The Church as the Family of God

23/09/2018

Jesus said that He would build his church. We’re used to “ground breaking” or “turning a sod” ceremonies, or laying a brick to launch a new building project. A few old men in suits turn up with shovels and pose for pictures. They tend to be genteel affairs with a few claps and some light refreshments afterwards. 

However, there was nothing genteel when Jesus chose to launch his church building project on the day of Pentecost. It was more like an explosion!

On that day, the church was born. The new testament has various ways to describe the church – body of Christ, bride of Christ, God’s household, temple of God. But one man suggests that Jesus had a favourite metaphor for the church – this man! 

Joachim Jeremias said that the metaphor ‘the Family of God’ was Jesus’ favourite image for referring to the church.

Politicians are always keen to stress their commitment to “Family Values”. During a speech in January 1992, then-president George Bush Snr said: “We're going to keep trying to strengthen the American family. To make them more like the Waltons and less like the Simpsons.”

There are two ways in which you can become a member of a family – you can born into one, or adopted. 

Interestingly, Roman Law in NT times allowed you to disown a child by birth but not a child by adoption.

What’s also interesting is that we become a member of God’s family by being both born into it and adopted into it! Belt and braces approach.

Let’s look at being born first. Christians have experienced both a physical birth and a spiritual birth.

Jesus told Nicodemus: 'Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again' (or born from above).

But Christians are also adopted. Listen to the start of Paul’s letter to the Ephesians where Paul opens his letter with some glorious truths about who we are as Christians:

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us for adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will – to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us.

Such a lot of good stuff in these few verses, like being chosen. As the old story goes about the child who was being bullied for being adopted – he stood up for himself and said – your parents had no choice when you were born, they had to take you home whether they liked you or not, but me – I was chosen!

There’s something special about being chosen, like being chosen to play on the football team - I still have a team sheet from boarding school where I was picked for the firsts rugby team! 

In John 15, talking about the Vine and the branches, Jesus reminds his disciples that they were chosen: 'I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit – fruit that will last.' Likewise, we’ve been chosen and appointed by Jesus to go and bear spiritual fruit in His name. 

This is not something that God did reluctantly – it was ‘in accordance with his pleasure and will’ It’s something he was delighted to do, because he delights in us.

God chose us for “adoption to sonship”. The Greek word for adoption to sonship is a legal term in Roman culture referring to the full legal standing of an adopted male heir. And of course, if you’re an heir, what does that make you entitled to? An inheritance – we’ll get to that later.

Paul keeps going with truth after truth, and he tells us that we have redemption through Jesus’ blood. The concept of redemption comes from the system of slavery. In the Roman Empire, during the time the New Testament was written, slaves accounted for roughly one-fifth of the population. A slave could be redeemed by someone paying a price, called a ransom. And so we have this concept of us being slaves to sin but then being redeemed by the blood of Jesus which makes us in some sense a slave to Christ. Paul told the Corinthians: “You are not your own; you were bought at a price.”

Another phrase to describe the church is therefore “the community of the redeemed”. Adoption into the family of God, however, is a much more powerful concept. It's one thing to be redeemed - to be set free, but it's much more powerful to be then adopted. Adoption gives you a new family, a new life, a new future, a new inheritance!

Which leads to another passage which starts with “Praise be….” (from 1 Peter 1)

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time.

Earthly inheritances are unreliable. At one point, I was hoping to inherit my grandfather’s cottage in Connemara – it didn’t perish or spoil, but the dream just faded – we had to sell it to pay for his nursing home. There are so many ways that an earthly inheritance can disappear from your grasp. And even if you get your hands on it, it can be more trouble than it’s worth. It can cause family rows and falling out. Where there’s a will, there’s relatives!

But as Christians we have been spiritually born and spiritually adopted into a new spiritual family, and as sons and daughters of the living God, we have a spiritual inheritance that is 100% reliable, it can never perish, spoil or fade. It is kept in heaven for us.

