Cnoc-a-Phobuill

2007-03-09T02:43:00.000-08:00

Why Cnoc-a-Phobuill?

There is a hill up between Durness and Tongue called Cnoc-a-Phobuill, from this hill the missionaries from Eilean Neave preached to the people, hence the name 'hill of the people'. Eilean Neave was probably occupied by Celtic Christian monks from around AD 600-800. So this little offshoot blog is simply somewhere where I can put big articles away from the main blog, I will alert new articles via the main blog...hope you enjoy

Lairg 11th Feb

2007-02-14T04:11:00.001-08:00

Transcript is from second half of sermon

Audio File of whole sermon

Yet as is the confession of our faith, God did eventually turn up on the property in the person of Jesus Christ, the messianic King and suffering servant of creation.

John the Baptist (also known as Elijah) drew the outline and then Jesus came and coloured it in, declaring that every single eternal purpose was to be accomplished in his visitation.

He came, he saw, he conquered and then he disappeared, and from what I reckon and have observed, there is no heavenly city and no effective kingdom that has solved the world’s problems.

So where does that leave us, well clearly not alone, and clearly not wandering, listen to Hebrews 11

By faith he made his home in the Promised Land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God.

Abraham was looking for something with solid foundations, not transient religion or reliance upon self. Any of that ring a bell…? Stranger/Foreign Country/tents

11By faith Abraham, even though he was past age—and Sarah herself was barren—was enabled to become a father because he^[a]considered him faithful who had made the promise. 12And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore. 13All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance. And they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. 14People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. 15If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. 16Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.

Verse 13, these people were living by faith (faith in Jesus? - well obviously not as he had not visited at this point) faith in who…verse 11, faith in him who is faithful.

What did that faith look like (by the way we are getting close to who are good and bad fish), well it looked like this… They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance. And they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own.

What happens to these people – well let me make it really clear…those people who by faith alone, look for a future hope, a city built by God, who do not look for possession, or fame, or name, or legacy but look up and ahead…God is not ashamed to be called their God, and he has prepared a city for them. What has he done? He has finally erected that heavenly city in the midst of the eternal garden, and it is in eternity that they will tend and nurture all he has prepared for them, living in community and peace and soul satisfaction.

But quickly now, we need to return to those fish on the beach, probably flapping their last and gasping for air, for we have been away for quite some time. What is the criterion for separation? Faith and faith alone.

What does that faith look like, well it looks like a whole pile of people who don’t have regard for themselves because they have a regard and a passion for a future hope.

Let me if I may add a little flavour to your faith and hope…we are not judged on our past performances, but rather we are judged by what Jesus did for us by taking the evil into himself, by pointing the bow heavenward, the greatest example and pattern for how it looks when someone has a future hope, for the glory set before him he endured death on our behalf, even death on a cross.

You see what has happened on the beach? Every thing has reached the millennial shore, there is forgiveness for everyone. Let me shock you a little if I may…both heaven and hell are populated entirely and only by forgiven sinners, the reason for hell is that some people just do not want any part of that forgiveness, they do want to be at the party, and they reject the grace of God.

Matt 13:49This is how it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come and separate the wicked from the righteous 50and throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

The righteous are those clothed in the right clothing of Jesus Christ, the wicked are those who gatecrash the party and find they are naked, just like Adam & Eve in the beginning, naked when they realise that it is only by God’s power that they lived in the light.

You know why so many people reject the grace of God? Because they never invented it!!

Really, they will not accept a gift, because there is nothing anybody can do to receive a gift, which is the nature of a gift. These teeth gnashers are saying ‘don’t you dare give me a gift God, I can make it on my own, and to be honest, this gift you are giving me was mine anyway, I had a right to it!!! Selfish to the very end.

And God turns and declares, ‘well sorry my friend, but I am happy for all those who have accepted the invitation, but we have to celebrate and be glad, whether 1 or 99, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found. You are not going to spoil the party, so if you cannot bear the shame and joy of being forgiven then you need to get the hell out of here, literally.

Can you believe that being forgiven can be a shameful and joyous thing, I know deeply by the scars I wear what this means…times I have raised a clenched fist to heaven and shouted, ‘don’t you dare forgive me (stronger words) and I have wrestled and fought and He has stood over me, when all the mockers and finger pointers have gone, and he has said, ‘your sins have been forgiven, now go in peace’. Oh the shame and the joy of being forgiven by God!!!

Hurry now, we need to sort these fish out…hang on a minute though, we do not judge the nets contents…ever…we just trawl and haul and welcome and end up on the beach ourselves.

Yet sorted they will be, and the sad part of it all, because of the wilful refusal of some to accept the reconciliation of God they never make it from the net to the bucket.

Those who live in a way that shows a longing for a heavenly city built by God go away to a banquet and a feast, but what happens to those others, I’m so so very sorry, but we have an invite to a party, we need to go, we will just have to leave them to spend eternity flapping and gasping on the beach.

Lairg 4th Feb 2007

2007-02-14T03:08:00.000-08:00

Matt 13:47 “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a dragnet that was cast into the sea and gathered some of every kind, 48 which, when it was full, they drew to shore; and they sat down and gathered the good into vessels, but threw the bad away. 49 So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come forth, separate the wicked from among the just, 50 and cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.”

Now this parable deals with the end of the age, the final wrapping up, but put away any thoughts of rapture and tribulation etc.

Our understanding of the end in broad terms will allow us more freedom to live our lives today in a sense of peace and assuredness. We will see in this final act the very thing that Jesus has been teaching so far in his parables. This Kingdom is catholic or universal in its calling and appeal and yet it is deeply mysterious and refuses to be nailed to a preset series of rules and controls.

The main object we initially encounter is a net, in the Greek text this version of net is only used once, the word is sagene or dragnet, the others used are amphiblestron or throw net and diktyon or general net or network.

Now if you have ever seen deep sea fishing you will know that a dragnet is towed along the ocean floor, nothing escapes, nothing is left. Here Jesus uses it to emphasise that the final gathering will not omit anything, all will be included.

You will also notice if you have seen deep sea fishing, that it is not only fish that get caught. The net will gather up seaweed, rocks, old tyres, fish, squid, prawns, in fact the flotsam and jetsam of the ocean depths.

What Jesus is teaching is that everything will be caught up in that final act, not just people, but animal, vegetable and mineral.

If it were only people waiting for salvation then why would Paul write that all creation groans with longing to be set free from its captivity?

Did Jesus not say ‘if I be lifted up I will draw all things unto me? Will the new heaven and earth not be populated with all of nature, tree of life, city of God, rivers of life, all kinds of animals…we really do need to drop the idea that God’s plan of redemption centres around man alone and ultimately around me!!

Just as the net fetches everything from the sea to the millennial beach, so to the kingdom will deliver the whole earth to God. The new heavens and earth are not replacements for the old damaged ones, they are transfigurations of them. As one writer says, ‘the redeemed order is not the created order forsaken, it is the created order, all of it, raised and glorified’.

Now check your versions…there is no mention of fish in this parable, and whilst I think Jesus did mean fish indirectly, what can we make of its lack of insertion.

I am not sure if you have watched the BBC1 documentary called ‘Trawler men’? (The sheer weight of the description ‘trawling’ should give us insight into the work of the net and the kingdom.) This show features the ups and downs of three Peterhead fishing boats as they ply their trade in the freezing northern seas.

They are, in the main, fishing for prawns, and this invariably means drag net fishing. What strikes me though is Jesus knowledge of fishing when compared to this BBC documentary. Each time these men bring in the nets we find that it is not just fish. It is often fish of different sizes, but also prawns, starfish, squid, torpedoes and not a few rocks as well.

Dragnet fishing pulls in everything as I have already pointed out, what the passage calls ‘of every kind’. This shows the universal nature of the net and of the kingdom. Yet what is noticeable here is the lack of judgment or separation whilst the net is in the sea. How impossible for a trawler to separate the contents of the net whilst underwater, the whole lot, of ‘every kind’, no distinction between good and bad, is pulled to the shoreline.

Clearly a day of separation is on the way, but if the net saves its separating till all is pulled ashore, then how much more should the kingdom, and therefore the church, avoid the business of judging the contents of this great universal fishing trip.

We have in Scotland some of the finest game fishing in the world, the rich and famous flock to this corner of the UK to battle with the sport fish in our rivers.

The church, as representative of the Kingdom and therefore the dragnet approach to fishing, should resist all temptation then to act as these sport fishermen, only looking for the trophy fish, those people who are well thought of and have something to offer the church.

Even more so, bearing in mind the dragnet imagery, the church should not get into a habit of rejecting the flotsam and jetsam and old junk that will turn up in the net, remembering that it is not the trawler man who will decide who is or who is not fit for the to sit at the wedding supper of the Lamb.

The church (each one of us) has a role to play in the here and now, and not in the future. If Jesus in this parable refuses to sort the net till it reaches the millennial shore, then we should imitate that pattern.

Jesus, as you know only too well, did not shy away from sinners, so why should the church? Now I know you will maybe be thinking, ‘your wrong Dave, the church welcomes sinners’. But I know better you see, for experience tells me that the church whilst welcoming sinners, only welcomes those who repent and then never seriously need forgiveness again.

Oh yes I know it always welcomes those who gossip, or are envious, or who manipulate or have bad tempers, you know those ‘little’ sins…but God help those who commit adultery, or get divorced, or who live as unmarried.

How many times do we forgive? 70 x 7 which equal 490, only 490? No, Jesus used 7 x 70 as a way of expressing through the number associated with perfection the amount of times we forgive, the perfect amount! Do you want a figure?

