Carpe diem

Once, Jesus had the opportunity to heal a man on the sabbath, but was opposed by some pharisees. He could have said to the man, "Come and see me to-morrow." Surely it wouldn't have made a huge difference to the man, and would have kept happy those who wished to defend the sabbath. But, of course, he didn't.

Holiness

Jim Packer, in Keep in Step with the Spirit, mischievously comments that there exists no contemporary account of holiness, so he will perforce write his own. He begins by suggesting that the New Testament view of holiness has two components - the idea of being set apart, and the idea of being morally pure. Coincidentally, I read this passage from Matthew's gospel this morning (Matthew 10:34-39 Msg):

"Don't think I've come to make life cozy. I've come to cut—make a sharp knife-cut between son and father, daughter and mother, bride and mother-in-law—cut through these cozy domestic arrangements and free you for God. Well-meaning family members can be your worst enemies. If you prefer father or mother over me, you don't deserve me. If you prefer son or daughter over me, you don't deserve me.
"If you don't go all the way with me, through thick and thin, you don't deserve me. If your first concern is to look after yourself, you'll never find yourself. But if you forget about yourself and look to me, you'll find both yourself and me.

I've always found Jesus' statement disturbing. Is he against families? Jim Packer proposes a paradox: the detachment implied by our being set apart for God enables us to be more loving towards family members, neighbours, friends, etc. Possibly. There is a state called codependency which is regarded as unhealthy; maybe if we are firmly dependent upon God, we can be more real towards our fellow human beings.

Still struggling

This weekend, I wondered if the troubles of the past week might have been a punishment for my less than enthusiastic response to Awakening UK. I was challenged by what happened to the official who responded to Elisha's prophecy of deliverance thus (2 Kings 7:2 Msg):

The attendant on whom the king leaned for support said to the Holy Man, "You expect us to believe that? Trapdoors opening in the sky and food tumbling out?"

to which Elisha responded:

"You'll watch it with your own eyes," he said, "but you will not eat so much as a mouthful!"

There doesn't seem to be a place in the Christian life for honest scepticism (which is what I thought that I was expressing).

Drawing lines in the sand

How do we move forward? Something unfortunate has happened. Maybe it was avoidable; maybe it wasn't. There is a certain amount of anger in the air - maybe on both sides. There have been problems - nagging problems, which I haven't been able to solve - whose presence may have contributed to this particular conflagration.

Who was to blame? Am I (to some degree) at fault? Do I need to change? Do other people need to change (recognising that whatever I think, it is they who must decide the direction of their lives, and how they live them)? Does the situation need to change?

How do I move forward? If I withdraw, behave more coolly, what will be the consequences? What, exactly, does forgiveness mean in this situation?

Is a more radical departure called for? Should I be seriously looking for another job? In the same instituion, or elsewhere?

Betrayal

Psalm 55:12-14 (Msg)

This isn't the neighborhood bully
mocking me—I could take that.
This isn't a foreign devil spitting
invective—I could tune that out.
It's you! We grew up together!
You! My best friend!
Those long hours of leisure as we walked
arm in arm, God a third party to our conversation.

Just possibly

This will get through ... How quickly we unlearn things! It's probably less than a month since I last wrote in Graffiti 1 (Palm's original writing system) and already it feels 'wrong'. Is new always better?

Depth

Was at Awakening 2006 at the weekend. What was it? A concert? A service? A worship event (whatever that is)? I was disappointed. The weather was awful (a not improbable circumstance in this country). My wife did find value in Ruth Graham's testimony. And, yes, it was OK; just that, basically, she and Mark Stibbe told us of occasions when God met with them. Great! I'm happy for them. But why did I stand in the pouring rain? I wouldn't have minded a meeting with God.

If I want to meet with God, I find a quiet corner, open a bible (which usually means, start up a bible reader on my PDA), read, and pray. Crowds do not help.

I should say, though, that the highlight of the afternoon was definitely the session by Ian White and High Voltage. I probably shouldn't be singling out any one performer for praise, but the assurance of the 11 year old drummer (Harrison White) was truly amazing.

Where are we?

There is a verse which has always (since I first heard it (or, rather, sang it) in Ralph Vaughan Williams' Dona Nobis Pacem) had a certain resonance for me:

Jeremiah 8:20: The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved.

(I have linked to The Message, and quoted from The Authorised Version.)

