We hear a lot about situations which are not ‘binary choices’ — meaning that there are many shades and variants. Following Christ is a choice to trust Him in His sacrifice for our salvation. But Christianity has evolved beyond that simple choice to a range of preferences — apparently there are more than 40,000 denominations worldwide.
But the question that summarises the story that emerges from this week’s Bible readings is a binary choice. Are you a disciple on mission with Jesus — or a church club devotee?
We either know we share that mission, or we’re more at home in the club house. Church congregations can too easily absorb the preferences of people who like ‘their church’ the way it is — because that is what is comfortable for them.
But Jesus didn’t stay with what was comfortable for Him. And He didn’t come to start a new religion around certain practices.
Nor does He bless competing strands, or any kind of exclusive club, however much it claims to meet in His name! He wants our hearts and our worship and our participation in His mission. As Spirit, He is everywhere, with all the might of Heaven behind him — but He relies on our arms and legs, and our stories, to do the practical stuff in reaching others..
His Spirit is like Jesus physically leading us, but He needs our willing boots on the ground, for us to be salt and light to those around us.
We set the scene with words from Psalm 112 which remind us what godly sincerity and uprightness look like:
Even in darkness light dawns for the upright… who are gracious and compassionate and righteous. Good will come to those who are generous and lend freely, who conduct their affairs with justice.
Surely the righteous will never be shaken… trusting in the Lord, their hearts are secure, they will have no fear; in the end they will look in triumph on their foes.
Excerpted from Psalm 112
God’s eternal message of His goodness and kindness to us — beyond anything we deserve — doesn’t change, but we may be tempted to try to make it more contemporary and culturally acceptable.
In one sense, everything has changed. Satellites (and balloons) circle the Earth and take pictures of us in our gardens. We find new advances to feed more mouths with an ever-narrowing range of foodstuffs, and create new weapons to deter aggressors.
But in another sense nothing has changed! God’s purposes remain as they have always been.
Jesus needs us as much today to be His purifiers of a corrupt world, and light-bearers to dispel shadows of darkness and confusion. We inhabit this uncomfortable space, between the eternal love and truth of God, and the fast-flowing rapidly-changing world of selfish desires and competitive ambitions which have no time or space for the Creator.
Who will restore the balance — God’s balance for the world? Those who know what the balance of His kingdom order feels like!
Back in the day, the Israelites had lost intimacy with God. They went through the motions of worship. Their hearts were not in it, and social breakdown followed, because where light is lacking, confusion reigns and strife can breed unchecked. Isaiah brought a word from God to spell this out:
“Shout it aloud… declare to My people their rebellion… For… they seem eager to know My ways… [and] ask Me for just decisions…’Why have we fasted,’ they say, ‘and You have not seen it?’…
“Yet on the day of your fasting, you… exploit… your workers. Your fasting ends in quarrelling and strife… You cannot… expect your voice to be heard on high. Is this the kind of fast I have chosen, only a day for people to humble themselves…for bowing one’s head like a reed…?
“The kind of fasting I have chosen [is] to loose the chains of injustice… [and] set the oppressed free…
to share… food with the hungry and… provide the… wanderer with shelter — when you see the naked, to clothe them… Then your light will break forth like the dawn… your righteousness will go before you, and the glory of the LORD will be your rear guard.
“Then you will… cry for help, and He will say: ‘Here am I.’ If you do away with… oppression, with the pointing finger and malicious talk, and… satisfy the needs of the [hungry and] oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday.
Excerpted from Isaiah 58:1–10
The Jewish nation that Isaiah is bringing God’s word to, are lost, spiritually. And it shows in their lack of love. They had lost their capacity to love God, and to love each other.
Jesus came to be the answer to both of these deficiencies. At the very start of His Sermon on the Mount teaching — we’ll hear some more in a minute — He exhorted His hearers to recognise the lost and loveless state of the nation of Israel:
“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
Matthew 5:3
The heart of Jesus’ message of good news is to look to Him as God’s chosen Way of salvation for all who will trust Him. But that is the starting place, not the finish line. Jesus embodies the perfect representation of God. Looking at Jesus, is looking at love. Jesus in us is our capacity to love like God does — sacrificially.
What we see Jesus doing in the gospel accounts, is creating missional disciples. They are to grow in selfless love drawn from God, and then to go in that love to reach people with God’s salvation in Jesus. That was His original training objective while He was on Earth — — and it was highly effective.
The early church grew and spread rapidly with the unique dynamic that comes through doing life together with the Holy Spirit. Has Jesus’ training objective changed? We will take a visit to the early church in Corinth a little later, but for now we are looking in, on Jesus teaching those first missional disciples.
He is preparing them for the future role as much as the present situation.
