- Steve Richards
- Oct 6, 2017
Schools and churches have been celebrating the long-standing festival of harvest thanksgiving. It is good for people to gather together and consider where our daily bread comes from and it is right, as part of our thanksgiving, to share with those who, at this time, do not have enough of life’s essentials.
To illustrate his teaching, Jesus frequently referred to the theme of harvest, including ploughing, sowing seed and troublesome weeds. His concern was not to teach about farming techniques and food for the body; his primary concern was food for the souls of men and women. He famously quoted, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’ In other words, just as our bodies require physical food, the other part of our make-up which we call our soul (the ‘real’ me, or psyche) must have sustenance if it is to live.
Jesus insisted that He himself is to be that sustenance. ‘I am the bread of life’. And He calls us each to feed on him; not literally, but in the way that we may speak of a football devotee who eats, breathes and lives the game!
Taking another tack, he talks about the seed of his words being sown in the soil of our hearts, so that our moral and spiritual character grows. Maintaining the same imagery, such character is referred to as fruit. We are told there will be a divine harvest where this fruit will be assessed.
If we take such things seriously, then we need to think about whether the seed of God’s word for us has yet germinated. Our hearts are like a field. If the field is lying fallow, it will be dormant, lifeless and unyielding. A ploughed field however, is a field ready to receive seed which can, with appropriate amounts of water and sunshine, yield a life-giving crop.
The very fact that you have read this far, suggests that your heart is more likely to be a ploughed field than a fallow one. The question is what type of seeds do we allow to infiltrate our heart? Those seeds which take root the easiest are weeds. According to Jesus, we should be discerning as to what is good seed and allow that to germinate and grow in us.
When Christians are telling others about God, Jesus, faith etc, they are in fact sowing good seed, in the hope that some will fall on ploughed ground. A proportion of the same seed will inevitably fall on fallow ground and where this is so, some people become agitated or angry. When this happens perhaps it is the harrowing experience of God’s plough at work…
- Steve Richards
- Sep 1, 2017
During the course of the next couple of months we are likely to be reminded in the media about the pivotal event known as the Reformation. I predict that this period of Christian history will be given a negative press. So, let me get ahead of the game with a positive take!
This autumn will see the 500th anniversary of the time when a monk, named Martin Luther, challenged the Pope and the Roman Catholic church concerning some of its traditions and beliefs which, he said, could not be substantiated by the Bible.
Reformation in this context, refers to the reforming of the Christian Church and, by extension, to the reforming of individual people who fall under its reach. It is reformation in the spiritual and moral sense; how people can be at peace with God and, as a result, find themselves desiring to do what is right by him. Christian Reformation, then, is continually relevant - not something to be thought of as simply a period in history.
The Reformation reminds us that being religious or having an affiliation to the church does not, in itself, mean that we have experienced our own personal ‘reformation’. Only by passing over the twofold threshold of repentance and belief does a person live the Christian faith from their heart. ‘Reformed’ Christianity emphasises ‘heart faith’ rather than a faith grounded in externals.
How may a man or woman, boy or girl, move over the threshold from religious externals to a heart faith and so know their own personal reformation? Jesus calls people into a fundamental life shift that challenges the status quo. He summons us to a change of mind, a U-turn towards God which is what repentance means. But change our mind about what? In a nutshell, Jesus.
Who is this Jesus that he can require our allegiance ahead of other allegiances? It is at this point that belief (or faith) comes into play. Are we prepared to entrust ourselves to him, putting ourselves on the line and, so to speak, burning our bridges behind us?
Martin Luther did precisely this; he burnt his bridges behind him. As a means of getting himself right with God He turned from looking to religious traditions, the church and even the Pope. Instead he simply trusted Jesus for all that is necessary to establish him in right relationship with God. Because you and I can do the same also, Reformation is still alive in 2017!
- Steve Richards
- Aug 4, 2017
What happens when a football player places a well-aimed kick on another player’s shin? He might get shown a card, or be sent off, even given a match suspension, but doubtless he will be back playing again within a week or two. Now imagine someone taking a kick at Queen Elizabeth’s shin and the outrage would be of a different order altogether!
Why should this be? After all, the act was identical - someone kicked someone’s shin. The answer is, of course, that the offence lies not so much in the act itself but against whom the offence was committed.
Now, keeping in mind that all wrong doing offends a righteous and good God, read on…
King David (circa 1000 BC) ruled Israel in what was called the nation’s ‘Golden Age.’ His prestige, power and success caused him to be lax towards God. The devil finds work for idle hands and, while his troops were at war, David lusted after the beautiful Bathsheba. He had his way with her and she became pregnant. In an attempt to conceal what he had done, he manipulated things so that Bathsheba’s husband was killed in battle, so freeing her to marry the king. God appears to have been well off David’s radar screen at this time.
God graciously sent David a prophet, named Nathan, to touch his heart and to appeal to his sense of right and wrong. Once David had his view of God back in focus he was conscience stricken, cut to the heart, as we say. He called out to God in earnest, ‘Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight…’
Although David says, ‘against you only have I sinned…’, I don’t believe he was oblivious to the fact that he had done wrong to both Bathsheba and her husband. Nevertheless, a bit like the disparity between the football player and the Queen, he realised that his offences were first and foremost against God himself. David knew that when he was in trouble, even in trouble with God, the answer was not to run away but to come towards God who alone could bring him relief and forgiveness.
As Nathan the prophet was sent to David, God has sent us Jesus. It is he who shows us in sharp focus who God is; this so that our consciences might be awakened and we be drawn towards him. Here, forgiveness awaits those who earnestly want it. God will not refuse a contrite heart (see Psalm 51).