The end of Youth prayer week 2008

It's over. We had presentation on Satturday evening and it was really good. I will tell you what happened there... Soon. ;o) It is my favorite word already. Always soon...

The youth week of prayer 2008 eigth story

8. Calvary
the ultimate price

Matthew 26:47-75; 27 & 28; Mark 14:32-72; Luke 22-24
Gifford Rhamie
It’s hard to stand in court when all the evidence is stacked against you. We live in a country that prides itself in a judicial system that springs from the philosophy of the freedom of the individual: that you are ‘innocent before proven guilty’. But it’s hard to appear innocent when all the evidence compellingly conspires against you. In fact, then, you are guilty before you are even tried — ‘guilty before proven innocent’.

I’ve been there! I committed a traffic offence. I drove faster than my guardian angels, but not faster than the speed camera. It caught me. The photographic evidence was there. I was, my friends, ‘guilty before proven innocent’. There was no one between my soul and the magistrate, no one between except the court clerk, and what a stickler for the law she was. [In Great Britain, the magistrates’ court handles petty crime and the court clerk is the expert on the law who duly advises the magistrates.]

“Why are you here?” She interrogated, “You broke the law didn’t you?” “The penalty is mandatory – a £70 fine!” “You’re guilty aren’t you?” “Have you seen the photographic evidence?” “Then why are you here?” “Pay the fine!”

She not only said what she had to say, her entire frame embodied what she had to say. She threw the whole book at me, without reservation, without even an ounce of mercy – even though she knew I was a pastor! (In fact, I thought she had something against pastors!) The photographic evidence for her was enough – I was guilty as charged.

I felt silly and foolish before the little woman. By the time she was finished with me, my tall frame shriveled up to nothingness before her petite frame. Her face looked like the long face of the law, which rendered me defenseless. I would have been sent to the gallows had it not been for the words of the magistrate, “Have you got anything to say?” That came like a breath of fresh air! And all I could say was, “I had to pay the price of speeding to set her free!”

My experience serves as a parable of the human standing before heaven. You and I are charged by the arch-enemy, Satan, of a crime worthy of the ultimate death penalty. We are guilty, because we were “born in sin an shaped in iniquity”. Indeed, “in sin did our mother conceive us”. The penalty for our condition is death – eternal separation from God, eternal damnation. Now in the face of our condemnation, has God got anything to say? Well, what God has to say comes like a breath of fresh air, because it comes in the person of Jesus Christ. When I said to the magistrate, “I had to pay the price. . .,” I was talking about a speeding ticket. When God says, “I have paid the price,” God is talking about the ultimate price paid on Calvary to set everyone free.

Calvary is the answer to the charge of Satan. Calvary is what gives the human pardon from the penalty of death. Calvary is what makes us free. Calvary is the ultimate price for any pardon. But why Calvary? What makes Calvary the ultimate price?

The Man of Calvary
Calvary is the ultimate price simply because of the Man of Calvary. He is Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God. God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself (Philippians 2:4-6). “He who knew no sin became sin for us,” 2 Corinthians... Jesus is the God-man. Only the God-man could save man. Only the Creator Himself, is qualified to save His creation. That’s why the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth (John 1:14). No angel would do, no other created being could do. He had to be the God-man called Jesus Christ. Only He who personally knew the height and depth of the love of God could accomplish our redemption.

But know this that God Himself chose to rescue us through Jesus. Jesus chose to give His life as a substitute for us. He didn’t have to. He didn’t simply and passively lose His life as though He had no control. He actively gave it.

It is told that in the First World War there was a young French soldier who was seriously wounded. His arm was so badly smashed that it had to b amputated. He was a magnificent specimen of young manhood, and the surgeon was grieved that the youngster had to go through life without a limb. So he waited beside his bedside to tell him the bad news when he recovered consciousness. When the lad’s eyes opened, the surgeon said to him: “I am sorry to tell you that you have lost your arm.” “Sir,” said the lad, “I did not lose it; I gave it – for France.”

Do you see the point? Jesus did not lose his life, he gave it! When Jesus was taken from Pilot’s court to Herod’s and back again, Jesus was not helplessly caught up in a mesh of circumstances from which he could not break free. We are told that He could have called upon 10,000 angels to intervene and save His life. He did not lose His life; He gave it. The Cross was not thrust upon Him; He willingly accepted it — for you and me.

And guess what, it was the ultimate price, though He did it for free. You see, there are some things that money cannot by.

Money can buy a bed but not sleep, a hammer but not a carpenter, “things’ but not friends, a toy but not a child’s happiness, a pen and paper but not an author, a pencil but not an idea, a house but not a home, a wedding but not peace, paints but not an artist, eyeglasses but not eyesight, a chair but not rest, a computer but not wisdom, a flag but not patriotism, a gun but not a soldier, a book but not knowledge, a machine but not a skill, a name but not a man, a church but not a religion, an altar but not salvation, and a cross but not a Saviour.’ There are some things that money cannot buy. Money cannot buy love.

There is not price tag on love. The sacrifice of one’s life is the ultimate price. Moreover, money can’t buy a Saviour. So it’s Jesus the God-man that makes Calvary so special.

What is your picture of Jesus today? So often we picture Jesus without the cross. We picture Jesus without the nail-print scars in His hands. We prefer a Jesus who looks like a big brother, or even an unclelike figure, but not the Jesus of Calvary.

But did you know that the more we study and contemplate Jesus in light of the cross, the more we see mercy, tenderness, and forgiveness blended with equity and justice. The more we walk and talk with this figure of Jesus who has fresh nailprints in His hands, the more we see Jesus in our mind’s eye as the One who died in our place, as the One who died to save us, the more we would have the assurance that we are justified through the merit of his sacrifice. It is the Jesus of Calvary, not the Jesus of the womb or the tomb; but the Jesus of Calvary who gives the sinner another chance.

My friends, if at any time you begin to fear that you will be lost, that Jesus does not love you, look to Him at Calvary. He says, “I am He that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive forevermore,” (Revelation 1:18). Further, he says when you are witnessing of him, “Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the ages,” (Matt. 28:20).

So Calvary is special because of the Man of Calvary, Jesus Christ.

The Cross of Calvary
But Calvary is the ultimate price also because of the cross of Calvary. “The cross is the only ladder high enough to touch Heaven’s threshold.” “The cross is the only key to set man free.”

While taking a prisoner from a correctional centre to be arraigned on charges of attempted armed robbery, police constable John Bolton noticed a cross around the neck of the convict. Knowing the man was not religious, he took a closer look. The prisoner then attempted to hide something that was protruding from the top of the cross. When questioned, he said it was a good luck charm designed to look like a spoon for sniffing cocaine. But Constable Bolton was suspicious that it looked like a handcuff key. So he took it away and by experimentation found that this special cross could open most handcuffs. This discovery led to the exposure of an underground attempt by prisoners in Ontario, Canada to make a number of these cross-type-keys.

But friends while there have been attempts to make crosses that can set people free; there is only one cross that can set humans free! It frees them from the bondage and condemnation of the law, and that cross is the cross of Calvary. Unfortunately many are more concerned about freedom for the body than they are about freedom for the soul. Whether insid or outside prison, all men need the cross that sets us free.

We need to lift high the cross. We need to put the cross back where it belongs. I don’t mean around some pious neck, nor consigned to a rosary, or even confined to a church. All I’m saying is that the cross be raised again:

That the cross be raised again at the centre of the market place

as well as on the steeple of the church, I am recovering the claim that Jesus was not crucified in a cathedral between two candles:

But on a cross between two thieves; on a town garbage heap;

At a cross-road of politics so cosmopolitan that they had to write His title in Hebrew and in Latin and in Greek...

It was the kind of place where cynics talk smut, and thieves curse and soldiers gamble.

That’s where we need to raise the cross.

Because that is where He died, and that is what He died about.

And that is where Christ’s men ought to be, and what church people ought to be about.

In many communities, it is not fashionable to admit that you are a Christian. In fact, the cross is a symbol of shame and disgrace as it was 2000 years ago, although for different reasons. However, the same way Jesus turned the symbol from shame and disgrace to “amazing grace” by his sacrifice, so can we turn the symbol around today by our Christ-like sacrifice. The hallmark of Jesus-living is self-denial – sacrifice! So let’s put people first in our classes, in our apartments, in our neighborhoods, families, workplaces, initiatives, projects, plans – in our futures.

People need to see that it is the cross of Christ that makes the difference in our lives. They need to see that the cross has produced in us a new code of behavior. The things we used to do we don’t do them anymore. The things we used to wear ... read ... watch ... listen to ... places ... Why? Because the cross, which makes Calvary so special, has made a difference in our lives.

So Calvary is ultimate price not only because of the Man of Calvary but also because of the cross of Calvary.

Sinners of Calvary
But Calvary is finally the ultimate price because of the sinners of Calvary. Calvary makes little sense without the sinners hanging there.

Hear me out. On the hill of Calvary were three crosses. One cross portrays a thief dying IN sin, and the other a thief dying TO sin. (Which sinner are you?) But the centre cross speaks of the redeemer dying FOR sin. Calvary divides all of humanity into one of two categories — those who reject Christ and die in sin and those who receive Christ and can die to sin. (But which category are you in?)

For if you are in the one dying to sin, Jesus says you have to pick up your cross daily, and follow me. “If any man will come after me,” He says, “let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.” Mat 16:24.

The beauty about the decision that was made by the thief on the cross who accepted the grace of Jesus is that although it was a last minute decision, it was still accepted by heaven. There was no fanfare, no long altar call, no Bible study, not even time for baptism (though all these do have their places).

There was a mere, “Remember me...” that was affirmed by, “Today, you will be with me...”

