A Holy Service

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“I have told you these things so that you won’t abandon your faith. For you will be expelled from the synagogues, and the time is coming when those who kill you will think they are doing a holy service for God. This is because they have never known the Father or me. Yes, I’m telling you these things now, so that when they happen, you will remember my warning. I didn’t tell you earlier because I was going to be with you for a while longer.”
John 16:1-4 NLT

It is strange that there are so many points of view regarding God. None of us really know God in all His fullness and we tend to focus on the bits we know and disregard anything else. We blithely talk about an infinite God without really understanding what we are saying. To illustrate this, I once had a conversation with a fellow worker who was a devout Muslim. Every lunchtime, his office door was closed and out came his prayer mat. Even the company’s managing director wasn’t able to disturb him. One day he said to me, knowing that I was a Christian, that we worshipped the same God. I told him that this wasn’t the case because his “god” was an authoritative being called “Allah” whereas I worshipped a Trinitarian God – the Father, Son and Holy Spirit – who wanted a personal relationship with His children, those saved through a belief in Jesus. We pilgrims worship an Omnipresent, Omniscient and Omnipotent God and all we know about Him we find in the Bible and through our personal encounters with the Holy Spirit. But we won’t fully ever know God because making such a claim puts us right back in the Garden. Genesis 3:5, “God knows that your eyes will be opened as soon as you eat it, and you will be like God, knowing both good and evil“.

In today’s verses from John 16, we read that there will be some who claim to know God and who will think that they are doing God’s will by killing those whom they perceive as being blasphemers, those who elevate Jesus as the Son of God and follow His ways. Saul, later to be called Paul, was someone who thought this way. We read in Acts 8:3, “But Saul was going everywhere to destroy the church. He went from house to house, dragging out both men and women to throw them into prison“. It took a personal encounter with the living Jesus before Saul could see the error of his ways.

We look back through the last two thousand years and find many occasions where different views of God clashed on the battlefields of towns and villages, in churches and monasteries, in the lives of ordinary men and women. Even today there is sectarian violence between Protestants and Catholics in various places in the UK. People with different views of God thinking that they are doing a “holy service” by trying to eliminate those of another persuasion. And as I write the violence between the Jewish state of Israel and the surrounding Muslim nations constantly simmers in a maelstrom of hate and violence. 

But we pilgrims are of a different persuasion. We know whom we follow. We are in a privileged position, as we read in 1 Peter 2:9, “But you are not like that, for you are a chosen people. You are royal priests, a holy nation, God’s very own possession. As a result, you can show others the goodness of God, for he called you out of the darkness into his wonderful light”. We know what the true “holy service” comprises. And we praise and worship the One who made it all possible -Jesus.

Jesus, we do indeed offer up our sincere thanks for all You did for us at Calvary. Amen.

Jesus, the Great I Am

Posted on by Adrian Clark

In John’s Gospel, Jesus made seven “I am” statements, all true statements declaring who He was. To recap, here is the list.

In John 6:35 we read, “Jesus replied, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry again. Whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.””
John 8:12, “Jesus spoke to the people once more and said, “I am the light of the world. If you follow me, you won’t have to walk in darkness, because you will have the light that leads to life.””
John 10:7, “so he explained it to them: “I tell you the truth, I am the gate for the sheep.”“
John 10:11, “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd sacrifices his life for the sheep.”
John 11:25, “Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Anyone who believes in me will live, even after dying.””
John 14:6, “Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me.””
John 15:1, “I am the true grapevine, and my Father is the gardener.”