At this point, of course, He is present with them physically. And so there is a spiritual impartation, a covering. Being close to Jesus changed them. They were known as the men who had been with Jesus. There was a difference that others remarked on.
They are learning to be His presence to others and even at this point, learning to do that in a spiritual way. This helps us to understand the teaching He is giving them. We misunderstand much of His teaching if we receive it as actions we must do, or a standard we must aspire to, without proper regard to the spiritual dimAre You a Disciple on Missionension, and the Spirit of Jesus working with us. We’ll let Matthew take up the story now, in Matthew 5:
Jesus said: “You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.
“You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfil them. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.
“Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practises and teaches these commands, will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.
Matthew 5:13–20
People , even Pharisees, addressed Jesus as ‘Teacher’ because that is what He was — the best kind, the kind who models the lesson before teaching it. What is salt and light all about? Jesus is our perfect demonstration.
Jews were losing their sense of living in a covenant relationship, and some sought to make redress with a religion of strict adherence to the rules of the law — and even added to them for effect.
And we see that today, in the way some churches today are religious about keeping rules and rituals. But in making man-made requirements central, they bypass living faith and joyful spiritual encounter with Jesus and His love. Practice and formality can so easily take the place of spirituality.
Jesus — God with us — wants to become God within us. This is the Spirit of God poured out at Pentecost. Now the stark and difficult-to-grasp truth of the incredible victory of Jesus through His death on the Cross, and resurrection to new life, can be known and internalised spiritually , through the Holy Spirit working in us.
This headlines Paul’s lesson on living the Spirit-led, Spirit-enabled life which we hear now in 1 Corinthians 2.
…When I came to you, I did not come with eloquence or human wisdom, as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you, except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
I came to you in weakness… [and] my message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God’s power.
We do… speak a message of wisdom… but not the wisdom of this age. No, we declare God’s wisdom, a mystery that has been hidden, and that God destined for our glory before time began. None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
However, as it is written: “What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, and what no human mind has conceived” — the things God has prepared for those who love Him — these are the things God has revealed to us by His Spirit…
No one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us. This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words.
The person without the Spirit [considers foolish] the things that come from the Spirit of God and cannot understand them, because they are discerned only through the Spirit. …but we [are given] the mind of Christ.
1 Corinthians 2:1-16
Let’s focus on these two key statements and let them act as our point of focus..
We have received… the Spirit who is from God so we may understand…
The person without the Spirit cannot understand…
In these few verses, Paul manages to include about ten mentions of the Holy Spirit. That’s a strong emphasis! There’s something here he really wants us to get hold of. The Holy Spirit, who is God, keep us aligned with God.
Looking at the story as a whole, it’s about the spiritual dimension, missibng or present:
- The Israelites had lost the relationship with God and were left with religious rules and wrangling.
- The Pharisees and other religious leaders of Jesus’ time were tying people in knots with their idea of holy living, but missing the meaning of true righteousness.
- The church in Corinth confused spiritual realities with clever rhetoric. They had an experience of the Holy Spirit, but they were still carnal. They had a taste of the new spiritual nature, but the old flesh nature was reacting.
Paul is giving them — and us — the key to understanding something that doesn’t come by human understanding, however clever we are. The good news of Jesus keeps on presenting us with choices. We — like them — can choose to be led by Him, by His Spirit. This is how revelatory understanding comes.
These same three difficulties are recurring problems today. Because we are human, we repeat common human mistakes.
- Allowing the priority, personal relationship with God through receiving and trusting Jesus as Lord, to decompose into a formal repetitive weekly routine;
- Avoiding the challenge of living closely with God and upholding His values — and taking the easier path of following rules;
- Pursuing the froth of exciting contemporary worship without regard to the substance of it, valuing presentation rather than power and encounter with God.
It’s about recognising how easily we slide into what is about us, rather than what is about Jesus. We guard against that, and correct that, by actively choosing for Jesus. Making Him central, talking about Him, joining Him where He is going.
Are you a disciple on mission with Jesus — or a church club devotee?
Resolve with me, and with the help of His Spirit, the Helper, to make Jesus central.
Loving God and others like Jesus.
Being salt and light by showing people what Jesus is like.
Gaining spiritual stamina by worshipping in the close presence of Jesus.
PRAYER
Lord, how easily we slip into empty church routine and ritual — and church politics. How often we wake up and find we’re not talking about Jesus and His priorities, but ours.
Forgive us for being less than salt and light to the world around us. Help us to recognise our lapses into what is unspiritual and undiscerning.
Meet with us, Jesus. Fill us afresh with Your Spirit, Your wisdom and Your love — to flow out and transform those around us.
May Your Spirit in us bring greater realisation of the peace and joy Your death has purchased, for us and others around us. For Your glory, Lord Jesus. Amen.
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