Okay let me give you a Kingdom maths lesson 7 x 70 = (not 490, remember this is the mysterious world of the kingdom of God, yes 490 in the world. What would we do if it were 490, anyone guess, we would keep score) but here it equals perfect forgiveness, or in other words, eternal and never ending grace. If you take nothing else away today, then take this, and I mean it most seriously and gravely, just how big is the cup you use to measure forgiveness to others? ‘Because I tell you this, it is the same cup you will drink from in the heavenly kingdom and here on earth.

I think I will leave it there, and we never even got the net onto the beach and got round to the sorting between good and bad, maybe we will sort them next week.

Andrew Murray - Hebrews

2006-09-08T12:34:00.000-07:00

When I first I undertook the preparation of this exposition in Dutch
for the Christian people among whom I labour, it was under a deep
conviction that the epistle of Hebrews contained just the instruction
they needed. In reproducing it in English, this impression has been
confirmed, and it is as if nothing could be written more exactly suited
to the state of the whole church of Christ in the present day.
The great complaint of all who have the care of souls is the lack of
wholeheartedness, of steadfastness, of perseverance, and of
progress in the Christian life. Many—of whom one cannot but
hope that they are true Christians—come to a standstill and do
not advance beyond the rudiments of Christian life and practice.
And many more do not even remain stationary but rather turn
back to a life of worldliness, formality, and indifference. And
the question is continually being asked, “What is the need in
our religion that, in so many cases, it gives no power to stand,
to advance, and to press on unto perfection?” And what is the
teaching that is needed to give that health and vigour to the
Christian life that, through all adverse circumstances, it may
be able to hold fast from the beginning, firm until the end?

The teaching of the epistle of Hebrews is the divine answer
to these questions. In every possible way, it sets before us
the truth that it is only the full and perfect knowledge of
what Christ is and does for us that can bring us to a full and
perfect Christian life. The knowledge of Christ Jesus that
we need for conversion does not suffice for growth, for progress,
for sanctification, and for maturity. Just as there are two
dispensations—the Old Testament and the New—and just as the
saints of the Old, with all their faith and fear of God, could not
obtain the more perfect life of the New, so with the two stages
in the Christian life of which this epistle speaks. Those who,
through sloth, remain babes in Christ and do not press on to
maturity are ever in danger of hardening their hearts, of coming
short, and of falling away. Only those who hold fast from the
beginning, firm until the end; who give diligence to enter the
rest of Christ; and who press on unto perfection do, in very deed,
inherit and enjoy the wonderful new covenant blessings secured to
us in Christ. And the great object of the epistle is to show us that
if we will but follow the Lord fully and yield ourselves wholly to
what God, in Christ, is ready to do, we will find, in the Gospel and
in Christ, everything we need for a life of joy, strength, and final victory.

The cure the epistle has for all our failures and feebleness—the one
preservative from all danger and disease—is the knowledge of the
higher truth concerning Jesus, the knowledge of Him in His
heavenly priesthood. In connection with this truth, the writer
has three great mysteries he seeks to unfold. The one is that
the heavenly sanctuary has been opened to us so that we may
now come and take our place there, with Jesus, in the very presence
of God. The second mystery is that the new and living way by which
Jesus has entered—the way of self sacrifice and perfect obedience to
God—is now the way in which we may and must draw near. The third
mystery is that Jesus, as our heavenly High Priest, is the Minister of the
heavenly sanctuary and dispenses to us its blessings—the spirit and the
power of the heavenly life—in such a way that we can live in the world
as those who are come to the heavenly Jerusalem and as those in whom
the spirit of heaven is the spirit of all life and conduct. In this heavenly
priesthood of Jesus, heaven is opened to us day by day, we enter it by
the new and living way, and heaven enters by the Holy Spirit. Such is
the Gospel to the Hebrews that this epistle brings. Such is the life to
which it reveals the way and the strength. The knowledge of the
heavenly character of Christ’s person and work is what alone can make
heavenly Christians, who, amid all the difficulties and temptations of
life on earth, can live as those whom the superior power of the upper
world has possessed, and in whom it can always give the victory.

In offering these meditations now to a wider circle of readers, I
do so with the prayer that it may please God to use them to
inspire some of His children with new confidence in their blessed
Lord, as they learn to know Him better and give themselves up to
expect and experience all that He is able to do for them. I have not
been afraid of continually repeating this one thought: Our one need
is to know Jesus better and the one cure for all our feebleness is to
look to Him on the throne of heaven and really claim the heavenly
life He waits to impart.

Just as I was about to write the preface to the Dutch issue during the
first week of last year, I received from my beloved colleague as a New
Year’s text—with the wish that it might be my experience—these words:
“Jesus taketh with him Peter, and James, and John, and bringeth them
up into an high mountain apart by themselves: and he was transfigured
before them” (Mark 9:2). I at once passed the word on to my readers,
and I do so again. May the blessed Master take us “with Himself” into
the “mountain,” even the Mount Zion, where He sits as Priest King upon
the throne in power, each of us “apart by himself.” And may He prepare
us for the blessed vision of seeing Him “transfigured before us,” seeing
Him in His heavenly glory. He will then still be to us the same Jesus we
know now—and yet, not the same, but rather His whole Being, bright
with the glory and the power of the heavenly life that He holds for us
and waits to impart day by day to them who forsake all to follow Him.

In humble trust and prayer that it may be so, I commend all my readers
to His blessed teaching and guidance.

Servicable gods

2006-06-14T02:40:00.000-07:00

The good ole Worship Service, staple diet of the church as we know it, the Sunday morning ritualistic event that crosses all denominations. It seems that no matter where you go, the style may be different, but at its heart it is a self perpetuating monster that gobbles up its participants. We are slaves to the religious machine, from Fundamental to Emergent, there is no escaping the slavery we have willingly become chained into.

I was at a local church just the other day, and I was shocked (dismayed) by the sheer weight of complexity to the service. There was more electronic equipment on show than in MI3, it made me wonder how we coped without it all. There were 2 laptops, 3 microphones, 1 projector, 1 OHP and various things they all plugged into an overcrowded power socket. This was worship in the heart of the Matrix.

I am sure that most churches would equal this show of electronic equipment, and I fear many would far surpass this small offering to the technology God, but my gripe is not with techie stuff, its not even with style. Though I have to agree with Jason Baeder when he says ‘In the emerging church, some trends are encouraging, but it seems that we’re swallowing the worship service paradigm relatively whole. Instead of 1950s traditional styles, we’ve developed a strange hybrid between Catholic Mass and a Willow Creek seeker service’.

But style is not the issue at stake, it is simply that we have become a people for whom servicing the service is one of our gods. Sit back and think about the Sunday event that happens in your church experience….still thinking? Right now try to work out just how much time and effort it takes to produce the service. Here are some pointers, all these are guesstimates, fill your own in. Remember that this is all for a 60 -90 minute service.

When the Sunday ends, the planning begins for the next Sunday...

1 – 4 hours of worship group practice

Sermon preparation 5 – 40 hours, all lengths I have seen quoted, one website even offered a guide to how to prepare, amongst which they stated. ‘Plan for uninterrupted prep time, get a good computer, get a good word processor, bible program, illustration database, computer dictionary, Powerpoint and join a sermon study group' plus a whole lot more crap that Jesus and the Apostles forgot to do (curse you Bill Gates, why were you not around in the 1^st Century ).

The Sunday School (childrens and adults) has to be prepared by the various teachers, so lets say 4 teachers taking 3 hours each.

Then we have the rotas, door rota, flower rota, tea and coffee rota, washing up rota, creche rota, visual presentation rota. Maybe there is a bookstall that needs manning. Notice sheets, website updates and much much more. (Think of conferences, the time involved in getting ready for those events!)

Now take all this and imagine you are in temporary premises, as lots of fellowships are, you then have the setting up and taking down of all this stuff. Mind you at least you dont have the mortgage, insurance and sky high egotistical power struggles that having a building produces.

I'm gonna stop, it just depresses me, but with all that said, can you begin to see just how much is involved in producing a 1-2 hour service. Does it not seem to be a complete burden? The church I visited recently have been doing this routine for 10 years I guess, week in week out, and it was much the same at the last church I was a member. So much effort, so much time, and all for what? Possibly it has always been this way, was this how it was in the New Testament.

Well they met Lydia by the river, Paul preached in Athens, at the jailers house, at Jason's, Jesus preached along the way and many many other examples. the point being that they did not need to prepare at all, for they were constantly in a state of preparation by the dynamic yet simple lives they led following Jesus.

This is not an advert for 'house churches' for they are normally building services shrunk into a house setting to make the attendees feel more biblical, kind of 'Honey I shrunk the church'.

My point is simple, we spend far far too much time preparing for the service, the service becomes our driving force, and less and less time just following Jesus, doing as he commanded. We have become slaves to the machine, and for the most part all we do is serve other peoples dreams and aspirations, feeding their already inflated egos.

We will never break free I fear, for deep down so few trust God, we are happy with our mechanised lives, our conformity, our mundane clinging to second, third, fourth best. We are in no way priests of the King, for we have become like Lazarus, feeding on the scraps from under the tables, living a dogs life...dare we break free, I wonder?

The Successful Demon

2006-05-31T03:15:00.000-07:00

Warning...this post contains one instance of explicit language.