There are also a couple of occasions where Jesus referred to Himself with God’s name “I AM”.
John 4:26, “Then Jesus told her, “I Am the Messiah!””
John 18:5a, ““Jesus the Nazarene,” they replied. “I Am He,” Jesus said. …””

Jesus used ordinary objects and situations that the people would relate to. Things like bread, light, sheep, a gate or door, death, and a grapevine. And He wove the ordinary into spiritual statements that pointed to Himself, and statements that described life in God’s Kingdom. There could be no doubt as to who Jesus was and what His mission was all about. The problem for most of the Jews was that they seemed to have little appreciation or understanding that they could enjoy being part of God’s Kingdom during their natural lives by believing in Jesus. They also had to contend with the hostility of the Jewish leaders, who considered that Jesus was a blasphemer and a fraud. With all the miracles and signs that Jesus performed, that underpinned His teaching, it is a wonder that the people of His day, including the leaders, didn’t all wholeheartedly embrace Him and all He taught. But that is a sign of sin, because people generally love to sin is all its guises. And sin is incompatible with the Kingdom of God because there will be no sinners in Heaven. Various passages of Scripture in the Bible make it clear who will not be suitable candidates for living with God. For example, we have Revelation 21:8a, “But cowards, unbelievers, the corrupt, murderers, the immoral, those who practice witchcraft, idol worshipers, and all liars …”. Altogether, theologians believe that there are 120 separate sins listed in Scripture. To believe in Jesus and follow Him demands a life of repentance, as God’s people pursue holiness to be like Him. Our Holy Spirit inspired consciences will guide us into the truth Jesus taught about.

But the opportunity to believe in Jesus didn’t end with His death. In fact that was when the opportunity really started. The Bible is a legacy of spiritual truth that has continued Jesus’ ministry for the last two thousand years.  The life contained within its pages propagates the work and power of the Holy Spirit, as He lives within us. 

Dear God. We thank You for Your Word, the Bible, and for all it contains, the words of truth and life, Amen.

Believing The Message

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“Put your trust in the light while there is still time; then you will become children of the light.” After saying these things, Jesus went away and was hidden from them. But despite all the miraculous signs Jesus had done, most of the people still did not believe in him. This is exactly what Isaiah the prophet had predicted: “Lord, who has believed our message? To whom has the Lord revealed his powerful arm?””
John 12:36-38 NLT

These verses today portray a damning indictment of the people in Jerusalem, gathered together for the Passover Festival that year. Jesus worked hard and selflessly amongst all His people during His ministry but John recorded that “most of the people still did not believe in him”. Jesus correctly declared who He was, the Son of God. He backed up His claim by doing amazing miraculous signs, even raising one man from the dead. And then there was the public conversation between Him and His Father in Heaven. What more did He have to do to convince this people that if they believed in Him and followed Him, then they would receive eternal life? 

But human beings have a tendency to only believe what they want to believe. There is an organisation today called the Flat Earth Society. In spite of all the physical evidence to the contrary, the people who are members of this society are convinced that the planet on which we live is flat and not a sphere. Their web site sets out their aim – “Standing with reason we offer a home to those wayward thinkers that march bravely on with REASON and TRUTH in recognizing the TRUE shape of the Earth – Flat”. Really? And then there is all the confusion around gender ideology, with organisations promoting the belief that people can be born in the wrong body. Really? One web site says, “Trans young people and their families are at breaking point“. Of course they are at breaking point because they are going against what God created – Gen 1:27, “So God created human beings in his own image. In the image of God he created them; male and female he created them”. There are many other examples of people with other strange and unsupportable beliefs, so we shouldn’t be surprised if people, including us pilgrims, refuse to believe them. People are of course entitled to their views and beliefs, but there is a problem when they try and impose their ideologies on others, calling them all sorts of names if affirmation is declined. We pilgrims are used to all sorts of ridicule and abuse, as we try and speak out God’s message of love and hope to a resistant and unwelcoming society.

