Reflections on God and Money: February 2015

Friday 27 February 2015

CONTENTMENT (20): Paul's Death & Resurrection

Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord... That I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

Philippians 3:8-11

When St Paul wrote that he wanted to be like Jesus in his death, he meant a death made possible by Jesus’ crucifixion. In the Old Testament era, the dead went to Sheol but Christ liberated them (see Ephesians 4:8-10 and 1 Peter 3:18-20). It was different for Paul.

When Jesus was transfigured, he spoke with Moses and Elijah about his ‘departure’ or ‘decease’ but the Greek word actually used in Luke 9:31 means ‘exodus’. It has connotations of the Israelites’ exodus from slavery in Egypt. When Peter, who witnessed the transfiguration, wrote about his own death he used the same word (see 2 Peter 1:15). When Paul wrote about his ‘departure’, he used a different Greek word that described a ship departing its moorings. It’s this concept that Tennyson described in his poem, Sunset and Evening Star (also called, Crossing the Bar). Together, these references reveal death not at all like Sheol, a place of waiting, but as leaving behind limitation and preparation to embark on to a new realm of activity. Ships are not built to be moored in harbour: death isn’t a coming into harbour but a departure out into the eternal - the place that we were made to experience.

Paul’s ultimate desire was to ‘attain the resurrection from the dead’. Revelation 20 records this scene that the St John calls, ‘The first resurrection’.

Then I saw thrones, and seated on them were those to whom the authority to judge was committed. Also I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and for the word of God, and those who had not worshipped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years. The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended.

John adds this explanation. ‘Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection! Over such the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him for a thousand years.'

Paul’s goal in knowing Jesus was to be part of the first resurrection and to reign with Him for a thousand years. We may think that some of the things we read in Revelation are hard to understand but this is where intimacy with Jesus, the living Word, takes us beyond the Bible, the written Word. 1 Corinthians 2:9 is a verse that in my experience is quoted much more than the verse that follows it. Together they tell us this.

As it is written, 'What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him' these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God.

Although Paul is writing about the Holy Spirit, his words are equally true of the other Persons of the Trinity. Christians close to Jesus are shown things no one else can imagine.

Do we desire what Paul desired? We would if we had his clarity about the future! We may desire resurrection power - and from some of the modern worship songs I hear, many Christians do desire it with commendable passion - and we may desire the assurance of being worthy of the first resurrection. But what about all that lies between? It's one thing to have sufficient faith to say that, with God's help, we believe we could share in Jesus' suffering and experience a death like His if it's necessary. But could we really desire them? That Paul did desire them demonstrates the quality of his acquaintance with Christ.

We should all take time to reflect on this because, like Paul, we could be content with anything in this world if we could only see what he saw.

What is freely received should be freely shared and not sold for profit, so please feel free to copy these Reflections freely and without cost to others. Unless otherwise stated, Scripture quotations in these Reflections are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Friday 20 February 2015

CONTENTMENT (19): Paul's Identification with Christ

Philippians 3:8-11

The foundation of St Paul’s enduring contentment was, I believe, his supreme lifestyle ambition to know and identify with Christ Jesus his Lord. When we really begin to know someone, we begin to share their troubles and enter into their experiences. This sort of identification is common when young children are ill and their parents experience the suffering with them. Paul was specific about what he wanted to identify with in Jesus: his resurrection power, suffering and death.

The reality that Jesus experienced was suffering first, followed by death and then resurrection. So why does Paul put resurrection power first? It may be because the resurrection empowers us to endure suffering and death. As he wrote in Romans 8:11, 'If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you'. There's a lot that could be written about this power but I think it useful to focus on just one aspect: authority. I doubt any Christian will disagree that 'Christian' authority is lacking in much of the world today, in evangelism and the ability of Christians to be 'salt' and 'light' in their communities.