Right now you have the opportunity to say in your heart, “Jesus, remember me!” In so saying, you are saying, “I accept the gift of Calvary, the ultimate price that heaven had to pay to redeem a poor sinner like me!” I now want the miracle of Calvary to empower my living, whether it be to kick a habit, to change my taste buds, to go to the next level of my personal development, to embrace the values of endurance, simplicity and selfless service — whatever it might be — I submit to the power that Calvary unleashes to empower my soul.

When I stood before the magistrate that day, I told you that all I could say was, “I had to pay the price of speeding to set her free!” But what I didn’t tell you was the whole story. You see, I went on to tell the magistrates that I got an emergency call from the local hospital that late evening that one of my parishioners was dying and could I get there immediately to pray with her before her last dying breath. Well, apart from taking the word “immediately” quite literally, I knew that my presence as an agent of God would not only bring her comfort, but permission to die in the freedom of peace and hope. So I negotiated the roads a little sharper and quicker than I normally did to get there, acknowledging that I did break the law to do this. I wanted to tell them further that I did get there just in time, and managed to hold Agnes by her lily, crispy hands and recite and pray that “God shall wipe away all tears from your eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things would be passed away,” (paraphrased, Rev 21:4). I wanted to tell them this, but the magistrates stopped me in my tracks in order to break for their deliberations over my case.

A few moments later, they returned from their chambers and pronounced the verdict, “Not guilty!” to my utmost surprise and delight. They did, however, record the offence against my name, but that for me was a small price to pay.

Jesus paid the ultimate price to set every human free.

The youth week of prayer 2008 seventh story

7. Scandalous
the culture of foot-washing

John 3:1-17
Beth Holford is at Cambridge University, reading for a Bachelors degree in Social and Political Sciences. Among other things, she enjoys singing, reading, cooking for friends, writing, and photography.

Step into my life for a moment: it’s Sabbath morning. I’ve snoozed my alarm too many times, and am now attempting to shower, dress, eat breakfast and clean my teeth, all at once. I drive to church too fast, styling my hair in the rear-view mirror, and run into the sanctuary to take my place in the music rehearsal. Between song practices, I cast a distracted eye over the bulletin for the day and my spirits drop even further. I had forgotten that it was a communion service today. You might think that I’m upset because I haven’t had a chance to prepare spiritually for the occasion. Actually, I’m thinking about my feet. My toenails could do with a cut and shape, and the skin on my heels is still leathery from a summer on the beach. And, horrors, I’m wearing socks with holes in them. I lose track of my place in the music because I’m running through excuses I could use to immune myself from the foot-washing ordinance.

Now, imagine something slightly different: It’s Thursday night. We’ve been walking for most of the day, in the sort of weather that brings despair to air conditioning units, and, thanks to a lack of deodorant, none of us smells brilliant. The ‘practical’ open-topped leather sandals turn feet into a chiropodist’s dream – blisters, calluses and ingrown toenails. The road that we’ve been walking could easily be mistaken for a rubbish dump, a sewer, or a giant hamster’s dust-bath. When we arrive at the room we’re renting for the evening, the first thing we want to do is have our feet washed.

Ok, come back. Let me give you some background on the footwashing tradition as it stood before Jesus turned it on its head. Footwashing was a demeaning task. In a situation such as the one faced by Jesus and His disciples, a household slave would be expected to wash the feet of all of the guests before they touched any food. To eat with dirty feet meant that a Jew could become ceremonially unclean. It was a practise that helped to maintain a social hierarchy, and so the person of lowest rank, a Gentile slave if possible, would be the one to wash and dry everyone else’s smelly, dirty, toughened feet. No such attendant was present at this secret meal of Jesus and his disciples, so Jesus took the place of the lowest of the low.

So, this makes Jesus’ action scandalous, disturbing and embarrassing for everyone present there. Let’s look further into the reasons behind this. No-one made any comment or suggestion about the foot-washing dilemma, even though the situation generally called for each man to clean his own feet, or for the lowest-ranking disciple to offer to perform the task. Ellen White tells us more about the situation in the Desire of Ages, talking about the fact that earlier that afternoon, the disciples had been arguing about their positions in the group, vying for first place. She goes on, saying, “each of the disciples, yielding to wounded pride, determined not to act the part of a servant. All manifested a stoical unconcern, seeming unconscious that there was anything for them to do. By their silence they refused to humble themselves.” (p. 644)1 To use a little bit of poetic license, I’d say that the meal must have been extremely awkward for everybody. Peter might be looking meaningfully at Bartholomew, who, petrified, would turn to glare down the table towards Thomas, who, without doubt, would be expecting Thaddeus to step up to the task. I imagine Jesus, sitting at the head of the table, watching the interaction, heartbroken, knowing that these were his last few days as a human and that his disciples didn’t seem to have learned a thing. Time passes, Jesus keeps waiting, allowing the meal to drag out, allowing each disciple the chance to humble themselves, allowing each of his followers to mentally dismiss the idea of playing the slave and transfer the expectation to another.

Finally, he gets up.

Perhaps the disciples think he’s going to call the landlord to provide a slave to perform the foot-washing duty. Perhaps each of them thinks that Jesus is going to walk up to the lowliest disciple and dress him down for his failure to serve. He couldn’t possibly be walking over to the water jug. Jesus, the one for whom people had laid down their cloaks a few days earlier, wouldn’t be stripping to his undergarments.

Those hands that healed lepers, that raised the dead, that meticulously placed every star in the sky, those hands couldn’t be removing smears of manure from dry, cracked skin. To return to the words of Ellen White, “This action opened the eyes of the disciples. Bitter shame and humiliation filled their hearts. They understood the unspoken rebuke, and saw themselves in altogether a new light.”

To go back to my own story, the one that started this reading, I’d like to consider the meaning of footwashing today. Various traditions and meanings accompany this ordinance in different parts of the world. Some congregations use the tradition as a means of reconciling grudges within the church. Others have slightly modernised the idea, and rub moisturising lotion into their brethrens’ feet instead of washing them. Sometimes it feels like a new school of hermeneutics has discovered that ‘Communion Sabbath’ should be interpreted as ‘Visit another Church Sabbath’. What is it about communion that makes it so uncomfortable that people feel the need to ‘skip church’ that day? Maybe the English people really do have as low an embarrassment-threshold as other nations suggest. Or maybe we are just missing the point of this tradition.

At the very start of chapter 13 in the Book of John, the author states that “Jesus knew that the time had come for him to leave this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he now showed them the full extent of his love.” (verse 1)2 This demonstration of humility and love was Jesus’ parting gift to his disciples, and to us. If the disciples had realised what their Teacher was about to do, and excused themselves to prepare their feet for such an honour, the ‘service’ would have not only been unnecessary, but also undermined.

When I felt embarrassed about the state of my feet, I didn’t think about the difference between our sanitised version of foot-washing, and the original event. It hadn’t occurred to me that while I was concerned about being asked to partner with a visitor, the disciples were forced to come to terms with being served by their Master. If I can’t bear the thought of my Sabbath School teacher seeing my less-than-perfect feet, can I, with honesty, really open my heart to my God? I know that if my foot-washing partner had a glimpse of my conscience, he or she would realise that un-cut toenails ought to be the least of my worries. However, in my experience of church, misrepresentation starts with pedicured feet and ends in presenting ourselves as perfect. Or, if not perfect, a corrected, censored version of our characters. Church ceases to be a hospital and becomes a catwalk.

If we can’t be real with our fellow fallen beings, how do we hope to face up to our perfect Creator, God? Do we hide our metaphorical feet, trying to wipe off the foulest dirt as inconspicuously as possible? Or do we, like Peter, refuse to accept God’s service outright?

You might have heard people say that when we refuse to share our true nature with God, we are, at the same time, questioning His power to accept us, love us, and save us. I would suggest that by doing this we are also failing to accept His astounding humility, and His extravagant grace.

Similarly, when we present our foot-washing partner with freshly washed feet, we cheat them of their act of service.

According to Ellen White, in the book Pastoral Ministry (p. 170), “The object of this service is to call to mind the humility of our Lord, and the lessons He has given in washing the feet of His disciples. There is in man a disposition to esteem himself more highly than his brother, to work for himself, to serve himself, to seek the highest place; and often evil-surmising and bitterness of spirit spring up over mere trifles. This ordinance preceding the Lord’s Supper is to clear away these misunderstandings, to bring man out of his selfishness, down from his stilts of self-exaltation, to the humility of spirit that will lead him to wash his brother’s feet.”3 Perhaps the thing we need to practise in both our earthly and spiritual relationships is the quality of openness. Openness about our own failings, the paths we’ve trodden, the shortcuts we’ve taken, the messes we’ve gotten ourselves into, invites humility from others as well as ourselves. It invites the listener to react humbly, instead of judging and condemning us. Because of this, Jesus is most exalted when we are at our lowest, because these are the moments at which we truly accept his sacrifice as necessary for us, when we see our need for a Saviour. The apostle Paul writes in Second Corinthians, “[Jesus] said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses…” While this may seem like a rather extreme reaction to God’s saving power, I think that, in essence, it’s a revolutionary idea. To practise this sort of extreme honesty could add a whole new dimension to the way that we, as Adventists, understand church, fellowship, and even God.

I think that this is a useful time in which to point out something about the context of the scripture we’re focusing on today. We’ve only read John 13: 1-17, but if you continue to the end of the chapter you may notice that Jesus predicts both Judas’ betrayal and Peter’s denial of him almost immediately after he’s finished washing their feet. Not only does Jesus give his disciples an object lesson in humility and service, he does so knowing that most of them will have completely forgotten or disregarded it within a few hours. Ellen White suggests that it was this tremendous act of humility that sealed Judas’ decision to betray Jesus to the Pharisees. She describes the situation in the following way: “Judas was now offended at Christ’s act in washing the feet of His disciples. If Jesus could so humble Himself, he thought, He could not be Israel’s king. All hope of worldly honour in a temporal kingdom was destroyed. Judas was satisfied that there was nothing to be gained by following Christ. After seeing Him degrade Himself, as he thought, he was confirmed in his purpose to disown Him, and confess himself deceived.” (Conflict and Courage, p. 319)4 In full knowledge of the fact that he was facing shame, misunderstanding and condemnation, Jesus proceeded to wash his disciples’ feet.

