Monthly Message Pt 2 Jan 2021

Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and he relents from  sending calamity.”     Joel 2:13

 

Dear friends,

My last Monthly Message ended on a rather abrupt and solemn note, so I thought I should add a supplement leading on from Joel 1 to some of the great truths in Joel 2!

In his fallen state man not only dislikes the idea of dependence upon God but positively denies it. For centuries, man has assumed that politics, military power, philosophy, intellect, science and so on have the solutions to our problems.  Yet time and again history proves all that to be false. As Paul says in Romans 1:21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened”. We must, of course, do all we can professionally and socially, to combat coronavirus and its effects, but we were created to be dependent upon, and to live in relationship with, a loving, all-powerful Creator.

Joel 2 gives us several encouragements and challenges for serious consideration:

v2 “Let all who live in the land tremble, for the day of the Lord is coming” –  one day all sickness, fear, sorrow, injustice and wickedness will be no more. Though it will be a ‘day of darkness and gloom’ for those who persist in rejecting the Lord, it will be a day of gladness and full redemption for “all who have longed for his appearing” (II Tim 4:8).

v11 “The day of the Lord is great; it is dreadful.  Who can endure it?” – since God’s judgment on sin has fallen upon Christ, those who are in him, by faith, “shall be saved from God’s wrath through him!” (Rom 5:9).    Hallelujah!

v12  “’Even now,’ declares the Lord, ‘return to me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning’” – no mere lip service will do but the Lord himself longs for his people to return to him wholeheartedly.

v13  “Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and compassionate” – however far we wander, he is still our God, solely on the merits of our crucified Saviour!  The repentant, returning soul knows, to his deep joy, that God is gracious and compassionate.

As we return to the Lord let us also have a sense of history and of thankfulness:

vv20/21  “Surely he has done great things. Be not afraid, O land; be glad and rejoice. Surely the Lord has done great things”. What has the Lord done in your life?  Will he fail you now?

Now to the final verses of the chapter: God’s promise to pour out his Spirit on all people.  h Peter declared that promise to have been fulfilled on the Day of Pentecost and now the life-giving Holy Spirit is available and at work still today. The promise of v32 still holds true: “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

Understandably, the NHS, the Government and the news media are pre-occupied with the pandemic.  They need both our prayers and our co-operation.  But our greatest and most urgent need is to learn what it means to be totally dependent upon our Sovereign, Redeemer God, a God of justice and of grace who always keeps his word.

Your brother in Christ

God willing, Saffron Walden Bible Focus will take place this year on Saturday, 11th September. This is, of course, subject to lockdown restrictions having been lifted.

We hope the situation will be clearer by mid-April. 

We shall keep you informed!

 

Monthly Message Pt 1 Jan 2021

 

Has anything like this ever happened in your days or in the days of your forefathers?”     Joel 1:2

 

Dear friends,

Does the Bible have anything to say about pandemics?  I think Joel chapter 1 has a lot to say to us in our current coronavirus situation.  May I suggest you have that passage to hand as you read this?

Something had happened to Judah in Joel’s time that was quite unprecedented (when have we heard that word recently?): “Has anything like this ever happened in your days or in the days of your forefathers?” (v2).  It was something not to be forgotten for several generations (v3). About four waves of locusts had devoured everything in sight (v4).

Everybody and everything was affected; the devastation and suffering was all-pervasive, like the effects of Covid-19 on health, life, livelihoods, education, the economy and worship.

The locust invasion was likened to an invading army (vv6,7), or was it, in fact, an army likened to a swarm of locusts?  We can’t be quite sure but, either way, the result was the same: utter devastation with most serious consequences.  But what of the details?

Wine drinkers had a problem: the wine ‘has been snatched from your lips’ (v5). We, too, have been deprived of things we depend on – human contact, social gathering etc.

Plans and hopes had been dashed like a bride bereft of her husband (v8). We, too, have seen weddings postponed, funeral numbers limited, holidays cancelled. Temple worship had become impossible because there were no resources for the offerings and the priests were in mourning (v9).  We know all about closed church buildings and Zoom services being a noble but poor substitute for a ‘real’ service. Food production (vv10-12) was severely struck and we, though by God’s grace still have adequate food supplies, are facing a huge economic crisis from which it will take a very long time to recover.  The result of all this was that “the joy of people is withered away”.  Is that not true also of our society now?

The religious leaders of the day were the first to be called upon to give a lead in bringing the people back to a dependence upon God (v13).  As then, so today, the root problem and the root solution is spiritual.  So there was a call to prayer (v14) with ‘the elders’ to take the lead, for judgment is at hand (v15).  Maybe, if nothing else, this pandemic is a wake-up call to those of us who may have forgotten, or put to the back of our minds, the fact that we are all accountable to God.

A lack of joy and gladness in worship, together with a crisis in the environment (vv16-20) sound so familiar.  Is not a call to prayer of paramount importance and should it not start with us, and our church?

Now for the good news!  One day our sovereign God of grace and power will bring all sin and suffering to an end.  “…our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.” (Romans 8: 18).

Your brother in Christ

Monthly Message Dec 2020

God…has spoken to us by his Son”.  Hebrews 1:1,2

 

Dear friends,

Are you just a little bit confused?  We are receiving so many messages, aren’t we, about Covid-19 regulations.  It seems that no sooner have we been told one thing than the game changes and we have to take note of something else. But the Government is doing its best to deal with a situation over which they have little or no control.  Furthermore, there are so many opinions about what needs to be done and what steps are best for schools, or restaurants, or health workers, or care homes, or families. So many changes; so many voices.

If only all this confusion and uncertainty were to cause men and women to realise, maybe for the first time in some cases, that we need to listen to a higher voice, to follow a better guidepost, to adhere to a supreme source of principles to direct us through this life – pandemic or no pandemic. If only we were to look to an authority more reliable, more true, more certain than the best of any human wisdom.

Well, Hebrews 1:1,2 tells us that “In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son”.  In Jesus we have the authentic voice of God!  We do well, or rather we simply must, listen to him.  He is God’s last word to the world. He is the very language through whom God speaks to us.

At that first Christmas God came and shared in our human nature.  Why? “He…shared in (our) humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death – that is, the devil – and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death”. (Hebrews 2:14,15).

There are so many things that men and women fear today: coronavirus and its effects, no-deal Brexit with its effects, global warming and its effects, terrorism and its effects, the erosion of freedom of speech and conscience and its effects, and so one might go on.  But the great fear that people prefer not to dwell on or mention is death, the result and penalty of human sin. If that fear can be overcome then all other fears fall away.  And Jesus has overcome it for us – by his death for sin and his resurrection as evidence that the Father has accepted his sacrifice for us.

God spoke of old many times and in various ways but now we have his last and final word in Jesus.  We need no more than Jesus, and nothing less than Jesus.

May the restrictions and limitations that seem to be the order of the day this Christmas enable us all to reflect more fully than ever on Jesus, the Son through whom God speaks and whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe!

Your brother in Christ,