In the letters above, both Paul & Peter start off with theology and then deal with local issues. So far, I’ve talked about being part of God’s family in a somewhat theological and almost individualistic sense. So now I’d like to focus on the nuts and bolts.

If we only think in terms of being sons and daughters of God, and therefore brothers and sisters in Christ, we miss a key dynamic because today, many families are dispersed – and while the children all share in the inheritance of their parents, they could be living in different countries with not much contact and no meaningful relationship with each other and maybe not even with their parents.

Simply being brothers and sisters in Christ can give us an excuse for keeping a safe distance from each other, while pursuing our own personal relationship with God. In some ways, we are saying “My Father, who art in Heaven” instead of “Our Father…”

Jesus challenged this attitude in Matthew 12: 

While Jesus was still talking to the crowd, his mother and brothers stood outside, wanting to speak to him. Someone told him, ‘Your mother and brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you.’

He replied to him, ‘Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?’ Pointing to his disciples, he said, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.’

So Jesus goes beyond the idea of spiritual siblings, suggesting that the family of God should have inter-generational relationships. For example, maybe some of you have people you look up to as a spiritual mother or father in the Lord.

I think one of the most helpful way to localise the concept of the family of God is to see the local church as a spiritual extended family.

Biblical families were extended families. Just one example - when Joseph revealed himself to his brothers, he told them to go back and bring the whole family to Egypt. Gen 46:26 says: “All those who went to Egypt with Jacob-- those who were his direct descendants, not counting his sons' wives - numbered sixty-six persons.”

I’ve done a lot of talking, now I want you to do some thinking. 

1.    What barriers are there to the church functioning as a healthy extended family?

Here are some of my thoughts: 

• Lack of extended family in western society
• Western individualism
• Rick Warren - Christianity is seen as a Belief system rather than a Belong system
• The 4th century shift from House Church to Cathedral

2.    What can we do to address them? 

• Make an effort!
• Practice hospitality
• Practice the “One Anothers”

Apparently, there are 59 "One Another" phrases in the New Testament. Some examples are:

• Love one another
• Be at peace with each other.
• Honour one another above yourselves
• Stop passing judgment on one another. 
• Bear with each other      
• Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you
  
• Have equal concern for each other.
  
• Be patient, bearing with one another in love.       
  
• Don’t grumble against each other
  
• Forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another.

You can't practice the "one anothers" without being in and around people - small groups are the simplest way to do this, so maybe this is something for your to consider as the Bible Studies all start up again after the summer.

Let's Pray:

Heavenly Father, we thank you for our church family and we ask you to help us to see beyond our biological family, to love and embrace the needs of others. Help us to find time to be in the company of our brothers and sisters in Christ, so we can love, honour, accept, bear with and forgive one another. Amen.

An introduction to the book of Proverbs

09/09/2018
We’ve had two dogs, and both had a rather disgusting habit of vomiting, and then quite shortly afterwards, proceeding to return the food from whence it came! This is just one of a variety of real-life events that Solomon turned into a Proverb.

Anyone know the second reference to a dog in Proverbs?

"Like one who seizes a mad dog by the ears is a passer-by who meddles in a quarrel not his own." (Proverbs 26:17)




It’s been a while since I’ve read the book of Proverbs, so let me invite you to join with me in reading the whole book of Proverbs for the month of October – one chapter a day! And on the Sundays in October, there will be an opportunity for you to share what you learnt from your reading during the week.

We tend to turn to the Psalms far more quickly than Proverbs and I believe we need give Proverbs more of a look-in. In actual fact, if we look at the Psalms closely, we find that in at least 5 places, they tell us to seek wisdom and of course, Proverbs is where we find it.

The Psalms teach us how to worship, the Proverbs teach us how to act. We tend to use the Psalms in the context of “church” (Sunday Mornings, Prayer Meetings, Private Devotions) but we need the Proverbs when we go out into the world. We use the Psalms on our knees; we use the Proverbs on our feet.

