Hope or Despair

Yesterday evening, on my way to a shop in the centre of the market town where I live, I was entertained by a chorus of bird song, blackbirds and thrushes among them, just as dusk was settling.  Despite the surrounding and increasing gloom their delightful songs filled the air.  As I left the shop I tried to draw the attention of a man waiting for his wife to the brilliant music filling the air.  He listened for a moment, shrugged his shoulders and returned to his former rather gloomy state.  I wondered if the birds knew something he did not!

My day started, as it often does, with my listening to a current affairs programme on the radio.  Item after item seemed to present a list of things we should be worried about.  Doctors who make mistakes, hospitals that are overflowing and underfunded, police who fail to provide appropriate evidence, financial uncertainties, disturbing tweets from the White House, the threat of cyber attack on our infrastructure, more stories of sexual abuse and, of course, the shadow of Brexit!  The words “concerning” and more correctly “worrying” occurred several times.

Was, I wondered, the media reflecting the gloom, or was it the consequence of the disturbing habit of producing someone ready to pour scorn and criticise anything good that is happening.  If I may employ the contrary line to a well known Christian song, “Where there is hope in life, let me bring despair!”

All of this puts me in mind of Paul’s letter to the Christians in Philippi.  At the time of writing we are informed that he is imprisoned.  He refers to his chains, but whether these are actual or a metaphor for the restrictions he was under, we cannot be sure.  I note that when referring to the opposition he faced, Paul reveals that they too are suffering.  The circumstances are far from ideal, it would seem.  Yet the tone of this letter is upbeat.  He encourages his readers to rejoice and keep rejoicing.  He tells them not to worry about the circumstances, not to be anxious about anything.

I remember hearing a conference speaker refer to people who respond to the question “How are you?” by saying, “Alright under the circumstances!”  He went on to point out that Christians should recognise that we live their lives with Jesus Christ in God.  Consequently, since we are reigning with him we cannot be UNDER the circumstances.

Of course, there is a world of difference between living in denial and living by faith.  The former is psychologically dangerous.  The facts need to be faced.  The latter is liberating as it points beyond on reality to another reality where we have a loving heavenly Father, a wonderful Saviour and the indwelling presence and power of the Holy Spirit.   Even the psalmist took himself to task saying, “Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Saviour and my God.”  (Psalm 42:5). How much more should we who have come to know Jesus Christ, be people of hope in times of despair?

Peter, also writing to Christians who had suffered for the sake of Christ, writes about being ready to give a reason for the hope that they have.  Like the birdsong breaking through the falling gloom of evening, our lives and attitudes should shine through the depressing and worrying circumstances of the world in which we live.  This also brings with it the challenge of living above whatever unfortunate circumstances may be affecting us at this time.  We cannot deny the pain, but our confidence in the character and promises of God are able to lift us up, for he will never fail us.

I commend to you the words of Anna L Waring’s hymn, ‘In heavenly love abiding’.  You could almost preach a sermon on every line of this hymn.  It assures us of the depth and constancy of God’s love which never changes.  Even in the darkest storm there is no room for dismay.  In the final verse she writes, “My hope I cannot measure, my path to life is free.  My Saviour has my treasure, and he will walk with me”.

As I have written these words I have left playing in the background a recording of bird song, like that which I enjoyed yesterday evening.  I know that the song they sang as the day ended and the darkness fell, would have been repeated this morning as the first light of day broke over the horizon.  In Psalm 92 the psalmist talks about proclaiming God’s love in the morning and his faithfulness at night.  As he says, it is good to praise the Lord and make music to his name.

Maybe some of us also know what the birds have something to sing about!  Let’s sing it as loudly and as continuously as they manage to do from dawn to dusk.

Barry – 27 January 2018.

From the Diary

The past two weeks have kept me busy, but I still have not found sufficient time to complete the two important writings: one on developing appropriate strategies for mission and the other on a safeguarding topic.  Please keep praying about time management.  Often, urgent matters are brought to my attention through phone calls and email, sometimes every day!  I stress that I am always available to anyone who might need help or advice, so I need wisdom every day.

Among various ministry activities, it was delightful to take the morning meeting at Yelvertoft (my last pastorate) last Sunday, school assemblies have been well received, and the series of Bible studies in Ephesians I am writing and leading in prison have proved exciting.  God is at work in the prison in wonderful ways.

This Sunday (28^th January) I shall take the morning meeting for Welford Congregational Church, Northants.  After this, Doreen and I will be travelling to Kent for the rest of the week.  Hopefully it will be a rest, but I will be teaching at the Salvation Army College in London on one day and undertaking some business in Hastings on another day.

One of our current concerns is to find someone who will undertake some of our activities to support and encourage children’s ministry in rural churches.  We have been exploring several possibilities, and the role is advertised on our website at www,ruralmissionsolutions.org.uk  Please pray that we will find the right person or people to share in this important ministry.