[continued from here]...for all to bow down and worship, and his name is success. Success has pervaded every area of life and culture, secular education is under attack from this taskmaster, and as Sabrina Broadbent, a novelist and English teacher, says 'her students are ground down by the pressure of success'. Speaking of her students, her picture paints a scene of utter futility and bondage when she says 'At first, they told me, they had quite liked school. But now, after seven years, they couldn’t bear the pressure, the endless exhortations to succeed in order to prepare a survival route through the struggle and debt that they now saw was adulthood'. Her article is well worth reading in full, and can be found at women.timesonline.co.uk.

Even Christian religious education is under this onslaught, preparing men and women for ministry in which they must succeed, Dr.Harold Dean Trulear, Associate Professor of Religious Education at Howard University and pastor of Mount Pleasant Baptist Church in Twin Oaks, PA gives this sound bite at a recent conference detailing the danger of an enforced requisite for academic success.

Dr Harold Dean Trulear audio file 02:26minutes...PLAY.

Much of this desire for success has pressed into the gospel through teachings by men like Robert Schuller and the positive confession movement.

Success is the demonic desire to have ascendancy and pre-eminence, and ultimately to make a name for oneself. To receive the 'rich trappings' that success brings, and to feel wanted and needed is the reward of this pursuit at all costs. For those who claim to be part of the Kingdom of God this presents a problem, for the DNA of success is inherently different to the DNA modelled on weakness, servant hood, compassion, love and kindness for our neighbour.

The construction and blueprint for the Kingdom is found in the ministry and model of Jesus, it is into His image the disciple is being conformed. To chase success will only 'kick against those goads' , the goads that work to direct us to that perfect image.

Success takes no prisoners; it is an insatiable monster that requires constant feeding. Therefore those of us believe that Mark's gospel has some relevancy for our lives should step into our callings as exorcists, take up our ministry of exorcism, and cast out all those elements that stand opposed to the weakness of the Kingdom of God.

I think Eugene Peterson in The Message gives a good insight into those elements as detailed by Paul in Galatians 5 when he amplifies the verses saying...(bold is my emphasis)

It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on...[more].

Success often goes hand in hand with effectiveness; current thinking says that if something is non-effective it is unsuccessful and should be discarded. Something is only worth keeping if it is successful and effective, and it is exactly this mentality that is leading the church astray, so much so that it now finds itself almost completely out of touch with the Kingdom of God and totally in one heart and mind with the world, now matter how emergent it tries to be.

I know what this is like, this chase for success and effective ministry, for within the prayer letters I write for the Railway Mission, I feel compelled to be effective, to sound successful to the readers, those whose kind gifts enable the work to continue. I ask you, who would want to receive a prayer letter that said 'absolutely nothing visible happened since I last wrote'. Believe me, I have worshipped at the temple of success, and I have signed the constitution and agreed the statement of faith at the First United Church of Successfulness.

The church in its pursuit of success and effective ministry measured by recordable targets is moving very far from God, and I fear that it may have gone so far that God may now say 'I will not permit you any longer to work in my field' (Heb 6:3). Maybe we have flirted with the idols for too long, oh yes we will get to heaven in the end, but like a corpse needs to be carried to the grave, so we will have to be carried to heaven like helpless babies.

You recall that 'God hates divorce' and I think one of the reasons is because of the heartache of broken relationships. This is what commitment to success brings; it encourages broken relationships because in the pursuit of success we almost only ever please self.

Yet maybe another reason God hates divorce is because his bride to be is constantly serving divorce papers on Him. The almighty God, full of love and compassion comes to woo and nurture his bride, yet she rejects and spurns his advances, preferring to lift up her skirts to the world, and her lover has to watch as she prostitutes herself to the world.

You may have seen the film Jarhead, director Sam Mendes' dark and intense war drama. One scene represents what is happening to the church. The US Marines have been away for 100+ days, camped in the Kuwaiti desert, waiting for action in the 1991 Gulf conflict. One plotline follows the relationships of the soldiers and their loved ones back home, the tensions and mistrust those miles of distance can bring. One Marine cheers because his wife/girlfriend has sent him a video of The Deerhunter for them to watch. All the marines gather in a big tent and he inserts the video and presses play, after a few seconds of the film, the video changes to his wife on the bed at home having sex with one of his neighbours, he begins to scream. Then his wife, speaking from the video, tells him that this is payback for his unfaithfulness...a very disturbing scene.

Now God has in no way been unfaithful to his bride, in fact he is faithfulness that we can never understand, yet still the great cosmic audience stands in shock as it witnesses the disgusting show of all manner of idolatrous entities fucking the bride to be as she sells her body and inheritance to the idol gods of success and achievement. Now I think some of you will probably be more offended by the use of such explicit language than the scene that God has to witness each time the church he has purchased for himself gives herself to the bondage he came to set her free from.

I am not sure what there is left to say about this - other than we need to stop trying to be a success, stop trying to meet achievable goals, stop thinking that the universe revolves around us, for as we immerse ourselves in those things that we are already doing for good, then even though we may look to be weak and foolish failures in the world's and often the church's eyes, in Gods eye we will be those on whom He smiles.

Laodecia 2006

2006-04-28T05:03:00.000-07:00

The Laodecian Christians were asleep in the light. In Ephesians 5: 14 Paul says ‘awake you who sleep, arise from the dead’. Christ will give you light.
Should we find ourselves asleep then we also need to wake up; we need that power of Gods fire-baptizing Spirit to raise us from the deathly and dank pit into which we have sank. Cast your minds back to that first taste of grace, do you remember how sweet the name of Jesus was back then, is it still as sweet today, as sweet as the finest honey, is that how the name of Jesus is upon our lips...more

Do you remember that first love? In Rev 2 Jesus speaks to the church at Ephesus and says these words ‘Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love...I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I could wish you were cold or hot.

The classic interpretation of this verse often falls short of what the Lord was saying. Does Jesus want us to be hot and on fire, yes, without doubt. Does He want us to be cold and dead, surely not. This is what some scholars would have us believe.

The problem with that rendering is that should this be the case then Jesus would be implying that both extremes are positive. Could it be that Jesus would want us to be cold and therefore completely uncommitted and in a state of death. It should appear to us then that this would be a very unlikely exhortation from Jesus.

I believe there is an alternative view that opens up more of the Spirit of the scriptures. To understand the image we must recognise the geographical location of Laodecia. This picture of hot, cold and lukewarm could in fact relate to the water, this being a unique feature of Laodecia and the surrounding region.

The hot waters of Hierapolis had a medicinal effect and the cold waters of Colossae were pure, drinkable and had a life giving effect. There is archaeological evidence that Laodecia had access only to warm water, which would then cause nausea. When the city tried to pipe water in, it could manage only tepid, nauseous water.

The works that Jesus knows are their efforts to be a living witnessing community. The people of the city were receiving neither spiritual healing, the type which the hot waters would bring, or the life that the cold water would bring, in short the church was not fulfilling it’s calling.

This image would have had an immediate effect on the hearers for they would identify with their situation. The effect of their conduct in Christ was like the effect of their own water; they knew how they felt after drinking their water, this is how they made Jesus, the Lord wanted to spew them out of His mouth.

If the Laodecian Christians refused to own up to their identity with Christ, then clearly they had no claim on Christ and come the judgment he would spew them out.
Ultimately the work of the gospel would not be hindered, and I daresay that even our own town of Dingwall, if the church remains lukewram, then God is able to raise up even stones should He desire. He desires though to use those He has called for the work of His.

If we refuse to be a witness, a community of faith that must be a light by the sheer witness of our fellowship and love for one another (for being a witness is not about what we do, but who we are), but if we refuse, then maybe we should just accept the matter and cry out to the Father and say ‘Lord if you cannot do anything through us or with us, then we beg you Father, bypass us and take up another people who do not know you. Save them and sanctify them Father with the Holy Ghost, and send them out into this world that despises you.

There is a great day that awaits us, we have a glorious future, but we are already part of that glorious future, for the kingdom of God has broken into this present evil age. But listen, God Almighty has nothing else to give to this world, I know He sustains it, but hear me out.

The Lord has given His only begotten Son so that man can be saved and find shelter in time of trouble, the Son will not come again as the suffering servant for salvation and death on a cross, He has already given us His Word, their will be no other Bible (JW's and Mormons take note), this is His final word to us and our fellow man, He has given His Spirit in all its fullness and that Spirit is given so as to help us understand his word, to persuade man that he is in rebellion against the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and to build the Church into that spotless bride.

We have all that we need, what are we waiting for, do any of us lack wisdom, then ask the Lord who alone is wise for wisdom and he will give it to you, do any of you lack power for living godly lives, then ask the Lord of glory and he will endue with power from on high, do any of you lack boldness to witness, then ask the true and faithful witness, and he will give you the boldness to declare his gospel with all clarity.

Time is running out my friends, the disciple is to be either hot or cold.

Hot in the sense of those hot healing waters, like the hot springs around the world that have a medicinal effect, a superheated church, and the Christian is to bring reconciliation and healing to a dying and lost world.

Cold in the sense of those cold living waters. Jesus said let anyone who thirsts come to me, and I will give to him the water of life. The world and our fellow believers need that life giving; cool and pure water that will well up to springs of eternal life.

So this passage is a call for the church, the believer is to recognise his or her state, not to think to highly of oneself, but to see with the eyes of the Spirit. Should they be found naked and blind, then let repentance flow.

Let the blood of the Lamb flow from the cross of Calvary and wash away the sin and rebellion Jesus might present us before the Father without spot and blemish.
We are sons and daughters of the most high God, adopted and settled into this heavenly family, let us live that way with one another.