Here in the UK, we are definitely sensing that the summer is over. There is a chill in the air, leaves are changing colour. Soon, we'll be getting up in darkness, eventually getting home from work in darkness. The verse doesn't bite the way it used to. Then I was lamenting my singleness; now I have a family - that makes a huge difference. Life is difficult, but I don't feel, as I did then, that it lacks purpose.

There, I started with a doleful verse, and I seem to have cheered myself up!

Energy

I have a son, who is 6 years old; he has plenty of energy, which he doesn't always expend in the most constructive of ways. But, of course, he is my son, and I love him.

I thought that I'd have a look in the Bible for places where God's relationship with us is likened to that of a parent's with his (or her) child. And since I've been reading recently through the book of Malachi, that's where I started. And I came across Malachi 3:17. God says, "I treat them with the same consideration and kindness that parents give the child who honors them." Not quite the unconditional love that some speak of. We should expect respect from our children (seeking, of course, at all times to deserve it).

Conflict

For various reasons, I've been thinking about conflict - and how to resolve conflicts. I'm not considering deep-seated enmity, rather how people who love each other, but differ on how to tackle a certain problem area, can find common ground, and move forward. But as a commentary on how even long standing disputes can sometimes be ended by the application of kindness, here is the happy ending to a story from the Old Testament (preached on by our minister just yesterday), (quoting 2 Kings 6:23 (Msg), but the link takes you to the whole story):

So he prepared a huge feast for them. After they ate and drank their fill he dismissed them. Then they returned home to their master. The raiding bands of Aram didn't bother Israel anymore.

Law and Grace

Just been reading a poem by Iain Crichton Smith, entitled The Law and the Grace. It makes me think of how the Scots do religion - the minister in his black gown - a sense that God is frowning.

Does God sometimes smile? But is it always through the gloom and the rain?

First love

When John warns the Ephesians that - you walked away from your first love - I have had a picture of someone whose initial enthusiasm for the faith has worn off - the honeymoon period is over. But I learnt this morning that most scholars believe that the love referred to is for one another - that the members of this church no longer love each other as they used to.

Love for God, love for Jesus, love for my brothers and sisters in the faith - all, of course, are interlinked. And feelings do rise and fall. Also, initial impressions don't always last. I find myself coming back to the need to think of love, not as an emotion, but as determination - to go on loving - to go on desiring the best for the beloved.

But what about realism? What about discovering that the effusive welcome one received when one joined a particular church doesn't go deep? What about common sense?

Tender loving care

A phrase from this morning's reading caught my attention. In Deuteronomy 10:15 (Msg), Peterson has Moses say:

it was your ancestors who God fell in love with

I guess that it is difficult to render a Hebrew thought in English, and not being a Hebrew scholar myself I have no particular insight, but the image appears to be of a man falling in love with a woman, and marrying her. And perhaps it is fair to observe that in the human situation what starts as an emotional attachment needs in the long run to be bolstered with vows - a declared intention to go on loving, come what may.

Love as faithfulness

Just checking in briefly. And recalling a talk given to Aberdeen Christian Union wherein the speaker commented that the Hebrew word hesed, which in the Authorised Version of the bible is often translated loving kindness, carries the idea of loyalty. It is an operation of the will, not an emotion. So if God says - I do this because I love you - he isn't necessarily saying - because I think you're a nice person (or people) - he is affirming that he has decided to love us - his love towards us is fixed because, yes, he has chosen us (which might have been because he likes us, but I doubt it), but more, simply, because he has decided to do so. He has made a decision, and he isn't going to change his mind.

Commanding love

Thinking about love, and in particular God's command that we should love him:

Deuteronomy 6:4,5 (NIV): Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.

What does God mean when he tells us that we must love him? I can't tell you to love me. I could ask you, or I could try to earn your love. I would think it presumptuous to tell you to love me. Of course, it's difficult to have this discussion in English. Hebrew has how many words for love? And Greek, of course, famously, has four (as expounded by CS Lewis in 'The Four Loves'). I suspect that the kind of love which God seeks from us is more an act of will than an emotion.

Does it help to think of God as a jealous husband? One who has chosen us, who has claimed us, who requires us to be faithful. We love him, who first loved us.

Laws

The ten commandments were given to the people of Israel, redeemed from slavery in Egypt. Naively, I would think of these rules as indicating the people's side of the bargain. They were to obey God, but not in the sense of a servant doing the day-to-day bidding of a master or mistress, or a robot controlled by the transmitter in its creator's hand. The ten commandments were a framework, a broad set of rules, defining what it meant to be a citizen of the new dispensation.