How did Jesus have the courage to step so far out of line with human expectations? The answer is found right at the start of this story. Verse 3 states that “Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God”, and then verse 4 starts with “so…”. This means that John is implying here that it was because of Jesus’ confidence in his position in God’s kingdom that he could act in such an unworldly way. His security came from His knowledge of God’s love for Him, and not that of the fickle esteem of the disciples, or the crowds of cheering people who had welcomed him only a week before. Cocooned in His Father’s love and approval, Jesus had the audacity to break social convention, the humility to wash his followers’ feet, and the grace to serve those who were about to fail him.

Jesus’ foot-washing service doesn’t only provide a model for our behaviour to each other, but it also gives us the freedom and the confidence to perform acts of extreme service. As we see in Jesus’ action the character of God himself, we learn that our own confidence can rest in the hands of our Father. Trusting God with our sense of self liberates us to be truly humble. To paraphrase Romans 12, when we examine God’s mercy, humility and love, we learn what those qualities essentially entail, and come to a God-defined identity of ourselves, in which we can offer our bodies to be used as vessels to communicate God’s character to those around us.

What does this mean for our churches? It means a new social focus. It means a new group aim. It means actively seeking ways to serve our King through serving our congregations and our communities. Abandoning the church politics, the grudges, the doctrinal differences, and coming together humbly, to learn how to love. As Jesus says towards the end of John chapter 13, “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” Even the saint with smelly feet.

References:
1Desire of Ages, p. 644
2John 13:1
3Pastoral Ministry, p. 170
4Conflict and Courage, p. 319

The youth week of prayer 2008 sixth story

6. No Favourites Here
Healing every class

Mark 1:40-42
Trevor Young lectures in the Department of Theological Studies, Newbold College, UK, in Pastoral & Biblical Studies with Research Interest in the book of Acts and the birth of Christianity. He is passionate about young people and their development whether in well-being, music, education, or spirituality. He is married to Jasmine, with whom he shares two children, Serena and Jonathan.

I remembered when I was growing up, there was this youth club to which I belonged, which was involved in sporting as well as various other activities. Anyone who is familiar with me knows that sports play an integral part in my life. I was such a major influence on both the track and football teams that I enjoyed special privileges from the coaches, to the disgust of my other team-mates. Of course the human side of me would bask in those privileges. Who wouldn’t? As humans we have an inherent nature that enables us to treat some more special than others. That’s how it is with us; in fact that’s human nature. However it’s quite the contrary with our Saviour. He treats everyone as equal; ‘there are no favourites here, for He is no respecter of persons.’ It does not matter where you are from, where you have been, who your parents are, or what they own, how large your bank balance is, or the positions you hold in church. With our Lord these things do not matter, He sees us, as we truly are; sinners in need of His saving grace. He sees not as the world sees, for with us we see the outward appearance.

However He looks deeper and sees the entire picture, ‘Man looks at the outward appearance but God looks at the heart’. There are no special privileges for us to enjoy.

The Bible testifies that all of us were born in sin and shaped in iniquity. As a result of sin some of us have deformities, diverse diseases, physical and mental abnormalities. Some of these diseases can be healed by medical practitioners, for God has given them the knowledge However the Great Physician heals not only our physical and mental state, but also our spiritual state. In order to heal us, he must first heal our souls. He starts with our hearts, and then he heals our physical and mental abnormalities. However, we must accept by faith that He is able to do so. ‘For without faith it is impossible to please Him: for he that cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek him’ (Heb. 11:16). There are many who may feel downtrodden, depressed, and disheartened- like outcasts. (as if the dregs of society.Let not your hearts be troubled, for Jesus came to seek and to save that which was lost, to heal the sick, to comfort the disheartened and to lead sinners to repentance. ‘The whole [healthy] has no need of a Saviour, but those that are sick’. The scripture tells us that ‘they brought unto Him many that were possessed with devils and He cast out the spirits with His word and healed all that were sick. That it might fulfil that which was spoken by the prophet Esias, saying, ‘Himself took our infirmities and bear our sicknesses’, (Matt. 8:16-17)1. What a wonderful testimony, we can therefore rest assured knowing that He heals all classes, whether rich or poor, even outcasts like lepers.

Leprosy was the most dreaded disease of its age. Its incurable and contagious character, and its horrible effects upon its victims, filled even the bravest with fear. Among the Jews it was regarded as a judgement on account of sin. By the ritual law, the leper was pronounced unclean. Like one already dead, he was shut out from society, isolated from his family, and was doomed to associate only with those who were similarly afflicted. Whatever he touched was unclean, even the air was polluted by his breath. He was obliged to publish his own calamity, to rend his garments, and sound the alarm, warning all to flee from his contagious presence. (Ministry of Healing, pg. 45)2

The scripture (Mk. 1:40-42) tells the story of the leper who came beseeching Jesus, saying ‘if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean’. For he had heard the good news about the ministry of Jesus, and knew that all who had sought Him for help were not turned away. He was determined to find the Saviour, no matter how great the difficulties were. He first believed that Jesus was able to heal him, and he trusted in him to do so. As a result, faith strengthened in his heart, and he thought of nothing else but his blessed hope of healing.

His eyes were fixed on Jesus, as he purposed in his heart that only The Saviour could impart lifegiving power to heal him of the dreaded disease that etched away at his mortal flesh. He believed, and as a result of his faith, he was healed. Every one of us has been given a measure of faith; it is up to us to exercise that faith.

Therefore when we come to Jesus we must first believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seeks Him. Whosoever will fall at His feet, saying in faith, ‘Lord if thou wilt’, Thou canst make me clean, will hear the answer, ‘I will, be thou clean’. (Matt.8:2-3)3.

At times we are so sick and overtaken by diseases and infirmities that we are too weak to seek the master for ourselves. However our loved ones may intercede on our behalf, and earnestly desire for us to be healed. The scripture tells us in (Matt. 9:2) how the man sick of the palsy was brought in his bed to Jesus by his friends. The crowd was so thick that they couldn’t get in, but they were determined that if they got him to Jesus he would be healed. They allowed nothing to stand in their way. So they sought means to bring him in and when they realised conventional ways would not work, they went upon the housetop and let him down through the roof. When Jesus saw their faith, and his belief that only He could make him whole, the life giving mercies of the Saviour had first blessed his longing heart. For He had watched the first glimmer of faith grow into a belief that He was the sinner’s only helper, and had seen it grow with every effort to come into His presence. Now with words that fell like music on the sufferer’s ear th saviour said, ‘Son be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee’. (Matt 9:2) The burden of sin rolled from his soul, the peace of forgiveness rest upon his countenance. His physical pain is gone and his whole being is transformed. The helpless paralytic is healed, the guilty sinner is pardoned. (Desire of Ages, p. 227)4

Can you imagine having friends like those, who are so concerned about you that they would go through any lengths to help you? Those are friends who, if you are in the gutter they will come down there and help you to get out. These are the type of folks we need to associate with, the Bible testifies that every man should not look on himself, but on the other, let us bear one another’s burdens.’ You do no want to be ill or facing some severe circumstances or situation, and all around you is crumbling and falling to pieces. Then to top it all you have the added burden of your friends and loved ones’ discouraging words and actions. In these times you don’t need to be discouraged, you need to be encouraged. So when your friends discourage you, rebuke them in Jesus’ name and fix your eyes on Him. As the song writer poignantly pens it, ‘turn your eyes upon Him, look full in His wonderful face and the things of this world will grow strangely dim in the wonder of his glory and grace.’

On the other hand, there are those who want to see us remain in sin and be burdened down by our circumstances and infirmities. Therefore they will be like stumbling blocks. Instead of rejoicing with and for us, they complain and mourn as the Pharisees did. However be comforted by the fact that Jesus can heal and set you free from whatever illness, circumstance or sin that besets you; and whom The Son sets free, is free indeed.

There are times when we have been so long mangled in sin, adverse situations or difficult circumstances, but instead of losing hope we persevere. Hope still burns within our hearts that our healing will happen.

Of the time we know not, however we are assured and confident that it will happen. Our confidence and assurance is not in us, because of ourselves we can do nothing. On the contrary our confidence rests in Him, Our Saviour and Lord, Jesus Christ the righteous. The bible testifies that His word shall not come back to Him void, but it will accomplish that which it sets out to do. So if He says it, then you receive it, believe it, stand on it and you will achieve it. We may have to wait a while for our deliverance to arrive; therefore we need to exercise patience. However the scriptures testify of how strengthened a man will be when he waits upon the Lord. ‘But they that wait upon the Lord shall rene their strength….’ (Isa. 40:31)5. As a result of being overtaken so long in our circumstance, condition o situation, we become outcasts of society. Our so-called friends and associates reject us, and we are exclude from social gatherings, parties, etc. Luke 8:43 tell us of the woman who had an issue of blood for twelve years spent all her money on doctors and medication, all to no avail. Then she heard of Jesus and knew where he was going to be next. She trusted the Saviour’s love and knew that this was her only hope of ever being healed. Consequently she turned up to see Him, only to find a sea of people. This made it almost impossible for her to get close to Him, much less to commune with Him about her problem. So she purposed in her heart and believed that if only she could touch the hem of Jesus’ garment, then she would be healed. She pressed and pressed until she got within arms reach and finally she was able to touch just the hem of His garment. This she did and immediately she was healed. At times also we may feel disheartened and depressed because our situation may have been plaguing us for many, many years. John 5:2 testifies of the man who had an infirmity for 38 years. Surely he must have given up, and his mind riddled with bullets of doubt. He must have been wondering if there was still hope for him. Surely we can all understand that, and perhaps some of us may even be able to relate to it. Let us empathise with this man, who could have been a close friend, a neighbour or even a relative. Can you imagine how he must have felt, what must be going through his mind, for 38 long years? Now Jesus happens to be passing by where he was, and stopped by him. Don’t think for a moment that it was by chance that Jesus came his way. Instead it was by divine appointment, for the Saviour always appears at the appointed time, and this was to be his day of deliverance. Jesus knew of his case, hence He reached out to his faith by asking him if he wanted to be made whole. This was to see where he was spiritually, because Jesus already knew he wanted to be healed. How would he respond to The Saviour? How would you respond if you were in the presence of the Great Physician?