No matter where we go in this world, be it Scotland, England, Wales, Ireland or distant lands, let Him have his way with us and let us lay aside anything and everything that would hinder our responding in faith to the urgent call that the Lord has for His mission field in which we stand today. I believe that the Lord desires to make this church a blessing to the people around us, and I leave you with the sure knowledge that the Lord of Hosts, the Father of lights, is the Father of all spiritual gifts, equipping and preparing each one of us for the purpose that He seeks to perform in the locality where he has placed us, and I believe without any doubt that He is ready to pour out his goodness on all those who are ready to receive.

Golden Calf

2006-03-30T00:24:00.000-08:00

It was with baited breath that the crowd outside Tesco waited the revealing of the sculpture. It was with a certain amount of surprise then to see the Golden Calf upon the top of it. I must apologise here for being provocative, you see the notes on the day, as well as the artist who made it, took every opportunity to instil in us a notion that this is ‘not the golden calf that the Israelites worshipped’.

I could not help but think ‘why be so defensive’, let the sculpture be what it is, surely art demands that people have the freedom to interpret it with their own eyes?

I think the Sculptor deserves much credit for a wonderful piece of artwork, and the bull on top is representative of a local beast as well as the former mart. Maybe though the golden bull atop the sculpture means more than simply meets the eye, and maybe it is symbolic of all that we have become in this world.

If religion was the opiate for the masses in the world of Marx, then consumerism is now the number one drug of choice for the West. In vivid picture form, the golden calf/bull at Tesco’s seems to symbolise what retail outlets have become, the new centres of worship and communal gatherings. It’s no mere coincidence that places like the Trafford Centre in Manchester have a huge temple like feel, with a cavernous central cathedral area, and often these new worship centres host the priests of this ‘new religion’, the celebrities.

In our nation, Sunday attendance at church was once the normative practice, attendance has floundered somewhat in the changing face of society, and it is now the shopping malls that win the feet of the faithful. It is the global retailers and merchandisers who now have 7 day a week commitment, church membership swapped for loyalty cards, and black ties and hats replaced with corporate uniform bearing names such as Adidas and Nike. The holy books have are replaced by Bella and Best, and the altar exchanged for the cash checkout. The cry of kneel and pray has been superseded by the mantra of ‘chip and pin’. We are in every way, still very religious.

So is this harmful, this slide into greater and greater material dependency? Short term the answer may well be no, but long term I think the effects are going to be devastating for our nation.

We consume and dispose, and very rarely recycle; it is cheaper to buy a new DVD player than have the old one repaired, especially as retail giants like Tesco and the Dixon’s group can command low prices from the supplier. We become more and more individualistic and we have to a large extent lost our sense of belonging within our communities. To try and find commonality and meaning, we gather at these giant retail parks where the pew is replaced by the parking lot. We crave even more, and we demand lower prices, more choice and yet everybody wants a ‘bargain’, why else are outlets like charity shops and EBay such a success.

The big corporate retailers will defend themselves by declaring that they are only meeting demand, but a study of men like Edward Bernays, the blood nephew of Sigmund Freud reveals that the demand has been created rather than met, it was Bernays himself who said "If we understand the mechanism and motives of the group mind, is it not possible to control and regiment the masses according to our will without their knowing about it”?

We are being controlled, and our group mind is not now focused on values such as family and community, but moves impassively as one great connected consciousness through the ever increasing retail shopping malls.

So what should our response be to the ongoing onslaught of this relentless marketing and consumerist machine? As always in revolution, personal cost is high, for how many of us are willing to pay more for the things we can get for less. We no longer see ourselves as co-operatives, each person is simply out for the best deal possible, and I do not claim any moral high ground, for I myself shop at Amazon for ease of delivery and low prices.

What we can do though is support our local community in all the many ways it appears. We can support our local retailers, (and I do include Tesco as a local retailer who have become a genuine focal point for the community, like it or not). So why not buy your bike locally, and not at Halfords in Inverness, and those tins of paint actually cost much the same if not less at MacDonald’s as opposed to B&Q, and remember our neighbours are the staff in Dingwall’s shops.

So let us drive for the improvement of Dingwall and surrounding areas by our enthusiasm for local projects. Let us support our community councils and residents associations by listening to them and maybe even joining them. We can support our youth ventures by volunteering instead of despising the younger people of our community. We can support our local councillors by applauding the good work they do, realising the dilemma’s they face, encouraging them as they place social action above political allegiance.

We can in fact stick two fingers up at the golden calf and say that we will not become a centre for consumerist greed, but we will celebrate the rich cultural diversity and inherent creativeness that this part of the world and its people contain.

I imagine the Viking invaders all those years ago had to fight many battles to establish a secure place to live, let us continue the fight in our day against the golden calf of consumerism, individuality and marginalisation.

The Story of Cult

2006-03-27T05:24:00.000-08:00

The Self of Denial

Enclosed is a short story that reflects a long tale

David Lynch

INTRODUCTION

One thing is certain in this world of uncertainty, and it is this, someday Jesus will return, and we, His faithful people are to expect His return at all times and at any time.

Part of being ready is remaining steadfast in the good things that He has already shown us, and the Apostle Peter in his second epistle does just this. Peter calls the early church to steadfastness in the promises of God.

Reflecting on the flood and the lessons contained therein, Peter warns that the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night. Completely by surprise in its timing for masses of people, but for the faithful watchers, maybe not in its season.

The apostle urges us to look forward with diligence, being found in peace, spotless and blameless. He encourages us to grow in grace and knowledge of our Saviour, Jesus Christ.

As with any growth, time is required, and part of what follows deals with man’s impatience in contrast with God’s unending long-suffering and tolerant nature.

The Lord is after all the Supreme Gardener, and He will see that all spiritual growth is in His perfect timing. If the cultivation of men’s hearts was left for man to oversee, I dare say we would aim for 365 days of bloom. In contrast, the Lord’s garden has its season’s, a time to bloom and a time to prune, a time to die and a time to rise. The Lord is not looking for a quick flush of colour, but sustained and long lasting growth, refreshed and revived by the life giving watering of His Holy Spirit.

Peter then goes on to speak about the difficulty of understanding some of the Apostle Paul’s teachings. He says that unstable and unlearned people easily twist these teachings.

All down through Church history we find these so called ‘twisters’, no more so than in our present day. Both on and off the World Wide Web, and in and out of churches, these ‘twisters’ blow with stormy violence across the plains of sound doctrine. Many a once faithful saint is swept away from the safety of their ‘Kansas’ only to find themselves in a spiritually strange land, ruled by a self-styled wizard of Oz. Like the wizard in the film, it is often a little man with a big voice, hiding behind a huge facade.

Peter does not deal directly with these ‘religious wizards’ with all their deceit and trickery, but what he does, is speak with love to those who would be in danger of being led away, saying..........

Therefore, dear friends, since you already know this, be on your guard so that you may not be carried away by the error of lawless men and fall from your secure position. 2 Peter 3:17

Now it came to mind recently, as I was taking a contemplative stroll through a damp and misty Scottish evening, that from time to time, men and women could be prone to extremes of behaviour. Okay, not exactly an astounding revelation, but what it did was focus my thinking on what caused my own rapid move from stability to the outer limits of rationality.

It is apparent that an ongoing religious faith does not necessarily make one exempt from extremism, even if that faith is in the one true God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Likewise the promise of the indwelling Holy Spirit will not guarantee exclusivity from a leap into over zealous fanaticism. The danger signs and alarm bells that the Spirit of God sounds at these times of excessiveness, can often be ignored as one pushes the bounds of reason to the furthest position.

Within man, there is a need to worship; it is inherent within the human psyche. How, why, when and where are all legitimate questions in regard to worship, but these are secondary questions. The primary question(s) we must ask ourselves is ‘what or who do we worship?’ For one thing is certain in life, all mankind worships something.

Take for instance the ‘great’ football institution that is Manchester United. For many this is a religion, why the club even claim on some posters to be ‘a new religion’. One of the latest club book titles is entitled ‘Beyond the Promised Land’, surely a take on God’s miraculous salvation of the Jews through the Exodus, and their subsequent eternal inheritance of Canaan. Manchester United though seems to be implying that they are going ‘beyond’ God’s perfection. For millions of adoring fans Manchester United is their god, worshipped hourly, daily and weekly, receiving total commitment and adoration from its followers.

Football is an easy example of idolatry though. Maybe the worshipped object is more subtle, a car, a career, a diet, a fitness programme. We can even exalt our own family to a place where we leave the Lord out of the construction work (Psalm 127), thereby turning what may be seemingly good intentions into a form of idolatry.

More dangerous and damaging than all these though, but altogether more common, is the worship of self that can come through the denial of self. The adversary of all believers roams the earth seeking whom he may devour. So how subtle that he should use the denial of self to ensnare an unsuspecting sheep. Now many great men have laboured hard over the subject of ‘denial of self’, and some have produced fine, balanced work.

I believe though that this one subject alone, can (if we are not mature and balanced in our faith), start to undermine all the work the Lord may have already undertaken. If our goal is the complete denial of self, without any checks or accountability, then this very pursuit can be the jagged rock on which our faith becomes shipwrecked.

The following verse could, and maybe should be the basis for all our worship. For without a seeking after God, and His righteousness, our ‘spiritual worship’ can become an insidious idolatry.

Jesus said ‘love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' The second is this: 'Love your neighbour as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these." Mark 12:30-31.