All of which perhaps brings us back to how Jesus was perceived by the people in His day. Throughout their lives, the Jews were steeped in the Law of Moses, with no unconventional interpretations being allowed. Only the Rabbis were allowed to interpret the Law, and the people had to follow what they said. So Jesus burst into the Jewish religious scene with an explosive mix of teaching and miracles, apparently cutting across what the people had come to understand about the Law. Jesus said in Matthew 5:17-18, “Don’t misunderstand why I have come. I did not come to abolish the law of Moses or the writings of the prophets. No, I came to accomplish their purpose. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not even the smallest detail of God’s law will disappear until its purpose is achieved”. Matthew 5 – 7 make sobering reading. But in spite of all His teaching and miracles, “most of the people still did not believe in Him”. To a people stuck in a fixed religious mindset, Jesus’ presentation of a radical counter-cultural invitation to believe in Him was something that they couldn’t, or wouldn’t, accept. But, praise God, we can thank Him that some people did believe in Jesus, and they formed the early church that blossomed and reached the world of their day.

If we fast forward to today, the same problem still exists. Jesus’ message of forgiveness to all those who repent and believe in Him still stands. The signs of religious inflexibility however, still mark the landscape with empty church buildings standing as monuments to a past move of God. The Holy Spirit is always at work, gently preparing the ground in people’s hearts for a seed of hope to be planted in our hopeless world. We pilgrims are seed planters and we pray for the opportunity to present Jesus’ invitation to believe in Him to all who will listen. Isaiah cried out, “Lord, who has believed our message? To whom has the Lord revealed his powerful arm?” A despairing cry but not a hopeless one, because the answer came on a Cross at Calvary. We pilgrims proclaim the message and the Holy Spirit brings about the solution.

Dear God. Thank You for Your message of hope, that cuts across and trumps all man made ideologies. We praise You today. Amen.

Extraordinary Faith

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“Bethany was only a few miles down the road from Jerusalem, and many of the people had come to console Martha and Mary in their loss. When Martha got word that Jesus was coming, she went to meet him. But Mary stayed in the house. Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if only you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask.””
John 11:18-22 NLT

The scene couldn’t have been clearer. Lazarus had died and was in his grave. In those days a doctor wasn’t needed to certify his death because the people in Bethany just knew that he was dead. They had dealt with the rituals necessary before interment. The body had been washed and wrapped in scented cloths. There was no doubt and it was so real and certain that we read in John’s account that many people from Jerusalem, just a few miles up the road, had come to Bethany to offer their condolences to Lazarus’ two surviving sisters. Not even the Pharisees could have had any doubts about Lazarus’ demise. Lazarus and his two sisters must have been well known in the area and had many friends.

While Jesus was still on the road approaching Bethany, “Martha got word that Jesus was coming”. So she went out to meet Him, and gently rebuked Him for not coming earlier, when He could have perhaps saved Lazarus from death. But then Martha made an extraordinary statement – “But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask”. That is faith. Martha had no doubts about Jesus and His identity and powers.

Do we pilgrims have faith like Martha’s? Faith that expects miracles to happen when God shows up in our human situations? Of course, we mustn’t expect to see dead people rise up out of their graves just for the sake of it. Jesus had the power to raise Lazarus and return him to life, but He wouldn’t have done that without a reason, and that was because He wanted to bring glory to God and prove to the Pharisees once and for all that he was who He said He was. John 11:4, “But when Jesus heard about it he said, “Lazarus’s sickness will not end in death. No, it happened for the glory of God so that the Son of God will receive glory from this.”” 

Reading on in John’s Gospel, we find that Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, anyone who believes in me will do the same works I have done, and even greater works, because I am going to be with the Father. You can ask for anything in my name, and I will do it, so that the Son can bring glory to the Father. Yes, ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it!” (John 14:12-14). We pilgrims apparently have tremendous power at our fingertips, but Jesus introduced a caveat by saying such miracles performed in His name will bring glory through Him to the Father. That certainly happened in the case of Lazarus. 

God is loving, merciful and compassionate, and He will often bring about miraculous events in answer to prayers. I can personally testify to His healing power, and I give God all the glory for what he has done for me, and on more than one occasion. And what was about to happen in response to Martha’s faith and Jesus’s desire to bring glory to His father, turned Judea upside down.