So in order to encourage you to read the book of Proverbs for yourself, I’m going to tell you a little about it. I can’t read the Bible for you. Just like I can’t eat your dinner for you, but I can try to whet your appetite. So let me introduce you to the book of Proverbs.

The book of Proverbs actually requires two introductions – an introduction to a person, namely King Solomon and an introduction to a theme, namely Wisdom. 

Solomon was King David’s son and he ruled Israel for 40 years during what was termed as a golden age of peace and prosperity. He built the first Temple (which replaced the mobile tabernacle built by Moses) and he put Israel firmly on the map as an important centre of culture, religion and trade. Solomon was an international celebrity and many people, like the Queen of Sheba, travelled from far and wide to visit Solomon on account of his extraordinary wisdom, riches and achievements.

So what was the secret of Solomon’s success? It was his wisdom. And where did he get it? From God, of course. One night in a dream, God offered Solomon anything he wanted, and he chose wisdom to govern the people. Solomon excelled in wisdom but unfortunately, he didn’t always follow his own good advice. A recurring theme in Proverbs is to stay away from bad women and be faithful to your wife and of course Solomon did the opposite. He had 700 wives and 300 concubines. Maybe he wrote much of Proverbs in the light of bad experience and regret.

Solomon composed many proverbs, but he also collected them from other people. Some of the proverbs in the Bible are Arabic and some are Egyptian. Solomon recognised wisdom wherever he found it.

And that brings me to my second introduction, to the theme of Wisdom. 

Our reading from 1 Corinthians 1:17-25 contrasts the wisdom of the world with the wisdom of God. In some cases (such as the Cross of Christ) human wisdom is totally opposed to God’s wisdom but in many other situations, it’s not. People are made in God’s image and given a conscience and intelligence and so they will come up with timeless truths like “a stitch in time saves nine” or “look before you leap” - Proverbs like these are just common sense and are not at all incompatible with God’s wisdom. Solomon knew this and so he had no problem in taking certain proverbs from pagan sources and applying them into the context of a relationship with the one true God, Yahweh, the God of Israel, who is mentioned at least 70 times in this book. And indeed today, we can find wisdom from the secular world of business and finance, but we need to be selective and we need to be discerning. 

A recurring theme in Proverbs is “the fear of the Lord”.

“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge”;

“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom”;

“The fear of the Lord leads to life”.

The fear of the Lord is not about being afraid of God, because God is love and perfect love casts out all fear, it’s to do with reverence and awe.

“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge” is translated like this in the Amplified Bible:

The [reverent] fear of the Lord [that is, worshiping Him and regarding Him as truly awesome] is the beginning and the preeminent part of knowledge [its starting point and its essence]            

And so we must approach the book of Proverbs from a place of reverence, respect and awe of God if we are going to imbibe God’s wisdom from its pages.

When we think of the different classes of people in the Old Testament, we think of Kings and Prophets and Priests. But there was another class of people, and they were called “Sages” or wise men.  Proverbs is largely attributed to Solomon – his own proverbs and those he collected, but there are also some sayings of other wise men, the sages. 

      Proverbs is a book of literature – it’s nice to read because it is poetic, but not the type of poetry we learnt in school. It has a rhythm of thought rather than rhyme. 
There are metaphors: Wine is a mocker and beer a brawler.

There are similes: Like a bad tooth or a lame foot is reliance on the unfaithful in times of trouble.

And there are word pictures:

”There are three things that are too amazing for me, four that I do not understand: the way of an eagle in the sky, the way of a snake on a rock, the way of a ship on the high seas, and the way of a man with a maiden. “ (Proverbs 30:18-19)

There are short sayings – one or two lines expressing a single thought and then there are longer passages, called oracles. 

      Proverbs is also a book of contrasts.