Sure enough his faith was weak, he responded by focussing on the obstacles in his way. Instead of looking steadfast on Jesus and His promises, he focussed on his problems, oblivious to the fact that the stirring of the water that he waited upon, received its healing powers from the Living Well who was communing with him. I encourage you brethren that no matter what situation, circumstances, illness or shortcomings you may face, let not your hearts be troubled, for we serve a mighty God who is touched with the feelings of our infirmities. He hears the cries his children raise and always meet our needs, so keep your eyes fixed on Him. Hold steadfast to his promises because they are sure, and abide by his words because they are true. However, the devil, ‘the father of lies’, impregnates your mind with seeds of doubt and disbelief that weakens your faith and causes you to lose hope. But there is hope, and we can find no relief until we run to the healer of the soul. The peace that He alone can give, imparts vigour to the mind and health to the body. Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil. In Him is life, and He says, ‘I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly’ (Jn. 10:10)6.

Luke 7:1-16 testifies of various miracles performed by the Saviour.

The centurion was a very important man in Rome. He was admired by the Jewish Elders as he had built them a synagogue. He had manifested respect for the service of God, and shown kindness to the Jews as His worshippers. He felt unworthy to come into the presence of the Saviour and appealed to the Jewish elders to make request for the healing of his servant. The centurion did not question the His power. He did not even ask Him to come in person to perform the miracle. ‘Speak the word only,’ he said and ‘my servant shall be healed.’ The centurion’s servant was sick with the palsy and lay at the point of death. Jesus marvelled at his faith, and healed his servant according to the faith of his master. (Desire of Ages, pg. 317)7

Luke 18:35 tell us of the blind beggar that was healed by Jesus. Jesus does not care who you are or where you are, He has an everlasting love for all. Even beggars experienced his mercies. At times we need to lift our voices to the Creator and Redeemer, as only He can save us from this wretched sinful life. When others try to silence us from approaching the mercy seat, we need to raise our voices even higher. Imagine being physically blind, not being able to see anything, and all around you is total darkness. This alone should strengthen your faith, because you are at the mercy of everyone around as well as the elements of nature. To make matters worse you are confined to a life of solitude and begging for alms. Luke tells us of the blind beggar who heard that Jesus was near. Oh how his spirit must have burned within. Jesus’ fame had spread abroad, so he must have heard of all the miracles and healing He had done for others. Now to hear that He was near, that he had to accept by faith, because he could not see for himself. It was his faith that led him to cry out; ’Thou Son of David, have mercy on me.’ As would be expecte there were those who wanted to steal his joy, to silence his cry for his only hope of being healed. But he was not about to let any one or anything stand in his way, so even though Jesus did not hear, the man did not lose faith, he shouted even louder. Now the Great Physician heals the sick, He hears the cries his children raise and always meet their needs. Jesus already knew of his situation, so after commanding that he be brought to Him, He asked him what was his request. Now Jesus knew he wanted to be healed, but He wanted him to exercise his faith, He wanted first to heal his sin sick soul. Oh such faith, the blind man responded ‘oh that I would receive my sight’. Jesus healed him and immediately he received his sight and glorified God. He came into the world to save all that would believe and accept Him. We are no longer aliens but children of God, and as children of God we are heirs and partakers to the throne.

Jesus is no respecter of persons, whether you are a lawyer, doctor or an accountant residing in the upper echelons of society, or a janitor, domestic helper or garbage collector living on the other side of the tracks. Whether you are surrounded with loved ones and friends, or you are the life and soul of the party, or you may even be so snubbed and overlooked, that you feel like an outcast. Be comforted that in His sight the souls of all men are of equal value. In Him is life-giving power, and He still has the same power now that He had in his earthly ministry, as He ministers in our behalf in the heavenly sanctuary.

He heals all manner of diseases, whether those who come to Him for help are rich or poor, without distinction of age, rank, nationality, colour, creed, religious privilege, or social class. All are invited to come unto Him and live. ‘Whosoever believeth on Him shall not be ashamed: For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek….. (Rom. 10:11-12)8. ‘The rich and poor meet together; the Lord is the maker of them all’ (Prov. 2:2)9. ‘Whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord the same shall be saved’ (Rom. 10:13)10 There are no favourites here; He is no respecter of persons.

References:
1Matthew 8:16, 17
2The Ministry of Healing, p. 45
3Matthew 8:2, 3
4Desire of Ages, p. 227
5Isaiah 40:31
6John 10:10
7Desire of Ages, p. 317
8Romans 10:11, 12
9Romans 10:13

The youth week of prayer 2008 fifth story

5. True Freedom
Casting Out Demons and Cultural Traditions

Matt. 15:1-28; Mark 1:39
Becky De'Oliveira is a native of Seattle who lived twelve years in the UK and now resides in Southwestern Michigan. She is a graduate of the creative writing MA program at Lancaster University in Lancashire, England, and works as a writer, editor and graphic designer.

“I do not want my house to be walled in on all sides and my windows to be stuffed. I want the cultures of all the lands to be blown about my house as freely as possible. But I refuse to be blown off my feet by any.” ~Mahatma Gandhi

THE MAN WAS asleep on a soft mat on the floor of a crude hut, curled on his side like a baby. He’d fallen asleep there in the house of a cherished friend after a sumptuous meal and an evening spent telling stories around a warm fire. So comfortable and at peace was this man that he didn’t even stir as a dozen or so men crept single-file into the hut, quietly surrounding the man as if preparing for a friendly game of Farmer in the Dell. Each man carried a spear and wore a fierce expression. One or two of them carry pitch-burning torches. When they were all assembled in their rightful places, someone cleared his throat or made some other small sound. The sleeping man stirred. Someone shuffled his feet. All eyes watched the man, waiting for the moment when he opened his eyes. The story they’ve been working on is fast approaching its climax. The man licks his lips, sleepily opens his eyes, rolls onto his back . . . and then sits upright, eyes suddenly wide with fright as he takes in the sight of the circle of men, immediately understanding what it means. The circle of men erupts into laughter. Gotcha! Fade to black. Cut to strips of human flesh being barbecued on a large outdoor grill, the entire village lined up and laughing maniacally with bottles of A1 sauce in hand.

“I don’t get it,” I whispered to the girl sitting next to me on a plastic folding chair in the youth hall. “They ate him?”

BACK SOME TWENTY-ODD years ago, watching a film at home or anywhere outside a cinema was a big deal and required advanced planning. It also required renting equipment, perhaps a degree in engineering—or at the very least the ability to sort and plug wires without throwing your bowl of popcorn through the window in a fit of rage. Because of the logistical challenges, you knew with certainty that any teacher or youth leader who came bursting through the doors with a reel-to-reel projector or TV/VCR on a wheeled trolley was about to change your life. Anything they bothered to show would be burned forever into your mind. The Challenger exploding—and the endless replays, a long spiral of smoke falling over and over again into the sea. John Huss—or an actor playing John Huss—singing Jesus Thou Son of David in a quivering voice as the flames rose around him as he stood bound to the stake. Johnny Lingo and his ten-cow wife. Strips of human flesh being barbecued on a large outdoor oven.

The film The Peace Child, based on a book of the same title by Don Richardson, is about the Sawi people of New Guinea. As of 1962, when Richardson and his wife, Carol, went to live among them, the Sawi were cannibal/head-hunters who fought amongst themselves. In this twisted culture where values seemed turned back-to-front, murder was considered a good thing; but not just ordinary murder. In order to be “a legend maker” a Sawi would first pretend to make friends with someone, luring him into complacency, and then killing him once he was fully convinced of the authenticity of the friendship.

These same people, prizing treachery as the greatest good, laughed themselves into fits when the missionaries relayed the story of Judas’ betrayal of Jesus with a kiss. The way they saw it, Judas was the hero of the story, “a legend maker.” If the story of Judas and Jesus and the kiss were made into a cowboy movie, Judas would wear the white hat and ride off into the sunset with the pretty woman.

I was thirteen years old and it had never before occurred to me that there might be more than one way to see the story of Judas. Never! It seemed to me, at that still-innocent time of life, that there were such things as good and bad and that everyone—all humans everywhere, even the ones who stuck bones through their noses—understood those concepts in the same way I did. Even if a person did bad things—like sauté other peoples’ organs—he would be nothing more than an anomaly, someone the rest of his villagers would try helplessly to explain. “I raised him with values,” his mother would sob on an evening news program, wiping her nose with a wadded handkerchief. “He ate with napkins on his lap at mealtimes and had no more than half an hour of television a day—and never anything violent. He called his elders ‘sir’ and ‘ma’am.’ He did his homework on time, never gave me nor his father a minute of trouble.” People could be bad, sure. But societally-sanctioned badness? Bad considered good? Hate as love? The big chief handing out medals to those who tricked and ate their friends? Was it possible that words were nothing more than jigsaw pieces—part of a giant puzzle in which any two pieces fit together; nothing had to be any particular way and no matter what you do, you create a picture?

