Know the Scriptures

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“They replied, “We’re stoning you not for any good work, but for blasphemy! You, a mere man, claim to be God.” Jesus replied, “It is written in your own Scriptures that God said to certain leaders of the people, ‘I say, you are gods!’ And you know that the Scriptures cannot be altered. So if those people who received God’s message were called ‘gods,’ why do you call it blasphemy when I say, ‘I am the Son of God’? After all, the Father set me apart and sent me into the world.”
John 10:33-36 NLT

More clear speech from Jesus. Faced with a situation where the people around Him wanted to kill Him because He claimed to be the Son of God, a blasphemous claim in their eyes, Jesus pointed out what was written in Scripture. Jesus quoted a verse from Psalm 82 – “I say, ‘You are gods; you are all children of the Most High” (Psalm 82:6).  But the Psalmist, under the power of the Holy Spirit, then wrote, “But you will die like mere mortals and fall like every other ruler”. Of course, these references to “gods” were not assigning the recipients some form of divinity, but God was pointing out through the Psalmist that anyone who has some degree of control over another, such as a judge or someone in a position of authority such as an employer or civil servant, has a power that is godly (note the small “g”). And God then included a warning that such “gods” will themselves be accountable for their actions. Such judges were perhaps referred to by Paul in Romans 13:1, “Everyone must submit to governing authorities. For all authority comes from God, and those in positions of authority have been placed there by God”. Jesus was saying if those who hold a divinely appointed position can be considered “gods,” how much more can the One whom God has chosen and sent be the Son of God.

The Scriptures, what we believers refer to as the Old and New Testaments, are a rich and limitless source of information, all of which was inspired by the Holy Spirit through over 40 authors and over a period of 1500 years or so. The more we pilgrims read the Bible, the more we find out about God, and what we don’t know about Him. We can read a passage of Scripture one day, and then find more from it at a subsequent reading. Such a divinely inspired book is unique and it connects us to our Heavenly Father, inspiring us, and touching our spirits with His love and grace. Sadly, many theologians over the years have interpreted the Scriptures in certain ways and have veered away from God’s original intentions. This is how cults have developed, and some have even changed the Scriptures to suit their beliefs. 

But we pilgrims are committed to the Bible and all it contains. We take seriously the warning at the end of Revelation, “And I solemnly declare to everyone who hears the words of prophecy written in this book: If anyone adds anything to what is written here, God will add to that person the plagues described in this book. And if anyone removes any of the words from this book of prophecy, God will remove that person’s share in the tree of life and in the holy city that are described in this book” (Revelation 22:18-19). Instead, we agree whole-heartedly with Peter’s words in his first epistle, “Like newborn babies, you must crave pure spiritual milk so that you will grow into a full experience of salvation. Cry out for this nourishment” (1 Peter 2:2). The “pure spiritual milk” constitutes God’s complete, special revelation, encapsulated in what we now know as the Bible. So we pilgrims read the Bible and re-read it, feeding our souls on God’s Word. There we will find peace, purity and food for our souls. There is no other religion in the world that has a God who died for us so that we can have eternal life. All the other religions expect works to take place, so that our place in eternity is earned. We pilgrims are saved purely by grace. There is no other way into God’s presence.

Dear Father God. Only You have opened a door into Your presence. Other religions fail to find it, no matter what they claim. So we fall on our knees before You today, in grateful worship. Amen.

The Words of Eternal Life

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“At this point many of his disciples turned away and deserted him. Then Jesus turned to the Twelve and asked, “Are you also going to leave?” Simon Peter replied, “Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words that give eternal life. We believe, and we know you are the Holy One of God.””
John 6:66-69 NLT

In our fellowships and churches there can sometimes be a parting of ways between a member of the congregation and the leadership. It can be due to a simple administrative problem such as who does what, or someone falls out with another person,  or it could be over a doctrinal issue or some form of Biblical interpretation. Regarding the latter I know of a church where a member left because they disagreed with the Biblical stance over matters of sex and marriage. But all these situations may or may not be valid and I’m sure most divisions within the Christian real estate are avoidable, should there be a will to work out a solution.