Why are we building bungalows!

Many years ago, I heard someone say that the problem with most Christians in the UK is that we build bungalows on foundations that God put in for skyscrapers.  I think it’s a great comment, and one that deserves some serious thought.  Anyone visiting London would almost certainly notice The Shard.  It is an extraordinary building, some 1000 feet tall, well above adjoining buildings.  Unsurprisingly, its foundations go down some 172 feet deep.  Since there were underground train lines close by, extra care was taken with the foundations.

Imagine how ridiculous it would look if, after putting in those foundations, the builders erected a bungalow on them!  But that seems to be what many Christians do.  God has provided all that is needed for us to live far better and more effective Christian lives.  He must be very disappointed at times.

The first time I heard the bungalow analogy was probably in the early 1960s and it became a favourite quote of Graham and Kaye Stone, two Salvationist friends.  We were all in our teens, and worked together in a mission organisation.  As I consider what I have built since then, I also wonder where Graham and Kaye are today, and whether their dream of becoming Salvation Army officers ever came to pass.  They certainly had incredible potential, and I hope they made it.

The issue of foundations and what we build on it came home to me recently when preparing a Bible Study for some of the men at HMP Gartree, in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians..  Chapter 1 verses 3 to 14 Paul informed them that they were “blessed with every spiritual blessing”, and then lists something of what that means.  Each aspect in this amazing list could be the basis for a profound sermon.  Take a look: 

•         Chosen before the creation of the world
•        Loved by God
•        Part of God’s plan
•        Adopted into God’s family
•        The object of God’s pleasure
•        Beneficiaries of God’s glorious grace
•        Redeemed through Christ’s blood
•        Forgiven of our sin
•        Recipients of grace that has been lavished upon us
•        Those with whom God has shared his plans
•        Included in Christ
•        Heirs (guaranteed by the gift of the Holy Spirit)

Isn’t that amazing?  All of this is not what will be, but what is now!  But Paul continues immediately by telling the Ephesian Christians that because of all that is theirs as a result of their faith in Jesus Christ, he prays for them, that they will build on what God has already provided.  The key word in the remainder of chapter 1 is “know”.  Two different Greek words are used.  In verse 17 it expresses the sense of a growing understanding.  In verse 18 it is full comprehension.  In other words, on top of all that God has already done for them, there was more to be discovered.

But this ongoing experience of grace depends not solely on our efforts but because of the work of the Holy Spirit, who enlightens our understanding and excites our desire to know more completely God’s plan and purpose and how we fit into it like a piece of a jigsaw puzzle making up a beautiful picture.  We grasp the fact that his people on earth are the riches of his inheritance as he is ours, and discover an incomparable power available and working within us to change us, so that the world around might see God’s grand work like a great building breaking above the skyline.

So much is possible in our lives.  God’s power is unlimited.  The potential is there.  At the end of chapter 2 Paul writes, “[You are] built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone.  In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord.  And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.”

The Shard was planned and designed by Renzo Piano, but it was built by hundreds of people employed by or contracted by Mace, and later Turner and Townsend.  Someone was needed who could read and understand the plans who could turn the drawings into the tallest building in Europe.  In the same way, God wants us to read and understand his plans and, working with others, build something amazing that will make people say, “Who designed something so amazing?”

Barry Osborne – 13^th January 2018

(Diary for the remainder of January added in e-letter)

Blessings

A couple of things recently caused me to reflect on the topic of blessing, on which I may have written before.  It seems to me an important topic but one that is not given much serious thought.  So, what do we mean by blessing, who may bless, what may we bless, and what does it achieve?

We use the expression as Christians in various ways.  We may use it in connection with starting a meal.  We may use it at the close of a meeting when we might be asked to “say the blessing together” or someone may dismiss the congregation with a blessing.  The word “grace” gets somewhat confused with both these aspects.

I knew a man who would respond to any criticism of himself or his actions, by saying in a jovial way “Bless you”.  I suspect it was his way of applying Romans 12:14.

There are subtle differences between the Hebrew Scriptures use of blessing and that of the New Testament, though there are also important similarities.  The Hebrew word translated bless is barak. It has the sense of enriching someone’s life.  It was the custom for heads of families to pray for a blessing upon their descendants.  In Numbers 6: 22-27 God sets out specific words of blessing that Aaron and his descendants were to use in their priestly role to bless the people of Israel and to mark them out as God’s people. 

But we cannot assume that merely saying words of blessing do not of themselves achieved anything.  It would seem more like a prayer seeking the favour of God.  We also sometimes confuse the concept of dedication with blessing, and we need to careful in that respect.  For example, dedicating an object for use in worship would make sense.  But blessing it seems rather nonsensical to me.

In the main, the OT use of the word barak will be found describing the conditions that bring about an enriching from God.  The Psalms provide many examples, such as in Psalm 1.