So the questions that began forming in my mind were these. Is it possible, in an attempt to completely and totally deny self that we go to an extreme from which only the lifeline of God’s grace can rescue us? What happens when the outer edges of devotional and personal worship are pushed to breaking point? What happens when the worship that should be bringing freedom and joy, brings bondage and misery?

Instead of a ‘church without walls’ vision, we can develop a bunker or siege mentality. The attitude that the Bereans had, their liberty to seek the scriptures to ascertain the validity of even Paul’s words, is incorrectly perceived as persecution. This in turn will drive us deeper into an ascetic exclusivity. Instead of breaking down barriers and walls, the very thing that should liberate, begins to construct a mask that cleverly enslaves its victim.

We can come to a place where we strive to worship God so much with all our heart and soul, that we ignore Mark 12:31 and begin to neglect our neighbour. The very act of dying to self and living a selfless life can turn in on itself and we substitute the complete work of Christ upon the cross for our best efforts.

To work tirelessly at denying self and living out the message of the cross in our own strength is to completely cast aside the substituionary atonement of Christ at Calvary. An atonement that ushered in a New Covenant, where Jesus, as our High Priest is our surety. All of Him and none of me.

Roy Hession, speaking of the New Covenant says this...

So now we come to the new covenant of which Jesus, our heavenly High Priest, is both Surety and Mediator. It was prophesied long before in the Old Testament, even in the days when the old covenant was in force. It was as if God sighed and said, “If my purposes for Israel and the world are to come to pass, they will never be realised this way; they will only come to pass as a result of an entirely new covenant on an entirely new basis.”

This covenant, like the first, is not arrived at by mutual agreement, but is a disposition, or testament, whereby certain benefits are conferred on other parties on conditions stated by the the covenant-maker - only this time we do not seem able to find what the conditions are, and that for the simple reason, there are none. No conditions at all - save the obviously implied one that the beneficiary confesses his total lack of the blessings promised and his desperate need of them. In other words, it is a covenant of grace whereby God loves us as we are and does not require worthiness or attainments from us before He blesses us, because He knows we cannot produce them. It is a blessed one-sided covenant of love without strings and the responsibility for the implementation of the terms is put in the hands of the Mediator, the Lord Jesus, who is going to be faithful to Him who has appointed Him to act for us.[1]

The chief protagonist in all denial of self-ministries is pride. For the saint waging war against self, pride is the enemy they must do war with. Pride is the field commander sat in the war operations room of our heart directing the soldiers of envy, jealousy, selfish ambition, idolatry and hatred into battle, and care needs to be taken, for pride has the measure of many an unbalanced recruit.

The pride that we deconstruct by our own efforts gets reconstructed into a false humility, fooling the heart with its cleverly disguised deception. God will not to be mocked, and He sees the heart.

Without balance and spiritual maturity, denial of self will eventually require a need to control others in an effort to further enhance spirituality. Only by the putting down of others can we lift ourselves higher enough to meet the expectations that we place on ourselves, expectations that are not to be found or implied in God’s Holy Word.

Now this may or may not make a lot of sense, therefore I have tried to explain further in story form below for the purpose of clarity. I have used the imagery of shepherds and sheep, and the sheep that is portrayed in the tale below is a prime example of this headlong dive into an over zealous life and the devastation it can cause.

Firstly though, let me just side step for a moment to mention the will of God. For not knowing God’s will is a prime cause for wandering from the safe and narrow path and onto the very precipice of our secure position.

You see there are two verses in Scripture that say, “There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death”. Proverbs 14:12 and 16:25. Likewise in Proverbs 12:15 the Lord says, “The way of a fool seems right to him, but a wise man listens to advice”.

We have no need to walk the way that leads to death, and why?

For in our day we have a sure prophecy, revealed through the Son, and through the writings of the apostles under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and surely with such a glorious revelation at our disposal, we would not, could not, go astray.

Sadly some of us do, and therefore that leaves us with the possibility that at times we may sacrifice the revealed, Holy and true word of God for something that is a kind of Divine Lottery.

Take for example a Christian who is applying for a new job. In an effort to save many hours in fervent prayer seeking God, and searching His word for the truth contained therein, a believer may resort to a spiritual lucky dip. They may say...

“I will apply anyway, if I get the job then it must be the Lord’s will, and if not, then I can trust that the Lord has closed the door”.

How often do we hear that the Lord has ‘closed this door’, but ‘opened this one instead’, well so often that it seems that the Lord has become the doorkeeper in His own house?

Have we abandoned the perseverance that His glorious gospel demands? Are we in danger of moving so fast, that we abandon the discipline of seeking the Lord with patience and steadfastness?

Not knowing the will of the Lord is sure to leave us off guard and thereby vulnerable to being carried away by lawless men. Not only is seeking God’s will through patient perseverance and prayer a diminishing facet, but the reading of His word has seemingly lost it’s appeal in some quarters.

The blessed man in Psalm 1, who meditates day and night in His word, has been replaced by the man who seeks after an answer in the writings of other men. Whilst it is true that many faithful teachers have, with diligence, left us a sound inheritance to learn from, and many faithful saints are still laying down a fine carpet of sound doctrine, woven with cords of wisdom, for us to tread safely upon, there abound false teachers who are nothing more than self-seeking egotists, driven by the need to have pre-eminence rather than seeking the lowly place of true humility and servant hood.

Let us always seek the true teacher, the teacher who is shown in all His Glory by the writer of the book of Ecclesiastes.

Not only was the Teacher wise, but also he imparted knowledge to the people. He pondered and searched out and set in order many proverbs. The Teacher searched to find just the right words, and what he wrote was upright and true. The words of the wise are like goads, their collected sayings like firmly embedded nails -- given by one Shepherd. Be warned, my son, of anything in addition to them. Of making many books there is no end, and much study wearies the body. Eccl 12:10-12

That passage alone could inspire a thousand sermons, for its beauty and depth are great. Oh how sweet it is to see in a short portion of Scripture the intimate relationship between Father, Son and Spirit.

We see the Holy Spirit as the Divine Teacher, writing indelibly on the hearts of men. His classroom is a place of limitless joy, may we answer the register with delight as we enroll each morning.

We see Jesus, the One Shepherd, thoroughly acquainted with ‘firmly embedded’ nails, His words like goads, keeping us ploughing a straight furrow in His service.

The Teacher and the Shepherd together, completely and utterly united in a single purpose, working in the Father’s field to bring about a bountiful harvest of righteousness. Praise be to God the Father, Son and Spirit.

So let me tell to you then a short cautionary tale of what can happen when God’s Holy word is laid down for the opinions and teachings of unstable men.

THE GRASS IS NEVER GREENER ON THE OTHER SIDE

We start with a King, but let us lay aside our earthly conceptions of a King, for this King was unlike any King you could ever imagine. It had been written of Him the following...and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The Mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. So highly was He esteemed by His faithful and loyal followers that it will suffice for us to call Him The Shepherd King. That is to say, all the other shepherds were under His rule, authority, love and compassion.

Our story begins this way...There was a shepherd who had given up much to travel to a foreign land, obeying the call from the Shepherd King. Cutting his ties, and leaving family behind, this shepherd, his wife and children moved to a far off land.

This was a land that had been visited by the Shepherd King many times in former years, and many times the Shepherd King had led the sheep by His own rod and staff in this land. Sadly, this land now laid dry and almost barren, in need of water and good pasture.

Whilst the shepherd was in this foreign land the Shepherd King placed First Journey (for that was his name) as an overseer for the sheep of a small pasture. It was a new pasture, and required much work. Fences needed to be erected, and food and water provided. First Journey was young in his trade, but his youth was not to be despised, the Shepherd King could see that this young shepherd tried with all that was within him to please the Shepherd King. Through many trials and temptations First Journey served well the Shepherd King. The great ruler was pleased with this young shepherd, for he saw that he served the Shepherd King well, and not for selfish gain.

As the Little Flock grew, the Shepherd King sent another sheep with a young family to be part of the Little Flock. With great enthusiasm the new sheep travelled with his family to be with the Little Flock. He thanked the Shepherd King for sending him to this pasture, fulfilling a desire to live in this great land. The Shepherd King had sent him to help First Journey cultivate the pasture, and care for the Little Flock.

He was at first a good and faithful friend, enjoying the unity and fellowship that comes as brothers’ dwell in unity and harmony. He worked hard to help FirstJourney, looking for opportunities to serve and to learn, but gradually and over time he grew impatient and intolerant. He began casting aside the need to always esteem his brothers and sisters higher than himself. Slowly he began to think that he was greater than FirstJourney, and set his heart on seeking a higher place. He spent much of his time studying the King’s Book and he knew the King’s ways well.

Sadly, regardless of how well he knew the ways of the Shepherd King, he desired to be greater still in knowledge, and was not content with all things, as the Shepherd King had told him. The scales began to grow over his self-seeking eyes, but he could not see his partial blindness.

The Shepherd King encouraged him with the knowledge that there was a time and season for everything under the sun, but his impatience and zeal was to be his undoing. His desire to know more began to entangle him as he made vows he could never keep in his own strength. He ran hard after knowledge, but it made him none the wiser, for the more he thought he knew, the more headstrong he became. The more he believed he could see, the blinder he became as his heart began to deceive him.

Hard Heart (as he had become) was convinced that he was full of wisdom and knowledge. The book the Shepherd King had given him to keep him on the true path was now being discarded. He started to listen to his own opinions, but more dangerous than this, he began to rejoice at the sound and opinions of other so called ‘wiser’ shepherds. Never did HardHeart check that what these others were saying was the same voice he heard within the King’s book.