People were impressed by Jesus’ authority before his death. It was seen in his teaching as well as his miracles but at his ascension he confided in his disciples that, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me’. It was on the basis of this authority that he commissioned his disciples. ‘Go therefore and make disciples of all nations’, he told them. Finally, he adds something only possible by resurrection power. ‘And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.’ (See Matthew 28:19-20.) That authority, that power is just as real today.

When Paul wanted to share in Jesus' sufferings, I'm sure he wasn't thinking of Jesus’ past suffering. He wasn't thinking about the hours leading up to Jesus' crucifixion when he was arrested, abused, flogged, forced to carry his cross through the streets and then nailed to it. That suffering was past. It had happened about 50 years before and it was finished. I know there is merit in meditating on that suffering but I don't think that's what Paul meant.

Rather, I'm sure he meant Jesus' current suffering in his on-going mission of redemption. Jesus had often said that his disciples would suffer like Him, their master. Even more than before his resurrection and ascension, Jesus has continued to be misunderstood, misrepresented and mistreated, which is just what His disciples must expect in every age. ‘All who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted’, Paul wrote (2 Timothy 3:12) and it was his personal experience. 'I bear on my body the marks of Jesus', he wrote in Galatians 6:17.

Paul wanted to be like Jesus in his death. Paul writes about at least two types of dying that I can only mention briefly. In Romans, he writes a lot about how Christians have died to sin and encourages us to consider ourselves dead sin and alive to God. ‘Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions...’ (Romans 6:12). To the Galatians, he wrote about dying to self . ‘I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me...’ (Galatians 2:20). Dying to self is a big subject but it begins with setting aside our own agendas in favour of cooperating with Christ Jesus in his mission.

In much of nature, dying and resurrection are the means of reproduction. Jesus said, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life...’ (John 12:24-26). The life of God is in Jesus and it was not his birth or his teaching (as important as they are) but his death that made it possible for divine life to spread. It's no different for his followers today. To spread the good news of Jesus we have to die because Jesus’ way is the way of all Christians.

The life in a grain of wheat is barren unless it goes into the ground. As it disintegrates, losing its own shape and form, gradually something new sprouts and grows. In time, that new life breaks through the earth; in time, it forms a head that contains many more grains of wheat, each with its own life. Each new life seed has the life of the original grain and when those grains go back into the earth, the process is multiplied. As Jesus died to spread the seed , Christians themselves die and live to spread more seed, all of it containing the life of God. I believe that's what Paul wanted in his acquaintance and identification with Christ and it was the foundation of his contentment.

Friday 13 February 2015

CONTENTMENT (18): Paul's Acquaintance with Christ

Philippians 3:8-11

In this series of Reflections on contentment, we’re looking at St Paul’s supreme lifestyle ambition to know Christ Jesus his Lord because in their relationship we find the foundation of Paul's enduring contentment.

Some people equate knowing Jesus with being a Christian. We become Christians by expressing faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and committing ourselves to Him and we can say that he has ‘saved’ us. Many prayers of commitment include the idea of inviting Jesus to come into our hearts and taking control of our lives. It seems to me to me that this is meeting Jesus rather than knowing Him.

St Paul had met Jesus on his way to Damascus about 30 years before he wrote his letter to Philippi, so he was already well acquainted with Him when he explained his great desire to know Him. Of course, we never really know people. We’re often surprised and sometimes shocked by what our friends and neighbours do, while their own immediate families, the people closest to them, see no contradiction in their behaviour. So, inevitably, only in eternity can we really begin to know the infinite Son of God. But that is not to say we can’t begin now!

The Gospels are not the only way or the best way to get to know Jesus but they are the place to start. If I met a famous person and we seem to get along well, I might look them up on the internet and perhaps read their biography, to help me understand them better. But while that knowledge would help, it would not be a substitute for spending time with them.

We get to know people well when we spend quality time with them. That is why many Christians speak highly about periods of illness, imprisonment or isolation as the times of minimal distractions when they began to know God. Even Jesus would go off by Himself to be alone with God His Father.