Sucker punch! But the more I considered the idea, the more it started—strangely—to please me. I’ve always liked surprises—the little shock you feel when you discover a truth wholly unexpected. Eureka! Life is not what you thought. Eureka! You will never understand it all, but right now, you can understand this. Hold this truth in your hands for a moment and feel as it begins to swell. You can’t hold it forever; it will escape your grasp and you’ll be left, once again, yearning. So stroke it. Enjoy its cool clarity. The impossible was possible after all. There were people in the world who were nothing like me. They didn’t care about the same things, weren’t frightened or repelled by the same things. They were something else entirely. What? Is a person who prizes treachery, death and cannibalism even a person? A human being? What makes you human?

“Don’t be a fool,” a friend answered when I asked the same question. “Your DNA makes you human.”

“What makes you a Christian?”

“Giving up your sins and following Jesus.”

“But what if, to you, your sins are good? What if you’re taught that wrong is right? What about people who bury suspected adulterers to the neck and stone them, fathers who murder their own daughters in “honour” killings, tribes who perform ritual sacrifices? They do these things because they believe they are good— even required. How are people supposed to become Christians if even their thoughts are so corrupt that they don’t know the difference between right and wrong?”

“I don’t know. What happened with the Sawi people?”

“Are you kidding? It’s been more than twenty years. Anyway, after they ate the first guy, I think I went to the bathroom and locked myself in one of the stalls. I was too scared.”

CHRISTIANS, we are told, are supposed to transcend the cultures we are born into. We are not to merely reflect the values of our parents and societies, but we are to embody the character of Christ. In the old days, wherever wester Christians converted “natives,” those natives would begin to wear white shirts with collars and ties. They’d sing hymns. In the books I read as a child growing up, the people of Burma would stop chewing betel nut and they’d get rid of the pigs that lived under their raised huts. That was how you became a Christian and that was why it was always easier to convert people who already wore white shirts and lived without pigs or dark-red juice dripping from their teeth onto their chins. A “culture” was something only other people have—a wicked culture even more so. You don’t notice the extent to which the person you are is informed by your culture until you leave it and enter foreign territory where the behaviour of others jars you, where you feel always like a fool.

As a kid, I was fascinated with other cultures, with the clothes and customs and languages of other people. In hotel rooms on trips with my family, I’d busy myself in the corner with the Gideon Bible, copying John 3:16 in the curly script of Sinhalese or Tamil, the elegant scrawl of Arabic, the boxy simplicity of Hebrew or Korean. I spent hours poring over the section of the encyclopaedia that dealt with native costumes, admiring the bright silks of Asia, the lace of Spain, the palm fronds of the South Pacific. One of my greatest disappointments was when a girl from Zambia joined my third grade class and I found her dressed in blue jeans and a t-shirt with Wonder Woman underpants. Still, I wanted particularly to be her friend— to be the friend of anyone who came from anywhere else. The endless variation among people seemed wonderful to me. Some people were offended by feet, I’d marvel. Feet! Who would have thought!

The difference between being a child and being an adult is that when you’re a child, you never have to think about anything horrible for very long. Horrors, injustices, these roll off you like water off an otter’s fur. Things can appear to you as nothing more than curiosities—you don’t have to deal with them. They don’t confront you, forcing you to make choices, to take uncomfortable stands.

That people hold to various cultural traditions and have vastly different value systems—well, sure, you could call that magical. You could think it’s beautiful and the “spice of life” and the very thing that makes the world “interesting.” And this is quite true- if you’re talking about aesthetics; food, manners and language. However, the idea that there is nothing intrinsically human in people —in terms of values—is slightly alarming. Maybe even more than slightly so. Maybe it’s the worst thing in the world.

“What sets worlds in motion is the interplay of differences, their attractions and repulsions. Life is plurality, death is uniformity. By suppressing differences and peculiarities, by eliminating different civilizations and cultures, progress weakens life and favours death. The ideal of a single civilization for everyone, implicit in the cult of progress and technique, impoverishes and mutilates us. Every view of the world that becomes extinct, every culture that disappears, diminishes a possibility of life.” ~Octavio Paz

Not too long ago, I came upon an article in a newspaper about a young woman of a lower-caste family somewhere in the Indian subcontinent. She was the first in her family to receive an education, and as such, was the pride of her parents. The men of another family in the same village, unhappy that one of the young woman’s brothers was interested in their sister, decided to bring “shame” upon the entire family by kidnapping the educated young woman and raping her. After this news came to light, the school, which had recently offered the woman employment as a teacher, revoked their offer. They did not want to be “tainted” by association with this “scandal.” I read the article several times over, just to make sure I understood, because I couldn’t understand. How is it possible that people can think that by acting in a dishonourable, criminal way they are bringing “shame” on another person? Weren’t they, in fact, bringing shame only upon themselves? Although I am familiar with this idea and have heard many, many stories of this kind, they never fail to shock me a little. How is it possible for people—human surely, in their DNA, just like me—to look at the same set of facts and reach such different conclusions?

My thirteen-year-old mind thrilled a little at this new idea, the possibility of pluralism, the way there could be so many answers to the same question, endless facets to the same bit of cut crystal. She would hold that crystal to the sun and turn it this way and that, endlessly exploring and exclaiming aloud at the wonders revealed. My thirty-five year-old mind though, feels tired and a little sick at how people are, at how wrong the world is. Let me put it this way: Maybe sometimes there are some possibilities of life that should disappear—and quickly (don’t spare the horses)—without weeping or violins playing. Not everything is valuable or worth preserving just because it happens to be a part of someone’s culture. “Difference” if that difference includes violence or cannibalism is not wonderful or interesting. It is pain. It is a prison. It isn’t what we were created for.

LIKE IT OR not, we live within culture the way we live within the atmosphere. It holds you to the ground, allowing you to breathe and live. It is easy, of course, for me to cast a critical eye on the villagers of the sub-Indian continent for their sexist and unjust ways because they are floating in another bubble, one perfectly designed for pricking by just the sort of sharp instrument I hold in my hand. They could probably make pointed observations about the culture in which I live and breathe—observations that pass lightly over my head, barely brushing my brow. Like those annoying and almost invisible black gnats, you know they’re there, but you can’t quite grasp them, let alone find an adequate way of dealing with their presence. You wave a hand in front of your face, half-heartedly. You go about your business. This is how we humans survive.

Thinking too much and looking too hard hurts. It’s easier to keep moving. What, after all, does God expect from us? How can we be anything more than what we are?

I WAS CURIOUS about how The Peace Child ended, so I Googled it on the Internet. Turns out the Richardsons finally found a way to get through to the Sawi—a concept within their culture that gelled with the reality of Jesus. This was the idea of the Peace Child—the only guarantee that all Sawi would honour. It was the exchange of infants between villages. While any other form of murder was sanctioned, the killing of a peace child was not. Peace reigned as long as the peace child lived. Richardson used this idea—that Jesus is the peace child who will live forever, establishing eternal harmony among people—to get through to this tribe of people. Many of them became Christians as a result. Probably they started wearing ties and singing Amazing Grace, but none of that matters. What matters is that even in this depraved, upside-down culture there remained the essence of an idea that led to Jesus. And that, along with DNA, is what makes us human—this tangible link we all have with God.

It is okay for us to be different—in fact, more than okay, it’s the way it is. We are different, whether we like it or not—but we are not called to complacency. Jesus offers us true freedom from everything that might keep us from being the people we were created to be. This includes aspects of our various cultures that are not right. Socrates famously remarked that the “unexamined life is not worth living.” We all come to Christianity with our own cultures and viewpoints, our own way of seeing the world, but none of that excuses us from the task of trying to see the world as Jesus does. The mixture of beauty and ugliness that the world offers swirls around us like a colourful tornado and we stand still in the midst of it all. I will not be blown off my feet, we say, and close our eyes.

The youth week of prayer 2008 fourth story

4. Walking the Walk
Teaching all over the land

Matthew 15; John 4
Joanna Poddar is a high school science teacher. She likes reading books, Gary Larson cartoons and being right. She is also a big fan of praying and feels we should all do it more.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that children in the company of their friends – and teenagers in particular – will fear, or will actually be embarrassed by their parents. Put a group of teenagers from almost anywhere in the world into the same room, send in one of their parents and watch to see who cringes.

As a teenager, I was no different. It didn’t matter that in reality my parents were very normal and well-respected people, I would still feel awkward. My father could be especially embarrassing, partly because he was very different from me. My father is one of those outgoing people who can strike up a conversation with anyone – from the checkout girl at ASDA; to an old man walking his dog; to random strangers on a plane.

The aeroplane situation I found particularly awkward because on a plane there’s nowhere to hide. My father would be helping some woman to put her luggage into the overhead lockers and would start talking with her. “Are you on holiday? Who are you visiting? Is this your first time?” etc. which turned into “Where are you family from? What do you do?” to even more personal questions, while I hunkered down in my seat doing my best to ignore what was going on next to me.

Worst of all were the times when the conversation turned to religion. My father has no compunction about sharing his beliefs. He’d get up to take his Bible out of his bag and starting pointing out Scriptural references to support what he was saying – on the plane! While everyone else was watching the in flight movie or dozing under their blue plane blankets, my father would be sharing the gospel.

Jesus was travelling with his disciples through Samaria, near the town of Sychar. He’d been with his disciples, baptising and teaching, near the Jordan River and was on his way back to Galilee. Most Jews would have taken the long way round, avoiding Samaria, doubling the length of their journey. Even taking the direct route, such a journey would have taken three days. It was a tough walk – the path twisted and turned through the mountains, and it was not only the landscape that was hostile. As they near Sychar, the disciples went into town to buy food, temporarily putting aside their prejudices out of sheer necessity. Jesus, tired, sat down to rest by Jacob’s well.