However, in Jesus’ case, the disciples left Him because they could not accept His teaching. These men and women were having difficulty in accepting that Jesus was the Son of God, and that what He taught about His body and blood was true. Jesus said, “For no one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them to me, and at the last day I will raise them up” (John 6:44), implying that Father God sent Jesus to this world, and in the process He was going to attract people to support His Son. So perhaps the disciples who left Jesus were not the ones needed at that time. This is perhaps a contentious thought, because we know that the Gospel is available to all, but after there had been an exodus of disciples, Jesus turned to the twelve disciples He had chosen, and asked if they were going to leave too. But Peter responded with a timeless statement, “You have the words that give eternal life”. After all that had happened, the difficult (to them) teaching, the divinity claim, the consequent murmuring and complaining, and the mass exodus of Jesus’ followers, the Twelve disciples, later to become the Apostles, stood firm in their allegiance to Jesus. What would I have done, is a question I ask myself. But we note that not all the disciples other than the Twelve deserted Jesus – just “many” of them. There were still some who remain faithful. Men and women on the periphery doing what many do today, quietly getting on with a life of service to God, below the radar of public notice. People who have accepted Jesus, who believe in Him and His teaching, and who are doing their best to apply it in their own lives. 

Peter, speaking as the Twelve’s representative, stated two truths that must have gladdened Jesus’ heart. Peter said that the Disciples recognised Jesus’ divinity, and that they believed in Him. Because of that, the Disciples knew that Jesus was speaking words that, for those like them that believed them, will lead to a life spent with God.

We pilgrims too have declared that Jesus is the Son of God, that we believe in Him and we follow His teaching. The “words of eternal life” were not just for that generation but timelessly apply over the millennia right up until today and beyond. Paul wrote in Romans 10:9-10, “If you openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is by believing in your heart that you are made right with God, and it is by openly declaring your faith that you are saved”. The early disciples who left Jesus failed to make the declaration and ended up in a spiritual wilderness, but we pilgrims are in a privileged position, being of those who have declared and believed. 

Today we once again declare that Jesus is Lord and that he has the Words we need to hear for our future. And we tell others about our wonderful Saviour, that they too will have the same opportunity we have had.

Yes, Lord Jesus. We proclaim and declare that only Your have the words that will lead to eternal life. We give You all the glory today. Amen.

Too Hard to Understand

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“So Jesus said again, “I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you cannot have eternal life within you. But anyone who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise that person at the last day. … Many of his disciples said, “This is very hard to understand. How can anyone accept it?” … At this point many of his disciples turned away and deserted him.”
John 6:53-54, 60, 66 NLT

On the way to the synagogue in Capernaum Jesus had made many disciples. These were men (and presumably women) who believed in what He said. They saw His miraculous signs. They heard His wonderful words of grace. They heard Him expound the Scriptures in a way they liked. But then they heard Jesus say things that they struggled to understand. So they ended up leaving Him and they “turned away”. A tragedy for them because they missed the only opportunity of receiving Jesus’ promise of eternal life. There may have been too many problems for these early disciples. Firstly, the concept of eating and drinking Jesus’ body and blood from a physical perspective blinded their minds to the spiritual meaning behind His words. Secondly, they perhaps did understand what Jesus was meaning, but the consequent commitment and implication for how they should now live their lives was too great a sacrifice. 

There are always people who are unable to understand, or don’t want to understand, what Biblical teaching says. One day a person might hear a sermon on anger, taking as its text Jesus’ teaching on anger – “You have heard that our ancestors were told, ‘You must not murder. If you commit murder, you are subject to judgment.’ But I say, if you are even angry with someone, you are subject to judgment! If you call someone an idiot, you are in danger of being brought before the court. And if you curse someone, you are in danger of the fires of hell” (Matthew 5:21-22). A naturally angry person might decide that to change their approach to other people who upsets them is too big an ask and they decide they can’t follow teaching like this. So they either rationalise it and continue as they did before, or they leave and find a church where Biblical teaching is less challenging. And they conveniently forget these verses from Matthew. It is easy to follow a Gospel that we agree with and won’t mean we have to change our lives.