It deals with wisdom and folly, pride and humility, love and lust, singlehood and marriage, wealth and poverty, work and leisure, gossip and discretion, masters and servants, righteousness and wickedness, diligence and laziness, life and death. It speaks into nearly every situation you could ever find yourself in and helps you make the right decision.

There are a couple of things to watch out for when you read Proverbs.

Proverbs is essentially a book of morality, about right living. So when it talks about wisdom and folly, it is nothing to do with intelligence. Folly is seen as a moral deficiency, not a mental deficiency. Intelligent people can do immoral things. Conversely, wisdom is not about having a high IQ, it’s about making godly choices in life. We see this principle in other parts of the Bible. For example, in Psalm 14 we read:

The fool says in his heart, "There is no God."  

I’m sure there are lots of very intelligent atheists in the world!

Proverbs is a book of general principles and observations

General observations don’t always hold true. For example:“Grey hair is a crown of splendour; it is attained in the way of righteousness.” (Proverbs 16:31)

I’m sure there are criminals with grey hair who did not lead a righteous life! And so a proverb, as a general observation, doesn’t apply in every case.

A proverb is not always a promise.

As part of my research on Proverbs, I listened to some material by a guy called David Pawson, a well respected Bible teacher. He was very strong on this point: He says a Proverb is not a Promise full stop. His argument goes like this: A proverb is a general observation on life whereas a promise is a specific obligation. A proverb is generally true but not always and so we can’t apply a proverb to every situation and depend on it to work.

Here’s an example:

Commit to the Lord whatever you do, and your plans will succeed.  (Proverbs 16:3)

Heard that one? So if you decide to start a business, with no business plan and no market research and no capital and you say, well I’ve committed it to the Lord - is God under an obligation to make it succeed? Of course not!

Here’s another one:

Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it. 

(Proverbs 22:6)

People often quote this proverb about their wayward children – as if it’s a promise that because they were brought to Sunday School, they will eventually turn to God later in life. It is true that if you bring up a child in a Christian home and environment, they are more likely to become committed Christians than other people, but if they don’t, it doesn’t mean the Bible’s not true, or that God doesn’t keep His promises. At the end of the day, each person has to make their own choice to accept or reject Jesus and God will not violate their free will.

Does that make sense?  I would add one caveat to David Pawson’s argument. I believe that there are times when the Holy Spirit can speak to you through a Proverb, or some other verse of Scripture for that matter, and personalise it to you as a promise. But you have to be very careful that it’s really from God and not just wishful thinking. And that’s all the more reason to seek the wisdom and discernment that God will give us as we read and study the book of Proverbs.

Finally, Proverbs is a book of Edification – it builds you up, it encourages and inspires.

One of my favourite proverbs is in Chapter 3:5-6.

Even if I take these 2 verses as a promise from God, I have to be careful how I interpret them. In Scripture, a straight path is not an easy path, it’s a narrow one and a difficult one at times. Answered promises are sometimes like answered prayers – not exactly what you had in mind!

To conclude, there’s a lot more to be said about the book of Proverbs, but listening to me talking about it is not going to make you any wiser, you’ll have to read it for yourself!

Let me finish with some words from chapter 4:

Get wisdom, get understanding; do not forget my words or swerve from them.  Do not forsake wisdom, and she will protect you; love her, and she will watch over you.  Wisdom is supreme; therefore get wisdom. Though it cost all you have, get understanding.  Esteem her, and she will exalt you; embrace her, and she will honour you.  (Proverbs 4:5-8)

Let’s Pray.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for your Word, for in it we find words of life. We thank you for the book of Proverbs, for how you’ve managed to cram so much wisdom into one book. We acknowledge our dependence on You and on Your wisdom and guidance for our lives. Help us to read and study Your Word that we might grow in our understanding and practice of the Christian life. Help us to cultivate a healthy and proper fear of the Lord as we continue on a lifelong journey of attaining spiritual wisdom and knowledge, for we pray in Jesus name. Amen.