It is here that Jesus has a shocking, unconventional, even embarrassing encounter with a Samaritan woman who comes to draw water. Sitting in the shade of the well, sheltering from the heat of the day, Jesus asks the woman “Will you give me a drink?”1 The Samaritan woman is startled – Jewish men did not initiate conversations with women in publicnot even with their own wives, let alone a despised Samaritan! Furthermore, Jews would not touch or drink from a cup that an ‘unclean’ Samaritan had touched. How could this man make such a request of her?

Throughout their conversation, Jesus constantly surprises the woman with his answers. He is not like anyone she has ever met. He doesn’t conform to the attitudes or hold beliefs that she is familiar with. When she mentions the ‘Mount Gerizim vs. Jerusalem’ issue2, a hot topic of debate among Samaritans and Jews, he tells her the place of worship is not important, but that “true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth.” 3 He appears to know intimate details of her life and yet is not judgmental. He doesn’t make any accusations; he doesn’t look down on her.

She has never had a conversation like this before and cannot fully take it in. She says, “I know the Messiah is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.” And then Jesus drops the bombshell, “I who speak to you am he.” 4

It is at this dramatic point that the disciples return. John says that while they “were surprised to find him talking with a woman” … “no one asked, “What do you want?” or “Why are you talking with her?”” 5 Yet, surely this was what they were thinking. They must have glanced at each other and raised eyebrows. Inwardly, perhaps, they cringed at yet another social faux pas from Jesus. Honestly, you couldn’t take him anywhere. What kind of reputation would he acquire if people heard about this?

How often do we have a similar reaction to that of the disciples? When it comes to sharing the gospel, is our initial reaction embarrassment? Do we limit ourselves to associating with ‘acceptable’ people because we are unwilling to break with social convention? Are there certain groups of people to whom you would not witness out of fear, prejudice or discomfort? What are your priorities – telling people the good news or your own well-being? Do we seek our own comfort, to fulfil our own needs (like the disciples, focused on finding food for Jesus) or the spiritual nourishment of others?

Most of the societies we live in today promote a ‘me first’ attitude – my rights, my happiness, my way. Such attitudes (can) lead to false pride and subtle prejudices which persist despite the prevailing trend toward political correctness. These prejudices are found everywhere, from reality TV shows; to the government and church organizations – sometimes veiled, other times overt. We can get so caught-up in condemning them that we lose sight of more pressing concerns. Like the Pharisees, so determined to follow the letter of the law to keep themselves and others from becoming unclean6 that they refused to associate with ‘unclean’ Samaritans or Gentiles. The Pharisees were quick to judge, to focus on sin rather than sinners, and to uphold traditions rather than the principles behind them.

Do we share such attitudes? Does our practice of certain customs prevent us from reaching people? By judging people on their choice of music or dress, do we fall prey to prejudice? In our attempts to stay ‘clean’ do we lose touch with the needs of people around us?

Jesus highlights such thinking in his encounter with the Canaanite woman. By showing the typical male Jewish response to a heathen woman’s plea, he exposes the pride and prejudice held by the disciples. 7 Jews considered themselves chosen of God and the sole beneficiaries of salvation. They could not comprehend extending such privileges to other, less worthy nations.

Jesus says to the woman, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel. It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to their dogs.” 8 To our sensitive ears, such language from Jesu may appear appalling. Yet, the disciples remained unfazed and indifferent. Furthermore, they were annoyed at the persistence of the woman and asked Jesus to send her away Do we allow annoyances to blind us to the needs of others? Do we only help when it is convenient for us to do so?

What is most striking about this story is the woman’s response. She is undaunted by Jesus’ apparent scorn. She has come to Jesus out of desperation, with no other alternatives. She is willing to take whatever he has to give. “She begs for the crumbs that fall from the Master’s table. If she may have the privilege of a dog, she is willing to be regarded as a dog. She has no national or religious prejudice or pride to influence her course, and she immediately acknowledges Jesus as the Redeemer, and as the One able to do all that she asks of Him.” 9 So great is her faith that Jesus instantly, willingly, lovingly grants her request.

How often do we encounter people who are desperate for something more –people who are in need of friendship, or comfort; people with pressing physical and financial needs? How often are we put off from ‘witnessing’ because people seem unreceptive and indifferent to what we have to offer, because what we offer is not meeting their needs? We take part in activities such as delivering leaflets or attending outreach programmes to which we haven’t invited our peers and assume we are doing our part to evangelise. Or, we content ourselves with financially supporting charities or church projects, and then wonder why these efforts do not seem to bear fruit.

“Everywhere there is a tendency to substitute the work of organizations for individual effort. Human wisdom tends to consolidation, to centralization, to the building up of great churches and institutions. Multitudes leave to institutions and organizations the work of benevolence; they excuse themselves from contact with the world and their hearts grow cold. They become selfabsorbed and un-impressible. Love for God and man dies out of the soul. Christ commits to His followers an individual work, a work that cannot be done by proxy. Ministry to the sick and the poor, the giving of the gospel to the lost, is not to be left to committees or organized charities. Individual responsibility, individual effort, personal sacrifice, is the requirement of the gospel.” 10

These are noble ideals, but how can we actually achieve them? How do we go about “giving the gospel to the lost”? To start, we can look at the example of Jesus. From reading the gospels, it is clear that Jesus was in touch with the common people. He was one of them; he worked with them, he ate with them, he lived among them. So should we immerse ourselves in our communities and get to know the people in our immediate environment. Jesus was always accessible, whether to mothers with their little children, outcast lepers, royal officials or Romans. He would talk to anybody, whether it was a religious leader who came at night or a foreign woman in the heat of the day. So should we be able to talk to all people in any situation – in the school playground, in the queue at the post office, at the hairdresser’s, or on a plane.

Jesus was sensitive to the individual needs of people. He used different approaches in different situations. The four thousand hungry people needed bread as much as words. The royal official’s son was healed so that his entire household believed. The Canaanite woman had her faith tested and was rewarded. The woman at the well had a conversation that changed her life. Wherever Jesus went, whoever he met, he took every opportunity to interact with people, not making demands or laying down rules. He didn’t condemn, but met people on their own level. He was attuned to their longings, their thirst, their emptiness and he was able to offer them living water, which would “become in [them] a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” 11

But following Jesus’ example in witnessing is not always easy. After all, he lived in a different time and place. He had a perfect relationship with God. How can we, as imperfect Christians, expect the same kind of results? How can we draw people to God?

Let us return to the experience of the Samaritan woman. “Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Christ?” … Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I ever did.”” 12

When we first met this woman, she was alone at the well, collecting water in the middle of the day. Commentators suggest this was because she was a social outcast, unaccepted by the other women, who would have visited the well in the evening. She had had five husbands; as Jewish law only allowed men to divorce their wives and not the other way around, she must have suffered the pain of a broken marriage and subsequent rejection, not once but five times! If her last husband had not given her a certificate of divorce, allowing her to marry again, she may have felt compelled to live with a man who was not her husband, for the protection and financial stability it offered. This was a woman with a notorious reputation, well known to people in her town.

But when she meets Jesus, all this is forgotten in her desire to share her experience. Her testimony, simple though it is, is sufficient to convince many of the Samaritans. They believe, even before they meet Jesus, on the strength of this woman’s witness. A brief encounter with Jesus changed the Samaritan woman in ways that were obvious to all who met her. As a result of her sharing this encounter, many became believers.

Do we find it difficult to witness because we have never had a real encounter with Christ? If we have never experienced the effects of the good news, how can we share it with others? If we don’t know Jesus, how can we tell people about him?

I am a fourth generation Adventist. My grandparents, uncles, aunts and parents have spent their lives working for the church. I attended a Seventh-day Adventist school from the age of 5. I grew up well within the church, taking part, attending all the meetings, Pathfinders, AY programmes, everything. And yet, I had never had a real experience with God. During my third year at university, I realised I needed to make a decision one way or another. I had to give a relationship with God a chance, by spending time praying and reading the Bible, consistently. If this didn’t work, I’d live my life without God.

I started and waited to see what would happen and was amazed at how quickly God made himself known. In tiny but tangible ways, God showed me He was working in my life. Prayers were answered in ways that shook me and filled me with wonder. Most of all, I was surprised by the joy; a deep and underlying joy that nothing could shake, based on the knowledge that God was in control of my life. Finally, this was real, this was meaningful. Having a real experience with God may not include amazing conversions or miracles. It may not happen suddenly or dramatically, but once you have encountered God, you know it is good news – news so good, so necessary, and so powerful that you have to share it. My experience did not make for a thrilling story. It wasn’t easy to share something so personal, something that had only made an impact on my life. It didn’t seem enough to convince non-believers of God’s goodness. But I had to share it - within my group of friends and fellow believers, people who knew me, who could see the difference in my life. If you can’t share your experience with God with other believers, how do you expect to tell unbelievers?

Once you have had a real experience with God, sharing it becomes compulsory. You may not be able to convert hundreds of people; you may not even convert one, but you are planting seeds, you are allowing God to work through you and you should never underestimate the power of doing so. You may feel your experience is insignificant but “To every one work has been allotted, and no one can be a substitute for another. Each one has a mission of wonderful importance, which he cannot neglect or ignore …”12

Sharing your experience may not be easy, it may initially be embarrassing and awkward but once you are prepared to do so, you will find more and more people who are willing to listen, people who are seeking something, people who have run out of alternatives. You may feel ill-equipped or inadequate, you may feel that you are not really making much of a difference, but God will use you in surprising ways, both for your benefit and for his glory. “God could have reached His objective in saving sinners without our aid; but in order for us to develop a character like Christ’s, we must share in His work. In order to enter into His joy,-- the joy of seeing souls redeemed by His sacrifice,--we must participate in His labors for their redemption.” 14 By taking every opportunity to share the gospel as we have experienced it, we share in Christ’s mission and His joy.