The more liberal of Christians will have a relaxed and dismissive approach to some parts of the Bible. For example in Matthew 5:27-28, Jesus said some hard words about adultery. “You have heard the commandment that says, ‘You must not commit adultery.’ But I say, anyone who even looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart.“ Of course, this is a very sensitive subject, but it emphasised a principle that Jesus expounded – it is not what we appear to do but what is going on inside of us. So people, particularly men, who may struggle to change their behaviour in this area, may instead choose to disagree or ignore what Jesus said. As pilgrims, do we approach the Bible with reverence and in the knowledge that it is the Word of God and the final arbiter of truth, or do we just take from it the bits that we agree with and ignore the rest, even making up excuses, or changing the meaning, for the contentious verses?

So many of the early disciples in Jesus’ day started to follow Him until His teaching became too difficult for them to follow. I wonder what they did then? But for us pilgrims, we have decided to follow Jesus, come what may. There is no turning back.

Dear Father God. There is indeed no way that we pilgrims will turn our backs on the very One who gave His all for us. We are so grateful. Amen.

Moses Prophesied

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“Yet it isn’t I who will accuse you before the Father. Moses will accuse you! Yes, Moses, in whom you put your hopes. If you really believed Moses, you would believe me, because he wrote about me. But since you don’t believe what he wrote, how will you believe what I say?”
John 5:45-47 NLT

Was Jesus correct when He told the Jewish leaders that Moses wrote about Him? Of course He was, although admittedly it wasn’t by name. Jesus quoted Moses’ writings several times in the Gospels. For example, we have John 3:14, “And as Moses lifted up the bronze snake on a pole in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up”. Then there is the parallel between manna and Jesus being the bread of life, or Jesus proclaiming that anyone believing in Him will produce rivers of living water flowing from his heart. The Jewish leaders, however, failed to make the connection between what was written in the Pentateuch by Moses, and the Man standing before them. Their minds and religious thinking was stuck in a groove more focused on a different religion of rules and regulations, and nothing was going to change their minds. Not even with God’s own Son standing before them.

But the Jews were not unique in their approach to matters religious. Today we have Christian denominations and movements stuck in their own individual grooves. For example, if we look at the Church of England, we find the Book of Common Prayer. In this worthy tome we will find Orders for Morning and Evening Prayer, various Creeds, the Order of how Holy Scripture is to be read, and so on. There are a shed full of scenarios for all the offices of the Church but perhaps we wonder why all this is really necessary. After all, the early Church liturgy can be found in Acts 2:42, “All the believers devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper), and to prayer“. So what would happen to the orders of service if Jesus came along with a counter-cultural exposure of congregants trusting in liturgies rather than His teaching as recorded in the Gospels? In Hosea 6:6 God said, “I want you to show love, not offer sacrifices. I want you to know me more than I want burnt offerings“. Perhaps we could write, “I want you to show love, not follow a liturgy. I want you to know Me more than a pew or the Book of Common Prayer”. Of course, I might be doing many sincere Christian believers a disservice, but I’m sure my readers will understand my point.

By now, I’m sure my readers will also recognise that I am passionate about the Bible and its integrity and value in supporting life in the Kingdom of God here on 21st Century Planet Earth. In His day, Jesus came as the fruition of many prophecies about Himself, and He accused the Jewish leaders of not believing in Him in spite of all the evidence that said He was who he said he was. In particular He pointed out the incongruity of the leaders putting their hope in Moses and his writings, and yet refusing to believe and understand what those writings meant in the Person of the Man standing before them. But we pilgrims today must never abandon or rationalise the Scriptures to make them fit in with our ideologies, liturgies or world views. Just because we don’t understand, or refuse to understand, what the Bible says about living in the Kingdom of God, it doesn’t meant that what is written isn’t valid. We will never achieve everything that the Bible says we need to attain holiness by trusting in our own strength. But through the grace of God and the blood of Jesus, we can stand before God righteous and holy. It’s all about Jesus, not about the man made liturgies we love to install in our churches and fellowships. 