There was another shepherd who had long walked with HardHeart and had been a loyal and faithful friend to HardHeart. His name was GoodFriend.

Now GoodFriend knew the ways of the Shepherd King well, He always encouraged HardHeart, and often tried to bring HardHeart back to the Kings book for guidance. Oh how GoodFriend wished he could just grab hold of HardHeart and cause him to slow down and sit at the King’s feet. The Shepherd King though would not let him, but he did give him some words to say. One day GoodFriend was told by the Shepherd King to send a letter to HardHeart as a warning to not stray away from the pasture, to beware of wolves. GoodFriend told HardHeart that ultimately he would end up fighting against the Shepherd King, and what futility this would be. HardHeart was true to his name, not wanting to listen to reason, so the day approached when the Shepherd King released the reins, and let HardHeart have his own way. GoodFriend was deeply hurt and upset for he knew what lay ahead.

It was a fine summers day, and HardHeart was wandering around the pasture. He was so proud of how much he had grown. He had on a number of occasions met up with a different shepherd whose name was StrongArm. This shepherd seemed wise beyond all HardHeart had ever known, and everything he said made HardHeart feel closer to the Shepherd King. On this particular day, HardHeart was seeking hard after greener grass and possibly new pastures, he wanted more food, but not wanting to humble himself and tell this to his FirstJourney, maybe asking for help and showing patience, he wandered further. His walk had an element of disdain about it, some may have said a ‘haughty swagger’, they would have been correct, for HardHeart was becoming self-righteous. “Why do the Little Flock not see the things I do,” he often mused to himself, becoming resentful, “ maybe they were holding him back, maybe he was one of the chosen ones who would receive special privileges from the Shepherd King”.

What he failed to realise that not all sheep walk at the same pace. He had become so blind that he could not see that there were some sheep that were lame and injured, some were with lambs and could not move quickly. Had he really looked hard he would have seen that his own pace was not quick anyway.

Still he thought he was so fast, and wished the others would keep up.

He tried to force them with strong words from the Kings book, but no amount of pushing or butting would hasten any walk. Had he heeded the Shepherd Kings example he would have seen that a few gentle words of love and encouragement could have added many a spring to a weakened step.

FirstJourney had been given the task by the Shepherd King of placing this Little Flock on the road that would take them to the Greenest of all Pastures. The Greenest of all Pastures were far away, over many hills and through many valleys, FirstJourney needed HardHeart to help him tend the flock. He needed him to help watch out for beasts that roamed the hills, to help him lift the chains from those who had been oppressed, and most of all he needed HardHeart to help bear him up if he grew tired and weary.

HardHeart was by now in too much of a rush to help anyone, he just wanted to fill his own belly with the best pasture. Gradually he wandered further and further in the pasture, till eventually, and with the Little Flock almost out of sight, he found a field just on the other side of the pasture he was in. Oh how green the grass looked in this field, greener than in any other field he had ever seen. It was new, fresh grass and this made him excited, so much more exciting than watching over the Little Flock.

The sheep who grazed it all appeared to be so well fed, they all spoke with one voice. They had learnt many of the words from the book written by the Shepherd King, and they repeated them well together, using them in a way that mesmerised HardHeart. He knew the shepherd of this pasture, and StrongArm knew HardHeart well. In his excitement and enthusiasm HardHeart desired that StrongArm could meet with FirstJourney and GoodFriend, but StrongArm did not want this. Instead he spoke of new things, weaving cords around HardHeart. Slowly he was introduced to the other flock. This unusual flock spoke of great things, and it seemed that they were the only ones who were going to the Greenest of all Pastures. They had all once belonged to other flocks, but now they were with the ‘true shepherd’ and together they all huddled in one corner of the field. They did not care much for other pastures, as the sheep in all the other pastures were blind and being misled. That is what StrongArm told them, and oh how they loved their simple ways.

There was a fence that divided the two pastures, and that fence had been built by the Shepherd King to keep the wolves and beasts at bay.

HardHeart now desired to move pastures, he knew well that the grass seemed greener on the other side. So all he had learned, all reason and sense were jettisoned, all thought of safety disregarded. He knew what he wanted and he was going to have his way. With force he broke through the fence, and using his newly gained wisdom and guile he dragged his family through the forced opening.

There were some other sheep who followed along as well, but they had long wanted to depart the pasture they were in as they thought themselves more highly as well. Actually the LiitleFlock were just not spiritual enough for them, and they certainly had little time to spend on anyone else. They were just thankful that someone else had broken the fence, that would save them ever facing the wrath of the Shepherd King should he visit they thought.

StrongArm and the small flock told HardHeart to pull as many from the Little Flock as he could, HardHeart tried with all his might, but the Shepherd King had already sent his messengers to repair the broken fence. FirstJourney and the faithful men around him saw to it that no more would be leaving this Little Flock. StrongArm though said that this was because FirstJourneys flock was happy but blind in it’s sin.

Before long HardHeart was grazing in the new pasture, but not yet with the flock huddled in the corner. FirstJourney gazed at HardHeart over the fence and was hurt deeply, for he still loved him and remembered times past when they had laughed together like true brothers. He remembered how he had given HardHeart all he had, and opened his heart to him and his family. When they were hungry he fed them, when they had no shelter, he, and others, built a shelter for him. The other sheep in the Little Flock were confused as they saw HardHeart’s lack of loyalty for their shepherd. As one flock they were upset, for they had lost friends whom they loved. From that time on their was a deep hurt in the Little Flock, and they all hoped that one day the Shepherd King would bring HardHeart and his family back.

There was to be no going back though, HardHeart now revelled in his new found ‘wisdom’. Not content with his new pasture, he would come to the fence around the LittleFlock and hurl abuse at the other sheep. He would bring some of them to the fence with a soft voice, and then with harshness and severity he would pull at them, entangling and binding them up in the barbed wire of his words. Oh how he lashed the Little Flock with the ‘new words’ he had learned from the Shepherd King’s book. With taunts and ridicule he mocked them, his shouts of derision grew louder as the huddled flock laughed and encouraged him. Oh HardHeart was loud alright, shepherds in neighbouring fields could hear him, his voice and the crack of his whip was so loud that it carried all the way to the Greenest of all Pastures. His brutality and abusive manner, along with his shouts of mocking had grown so loud that they now reached the Shepherd King, and in His wrath, he arose and set out to give His full attention to HardHeart.

HardHeart now went back from the fence, sure he was right, his proud strut still evident. There he sat, unaware that even as he rested, the Shepherd King was making his way across the hills and mountains to visit him. In complete self-satisfaction and self-righteousness, he began to settle with the UnusualFlock and try to enjoy the pasture.

The UnusualFlock had moved away from him slightly though, and the pasture that seemed so green had now changed. For StrongArm, who had once carried a rod and staff, now held a whip and brand. He had been watching HardHeart and seen how he still listened to other shepherds, including GoodFriend, and he did not like it.

StrongArm did not like the independence that he saw in HardHeart, all his sheep were to listen to him alone and must never stray away. StrongArm even stopped the people listening to the Shepherd King, for he said the Shepherd King spoke through him, and he was the one who could interpret the Shepherd King’s book. Before devouring HardHeart, StrongArm whipped him with all his might, and in full view of all the other sheep, StrongArm made a spectacle that would keep the other sheep in check.

Had HardHeart not become so blind, he would have seen what Little Red Riding Hood’s granny failed to see. With HardHeart whipped so hard that the wool begun to fall from his back. StrongArm took the red hot iron from the fire and strove to brand him as his forever, but HardHeart struggled and kicked out of fear. Wanting so much to do what was right, but confused and dazed he staggered in his blindness.

Seeing all this, the other sheep in the huddled flock, including those who had come through the fence with him, turned on HardHeart. As one flock they began to rip and tear at him. Circling around him they despised and beat him with words of condemnation and judgement. The other sheep had turned against him out of fear, for StrongArm was forcing them with abusive and intoxicatingly manipulative words. StrongArm even began to spread false accusations amongst the flock about HardHeart. Oh how they loved their power, and once they had separated HardHeart from his family they drove him away. HardHeart ran in terror, forced to flee for his life.

All day he ran, not knowing where he was going, but inside he felt sure that he was probably headed for the Dark Abattoir that was beyond all the hills and valleys, and as far as east is from west from the Greenest of all Pastures.

HardHeart now realised the folly of his ways and started to come to his right mind, and at once began to weep for all he had done. All alone he cried out for mercy, but never knowing if that mercy would come. He knew that he had angered the Shepherd King, though he still did not know that the Shepherd King was on his way to meet him. Falling flat on his face he cried out in anguish, telling the Shepherd King all he had done against Him and Him alone. For many hours HardHeart sat or kneeled or lay, he cannot remember which, for this was the darkest day and night in HardHearts life. He waited, sometimes in terror, sometimes in nothingness, but always in deep remorse. He was convinced the Shepherd King was going to take him straight to the Dark Abattoir, and this caused his heart to almost fail. How great the fear then when eventually he heard the footsteps of the Shepherd King echoing down the valleys. Trembling he fell to his knees and lifted up his eyes, ever closer the footfalls rang out.

More and more he remembered the evil he had devised and carried out, and all the while the booming echoes of the approaching King rang with a sound that seemed to echo through HardHearts entire soul.

The Shepherd King appeared as HardHeart looked to face Him, and what he saw changed his heart forever.

For the Shepherd King was not walking anymore, but with outstretched arms He was running to meet this once proud sheep.