Dear God. We pray for more faith like Martha’s, faith that will see amazing works and will give You all the glory. Amen.

A Brother With Two Sisters

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“A man named Lazarus was sick. He lived in Bethany with his sisters, Mary and Martha. This is the Mary who later poured the expensive perfume on the Lord’s feet and wiped them with her hair. Her brother, Lazarus, was sick. So the two sisters sent a message to Jesus telling him, “Lord, your dear friend is very sick.””
John 11:1-3 NLT

Chapter Eleven in John’s Gospel introduces Jesus’ friends, Lazarus and his two sisters, Mary and Martha. They lived in a place called Bethany, a village located about two miles from Jerusalem on the slopes of the Mount of Olives. So it was quite close to Jerusalem and someone walking from there would take about forty minutes. We know little about the three siblings, but a story was about to unfold that had earth-shattering consequences. The account in John doesn’t appear in the other Gospels, although references to Mary and Martha do. But we do know that Jesus was friends with this small family unit, and probably stayed with them as often as He could. 

We know a little about Mary, because she “poured the expensive perfume on the Lord’s feet and wiped them with her hair”. John 12:3, “Then Mary took a twelve-ounce jar of expensive perfume made from essence of nard, and she anointed Jesus’ feet with it, wiping his feet with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance.” And we know a little more about the two sisters from the account in Luke 10, where Martha bustled around preparing a meal for all the hungry guests – Jesus and His disciples – while her sister, Mary, chose to sit at Jesus’ feet, listening to His teaching. This is a well know story often referred to today, with some women identifying either with Martha or Mary in the course of their Christian journeys.

Lazarus became sick. With what we don’t know, but it was important enough for his sisters to send a worried message to Jesus. But the picture emerges in our minds of this ordinary Israeli family, living in a house large enough to accommodate guests. Lazarus and his sisters were probably at the younger end of the age spectrum, but there is no mention of parents or other relatives. Circumstances conspired to leave them, apparently reasonably well off, as three siblings living together on their own. John provided just the bare minimum of facts about this family unit, leaving us to try and fill in the gaps. 

But we pilgrims can relate to the concerns of being ill, and especially if a person close to us is unwell. A parent with a sick child. A wife with a sick husband. A Mary and Martha with a sick brother. Part of life as a human being living on Planet Earth is having to deal with sickness. This wasn’t God’s plan when He created the human race. Instead, we live in a world corrupted by sin, and under the power of the “god of this age”, and because of that we will experience illnesses, all the way from a common cold through to the ravages of cancer. When Jesus came He offered eternal life to all who believed in Him. This wasn’t an infinite natural life extension but eternal spiritual life. Yes, there were well documented occasions, such as in the account we are reading today, when Jesus healed the sick and even raised the dead. Today, there are still miraculous healings that take place through God’s servants and these are all down to God and His compassion.

There was a bond between Lazarus, Martha and Mary that was strong and able to withstand what would be coming to them in the days and weeks ahead in John’s account. But we pilgrims need to be on our guard because the devil excels in breaking up families, and especially Christian families. The devil will want to destroy anything that God has created and ordained. We know from Genesis 2 that God ordained marriage between a man and a woman – “This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one” (Genesis 2:24). From the man/woman union comes a family, and family life, and two of the Ten Commandments confirm the importance of the family. The sibling family residing in Bethany were perhaps unusual, but they demonstrated a familial bond that was important.

In a spiritual sense, we are part of a much larger family, made up of the children of God. The devil will want to divide and conquer the church of which we are a part, so we need to be on our guards. And that is the message today as we explore the account of Lazarus, Martha and Mary, and what was about to happen in Bethany.

Dear Father God. You designed the family unit and put within us Your family dna. You too are a part of a family unit, together with Jesus and the Holy Spirit. We pray for our families and know that even if we aren’t in a family unit, You are there with us. We are so grateful. Amen.