There is much more written about Jesus in the Bible. Throughout all the Old Testament books there is a thread foretelling the Messiah, woven almost into every page. And then He burst upon the scene, making an impact that launched the new order, the New Covenant between God and mankind. Most of the religious leaders in Jesus’ day failed to recognise Him, as many still do today. We have to remember though that the enemy has blinded the eyes even of God’s own people. But one day everyone, including all powers and authorities, will be forced to bow the knee before Jesus, the Son of God.

Dear Lord Jesus. We give You all the praise and glory. Amen.

Jesus is God

Posted on by Adrian Clark

”No one has ever seen God. But the unique One, who is himself God, is near to the Father’s heart. He has revealed God to us.”
John 1:18 NLT

I have never seen a famous historical person such as Shakespeare or John Wesley, because they were dead before I was born. But I know about them from their writings and biographies, and have seen artist’s impressions through paintings and drawings. But God is different. Even though He has always existed, no-one has ever seen Him, for one simple reason – He is Spirit. Human beings are natural and physical. There are occasions in the Old Testament when the greats of old such as Moses, Elijah and others apparently came close to seeing God, but not in any coherent and tangible way. But back to, for example, John Wesley. Although I have never seen him in the flesh, I can find out many details about him. His life has been picked apart by others who knew him to the extent that I can almost imagine that I have met him in person. 

When Jesus came, He revealed God to us. In the same way a son can tell us much about his father, through his memories, his mannerisms, his looks, Jesus told us much about His Father. We read in John 14:8-10, ”Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.” Jesus replied, “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and yet you still don’t know who I am? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father! So why are you asking me to show him to you? Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words I speak are not my own, but my Father who lives in me does his work through me“”. In his Colossians letter, Paul wrote, “For in Christ lives all the fullness of God in a human body” (Colossians 2:9). 

So we pilgrims, by following Christ, follow God, and in Him we will find a complete diet for our souls. In our natural world, there is much fretting and fussing over the food we eat, or don’t eat, or can’t eat. I know someone who is almost paranoid about the perceived harm done to their body by ultra processed foods. There are many diet sheets loudly proclaimed by their adherents. But there is only one diet for our spiritual lives and that can only be found in the Bible. Nothing ultra processed there! In this Book we will find out all that we need to know about our Trinitarian God. Fellow pilgrims – are we reading it? As often as we can? Through it God feeds our spirits. 

Two thousand years ago a baby was born, of peasant parents in humble surroundings, but that Child started a life dedicated to His Father that ended on a Roman Cross in the greatest sacrifice, and consequent moment in history, that this world has ever seen. Many, if not most, have discounted it as being irrelevant to them and their lives. But we need to proclaim this wonderful Son to all regardless. At every opportunity. How else will people know the wonderful God, the Creator of this Universe?

Dear Father God. Thank You for Jesus and all You have done for us. Amen.

Twisting Scripture

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“And remember, our Lord’s patience gives people time to be saved. This is what our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you with the wisdom God gave him— speaking of these things in all of his letters. Some of his comments are hard to understand, and those who are ignorant and unstable have twisted his letters to mean something quite different, just as they do with other parts of Scripture. And this will result in their destruction.”
2 Peter 3:15-16 NLT

Almost as an aside, Peter rushes to the defence of his spiritual brother Paul, who was a trail blazer when it came to theology in the early years after Jesus was crucified. Paul’s life was overturned on the Damascus Road, and regarding his message, we read in Galatians 1:12, “I received my message from no human source, and no one taught me. Instead, I received it by direct revelation from Jesus Christ.” In the first and second chapters in Paul’s Galatians letter we get a hint of the preparatory process Paul went through before he was able to set out that “direct revelation from Jesus Christ”, and God’s plan for mankind, but it was, at that time, probably so radical, particularly to Jews, that he suffered much abuse, not only because of his message, but also his theology. People in his day misinterpreted what he said, and, as Peter wrote, “twisted his letters to mean something quite different”. But the same process goes on today. 