With compassion in His eyes the Shepherd King embraced and kissed the neck of the sorrowful sheep and lifted him high into His powerful arms.

A sorrowful and repentant HardHeart was drowning in an ocean of love and compassion that filled his whole being, wave after wave of mercy washed upon his sinful body, and he was cleansed and washed whiter than snow, and now the tears really fell.

Like torrents they flowed as he saw his actions placed alongside the Shepherd King’s compassion. That night he slept in the arms of the Shepherd King, and as dawn broke he rose up, listening carefully to exactly what the Shepherd King told him to do, for his family were still with StrongArm.

The paragraph or two that should be here have not been written. They tell of HardHearts last meeting with StrongArm. Maybe this will be added in time, but then again, maybe some things are not to be written.

Releasing the family, the Shepherd King sent them back to the old pasture, but not before the once proud sheep had paid a price that seemed impossible to bear.

The Shepherd King took him aside for a time and showed him all he had done, and all those he had hurt, and then the Shepherd King showed him those things which were His will for the shepherds that He called.

He showed him how a true shepherd will search and look for the scattered flock, and will rescue them from all the places where they were scattered to. It should be the desire of the shepherd to seek out good pasture in which His sheep can lie down. If one is straying, then bring that one back, if it is injured, bind it up, and if weak, strengthen it.

Then to the once HardHeart He measured him a cup that was bitter to the very end, and with tears NewHeart drank. The Shepherd King reminded him of His words in His book saying

“How did all the things you exacted ever loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords that bound, how did your actions set the oppressed free, breaking their yokes. Now go in my name and in my strength, pursue and destroy the hunger of the hungry man, and satisfy the needs of the oppressed. Then like the son who squandered his inheritance you will find restoration and sustenance in time of famine. You will be strong, like a well-watered garden, a never failing spring of life giving water, and you will be a Repairer of Broken Walls and a Restorer of Streets with Dwellings”.

Newheart was at that point in time more sorry than any other sheep before him, and with all his heart he loved FirstJourney and the sheep that had remained faithful. Newheart desired and purposed in his heart to serve faithfully from this time on.

Now he saw the hearts of those he had mocked, and how they were looking to serve the Shepherd King. It was only now that he saw through very different eyes, eyes that wanted to believe and hope for the best in the flock, to love all those sheep and if need ever arose, to lay down his life for them.

For the Shepherd King had shown him compassion that was immeasurable and a depth of love that went beyond all comprehension. How could he ever love another with anything less than the love of the Shepherd King.

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside quiet waters. He restores my soul; He guides me in the paths of righteousness For His name's sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You have anointed my head with oil; My cup overflows. Surely goodness and loving kindness will follow me all the days of my life, And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

Psalm 23

David Lynch Monday, July 7, 2003

[1]Roy Hession, From Shadow to Substance, pg78

God in a Box

2006-03-21T14:47:00.000-08:00

Everybody is searching for something in one way or another, even Nemo’s dad went through a time of searchin, but sometimes its not enough to ‘just keep swimmin’ for we need to know where to look. Searching without some form of guidance is a bit futile, you remember in Acts 17, some of the people in Athens are searchin (unknown god) and Paul tells them where to find.

This is where you expect me to say a cheesy Christian cliché like, ‘the bible is our map for finding God’, well I’m glad to disappoint, the bible is not a guide book for finding God, and I don’t really know if we can find God in the Bible, we can read about God, see Him in Jesus, recognise his voice etc etc, but the Bible was never meant as a road map to the divine.

Sadly that is not a very neat conclusion, and we do like to have it all sewn up don’t we, you know how I mean, ‘chicken in a basket’, ‘burger in a bun’, ‘God in a box’, and yet it seems right to me to say that God does not inhabit boxes, never has, never will.

Oh yes I grant you that sometimes he parked his glory in a temple or tabernacle, but who was that for, him or his people, no God is not to be confined to man made structures, and part of this monologue is to show what happens when you put the creator of the universe in a box.

Let’s just say you could get God in a box first, how big would it need to be? Who is going to open it, or close it for that matter? For you can be sure that the one who opened it would become proud and exalt themselves as the God releaser. Come to that, who would dare open the box, you ever opened a jack in the box, the fright you get, imagine God coming out? I think Spielberg in Raiders had an idea, you know when all the Germans melt like wax when the Ark is opened, well that’s how it is; when God breaks free there is havoc and destruction.

Yet for some of us who have managed (?) to get God in a box, we now need to lift the lid, let him create a bit of havoc and destruction in our comfy mundane existence, let him wreak havoc upon our selfishness and let him wage utter destruction on our idolatry. It was Annie Dillard in ‘Teaching a Stone to Talk’ who said

"Why do people in churches seem like cheerful, brainless tourists on a packaged tour of the Absolute? On the whole, I do not find Christians, outside of the catacombs, sufficiently sensible of conditions. Does anyone have the foggiest idea what sort of power we so blithely invoke? Or, as I suspect, does no-one believe a word of it? The churches are children playing on the floor with chemistry sets, mixing up a batch of TNT to pass a Sunday morning. It is madness to wear ... straw hats & velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing crash helmets. Ushers should issue life preservers & signal flares; they should lash us to our pews. For the sleeping God may wake some day & take offence, or the waking God may draw us out to where we can never return.

I wonder if that’s how it is for you, God safely in the box and no chance of him getting out, Dillard says that ‘he may draw us out to where we can never return’, it is that which chills and excites my heart. Here’s the dilemma;

1. I don’t want to go where I cannot get back, because what if there is nothing out there.

2. I do want to go where I cannot get back because I don’t want to stay where God has long ago departed…this dilemma tears my soul and pulls at every nerve and thought.

Yet we have to, we must, we dare not refuse to let God break out in our lives, for what if, just what if, he is calling us and time is running out.

What’s your Sunday like, is that when you visit God, is it when you take him to the religious building. I once saw a picture of everyone sat in rows of seats, all with brightly coloured boxes under their chairs, the children carry theirs in little boxes. Every box is wrapped differently, and inside are a hundred million gods, each god a construct of the mind and will of the box owner, and their gods stay in their boxes, supervised and coerced into providing magical responses to the whims and moods of the owners. Year upon year of conformity has handed down more and more wrapping paper, and each god is wrapped till each owner simply becomes wrapped up in themselves because they are the gods whom they have created, and it is worship and service to self that is on the offering table.

So what does the real God look like when you put him in a box, well that’s the dangerous bit, for this is what happens when we put God in a box and take him to our temple.

You will know the story of the ark, the philistines and Dagon, the ark was captured and taken into captivity and placed in the temple of Dagon. Brueggemann tells the story (in his book ‘Ichabod toward home’, really well and some of his words mix into mine in what follows).

In 1 Samuel 4, the Philistines captured the Ark of God, we may read that passage quickly and miss the gravity of what had happened. Not only was the ark taken into bondage by God’s enemies, but YHWH himself, the great bondage breaker of the Israelites was now in captivity.

The story should wreak havoc and destruction in our safe zones of religion and theology, for we are not ready I don’t suppose for the fact that not only has the glory departed, but in fact it has gone into exile. YHWH is captured, humiliated and a trophy of his enemies, this is simply failure. We do not handle failure well do we as churches, success is the only option for the church of today, everything is measured in terms of success, numbers, mission, finance – the ethos of the world, and yet here in our text we are faced with failure in all its horror.

The narrative forces us to think and recognize that God has entered into bondage and subjection, the text begs and pleads with us to expand our theology of loss and have a robust doctrine of failure.

Yet here at the end of chapter 4 we have only loss, shock, bewilderment, abandonment and finally silence. It remains silent into the night, and now the reader and the narrator wait with fear for the beginning of chapter 5. Wait though, don’t jump into chapter 5, let the narrative speak for God’s sake, let the writer have his way and reflect on the loss and abandonment. God has gone, there is no hope, do you get it, do you see the force of the narration, the people of God were now as the nations, a godless society!!

Join me as we step into chapter 5, is there any hope, hold the loss, we need to enter into Dagon’s temple, we can only pray that we will come out the other side.

In the most ignominious, humiliating and reprehensible scenario up to that point YHWH the true God and ruler of the whole universe was presented at the feet of Dagon, and this demonic created power stood over the divine creator of the world. The Philistines delivered the God of Israel up to Ashdod. Now Ashdod was one of the five chief cities of the Philistines. The name means stronghold or fortress, some of the Anakim were found there in the days of Joshua (Jos_11:22), and the inhabitants were too strong for the Israelites at that time. It was among the towns assigned to Judah, but was not occupied by her (Jos_13:3; Jos_15:46, Jos_15:47). Ashdod was still independent in the days of Samuel. In the NT it is called Azotus, and is now a small village about 18 miles Northeast of Gaza.

More significantly this was the centre of Philistine worship, the very heart of false worship, and it is to this place that the source and object of all true worship is taken.

Five times we hear the words ‘the ark of God is captured’, the dwelling place of the almighty was in foreign hands and the cry went up ‘Ichabod’ – meaning – the glory has departed from Israel.

Walter Brueggemann comments on this passage saying ‘One can imagine the scene in the Philistine camp that night, celebration and liturgy to suit. Possibly they sang that great victory Psalm, 24 and verses 7-10 changing the words and saying

Lift up your heads, O you gates!

And be lifted up you ancient doors!

That the King of Glory may come in!

Who is the King of Glory?

Dagon strong and mighty, Dagon mighty in battle, he is the King of Glory.