No Perishing

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one can snatch them away from me, for my Father has given them to me, and he is more powerful than anyone else. No one can snatch them from the Father’s hand. The Father and I are one.”
John 10:27-30 NLT

In our journey through the Gospel of John, the picture is emerging of a caring Jesus, compassionate and loving, looking out for His followers, who are those who believe in Him. He feeds them spiritual water (John 7:37-38, “On the last day, the climax of the festival, Jesus stood and shouted to the crowds, “Anyone who is thirsty may come to me! Anyone who believes in me may come and drink! For the Scriptures declare, ‘Rivers of living water will flow from his heart’”). He feeds them spiritual food (John 6:35, “Jesus replied, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry again. Whoever believes in me will never be thirsty”). He protects them (John 10:11, “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd sacrifices his life for the sheep”). He brings light and life (John 8:12, “Jesus spoke to the people once more and said, “I am the light of the world. If you follow me, you won’t have to walk in darkness, because you will have the light that leads to life””). In fact His followers will enjoy abundant life (John 10:10, “The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life”). What is there not to like about Jesus, because all that he promised His followers two thousand years ago is still available to His 21st Century believers? 

But perhaps the most notable promise that Jesus made was His gift of eternal life. Jesus loves His followers so much that He wants to spend eternity with them. “They will never perish” He said. And this offer was not just restricted to His people, the Jews. He also included all the non-Jews, the Gentiles, in His offer of protection and eternal life (John 10:16, “I have other sheep, too, that are not in this sheepfold. I must bring them also. They will listen to my voice, and there will be one flock with one shepherd). 

But what is this eternal life with its promise that we will never perish? The Bible tells us that when we die, our physical bodies will be of no further use and can be discarded. But our spirits live on in a place variously called Sheol, or Hades, or Heaven. There seems to be some compartmentalisation in place, because, as Jesus promised the dying thief next to Him, there is a place called Paradise. So it is not unreasonable to assume that Jesus’ followers, those that believe in Him, will join Him there. Perhaps that is Heaven. We should note that Hell doesn’t exist at the moment, only coming into effect when its first inhabitants, the Beast and False Prophet, are thrown there (Revelation 19:20, “And the beast was captured, and with him the false prophet who did mighty miracles on behalf of the beast—miracles that deceived all who had accepted the mark of the beast and who worshiped his statue. Both the beast and his false prophet were thrown alive into the fiery lake of burning sulphur”). But there is no confusion or alternative, the spirits of all who have ever lived either end up in Heaven or Hades. There is of course then the Great White Throne judgement in Revelation 20, followed by the population of Hell. Hades ends up in hell as well (Revelation 20:14, “Then Death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death”). 

Thankfully, we pilgrims, believers in Jesus, will not have to face the terror of the Great White Throne because our names will be written in the Lamb’s Book of Life. We will never perish and end up in the company of totally evil beings.

Jesus brought a message of hope to a world floundering and dying in its sin. Evil still prevails, but Jesus promised us that we will “never perish”. As we persevere through this life, illuminating our passage with our testimonies of God’s saving grace, we will one day achieve our goal of eternal life through Jesus. What a Saviour!

Dear Father God. What a Saviour indeed. We praise and worship You today and every day. Amen.

Faith in Action

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“Then he spat on the ground, made mud with the saliva, and spread the mud over the blind man’s eyes. He told him, “Go wash yourself in the pool of Siloam” (Siloam means “sent”). So the man went and washed and came back seeing!”
John 9:6-7 NLT

Imagine myself in the position of the blind man. I could hear a man having a conversation with some other men about the cause of my blindness. Then one of the men, who seemed to be the leader, came over to me and I heard Him spit on the ground. A few moments later He smeared something gritty and unpleasant on my eyes. But there was something about this Man. He told me to go and wash off whatever was on my eyes in the Pool of Siloam. I knew where it was of course, so slowly and carefully, I made my way there, occasionally assisted by people on the way. People were asking me why I had mud on my face, but I carried on regardless. I finally got to the Pool and made my way into the water, finding a way although there were others there too. I started to wash the mud off my eyes and a strange thing started to happen. For the first time I was conscious of light appearing before me and as I washed it got stronger and stronger until I was aware of my surroundings. I could see! As it that wasn’t amazing enough, I knew what things were even though I had never seen them before. I had been aware of people but I could now see them. And the colours! Words could not express how I felt. I just had to get back and find out more about the Man who had smeared that mud on my eyes. 