The Bible is not difficult to understand. The Gospel message is perhaps too simple for some. The problem is that when we get to a passage or verse of Scripture, that might not fit in with our sinful world view, we try and make it say something that it doesn’t. The Bible was written over many years and the last contribution to it was nearly two thousand years ago. In those days the culture was different. The geography was different. In our technological age, however, Western Christians are sometimes left puzzling over what God thinks, but the answers we seek are in the Bible somewhere, if only we look. A modern approach to Scripture involves “liberal” thought, where people miss out or reinterpret Biblical truths to suit their own point of view, or try and make it more palatable, so they think, to the secular society around them. So someone of a particular sexual orientation will ignore what difficult verses say. Jesus’ teaching about marriage makes some people feel uncomfortable, so they say it was for that culture but it doesn’t apply today. And then we find the Anglican bishop who even denied that the virgin birth actually happened.

As an aside, an Anglican vicar, David Goodhew, summed up the dangers of liberal theology, when he said, “churches trimming faith to fit in with culture have tended to shrink, and those offering a ‘full-fat’ faith, vividly supernatural, have tended to grow.” A religious observer, commenting on the previous quote, wrote, “Christianity is not dying – rather, it is becoming more conservative. Congregants don’t want to be preached to about politics. What they want is the full-fat version of faith.” There is no point in going to a church that has effectively become secular in what it offers to society around them. We can find all the secularism we want in the local pub. Only Bible believing churches will survive, because they regard the Bible, in its entirety, as the inspired and eternal Word of God. Isaiah 40:8, “The grass withers and the flowers fade, but the word of our God stands forever“.

Paul aptly summed up the Bible when he wrote to Timothy, “All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us realise what is wrong in our lives. It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right. God uses it to prepare and equip his people to do every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17). We ignore this verse at our peril, something that Peter emphasised, as he wrote that life for those twisting Scripture will not end well. And the same end is waiting for those who ignore the parts of Scripture that fail to fit in with secular thought.

To avoid misinterpreting Scripture we must rely on the Holy Spirit within us to lead and guide us and bring to our minds exactly what God intended. So we precede reading a difficult passage with a prayer, and we allow the Holy Spirit to do what Paul wrote, teaching “us to do what is right”. And we definitely don’t ignore those Bible passages that challenge us.

Dear Father God. We pray for Your Spirit to open our eyes to the truths embedded in Your Word. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Sodom and Gomorrah (2)

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“Later, God condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah and turned them into heaps of ashes. He made them an example of what will happen to ungodly people.”
2 Peter 2:6 NLT

We will have another look at the account of Sodom and Gomorrah in the light of 21st Century Christianity. We considered in a previous post the sins committed in these two cities. We read in Ezekiel 16:49-50, “Sodom’s sins were pride, gluttony, and laziness, while the poor and needy suffered outside her door. She was proud and committed detestable sins, so I wiped her out, as you have seen”. And the situation was so grave that God removed the only righteous people He could find there – Lot, his wife, and their two daughters – before casting judgement. We read what then happened to these cities in Genesis 19:24-25, “Then the Lord rained down fire and burning sulphur from the sky on Sodom and Gomorrah. He utterly destroyed them, along with the other cities and villages of the plain, wiping out all the people and every bit of vegetation.” The Genesis 19 account focused on Ezekiel’s “detestable sins” – homosexuality.

But we pilgrims believe that God never changes. Hebrews 13:8, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever“. Malachi 3:6, “I am the Lord, and I do not change. That is why you descendants of Jacob are not already destroyed“. So surely, what God considered a detestable sin in the times of Sodom and Gomorrah He must consider equally detestable today. How does that fit, therefore, in 21st Century Christian beliefs? Today we have certain Christian denominations who are ignoring clear Biblical teachings on sex and marriage. On the 15th November 2023, the synod of Anglican bishops decided to allow the Church of England to bless same sex partnerships. But the traditional wing of the Anglican church issued a press release that said, “This action is offensive to the God of love. It replaces his wonderful gospel of grace with a distorted message, blessing what God calls sin. This is heart-breaking, wicked and outrageously arrogant“. Why is there such a desire to set aside clear Christian teaching in order to satisfy the strident lobbying of powerful groups who would not have survived God’s judgement had they lived in Sodom all those years ago?