We have moved on, haven't we? It would be difficult to summarise Jesus' attitude to the laws of the Old Testament. In one respect he made them even more difficult to follow, internalising their requirements. 'Thou shalt not kill', but you must not even harbour angry thoughts towards your brother. Elsewhere, though, he seems to relax their hold - the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.

I think that I grew up believing that the ten commandments were absolute. Thousands of years old, perhaps, but still with an iron grip. I don't know, however, if that is the attitude of Christians to-day, or the church. I wonder if we can be inconsistent though - ignoring one commandment when it suits us, and trotting out another when we wish to make a judgement.

Signs of the covenant

If you and I reach an agreement, we shake hands. If we want to make it a bit more formal, we create a document, and sign it. The old covenant had its signs. To signify that you had become a member of the covenant people (if you were male), you were circumcised. Beyond the initial sign, as a member of the covenant people, you took part in rituals - sacrifices, festivals. As I believe Isaiah pointed out somewhere, however, it was possible to be scrupulous (and enthusastic) about maintaining the outward symbols of the relationship, while inwardly ignoring its fundamental requirement - obedience.

The new covenant, the covenant of grace, also has its signs. The initiation rite is baptism (an obvious difference appears immediately - a day after your baptism, there may be no visible evidence of what has happened, whereas circumcision leaves a scar). I submit to baptism to signify (among other things) that I am joining the community of believers. As I continue in the faith, I participate in its activities. I would suggest that communion (or the eucharist) is the action (more than any other) which signifies the renewal and continuation of my acceptance of God's promise.

Of course, different denominations do communion differently. As I find myself once more in the Church of Scotland, I am aware that the way that things are done does influence the way that I think about the whole thing. The CofS takes communion just three or four times a year. It becomes (has, for me, therefore, always been) impossible to think of communion as sustaining my daily (or even weekly) life as a Christian. Indeed, I lived through presumably my formative years as a Christian without being allowed to take communion - I 'joined' the church aged eighteen. I sometimes wonder if those with authority in the church ever think to decipher the messages they send by the rules they apply.

The new covenant

OK, I'm floundering here. The old covenant is easy to understand, but, as it turned out, impossible to implemement. Human frailty means that people will always fail to keep their side of the bargain. So, what is the new covenant which replaces the old one? Is it the promise in Jeremiah of hearts of flesh to replace hearts of stone? Is it the giving of the Holy Spirit, to enable us to become better people, worthy of God's blessing?

When I become a Christian, I accept Christ's sacrifice to deal with past sins. But what of future sins? Under the old code, there was an ongoing system of sacrifices, to deal with sins. If I, at the end of the day, confess my sins, do I automatically know God's forgiveness? Can I be sure that I have been forgiven?

Covenants

From the 100-Minute Bible (5 The giving of the Law):

God made a covenant with the people of Israel; he would care for them, and they would obey his commandments.

I suspect that, for many of us, subconsciously perhaps, this is still our agreement with God. We shall do our best, to keep his laws, to help other people, and in return, we expect him to look out for us. If something bad happens to us (or someone we know, or know of), our first question is 'why?' And, for myself, I wonder if God is punishing me for some wrongdoing. And when we hear of natural disasters, we comment on the injustice - why were these people singled out?

Of course, I'm touching on a huge, and difficult topic. I just want to consider one tiny aspect of the question. Do we (believers, Christians) live under the old covenant (we do our part, God does his), or have we grasped the new covenant? Or do elements of the old covenant still apply under the new? Does God punish wrongdoing? Do we experience what some people call chastisement? Does God deal with us as a parent deals with a child? And if God is prepared to deal severely with us, to purge us of wrongdoing, should parents have freedom (and backing) on occasion to deal severely with their children?

Was God watching over me?

This morning, I deleted a user's local email folders. Over a gig (1 gigabyte) of data, almost certainly irreplaceable. I didn't mean to, of course.

But for this particular user, some months ago, I set up a backup procedure, which meant that these folders were backed up last night (I certainly hope they were - now I'm not quite sure). When I started writing this entry, I thought that I had managed to retrieve the files from a recent backup, but, sadly, it looks as though the backup hasn't run since March of this year. So, I have lost possibly 3 months' worth of emails.

Maybe I should be leaving God out of this debacle. It's been a disaster; it could have been worse. My fault, I suppose, for not taking an immediate backup before doing anything with someone's data.