But words cannot adequately describe the experience of the blind-no-more man. It wasn’t like a sore finger that healed. This was a miraculous event that transformed the lives of the man, his family, and all those who knew him. No more having to beg. No more having to depend on his parents and well-meaning friends and family for the basics of life. No more times of self-pity and even anger, as others seemed so much more blessed than he did. But what if he had refused to go and wash his face in that particular pool, instead heading for the nearest source of water, using that instead? What if he had reacted angrily to the indignity of someone smearing mud on his face? But there were no shortcuts. The man dutifully did as the Man had told him – go and wash in the Pool of Siloam. That took faith.

In 2 Kings 5 there is the story of Naaman, an important man in charge of the king of Aram’s army. He had leprosy, and ended up at Elishah’s door, expecting to be healed of his affliction. Elisha told him to go and wash 7 times in the River Jordan. Though initially reluctant to follow Elishah’s instructions, he was persuaded by his army officers to do what he was told to do, and through the grace of God, Elisha’s faith, and his obedience, he was healed.

Sometimes God will ask us to do something, and in the process, He will strengthen our faith. All through the Gospels we can see how Jesus tested a person’s, or a people’s, obedience leading to a miraculous sign. There was no way a pot of water could become a very good wine, but the servants obediently dipped in a ladle and in front of their eyes it became wine. They could have refused, considering it an insult to their intelligence. The blind man could have refused to walk through a Jerusalem crowded with people because he had mud on his face and probably looked a bit weird. The man lying on his mat at the Pool of Bethesda, could have ignored Jesus’ instruction to get up and pick up his mat and walk away. Perhaps God has asked us to do something to unlock a healing or some other requirement that we have been praying about. But in the process of being obedient to God’s command we might have to cast aside our pride. Naaman, an important man at the head of an army, is told to go and wash in a muddy river not once but seven times. And in front of all his subordinates. That took courage. So, what is God asking us to do today? Sorry, did I hear You right, God? You really want me to …?

Dear Father God. Please increase our faith to equip us to be totally obedient to You and be You want us to be. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Ointment of Mud

Posted on by Adrian Clark

““It was not because of his sins or his parents’ sins,” Jesus answered. “This happened so the power of God could be seen in him”. … Then he spat on the ground, made mud with the saliva, and spread the mud over the blind man’s eyes. He told him, “Go wash yourself in the pool of Siloam” (Siloam means “sent”). So the man went and washed and came back seeing!”
John 9:3, 6-7 NLT

Why did Jesus make mud with His saliva, using it as a salve or ointment for smearing on the blind man’s eyes, when He could have just healed him with a word? Or He could have laid His hands or fingers on the malfunctioning eyes. Why the mud? There have been a number of theories as to why Jesus healed the man this way. Jesus healed another blind man in Bethsaida, and we can read the account in Mark 8:23-25, “Jesus took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village. Then, spitting on the man’s eyes, he laid his hands on him and asked, “Can you see anything now?” The man looked around. “Yes,” he said, “I see people, but I can’t see them very clearly. They look like trees walking around.” Then Jesus placed his hands on the man’s eyes again, and his eyes were opened. His sight was completely restored, and he could see everything clearly”. This was a two stage healing, starting with Jesus spitting in the man’s face followed by Him placing His hands on them. A theory promoted by some in those days was that saliva had healing properties, so perhaps Jesus was using it to help the blind man’s faith. But we don’t really know what was going on in Jesus’ healing ministry. No two healing events were the same so, try as we do to think one up, there is no formulaic recipe for copying Him. 