It’s time, perhaps, to look at some basics. To start with, who or what is a Christian? The Cambridge English dictionary definition states, “someone who believes in and follows the teachings of Jesus Christ“. Literally, the word “Christian” means “Follower of Christ”, and the word first appeared on the scene in the New Testament in Acts 11:26, “When he found him, he brought him back to Antioch. Both of them stayed there with the church for a full year, teaching large crowds of people. (It was at Antioch that the believers were first called Christians)”. So a Christian is someone who believes in Jesus and trusts Him for their eternal salvation. The “believing” bit includes the virgin birth, the teachings and life, and the death and resurrection, of Jesus. The “following” bit means doing our best to read all that has been taught about Jesus and God’s ways in the Bible, and trying to implement them in our lives. A Christian therefore will fall under the category of being “born again”, as Jesus said to Nicodemus in John 3:3, “Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, unless you are born again, you cannot see the Kingdom of God””.‭‭ A Christian will be susceptible to sin, like everyone else, but he or she has an Intercessor in Heaven, praying for us, and offering forgiveness for our sins through His shed blood at Calvary.

Quotation from “Gotquestions.org”, “Unfortunately over time, the word “Christian” has lost a great deal of its significance and is often used of someone who is religious or has high moral values but who may or may not be a true follower of Jesus Christ. Many people who do not believe and trust in Jesus Christ consider themselves Christians simply because they go to church or they live in a “Christian” nation”. I have a good friend who calls himself a Christian, because he believes that there is a God in Heaven, and whose father and grandfather were elders in the Church of Scotland, but he never goes to a church service (funerals excepted). He lives a good life, he says, and all that qualifies him to call himself a Christian. A common misunderstanding? The UK census in 2021 found that 27.5 million people identified as being Christian. This is about 43% of the UK population but another survey in 2021 estimated that only 5% of the population actually attend a church service regularly. I know, of course, that church attendance doesn’t make someone a true Christian, but sobering statistics nonetheless.

So perhaps we pilgrims need to qualify what we mean when we refer to Christians. And we perhaps need to be aware that everyone who calls themselves a Christian isn’t quite what we expect them to be, because they neither truly believe in Jesus and certainly don’t follow all His commands. But I’m sure there are many Anglicans who are true Christians, believing in, and following, Jesus, although there are also many, like the bishops who seem to have abandoned Biblical teaching on sex and marriage, who aren’t. 

But back to Sodom and Gomorrah. The problem with those cities was that depravity was total, involving the whole population. Lot and his family were the only ones who stood firm in their faith in God. Today there are thankfully many true Christians who stand as beacons of light in their communities and workplaces, holding back the righteous judgement of God. We must never stop interceding for our friends and families, our communities and workplaces, praying that God will show mercy and compassion. Will God find 10 righteous people in our community? We pray that he will.

O Lord. Please help us to follow Your commands of being Salt and Light in our communities. Your way is the only way. Thank You. Amen.

Myopic Believers

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“The more you grow like this, the more productive and useful you will be in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But those who fail to develop in this way are shortsighted or blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their old sins.”
2 Peter 1:8-9 NLT

We need to go back a few verses in 2 Peter 1 to verse 3, “By his divine power, God has given us everything we need for living a godly life. We have received all of this by coming to know him, the one who called us to himself by means of his marvellous glory and excellence“.  And I wrote in response, “the availability of His Power is intricately related to our knowledge of God. As we delve into the depths of understanding Him, we unlock the reservoir of His power available to us. Peter then wrote in verse 9 some strong words, implying that if we don’t grow in our knowledge of Christ, we have become forgetful by not remembering that day when we were saved, that day when we made a decision to follow Jesus for the rest of our lives.

I once knew a man whose testimony was based on a decision he made for Jesus many years ago. But since then his times of private prayer and Bible reading have been sadly lacking. Yes, he would stand up in church and read a passage of Scripture or say a prayer, but for the rest of the time, as he openly confessed, his life carried on as it always had done. “I’ve always been a good person” was his belief. Peter said that such a person was “shortsighted or blind”, because becoming a believer is the start and not the end, of the process of sanctification. It has been said that in terms of our faith, we either go forward, developing “in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ” or we go backwards “forgetting that [we] have been cleansed from [our] old sins”. Standing still is not an option. 