References:
1John 4:7
2John 4:19 – 21
3John 4:23
4John 4:25, 26
5John 4:27
6Matthew 15:1 – 10
7Desire of Ages, p. 400.
8Matthew 15:24, 26
9Desire of Ages, p. 401.
10The Ministry of Healing, p. 147.
11John 4:14
12John 4: 28 – 30, 39
13Review and Herald, Dec. 12, 1893
14The Desire of Ages, p. 142.

The youth week of prayer 2008 third story

3. Tried and True
Casting Out Demons and Cultural Traditions

Matt. 15:1-28; Mark 1:39
Graham Pilmoor

In his widely read confessions, St Augustine of Hippo famously described the attitude of his youth as “Lord make me chaste, only just not yet”. This is something almost all of us are familiar with. It is basically a variation on the idea of the spirit being willing but the body weak. The kingdom of God, like many other things such as charity or equality, is something we accept in principle but are very slow to actualise. Feeding the hungry and clothing the naked is something we are less enthusiastic about when confronted in the street. We tell ourselves, “of course I agree with the principle, but must I deal with this beggar here and now? I already donate money to a charity and they should understand that.”

It would be easy to say that our reluctance to be charitable is down to wanton materialism, but it is doubtful that many of us are so attached to a few pennies. It’s much more likely that we simply don’t want to get involved. Who knows where it will end? What if they simply won’t go away? What if they tell all their beggar friends I’m a soft target? What if they’re mentally unstable? Of course I don’t want to see people living in poverty, but I can’t commit myself to this problem. Lord make me chaste only just not yet.

The baptism of Christ contrasts with this. In Matthew 3:16 Jesus puts aside the protests of John the Baptist saying “let it be so NOW; it is proper to do this to fulfil all righteousness”. Whatever the full ramifications of His baptism, Jesus is not in the habit of filibustering. This automatically puts him in a league beyond Moses at the site of the burning bush and Jonah on the way to Tarshish. Indeed urgency is a recurring theme for Christ. Famous phrases you might recognise include “The Kingdom is near.” “I stand at the door and knock.” “Time is short” and so on. In fact a sense of urgency seems to be an intrinsic part of what we consider righteousness and is reflected in God’s church looking forward to, and indeed seeking to hasten the Second Coming. However it is worth stressing that this urgency is quite different from what we might call the pejorative interpretation of “zealous”. Whatever zeal used to be we now understand it to be the pursuit of an ideal regardless of costs. Dietrich Bonheoffer is typically explicit about the nature of Jesus’ ministry not being this particular brand of zeal.

“Christ did not, like an ethicist, love a theory about the good; he loved real people. Christ was not interested, like a philosopher in what was “generally valid,” but in that which serves real human beings. Christ was not concerned about whether “the maxim of an action” could become “a principle of universal law,” but whether my action now helps my neighbour to be a better human being before God. God did not become an idea, a principle, a program, a universally valid belief, God became human…”

Of course there are many ways in which Christ’s humanity is important, but of particular significance to the scripture reading is the word righteousness. Righteousness is not first and foremost a moral matter. William Barclay succinctly defines righteousness as “being in a right relationship with God”. In the context of this right relationship with God, urgency can then be seen to be analogous to a parent’s desire to be reunited with his/her children after a long separation, or a spouse anxiously wanting to make sure the preparations for an anniversary celebration are perfect. Flowers have to be of the right kind, the restaurant has to be one of significance, and all the endearing peculiarities of the relationship must be celebrated. Returning to the example of the beggar, our struggle is not with the moral or ideal of sharing wealth so much as the potential relational challenges we fear. Urgency can’t be brought about by ideals, however noble they are, but rather by relational feelings such as compassion, desire or wrath. Continued spiritual growth rests on putting aside personal pride and indeed personal ideals, rolling up our sleeves and engaging with God in ways that are real whether it be helping the needy, leading others to worship or taking up ascetic life in the wilderness; and doing so with a sense of urgency. To “engage” with God at arms length in purely intellectual terms is essentially saying “I accept the challenges posed by Christ in principle, but real life doesn’t work like that”, in other words “Lord make me chaste only just not yet”.

What exactly was Christ thinking when he so eagerly went into the wilderness? The scripture itself claims that he was lead by the Spirit to be tempted by Satan. Taken too literally this can be a dangerous concept. If Christ is supposed to be a role model, we must be careful not to view volunteering ourselves for the ordeal of temptation as virtuous. Christ himself says that if your right hand offends you then you must cut it off In fact, leaving ourselves open to weakness is no more sanctioned or meaningful than literally crucifying ourselves. So again we must ask what was going through Jesus’ mind when he went into the desert. These are not the conventional actions of a sane man and yet the desert offers us a strange attraction. When you go to the desert what do you hope to see? Many people have ventured into the desert intent on some kind of spiritual growth or epiphany. For some strange reason the one thing we are so sure will grow in an inhospitable climate is the soul. Images burned into the pages of National Geographic romanticise the rising and setting desert sun; a symbol of the ineffable mystery of God from the ancients onward. We imagine an incredible silence that somehow whispers precious Godly secrets that will gently seep into our consciousness, elevating us to a state of enlightenment whence we can return to our peers as sun scorched priests and rabbis. The rare man you meet in the desert is a sage, or better still one of the magi still trying to find his way home from the scene of the nativity. In truth there are few wise men in the desert, most people you meet will be feeling as spiritually and geographically lost as yourself. In truth there is no whispering. The heat is so overpowering it becomes deafening and pondering mystery is put aside as your brain focuses on your most primary needs, and yet nuns, monks and the spiritually inclined continue to make the pilgrimage to the middle of nowhere. In truth the desert very quickly robs you of what you wish to be and very quickly reminds you of what you are: entirely human and entirely mundane. The questions you find yourself asking are less concerned with the divine nature of Christ and more along the lines of ‘Must I really sleep here?’; ‘Why can’t I have a proper bath?’; ‘Why must I eat this awful food again’; “Why Me? Why Me? Why Me?” To live in squalor and still be thankful for your daily cup of water and barely sufficient shelter is not easy.

Jesus faced these challenges and must have been equally frustrated, hence his outcry later in Matthew ‘birds have nests, foxes have holes but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.’ So, while thinking about the harsh realities of wilderness living, it becomes evident that Jesus didn’t simply sit under a tree waiting 40 days for Satan to turn up for the date. Jesus was challenged from day one and in this long and gruelling trial Jesus too was reminded of his humanity. Living with the dichotomy of a human and divine personage in one body represents a formidable challenge in which he was at the mercy of the Father. The extraordinary thing about it is that whilst Jesus was himself divine and therefore authoritative, he continued to be obedient to the will of the Father, submitting himself to be baptised by a man, submitting himself to the psychological challenges of the desert and ultimately submitting himself to a humiliating death. Paul expresses this particularly well in his letter to the Philippians.

“Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who being in very nature God did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death-even death on a cross!”

Anybody who claims to be a Christian and claims to live in the Holy Spirit is therefore called to have a similar sense of their own humanity; to recognise their frailty, their frustrations and their absolute dependence on God in the trials of life, not just as a forgiver of sins in the abstract end game scenario of his second coming, but as one whose grace offers transformation and sustenance in the here and now, gradually building us up to be called the body of Christ. Recalling the Bonheoffer quote cited earlier “Christ does not want us to be first of all pupils, representatives, and advocates of a particular doctrine, but human beings, real human beings before God.”

And if Christ came to restore all humanity, how can we lay claim to a humanity restored or even the promise of a humanity restored if that very humanity is something we deny in ourselves?

In Ellen White’s The Temptation of Christ in the Wilderness she says that “Christ’s work was to reconcile man to God through His human nature, and God to man through His divine nature.” p. 38

Indeed this is something we often skip over. Christ’s reconciliation of man to God could arguably have been achieved simply by being mortal and godly at once, but Christ was not content with simply being. Christ actively embraces both his human and divine natures. At once he is the man who vanquishes money changers, hypocrites and calls us to a more dignified existence with the irresistibly enigmatic words “follow me” whilst also being the man who acts in total subservience to God the Father and to his fellow man. The temptations of Christ are not simply there to show us that God was capable of resisting sin, this is something we could logically work out for ourselves, neither are the temptations there simply to portray Christ as a hero in an epic struggle as our western, Kant-influence minds tend to do. Though his collapse after the third trial shows it was difficult, the power of his responses to Satan at the time of temptation points to a man who, despite temptation would inevitably resist, simply for being the person He was. The aspects of resistance and struggle may well be legitimate, but Christ’s temptations are also there as messages of hope for people as they live this life. As Rowan Williams describes in ‘Silence and Honey Cakes’

“The saint isn’t someone who makes us think ‘That looks hard, that’s a heroic achievement of will’ - with the inevitable thought, ‘that’s too hard for me’- but someone who make us think, ‘How astonishing! Human lives can be like that, behaviour like that can look quite natural’ – with perhaps the accompanying thought ‘How can I find what they have found?’”

In his resistance to temptation Christ offers us all hope, helping as to think “how remarkable, human behaviour can look like that, that there is a human reality beyond anything the world offers” and is perhaps one way of interpreting Paul’s words in Romans Chapter 2 that we shouldn’t conform but be transformed by the renewing of our minds. This is a very encouraging notion for us all; no matter the state of our relationship with God, and no matter what temptations we face though we might fail and fail again. The first and most important steps to righteousness, as Jesus demonstrates, are found in our acknowledgement of who we are, our call for mercy and our commitment to living by His grace. It is only after showing this that Christ goes on to counsel us with the Sermon on the Mount. Paradoxically the more we realise our humanity the more Christ-like we are made and the more righteous we become. This is one of the impossible possibilities of our faith.

