundant life.
Tuesday 16th April – John 7:1-13 ‘A change of mind?’
Can the Son of God change his mind?
That might sound like a fanciful question, the sort of thing that gets theologians agitated but nobody else… however, when you think about it, it is quite a significant question to answer. How human is Jesus? If he really is the divine Son made flesh, with (in theory) access to all the wisdom of the universe, is it possible for him to make a decision and then change his mind some time later? Would that mean he is just a great human being after all?
It was certainly a question that vexed the scribes responsible for copying out precious portions of John’s gospel. Here, in today’s passage, Jesus says one thing to his brothers: (v8) ‘I am not going up to this festival;’ and then, some time later, he apparently changes his mind and goes anyway (v10). What are we to make of it?
Some theologians have suggested that Jesus knew all along that he would be going, he just wanted to do it secretly – but that would then put Jesus dangerously close to lying, since he was quite clear with his brothers that he wasn’t going. And one thing pretty much all of us can agree on is that Jesus doesn’t lie. That would certainly imperil his identity as the Son of God, the one sinless human being there’s ever been.
Some scribes – probably monks and therefore followers of Jesus who took their sacred task very seriously indeed – came up with another solution: add the word ‘yet’ to Jesus’ conversation with his brothers; so, verse 8 is written in some surviving manuscripts as: ‘I am not yet going up to this festival.’ This conveniently resolves two problems – Jesus misinforming his brothers and/or changing his mind – but creates another: would his ‘time’ really have come so quickly after he had just said it didn’t?
It comes back again to our question: can Jesus change his mind? For what it’s worth, this is where we need to accept that Jesus is both fully divine and fully human. He has all the authority of the universe, but he is also subject to exactly the same limitations as the rest of us: he gets hungry, he gets tired, he cries and yes, dare I say it, he also changes his mind sometimes. He knows the general trajectory of what he is called to do, but it is not mapped out in minute detail, so that every step is pre-planned and micro-managed. So, he can tell his brothers he’s staying in Galilee, and then think better of it later.
Personally, I find this a great encouragement. It makes Jesus all the more relatable. Yes, we worship him, we stand in awe of him. But he also calls us to follow him, and I take great heart from the fact that Jesus has to wrestle with exactly the sort of tricky decisions we do – and if need be, change his mind.
Jesus knows what you face: our ‘normal’ challenges, with grey areas and ‘judgement calls’. So, take these to him today. Trust him to direct your paths. And do that, trusting that, even in our failings and weaknesses, he can turn these things to good, for those who love him. Amen.
Monday 15th April – John 7:1-9 ‘A change of heart’
On one of the shelves in my study, I have a woodcut of a famous drawing: ‘Praying Hands’ by Albrecht Durer. Durer was one of the great artists of the Northern Renaissance, but this particular work has a wonderful backstory – albeit one that is not conclusively proven. The story goes, however, that Albrecht and his brother Albert were both talented artists – however, the family business also needed help, so Albrecht pursued his dream while his brother worked with his father in the mines. After a few years Albrecht returned home, by now a celebrated artist, and invited his brother to go and do the same. Years of hard labour, however, had ruined his brother’s hands: he could no longer draw or paint. In gratitude at his brother’s sacrifice on his behalf, Albrecht created this beautiful ink sketch, ‘The Praying Hands.’
Sibling relationships are complex – especially if one child is seen to achieve public success or recognition. Albert is a wonderful example of a positive outcome, but there are many examples of relationships that go awry. Prince Harry’s difficult relationship with his brother has dominated the news for several years now; this is not the place to comment on that, but the title of Harry’s recent autobiography – ‘Spare’ – makes it clear where the source of this resentment comes from. An insensitive putdown from his childhood has taken root and stayed with him throughout his life.
Today’s passage highlights another tricky set of sibling relationships. At first sight, Jesus’ brothers’ advice to their famous sibling to go to Judea looks wise: after all, they would have been aware that many had deserted Jesus (6:66 – see Saturday’s reflection), so a major festival was the perfect opportunity to put things right: (v4) ‘No-one who wants to become a public figure acts in secret… show yourself to the world.’
But John makes it clear that they had failed to grasp the heart of Jesus’ mission. It was not about ‘appearances’ or popularity, there were deeper and more fundamental things at stake. He concludes quite bluntly: (v5) ‘For even his own brothers did not believe in him.’ If this seems harsh, Mark says exactly the same about Jesus’ family (Mark 3:21,31-32). They simply couldn’t get their heads around what Jesus was doing, the figure whom Jesus had become. To start with, they were skeptical – now, they were thinking like politicians or PR advisers. And Jesus challenges them accordingly: (v6) ‘My time is not yet here; for you, any time will do.’