Myopia is an ocular condition more commonly called short-sightedness. A person with this condition finds that they can focus on objects near to them, but things further away become a blur. But there is a condition called spiritual myopia, where a myopic Christian fails to see God’s truths clearly enough to use them in their own lives. The Apostle James wrote about this, and we read, “But don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves” (James 1:22). He expands this theme in the following two verses, “For if you listen to the word and don’t obey, it is like glancing at your face in a mirror. You see yourself, walk away, and forget what you look like” (James 1:23-24). We find his conclusion in James 1:25, “But if you look carefully into the perfect law that sets you free, and if you do what it says and don’t forget what you heard, then God will bless you for doing it“. We find that the remedy for natural myopia is a pair of glasses or spectacles. We can find a remedy for spiritual myopia by reading God’s Word, the Bible, and applying it to our lives, so that we will grow in the “knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ”. Spiritual myopia, according to Peter, can develop to the ultimate condition of blindness. In this case, the sufferers, even if they read the Bible, or sit under the ministry of many preachers, will fail to connect with God’s truths. They prefer to remain in the domain of their old sins and nothing will change them otherwise, because they cannot see that they are failing in obedience to God’s Word.

James 1:22-25 makes uncomfortable reading because we pilgrims are guilty of doing what he warned against from time to time. We find a cul-de-sac, or backwater somewhere where we find comfort and freedom from the constant slog of journeying to our promised land. We put our spiritual lives on hold for a time, but even when we behave like lost sheep, God is always there for us. Always willing and able to welcome us back into His arms. Jesus said He will always seek us out. Matthew 18:12-13, “If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them wanders away, what will he do? Won’t he leave the ninety-nine others on the hills and go out to search for the one that is lost? And if he finds it, I tell you the truth, he will rejoice over it more than over the ninety-nine that didn’t wander away!” What a Saviour! If we find ourselves failing to see Him clearly today, God’s prescription for our condition is waiting for us to open it up and start reading. 

Father God. You have the Words of eternal life, written for all time in Your Book, the Bible. Please help us to see clearly what You have for us, as we read it day by day. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

A Clear Conscience

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“Instead, you must worship Christ as Lord of your life. And if someone asks about your hope as a believer, always be ready to explain it. But do this in a gentle and respectful way. Keep your conscience clear. Then if people speak against you, they will be ashamed when they see what a good life you live because you belong to Christ.”
1 Peter 3:15-16 NLT

Our consciences are deeply embedded within our minds, and they are a very important driver of our thoughts and actions. A person without a conscience doesn’t exist, but a conscience can be trained to be more or less sensitive to certain behavioural patterns. Our thought processes can rationalise what we do and override our conscience-generated feelings and emotions. But, generally, our consciences make us feel bad when we do wrong and feel good when we do right. A big driver of how we feel and behave is related to our morality. The modern ideology of “if it feels right just do it” is a conscience-busting principle where our personal morals have failed in keeping us free of guilty thoughts.

So we must ask the question – what is our moral or values system? Where do we find the standard which we can use to programme our consciences? This is where the world view clashes with the God view. There is obviously some behaviours that are essential in society, driven by a pragmatic understanding of what Jesus said in Matthew 7:12, “Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you. This is the essence of all that is taught in the law and the prophets“. This, called the Golden Rule, cannot be disputed even by those who are not believers. Bluntly, we don’t abuse our neighbours because they would then feel entitled to do the same to us. 

We must operate a system of self-evaluation within us, but we know that we can’t depend on ourselves in this process. We read all about this in Jeremiah 17:9-10, “The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is? But I, the Lord, search all hearts and examine secret motives. I give all people their due rewards, according to what their actions deserve“. We need that external guidance to eliminate any possibility of our consciences being tarnished by our own deceit. Paul, on more than one occasion, publicly declared that he had a clear conscience. Acts 23:1, “Gazing intently at the high council, Paul began: “Brothers, I have always lived before God with a clear conscience!”” 