In the words “Follow me” Christ isn’t first and foremost looking for you to give up smoking or stop fantasizing about the girl behind the bar, though these things come with time, rather he seeks the urgent confession of a sinful humanity and the commitment to transformation under His grace through discipleship, not in a fortnight of cold turkey conversion, but over a lifetime. A lifetime commitment to the Christian path may seem daunting, but it is less so than attempting to instantly exorcise our foibles with a Levitical tick list. That would simply be self help under a Christian label. Now knowing as we do, that the persons God has elected us to become requires a lifetime of growth in righteous humility and humanity there seems neither time nor reason for any of us to say the prayer “Lord make me chaste only just not yet.”

The youth week of prayer 2008 second story

2. Always the Best
Wedding at Cana

Johannese 2:1-11
Remona St. John

Most of us in our lifetime will have been to a wedding, many of us have been to a few and we may get the opportunity to go to many more. Some of us will even have been part of a wedding, a flower girl, groomsman, maid of honour or even the bride or groom!

There is something truly beautiful about weddings and the gift of two becoming one; the blessing ceremony and of course the celebrations at the end. But despite all the time, the effort, the planning, the arguments and the costs (money), weddings can still go terribly wrong. No doubt you’ve experienced a few of those too. Those weddings where the limousine breaks down 60 kilometres (37 miles) away from the church; where families at war turn up and forget not to be at war that day or those weddings where 200 guests have been catered for but 300 guests are seated, ready and waiting. As sure as there are weddings where things go right, there will always be weddings where things go wrong.

Jesus attended a wedding; a small, local wedding so we could presume most of the guests grew up with each other and knew each other. It is likely they would have fond memories of playing ball games with each other as children, celebrating their graduations as students, and attending each other’s weddings as young adults. These guests knew each other and they knew each other well. They could well be thinking to themselves “What are Claude and Maria possibly going to do to top the iced cherubim sculptures at Lucinda and Elroy’s wedding?” So had anything gone wrong at this wedding it would have been scandalous, it would have taken no time for news to spread across town, because the whole town had an invitation and would witness first hand.

The guests are still in the midst of merrymaking, still celebrating, still guzzling down the wine when disaster strikes and the wine runs out. (John 2:3).

Now running out of wine isn’t the end of the world by any means. According to the custom of the time the celebrations would have gone on for several days and it’s probable, considering the wine jars had run dry, they had been partying for some time already. It could well have been a fitting time to stop the celebrations and announce; “We would just like to thank everyone for making these last few days special, thank you all for coming, goodbye and goodnight”. But it would seem that, in the thick of the celebrations, the end was not in sight and nor was it desired. Rather than pack up and go home the preferred solution was to find more wine and enough wine to prevent the festivities from grinding to a premature halt.

Now considering He didn’t want to get involved when His assistance was requested in John 2:4, Jesus was incredibly generous. By having 6 large pots filled with water Jesus turned up to 180 gallons (almost 700 litres) of water into wine, an enormous amount.

But this wasn’t a gift of mere quantity. The Master of Ceremonies tastes the wine and with no knowledge of where it has come from, makes a point of calling the bridegroom aside to compliment him on the quality of this latest stock. This gift symbolises excellence. It was indeed the very best. Jesus had the ability to make this new supply of wine exactly the same as previous batches. Only the servants, his mother and his disciples would have been aware that any arrangements had been made. The new wine would have been served and nobody would have known that anything was different. Jesus could have produced run-of-the-mill, ordinary wine that would draw no attention and would meet the basic needs of the guests.

That simply isn’t in Christ’s nature to do things in an ordinary way. Christ’s love for us initiates a reaction in Him to give us nothing but the best. In Matthew Christ describes Himself as the father to rival any earthly parent. “If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask Him!” Matt 7:11 Jesus could do nothing but give the best wine to the wedding guests.

Imagine if Jesus raised Lazarus (Jn. 11: 43-44) from the dead but Lazarus remained in a coma, or provided food for 3,999 persons, (Mark 8:1-10) then ran short (of food) and left one hungry. Or, if after He cast out the demons from the man of Gerasenes (Luke 8:26-33) some demons simply remained. Imagine Jesus doing only the bog standard—the bare minimum, and the basic essentials. His glory would never have been revealed.

While Jesus had made 180 gallons of wine of such quality that it would have the most inexperienced wine connoisseurs yearning for more, the wedding guests had already consumed a fair bit.

You may know what it’s like to attend a function or event where they serve a first-class meal. You experience fine tasting foods, created perfectly in every way and fit for a delicate appreciative palate just like yours. You know you don’t eat food this good every day so you make an extra effort not to disappoint your hosts, by finishing that last forkful (or six), even though you are already full. Then before your eyes, out comes the dessert. The aroma is breathtaking; the view astonishing, you salivate at the very idea of just one lick, but you could kick yourself because there simply isn’t room to hold it.

Now the good wine had arrived. Some of guests at the wedding had drunk themselves full of the bridegroom’s original supply of standard wine. “Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wines after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now.” John 2:10. Then out comes the miracle wine. I’m sure most found room, made time, let the old wine settle before indulging on the better wine. But it is possible that many had had as much as they could. There could well have been some that were so filled they couldn’t find room to even taste the new wine. So full were they that they didn’t experience for themselves the miracle that had taken place, the special gift that Jesus had given.

While Jesus is giving His best to us, pouring out His choice wine, it is our responsibility to ensure we have room to receive it. For each of us it may be a different type of clutter that keeps us from receiving ‘the best’. Maybe we are focused on our careers so when the good wine comes along we’re too busy. For others it may be our spouses, so caught up are we with making our relationships run smooth we’re filled with standard wine and have no room for the best. For some it is college, friends, television and that’s just the start. Each day we sip a little of the good wine but rarely is there room to “Taste and see that the Lord is good…” Psalm 34:8

There is ample supply of wine to go around. Blessings from God are regular and can easily meet and supply the demand. We must ensure our hearts and minds are open to receive the best, which is what Christ is offering us.

Jesus didn’t withhold the miracle wine until the end of the feast. To the guests it seemed as though the bridegroom had saved the good wine until later in the festivities, but that was not the case. The bridegroom didn’t save the quality wine until later, for he had none to save. It was not the bridegroom’s choice to serve the better wine later, nor is it for us to save our best until last

As a child growing up I had a habit of eating the food on my plate one item as a time. I’d start the meal with the worst thing on my plate. That was usually the cabbage;
I hated cabbage. So I’d eat my cabbage first. When I’d finished the cabbage I’d start on the rice and peas. I was never really keen on peas, so I’d pick them out of the rice,
put them to the side of the plate and then I’d start on the rice.

Then having saved the best to last I’d look longingly at my meat and lick my lips before tucking in. By this point my father, who was a trickster, would have finished his dinner and begun looking around for more. He would point out of the window telling me to take note of the flying saucers cruising over the back garden. Distracted I would look away momentarily, only to look back at my plate to see that my meat had gone and I could be sure to find my father licking his fingers in delight. I’d be left with a plate of peas that I didn’t want or like. It took me some time to learn that saving the best until last didn’t work for me.

God doesn’t want us to save our best until last. After all we don’t know what tomorrow holds. Look what he says in Matthew 6:34: “Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own”. The servants poured out quality wine, first time! Jesus gave His best first time and He gives us the best of Himself every time. In the same way we are not to give our best first and then slacken as time goes on.

“As men set forth the best wine first, then afterward that which is worse, so does the world with its gifts. That which it offers may please the eye and fascinate the senses, but it proves to be unsatisfying. The wine turns to bitterness, the gaiety to gloom. That which was begun with songs and mirth ends in weariness and disgust.

But the gifts of Jesus are ever fresh and new. The feast that He provides for the soul never fails to give satisfaction and joy. Each new gift increases the capacity of the receiver to appreciate and enjoy the blessings of the Lord. He gives grace for grace. There can be no failure of supply. If you abide in Him, the fact that you receive a rich gift today insures the reception of a richer gift tomorrow.” Desire of Ages pg. 148

Jesus is looking for consistency from us, in our college work, in our places of employment, in our homes, in our churches and most importantly in our relationship with Him.

Many wives, after years of marriage don’t continue to honour their husbands as the men who once courted them with love, affection, time and attention. Many churches don’t continue to honour and support their Elders/Deacons/Youth Leaders after years of hard labour in their ministries leave them tired; their excitement and zeal having long since waned. Even teachers can fail to credit a student’s thesis as being all his/her own works when it starts off strong and with conviction, then fades into a weak and wordy conclusion in the end. And we fail to honour Christ when the zeal and passion we once had for Him, has slipped into a quick mumble over food at the dinner table, and a hasty prayer just before going to bed.

As Jesus’ gifts are new every morning so we should wake each morning determined to give our best effort in everything we do, with constant supply. In our spiritual relationship, in our households and in all areas of our lives, we need to be giving our best consistently. When things around us are evolving, one thing that must remain constant is our commitment to the Communion Service, our regular reminder that Jesus gave us the best gift He could have given. He gave us His body and His blood; and that gift bought us eternal life. The wine at the wedding symbolises Christ giving His blood so that we might be able to have forgiveness for our sins. “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.” (Matthew 26:28)

While the story of wedding at Cana is founded upon many more elements of symbolism what should be noted is the more simplistic theme of the generosity of our Lord. God gave the best and most generous gift He could have given, His only Son, Jesus Christ.

And Jesus keeps giving and giving. The wedding in Cana, Jesus’ first recorded miracle, was just the tip of the iceberg in regards to the gifts that He had given and would continue to give man.

For Jesus, “the wedding festivities pointed forward to the rejoicing of that day when He shall bring home His bride to the Father’s house.” (Desire of Ages, p. 151.) Jesus our bridegroom invites us to live with Him for eternity and dine with Him at His table forevermore. Your decision must be to decide whether this is an invitation you choose to accept?