There is, though, a postscript to this story. Jesus had four half-brothers, and two of them became leaders in the early church: James chaired the important Council of Jerusalem in Acts 15 and Judas – called Jude by the early church to distinguish him from the infamous disciple of the same name! – wrote one of the New Testament letters. In other words, we know that at least two had a change of heart: they ‘got it’, they understood who Jesus really was and came to follow him, not just as their famous brother, but as their Lord and Saviour.
Today’s story reminds us, both that family relationships can be challenging, especially if not all our relatives share our faith. However, it also encourages us that there is hope – even those who ‘don’t get it’ sometimes do. May the stories of James and Jude inspire us to keep praying for our families – especially our siblings, parents and children – trusting that the Lord would reveal himself to them in his good time.
Saturday 13th April – John 6:60-71 ‘The source of life’
I was once told a story attributed to David Watson, the famous Christian leader, and one-time vicar of St Michael-le-Belfry in York. After a particularly stirring service, a student approached him at the end asking to commit his life to Jesus. Watson’s response, so the story goes, went something along the lines of: ‘Don’t be ridiculous! You do realise what it’s going to cost you? Go away and pray about it this week, and if you’re still ready to commit your life, come and find me next Sunday.’
A week later, the student did indeed return, and committed his life to the Lord.
Some of you may have raised an eyebrow at the minister’s response. Accustomed as we mostly are to trying to make faith look as attractive as possible, it’s shocking to see someone apparently go out of their way to put people off!
But the approach has good precedent. Look closely at the gospels and you’ll see Jesus does exactly that on numerous occasions. As someone once summarised: Jesus came to comfort the disturbed… and disturb the comfortable.
Here in John chapter 6, just such an encounter has taken place. Jesus knows that many of the crowd have got the wrong end of the stick about him, expecting their Messiah to be all about glory and conquest. They even want to impose this vision on him, whether he likes it or not (v15). So Jesus spends much of chapter 6 setting them straight. He is indeed the key to true life, but the path to this life is through surrender not conquest (v29), through spiritual growth not physical successes (v27, vv49-50), and ultimately through his sacrificial death (v51-59).
‘This is a hard teaching,’ the crowd responds, ‘who can accept it?’ (v60) The end result is that many give up on Jesus, disappointed that he’s not the Messiah they wanted (v66). Something easier next time, please!
It’s unsettling to reflect on this aspect of Jesus’ teaching. But at the same time, we can acknowledge that Jesus was led by absolute integrity, and that he was always refreshingly clear about what his mission would cost both himself and his followers. It is the narrow path, the road less travelled, the call to surrender and to sacrifice alongside the joy, the hope, the peace and the love which accompanies it. Indeed, what we often find is that this joy, hope, peace and love comes precisely through the surrender and sacrifice. It sounds strange, but it is the kingdom way, God’s way.
Jesus knows this – his words are ‘Spirit and life’ (v63) – and so he calls us unashamedly to the true path of life. Human success models ultimately can never succeed for long – which is one way of paraphrasing ‘the flesh counts for nothing’ – it is the life of the Spirit which endures.
May God grant us grace to receive these challenging words afresh today, and thus to receive the true life of God, imparted by the Spirit of Jesus. May his joy, hope, peace and love be ours, too. After all, as Peter cries out (v68), where else can we go to find the true source of life?
Friday 12th April – John 6:51-59 ‘Given for the life of the world’
Of all the many changes forced by the Covid-19 pandemic, not the least for many of those in the Christian community was the loss of the capacity to share bread and wine together. Since the earliest days of the church, sharing bread and wine has been vitally important to our community life. It was commanded by Jesus, and although the exact format of its expression varies hugely across cultures, its essence takes us back to the heart of our good news. Jesus gave himself ‘for the life of the world’ (v51).
As Jesus continues his debate with the religious leaders – who are by this point arguing among themselves (v52), he now refers much more explicitly to the sacrifice he will be called to make. Thus far, his references to feeding on him as the bread of life have been open to interpretation, but now he is much more blunt: his flesh and blood must be received to know the life of God within us (v53-56, repeated every verse, to ram home its importance).
Scholars have long debated whether this ‘feeding’ is literal or spiritual, and certainly the connection to the physical act of sharing bread and wine, later celebrated by the church in remembrance of Jesus, is inescapable. But in a way, the debate as to whether it is physical or spiritual is irrelevant, since Jesus as the Divine Son carries both the physical and spiritual within himself. It is, surely, both.