So we pilgrims must work hard to maintain a clear conscience, and the only source of the data we need to ensure our consciences are in line with what God requires is through His Word, the Bible. We must constantly read the Scriptures, because we forget and are often in danger of being subtly lured away from the straight and narrow path by the whisper of the enemy bringing half-truths into our thoughts. Remember what the serpent said to Eve? “Surely God did not say …”. Thankfully God’s presence is always with us. By constantly flushing our thought processes with the water of His Word we will maintain a soft heart.

One final thought. There will be others around us in the family of God who will perhaps not be in the same place as us when it comes to matters of the conscience. We pilgrims treat them with love and compassion, as God does with us. 

Father God, we thank You for the way we are “wired”, with a conscience aligned to Your Spirit. Amen.

Pure Spiritual Milk

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“So get rid of all evil behaviour. Be done with all deceit, hypocrisy, jealousy, and all unkind speech. Like newborn babies, you must crave pure spiritual milk so that you will grow into a full experience of salvation. Cry out for this nourishment, now that you have had a taste of the Lord’s kindness.”
1 Peter 2:1-3 NLT

Milk is a common food. It is freely available in many guises on supermarket shelves, and is still delivered to doorsteps in some places here in the UK. So we have skimmed, semi-skimmed and full fat. Then there is one of my favourites, a “gold top” variety approaching single cream in its consistency. We have the “lactose free” variants, for those with dairy intolerances.  I remember that when I was a small boy the milk wasn’t homogenised so a layer of thick cream formed at the top of the milk bottle, and was much prized when combined with the morning breakfast cereal. In recent years a variety of plant-based alternatives have emerged, based on soya, almonds and even oats.

There wouldn’t have been the same choice in Peter’s day, but milk then would have been available and his analogy for “pure spiritual milk” would have resonated with his readers. And Peter wasn’t alone – New Testament references also occur in the Hebrews letter and Paul makes mention in 1 Corinthians. So why is this connection between natural and spiritual milk such a good one? I have been blessed this year with two great-grandsons, and their mothers are both feeding them their own milk. And watching these babies thrive and grow is a joy to watch. The “newborn babies” in Peter’s letter would immediately create a picture in his readers’ minds of demanding children, not long born, and needing to be fed. The milk they crave for helps them live and grow.

We move onto the spiritual craving and ask ourselves if we are as demanding for the spiritual food as a new born baby is for their mother’s milk? And not any milk will do. Peter wrote that it should be “pure”. There is no other source of “spiritual milk” than the Word of God, the Bible. Just as a baby needs his or her mother’s milk, so a Christian needs to feed on the milk of the Word, the spiritual food that God has provided for us. And just as a baby graduates onto solid food one day, so must the new believer. Peter said that the “pure spiritual milk” will enable the new believer to “grow into a full experience of salvation”. It is interesting that Peter used the word “grow”. A new-born Christian cannot get off his knees of repentance and then carry on as before. He has to “grow”. Just as a baby starved of milk will fade away and die, so will a new believer die spiritually. There is no going back.

There are many helps available to encourage a new believer. Bible plans and notes. Apps for our smartphones to remind us of prayer. But new and quick fixes are not to be found.  Instant growth may be a modern expectation but there is no substitute for spiritual growth through the renewing of our minds. The Holy Spirit will lead and guide us. But in the end it is our self-will that applies. 

Peter also reminded his readers that the “pure spiritual milk” is necessary for the “full experience of our salvation”. Once again we are reminded that salvation is an on-going process. We were saved when we repented of our sins and believed in God’s saving grace (Justification). We are being saved as we consume the “pure spiritual milk” (Sanctification) and one day we will receive a full experience of salvation when Jesus returns (Glorification). No short cuts! But there’s no pressure. God isn’t a strict school master wielding a cane, expecting us to do well in exams and appear on the league tables of Heaven. We drink the milk. God will do the rest.

Father God. We thank You for Your Word, so necessary for feeding our inner beings. Please help us apply all the teaching and encouragement You provide for us. In Jesus’ name. Amen.