Vision difficulties today are common and the medical profession can often help by using optical corrections such as spectacles or contact lenses. Cataracts can be removed and replaced with an artificial lens. Degenerative or age-related conditions can often be delayed with the skills of the doctors. But someone born blind is, unless there are exceptional circumstances, beyond healing by our medics. But nothing was too hard for Jesus – He had the ability to restore sight whenever the opportunity arose. And we should also take note that through the power of the Holy Spirit, blind people have been healed today. There are well documented accounts available for those who look for them. Also note that healing a man blind from birth was more than introducing sight to his eyes. There is the infrastructure behind the eyes that processes the visual information to enable what is seen to be interpreted correctly. In healing the blind man, Jesus also reprogrammed the man’s brain.

There is a condition much worse than physical blindness and this is spiritual blindness. People with this condition are those who have rejected God and who deny the validity of anything spiritual, and particularly anything to do with God. We read what Paul wrote about the cause of spiritual blindness in 2 Corinthians 4:4, “Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don’t believe. They are unable to see the glorious light of the Good News. They don’t understand this message about the glory of Christ, who is the exact likeness of God”. Those who fail to respond to the invitation to the Good News about Jesus are committing themselves to a future spent in a place of total blackness, where any form of sight is no use at all. One day, any believer who is physically blind will receive a new pair of eyes, with perfect vision. And he or she will be able to gaze on the face of God in awe and worship. It will be an amazing experience for all of us. In Revelation 21:23 we read, “And the city has no need of sun or moon, for the glory of God illuminates the city, and the Lamb is its light“. Jesus proclaimed to His people that “….. I am the light of the world. If you follow me, you won’t have to walk in darkness, because you will have the light that leads to life” (John 8:12). Both sighted and unsighted people are in the same place before the Cross of Christ.

Dear God. You are a God of light and there is no darkness within You. We worship You today. Amen.

Stop Complaining

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“But Jesus replied, “Stop complaining about what I 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. As it is written in the Scriptures, ‘They will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who listens to the Father and learns from him comes to me. (Not that anyone has ever seen the Father; only I, who was sent from God, have seen him.)”
John 6:43-46 NLT

Jesus told the people who were murmuring amongst themselves about His claim to be the “bread that came down from Heaven” to “stop complaining”. This passage of Scripture recording Jesus’ claims to be God’s Son contained several references to Him being the bread of Heaven. The people around Him seemed to be having great difficulty in accepting or understanding what Jesus was saying, and He had to repeat His message several times. But we have to position what Jesus was saying in the culture of His times. The Jews were steeped in their history and particularly the times after the flight from Egypt and the journey through the wilderness, where God fed His people for a massive forty years. There were no doubts amongst the God-fearing people of Jesus’ day, that God had performed the miracles that they were taught about at their schools and in their homes as they grew up. So the phrase “bread from Heaven” would have been immediately associated with manna, and the miracle  that Jesus performed in feeding the crowd grabbed their attention, because it was the closest they had come to experiencing being divinely fed as their ancestors had been. 

Jesus had been known by many of the people all their lives, so although they could probably accept that God had performed miracles through a human being – after all their Scriptures recorded many such events – they were unable to accept that this “human being” before them was not just any human, but the Son of God Himself. So they complained and murmured because of, what was to them, His audacious claim. 

Unfortunately, there are many people today who puff themselves up and make outrageous claims about themselves and their spiritual abilities. But in all the froth and bubble, there is the danger of missing the very person who is making a genuine claim. This is what happened with many of Jesus’ listeners, and it continues to happen today. But instead of complaining, we must check them out. We read in Matthew 7:15-16a, “Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep but are really vicious wolves. You can identify them by their fruit, that is, by the way they act. …”. There is also 1 John 4:1, “Dear friends, do not believe everyone who claims to speak by the Spirit. You must test them to see if the spirit they have comes from God. For there are many false prophets in the world”.