Which is especially good news, if the pandemic has affected how you are able to receive Communion/the Eucharist/Mass. Even if, for example, we can’t share a common cup, we can still ‘feed’ on Jesus spiritually and receive his life.
Ultimately the references to flesh and blood point to Jesus’ death on the cross – his life offered for us all, that we might receive God’s new life, forever (v58). The greatest act of human history, in many ways the pivot of all history: God’s sacrifice of himself for our forgiveness and healing.
Today, take a few moments to go back to the cross. Give thanks for what Jesus did for the world – and for you. And receive his forgiveness, his healing, his hope, his life, again.
Thursday 11th April – John 6:41-51 ‘All taught by God’
‘I refuse to join any club that would have me as a member.’ So quipped Groucho Marx, and it’s one of my favourite quotes. I’m not much of a ‘clubbable’ person either. But Groucho puts his finger on a deeper truth here. There’s something in us humans that likes to create a ‘them’ and ‘us’ mentality. We define ourselves by our ‘tribes’, and that gives us a sense of belonging and self-esteem.
It is also deeply divisive. Some people are in, some are out. And sadly, this mentality can also affect matters of faith. For all that beliefs – of all things – should be dealing with universal questions, we find it hard to resist the temptation to sink into the ‘club’ mentality.
In our passage today, Jesus faces more grumbling. At its root, the discontent stems from two very human failings. Jesus’ message is being questioned, both because he wants to widen the club, and also he doesn’t appear to be ‘the right sort’ in the first place. Underneath these debates lies a fundamental question: who gets access to God? Is it only members of a particular group?
In later chapters Jesus will address the question of whether one particular human group has special access to God in more detail. But here, the root of the grumbling is more to do with his humble background. ‘How can he say these things,’ the leaders mutter, ‘when we know where he comes from?’ (v42) A divine messenger couldn’t have a human mother and father, surely? Especially not a Northern carpenter’s background!
Jesus challenges this by reminding them of God’s greater plan for all humanity. He quotes directly from their greatest prophet, Isaiah: ‘They will all be taught by God.’ (v45) In other words, hundreds of years before Jesus came, God’s plan was always that access to God would be available to everyone. God’s blessing was for all nations (this goes way back to Abraham in Genesis 12), and all can now come to God the Father and know eternal life.
The ‘way in’ is Jesus: ‘I am the living bread…. Whoever eats this bread will live forever.’ (v51) And we too are beneficiaries of this great truth! Thanks to Jesus, we have free and full access to God. We are no longer shut out of the club, we are part of the family now.
This is a hard section of John’s gospel, but let’s rejoice in this simple truth today. All of us can know God now. All of us can walk with him and draw strength in his abiding presence. Where would you like God to teach you more today? Why not ask him? It’s a promise.
Wednesday 10th April – John 6:35-40 (ii) ‘I shall lose none’
I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty good at losing things. It can be all kinds of things, but it’s usually my glasses. I’ll take them off temporarily while doing something else and wander off – then an hour or so later I’ll have to retrace my steps to work out where I might have put them down. As they’ve got thin, dark frames they tend to camouflage quite easily. I probably need some of those brightly coloured glasses that Prue Leith wears on The Great British Bake-Off, which you couldn’t miss wherever you left them.
It’s unsettling to lose something. It reminds us that we’re not perfect or as much in control as we’d like to be. It’s not that the item isn’t important to us, it’s just that we get distracted and make mistakes. It’s the human condition.
It’s tempting to wonder if Jesus is like that, too. Perhaps for many of us especially who’ve grown up with dominant images of the ‘hippy traveller’ Jesus, so popular in the 60s and 70s, wandering round Palestine in sandals with long hair and a languid expression, it’s easy to imagine that he might have the odd brain-blip…..
Not a bit of it!
Jesus is a man on a mission. And whilst his deep humanity seeps through every page of the gospels, he remains the divine Saviour throughout, a sure and certain hope for all of us. And here in our second look at today’s passage, he sums it up in this glorious truth: ‘I shall lose none of all those [the Father] has given me’ (v39).
Jesus never ‘loses’ people. We might sometimes loosen our grip, but he never loses hold of us. We are safe in his presence, and he has the love and the power to bring us safely home. Thanks to Jesus, all who look to him will enjoy eternal life (v40) and God will raise us up at the end of time. This last point is so important Jesus says it twice in quick succession – in v39 and v40. In other words, he really, really wants us to grasp the full reality of what that means!
Our present often feels uncertain. But our future is secure. And that means our present is actually secure too, since Jesus will never leave us or lose us.