We spend time with God―Father, Son and Holy Spirit―by prayer. Prayer is conversation, both speaking and listening. It’s never good to meet a friend but never stop talking, which is why the best friends are often the best listeners. We have many assurances in the Bible that God listens to us but our times with Him should include quiet listening by us. In John 10, Jesus likens His disciples to sheep and Himself to a shepherd. ‘My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me’. In those days sheep learned to recognise and trust their shepherd’s voice, so shepherds could lead their sheep. (Today, many of us are used to seeing shepherds drive their―and often using dogs to help!)

I think this may be why God often speaks to us during the night and in dreams, when we are most often still and not absorbed in our daily routine. But we really ought to make time each day to be alert to God’s voice.

Friendship includes sharing. It is true that some friends can have very little in common but at the heart of any friendship must be some mutual desires and shared experiences. The things of Jesus Christ that Paul wanted to share in were the power of Jesus’ resurrection, His sufferings and even His death. What he meant by that will be the subject of next weekend’s Reflection.

In the meantime, we should remember the sustaining comfort in difficult times provided by loyal families and close friends and reflect on how much greater contentment can flow from a close relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ.

Friday 6 February 2015

CONTENTMENT (17): Paul's Lifestyle Ambition

I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith―that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

Philippians 3:8-11

As I’ve mentioned before, I began writing this series of Reflections because I needed (and still need) to learn contentment. One consequence of this is that every time I think I’m coming to the end of the series, I’m gripped by something in St Paul's letter that I hadn’t properly appreciated before. This is what happened when I began to look again at the passage at the start of this Reflection. I thought it would be the subject of one or two Reflections but I’ve discovered that I’m barely going to scratch the surface of Paul’s meaning. Instead of this series finishing in February, I now expect it to last until nearly Easter.

If we’re to even begin to understand the foundation of St Paul’s contentment, we need to understand this passage. In earlier Reflections, we’ve considered the need to understand God’s best intentions―‘with knowledge and all discernment, so that [we] may approve what is excellent’― and to trust God unerringly when things don’t go as we expected and in spite of our own mistakes. But in Philippians 3, Paul goes further than knowing God as we might know and trust someone. After 30 years as Jesus' disciple, Paul writes of knowing and ‘gaining’ Christ Jesus! That was the single focus, the chief ambition of his life and no other ambition came even a close second! Paul's entire lifestyle was subordinated to this aim, which is why he could be content to pursue it even in prison.

How do we know Jesus Christ? The first and most obvious way is from the Gospels, the four biographies. A mistake I’ve made and which I think I see others making is that we’re often more attracted to the New Testament letters which seek to explain how we should live rather than to the Gospels that tell us how Jesus lived. I’m not suggesting there’s anything wrong in studying the letters, or in wanting to understand the book of Revelation better, but that should never be at the expense of putting first things first: knowing Jesus.

Christianity is essentially, fundamentally a religion of a person. Other religious systems have their origins in the thoughts and teachings of certain people but, as time goes by, the religion becomes a system of faith in itself. The founder or founders are revered but the beliefs they founded continue without them. This can never be the case with Christianity. It began with Jesus Christ, continues through Him and is nothing without Him. It is when the Church has lost sight of this fundamental that ‘Christians’ have become so unlike anything that Jesus was or taught, sometimes behaving no better than violent religious extremists today.

Dr G Campbell Morgan (1863-1945) is one of the Bible teachers that I’ve learned most from. I think his commentaries on the Gospels are the best things he wrote and the best I have read. I know from his own comments on teaching that he would not prepare sermons on a particular Bible book until he had read it 40 to 50 times. Recently, I listened to a recording of an old sermon in which the preacher referred to a conversation he had with Dr Morgan, when he said that as a young minister there was a period of two years when he read nothing but the newspaper headlines, the few letters he received and the four Gospels. The preacher I was listening to added that it was at about that time that people had began to take notice of G Campbell Morgan!

The Gospels are not the only way that we get to know Jesus but they are the place to start. I plan to resume this theme next weekend because knowing Jesus as St Paul knew Him is crucial to experiencing contentment as Paul experienced it.