We pilgrims must never become complainers. Such people are never popular, because complainers are not a blessing to others. Rather than complain we must look to God for guidance, because He will “lead us into all truth”. Complaining achieves nothing and can make us, and others, depressed. I know we live in a world that encourages people to complain, often in the hope that they will receive some sort of monetary compensation for bad service or something like that. But when it comes to issues around God and His servants, we live in a different Kingdom, God’s Kingdom. Here there will never be any need to complain.

Dear God. Through Your grace and mercy, we have nothing to complain about, other than about our own sin. Please help us to know You more, day by day. For Jesus’ sake, Amen.

The Dead Hear Jesus

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“And I assure you that the time is coming, indeed it’s here now, when the dead will hear my voice—the voice of the Son of God. And those who listen will live. The Father has life in himself, and he has granted that same life-giving power to his Son. And he has given him authority to judge everyone because he is the Son of Man.”
John 5:25-27 NLT

Jesus is still talking with the Jewish leaders. But even though this is God, talking to them through His Son Jesus, all the Jews could see was an ordinary man making some incredible claims. It is just about possible to see these leaders shaking their heads in disbelief. The language that Jesus used was clear and straightforward. He said that “the dead will hear [His] voice“. But to anyone listening they would have immediately associated the word “dead” with physical death, the state human beings end up in after their life leaves them. The dead body was then interred in a grave and would eventually have disappeared through decay. So, the Jewish leaders would have scoffed at Him, treating what Jesus was saying perhaps as a bit of a joke. Jesus was deadly serious though, because He was referring to spiritual death.

As He was out and about in the region of the Middle East, Jesus brought to the people the words about His Kingdom, where people live forever. There is no death in the Kingdom of God, and many people heard what He had to say. But how many people listened to Him? In this context Jesus was saying that when He was listened to, the listener would understand and believe Him, becoming alive in the process. Simple really. But isn’t it strange that people prefer to carry on in their old familiar ways instead of changing the course of their life, which will provide them with a better outcome. As an example, I know a lady, a committed Christian, who smokes. She has done so for many years, and it has badly affected her health, and continues to do so. Doctors have time and time again warned her about her smoking, but she continues to smoke, knowing the dangers, but unable to change and choose a better way.

We pilgrims have the opportunity to tell people about the “life-giving power” that Jesus has. But how many listen to what we have to say? To those of us in the Kingdom, the rejection we experience is inexplicable, but unsurprising, because to be a citizen in God’s Kingdom requires change. And people are more comfortable in staying where they are, in familiar territory, continuing in their lives of sin, than turning to God in repentance and receiving His life for the rest of their physical lives and into the future beyond the Great Divide. Imagine I put before a person two glasses, one containing water and the other a deadly poison, and if I told them what the contents were, which one would they choose to drink? The answer to the choice between accepting the Good News about God and His saving grace and living with Him forever, and eternal life spent with the devil and his angels in torment, is just as clear cut. But people are more likely to choose the latter rather than the former. 

The consequence of drinking the poison is physical death, and the consequence of rejecting the Gospel is eternal death. Jesus’ teaching was hard to listen to at times, and even harder to apply in their lives. There was an occasion when many of His disciples decided that they couldn’t follow Him anymore because of His teaching. In John 6:66-68 we read, “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””. Jesus said to the Jewish leaders, and through the Holy Spirit He is saying the same thing today, that if you listen to what He was, and is, saying, believing in Him, then You will live forever. There is no other way to Heaven.

‭‭Father God. There is a huge difference between hearing and listening. Please help us communicate Your words of eternal life to those around us, as we speak about Your love and grace. And we pray that You will open the ears of those that hear Your message so that they too will believe in You. In Jesus’ name. Amen.