Today, let’s look to the Son and spend a few moments dwelling on this beautiful truth. Jesus has never lost you, Jesus doesn’t lose you now, and Jesus will never lose you. You are safe in him, and his plan for you is abundant and eternal life. May that truth, and that life, be yours today.
Tuesday 9th April – John 6:35-40 ‘I am…’
Who are you? Or rather, if you were asked to describe yourself, what would you say?
Studded throughout John’s gospel are seven answers to this question: seven ways that Jesus used to describe himself. But they’re not quite the sort of thing we might say about ourselves! Which probably isn’t a surprise… today, however, we read the first of them: ‘I am the bread of life’ (v35).
It’s a natural follow-on from what Jesus has been saying in the last few verses. Life is found, Jesus has said, not just in physical sustenance, but in believing in him; in working for food that endures, eternal nourishment. It makes sense, then, for Jesus to summarise his teaching in this famous and striking phrase: ‘I am the bread of life.’
To know life, we must ‘feed on’ Jesus. As the church grew, this sense of feeding naturally became associated with the act of receiving bread and wine, which is variously called Communion, the Eucharist (from the word ‘to give thanks’), the Mass (the old word for ‘feast’) or the Lord’s Supper.
That’s all well and good, and it gives us a tangible ‘hook’ to interpret the phrase – but this is probably not the first meaning. Since, from what he’s just been saying, Jesus is quite clearly drawing a distinction with the physical act of eating bread, it much more likely means a spiritual union with Jesus – to trust in him, to receive his Spirit, to be filled with his abiding presence day by day.
And let’s go a little further and note that the very phrase ‘I am’ is significant. In Greek it’s heavily emphasised by Jesus in the words Ego eimi – I Am: capital I, capital A. The name God gave the Israelites, the name so holy that no Jew would speak it – Yahweh – is almost impossible to transcribe, but in Greek it is usually rendered as (you guessed it) ‘I Am’.
So, this is more than just a striking description of Jesus’ mission and purpose. It points towards his identity at the very deepest and most profound level. Jesus is not just a good human being, he is the divine Son, God on earth in human form.
It follows that, as we feed on this bread of life, we are not just receiving something that leads us towards God, we are feeding on God himself. Jesus dwells in us by his Spirit – not just for a few hours until we need to eat again, but permanently. No wonder Jesus was able to say: ‘if you feed on me, you won’t go (spiritually) hungry again’ (v35).
Today, let’s give thanks for this gift of the bread of life. Let’s consciously choose to receive it again. And let’s resolve to keep ‘feeding’ on the abiding presence of Christ, nourishing our lives every hour of every day.
Monday 8th April – John 6:30-35 ‘Bread of heaven’
No-one sings their National Anthem like the Welsh. It remains one of my bucket list wishes to watch a Rugby match at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff, just to hear ‘Land of my Fathers’ belted out by 72,000 Welsh rugby fans. Even now, whenever Wales play at home and the national anthem begins, the volume on the TV gets turned up way too loud and the hairs on my neck stand on end – especially if the accompanying picture, as often happens, is of a grizzled 18-stone prop singing his heart out with tears streaming down his face.
Usually some time before we get to the crescendo of the national anthems, there will also be a rendition of ‘Guide me O thou great Jehovah’ – and no doubt when you read the title for today, many of you immediately thought of the classic hymn. The words were written in the 18th century by William Williams – you can probably guess the land of his birth – but it wasn’t until the words were set to the rousing tune Cwm Rhondda in 1904 by John Hughes that it became the unofficial soundtrack to the Welsh Revival and came to prominence.
The theology of the first verse comes straight from our passage today. As Jesus draws the parallel with God’s miraculous provision of manna in the desert after the Exodus (you can read the story in Exodus 16), so now he is the ‘bread that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world’ (v33). This is eternal sustenance, and Jesus summarises it perfectly in the iconic phrase of v35: ‘I am the bread of life’. Eternal, abundant life – the true life which God means for all of us to enjoy.
No wonder the crowd’s imagination is stirred – heavenly bread? ‘”Sir”, they said, “always give us this bread.”’ (v34) Feed us now and evermore – this is what we want!
As it happens, most of them eventually don’t want it, once they realise the implications – a sad reality which dawns as the gospel goes on. But today, let’s recapture the excitement of the crowd, and claim their first response as ours.
Where do you hunger today? Let the bread of heaven feed you – now and evermore. And may the words of William William’s hymn be our prayer today:
Guide me, O thou great Redeemer, pilgrim through this barren land;
I am weak, but thou art mighty, hold me with thy powerful hand;
Bread of heaven, bread of heaven
Feed me now and ever more; feed me now and ever more.