The New Testament uses two different Greek words for blessing.  These are Makarios and Eulogia.  The former has the sense of happiness, and this is how some versions of the Bible translate “blessed” in the beatitudes in Matthew 5.  This often reveals a paradox where two different experiences come at the same time. For example, God declares people as happy who are persecuted!  This is because the persecutor will not have the last word.

Eulogia, and its derivatives, are more often translated “praise”.  But we note that it is this Greek word that is used to translate the Hebrew word barak in the Septuagint (The Greek version of the OT).  So, it also carries the sense of enriching.  Paul uses this in Ephesians 1:3 where he writes that God has “blessed up with all spiritual blessings”.  Read on in the chapter to see how these blessings are described.

In almost every situation where food and blessing are mentioned in the Gospels, it is eulogia that is mentioned.  In this context, it expresses not a blessing on the food but praise to God for the provision of food.  An interesting exception occurs in Mark 8 where in the account of the loaves and fishes, Mark says that Jesus blessed the food before it was shared. So, when it comes to eating today, it should always be God who is blessed or praised not what we are about to eat!

It is Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians that ends with the prayer in a trinitarian blessing, commonly used today.  Paul’s letters always opened with words of peace and grace as a greeting.   Sometimes epistles also ended with a similar salutation, but these are more prayers than priestly bestowment, and reflect the culture of the time.  In our own contemporary culture, we use common greeting and farewells, some of which, like goodbye (God be with you), have a Christian derivation. 

In some Christian traditions, only an ordained priest can say “the blessing” and lay preachers or readers are under an obligation to use inclusive language (“us” rather than “you”).  My own understanding of ministry causes me to prefer using inclusive language.

All blessing comes from God and is God’s.  We can and should seek it for others and not just for ourselves.  God promised to bless Abraham and his descendants and through them to bless the whole world (Genesis 19:18)  One of the triggers for this reflection was recalling precious and moving words that were sung by staff and students at the Bible College of Wales after a colleague and I had spent a weekend ministering to them.  As we were about to leave they sang, “Bless them Lord, and make them a blessing……”, which was an adaptation of an old gospel hymn

So often, we become selfish as we seek God’s blessing in our lives.  But God blesses us so that we might be his instruments to bring his blessing to others.  He wants us to be channels of blessing.  So, the prayer, “God bless me and my wife, my son John and his wife, us four and no more for evermore!” is the opposite of what God wants.

My final thought is how we work out blessing others in our relationships with those who do not share our faith, either because they have a different faith or none.  Far too often they become treated as if they are enemies.  My ministry in prison chaplaincy causes me to work  in partnership with earnest people of other faiths, so I seek to be a blessing to them, not despite being a committed Christian but because of being a committed Christian.

In the days of Jesus’ earthly ministry his only condemnation of people of faith seem to have been reserved for those who were hypocrites, rather than for the many who worshipped idols.  What he did on one occasion, was to set himself in a location of extreme idolatry and simply ask, “Who do you say I am?” (See Matthew 16:13-17)

Asking God to bless when we pray is often far too casual.  Could we be more thoughtful and specific?  Perhaps, when we next say, “God bless you” we should also put a little more thought into it, and consider whether by our actions we might become the instruments of God’s blessing to those whom he loves as much as he loves us!

So, may God bless you in 2018…… and make you and your church a big blessing to others in his name.

Barry. 5^th January 2018

From the Diary

One of the main tasks at present is setting out the agenda for the ten webinars we will be running through 2018.  Linked with this is writing the script for a series of short reaching videos on rural evangelism.  I hope to see these develop into a useful library that can be used by any church anywhere and at any time.

New regulations on data protection come into force in May this year.  To prepare for this, we must obtain explicit permission to hold personal information, including names and contact details.  Those who read this via the Praise & Prayer News can unsubscribe from this list at any time (see below).  But we will need to ask you and many more for that explicit permission.  There are many hours of work to be found to ensure we comply with the incoming tighter regulation.

This additional work must not be allowed to hinder the essential writing currently being undertaken.  Pray for wisdom in time management.

Last Sunday 31^st December the ministry at HMP Gartree was well received.  I also had a useful time in the prison on Tuesday. On Thursday, I joined my friend and colleague, Brian Kennard, who led the weekly Bible Study.  I am taking on that responsibility for the next seven weeks.  This is the first time of leading Bible Study in a prison and I value your prayers as I plan.

This week will also include…

Sunday 7^th January, I have the opportunity of attending my home church.

Monday 8^th – School Assembly

Tuesday 9^th – regular activity in HMP Gartree

Wednesday 10^th -  Following a Men’s Breakfast, I will be attending a meeting of the Churches Rural Group.

Thursday 11^th – Session One of the new Bible Study series at HMP Gartree and attending a meeting of Harborough Churches Together.

Sunday 14^th – Elstow Christian Fellowship, Bedfordshire.

Please pray that I will be a blessing.

Barry