The celebration ends, the military officers retire for a last brandy, the lights are turned off in the temple, and the crowds go home. Have you ever stood in a church building at night, silence, eerie still somewhat cool silence? I have heard many reports from disaster zones, Aberfan, Pakistan earthquake, avalanches, tsunami’s, mud slides, and the one common thread is that after the initial disaster there follows a period (often short, sometimes long) of stunned, hopeless silence. Is this the reaction in the Israelite camp that first night, should this be our reaction in our days of departed glory? So now the ark of God, the dwelling place of YHWH resided in a tomb, a long night of darkness, sealed and locked in the temple of this false god, in the grave.

The next day dawns and the priests return to the temple, probably ready to begin victory parade day two, they open the door and what do they see ‘Dagon fallen on his face’. Where he fell he lay, his nose pressed to the floor in a prostrate state, this was no accident, possibly this was an act of genuflection. Dagon was bowed before the ark of God, somehow in the night, we know not how; Dagon had learned that YHWH is the God before whom every knee will bow. The priests set him upright again, maybe the celebrations continued, the priests saying to each other ‘Schhh, don’t say a word, something is wrong, but remember our reputation, let us pretend all is well’….sound familiar?

The night comes again, the temple closed, darkness, silence, just YHWH and Dagon locked in a place of worship. We know how round one finished, the battle for worship was YHWH’s victory, but what about round two, who will win.

Silence again, no preview of how this will turn out, no running to the bible to see how it ends, just another long and fearful night of cold darkness. The dawn breaks, the priests rush in, ‘Oh no! Not again’, Dagon is prostrate before the Israelite deity, this deity they worship with the words ‘Hear O Israel: The Lord our God; the Lord is one!

But this time it is worse, much worse, somehow in the night Dagon had been decapitated, his head is gone, maybe trying to maintain pre-eminence in the presence of YHWH had driven Dagon crazy, but wait, its worse, for here is Dagon like some pathetic Venus de Milo, his hands have gone and his arms are broken, all his power is gone.

The Philistine god has been utterly dis-armed, made weak, helpless and impotent. This is the end of Dagon.

So that was the end for Dagon, and that will be the end for all those who think they can fit this God into a box and dictate how and when he will act, and maybe that would be no bad thing. To be dropped off at the rail station that appears on the map as ‘the end of ourselves’. It is only in the complete recognition of the end of our power, our strength, our ability to be self sufficient, that we find God.

God is not the God of boxes, and Jeff Goldblum, a chaos scientist, in the film Jurassic Park proves this. When asked how the scientists in Jurassic Park inhibited breeding in the park the biologists said that only males had been created. Later on in the film we see egg shells in the park, proving Goldblum’s theory, that life will find a way. In the film life broke out and chaos ensued, and in the blockbusting film of your life, God desires to break out. Jesus will create chaos as he storms through the avenues and alleyways of safety that we have kept off limits. Yet his chaos is ordered in purpose, for he will bring to that life, a peace, out of the chaos he brings shalom, that Hebrew word that encompasses peace, salvation and justice.

I cannot recall how many times I thought I have had Jesus all sussed out, I believe I know how he operates, only for him to go and do something, in the gospels and out of them, that just messes with my head and what I have allowed him to do. You remember the disciples in Samaria, Jesus is tired and he sends them of to Burger King to get some chicken nuggets and one of those headache creating milkshake, only for them to come back and find him alone with a Samarian woman – Jesus stop it! – You cannot do that!

The futile cry goes up…this is not the Jesus we signed up for, I wanted the Jesus that danced on the puppet strings – you know the one I mean…the Jesus in a box that we try to give to sinners – you know the one with the offer on the box ‘get this Jesus and receive a plan for your life’

Maybe it’s just me, I don’t know…but the Jesus I got never came in a box, he just burst into my life. His appearance can perplex us, causing us to cry out ‘why did he not just stay in the box, why will he not be who we want him to be’ – Its almost as if mankind cries up to heaven with the vain words “I made you God, now do what I want”, conform to my will we cry, and yet this God we have so wrapped up and fitted to our interpretation of scripture moves and blows where he will, he changes his mind as it suits him, he has mercy on whom he chooses, he eats with lepers and spends the night with prostitutes, he heals on the Sabbath.

The real danger with having God in a box is that we will fail to recognise where he is working, and therefore we will miss the wind of the spirit…we will sit and sit and wait, and all the while our sails will be limp and we will fail to move. Where he does work we will not attribute it to him, we will say it is not his work, and we will say in our hearts, this is the work of the evil one, and we will place ourselves in deep exclusion.

I read of a group in Bournemouth opening one of those old gothic churches up to night clubbers, a bit of music being spun by a DJ, some candles and moody lights, and a prayer board. Between 10pm and 3am, 200 people came and went, but for those people in Bournemouth, in the dark of night, God had broken free, may He break free in my life.

Sanctuary

2006-03-09T02:52:00.000-08:00

Have you ever noticed how certain churches call one room a sanctuary, and begin to make it something special, like a little nest for the divine. Now we can call it whatever we want, I do not have a problem with a name as such, what I would like to do is answer two questions;

What is Sanctuary?

Where is Sanctuary located?

So first question and some sub points

What is Sanctuary?

Turn to Genesis 1:26
²⁶Then God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all^[1] the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth."

Now if we had the time we could explore and see that this verse and in fact just the first part of the verse have many aspects to it, but let me just put forward one aspect. The triune Godhead created mankind with the capacity to relate to the Godhead. The divine image within man means that God can enter into a personal relationship with him, speak to him, and make covenants with him, all of which man can choose to respond to in a positive or negative form. You see man is a relational being. Hence we read in Gen 2:18 that ‘It is not good that man should be alone.’ The creation was good and ‘very good’, but mans loneliness was ‘not good’. Move on with me to Gen 3:8 and we see that the ‘Lord God was walking in the garden in the cool of the day’. There is nothing within the text that can stop us from assuming that this was a frequent event; I like to think a daily occurrence, God walking and communing with His creation.

With that in mind we may wonder, is the Father walking through the garden of our lives, wanting to speak to us, communing with us on a daily, moment by moment basis?

So the first point to make is this, man is a relational being created for communion with the Father.

Move with me to Exodus 25:8

And let them make Me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them.

Here we see the divine initiative, it is God the Father that desires to dwell with man, the creator of the whole universe, majesty on high, wants to dwell with the people He has created.

So here we have part of the answer to my opening question, ‘What is Sanctuary’, it is a place where God, through His initiative, dwells with man.

Let us continue in Exodus 25:8. The term used here for sanctuary is from the Hebrew word ‘mikdash’ which means ‘a holy place’. Here we find Yahweh is proscribing the way in which He will dwell among his people. If we look at verses 9 and 40 we see the prescribed way

According to all that I show you, that is, the pattern of the tabernacle and the pattern of all its furnishings, just so you shall make it. // And see to it that you make them according to the pattern which was shown you on the mountain.

Similar phrasing is used as in Genesis 1:26. Man is made in the ‘divine image’, just as the tabernacle is made in the ‘divine pattern’. What is significant about that you may ask, well simply this, both the sanctuary in the tabernacle and the divine image in man were created for a purpose.

What purpose? To house and hold the glory of God that it may be a visible witness to the nations and to the people around it. Can I emphasise that…To house and hold the glory of God that it may be a visible witness to the nations and to the people around it. A Visible Witness, the relational, forgiving and reconciled community will be ‘the light on the hill’. It is never about what we do, but what we are. As a side issue this enables us to see the mission of the church more clearly.

For the mission of the church, is rooted way back here in the Creation and Exodus accounts. We must guard against a reductionist gospel, seeing our mission as church planting and the saving of souls. Our mission consists in those things, proclaiming and teaching, but also in healing and liberating, in compassion for the poor and the downtrodden. The mission of the church, as the mission of Jesus, involves being sent into the world – to love, to serve, to preach, to teach, to heal, to save, to free.”

John 1:14 says

¹⁴ And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

Two quick points, firstly the greek word behind ‘dwelt’ is tabernacled, and there is a great deal of imagery, symbolism and teaching that underlies this verse, and I feel somewhat amiss to not unpack this verse here, perhaps we should endeavour to look into this ourselves in our own time. Secondly the disciples beheld His glory, they did not just hear of his glory, Jesus ministry was of course words and deeds, but his words and deeds were given power by Him being ‘full of grace and truth’, an inward witness not just external actions. Jesus was the whole deal, fully man, fully God.

So I say, with the knowledge that I have left many precious gems of wisdom unopened, that the answer to the first question, what is Sanctuary? is

A holy place where God, through His initiative, dwells with man for the purpose of showing forth His glory as a visible witness to all mankind.

Question 2, where is sanctuary? Time dictates that I be brief so all I will say is this.

There have been tabernacles and temples in the past, so let us note where sanctuary is not so as to narrow down our search.

Lamentations 2:7 says

⁷The Lord has spurned His altar, He has abandoned His sanctuary;

The southern tribe of Judah had been taken into captivity, Solomon’s temple had been destroyed.

Herod’s temple was sacked and destroyed by Emperor Titus, son of Vespasian, probably on August 5^th in the year AD70. So sanctuary is not in a stone built temple

So what I am saying is this, there is no earthly temple anymore, the sanctuary is not an earthly concept bound up in buildings that man has made, now we could see this plainly from 1 Cor 3:16-17 or 6:19 or 2 Cor 5:1, but for now let us turn to Hebrews 8

Now this is the main point of the things we are saying: We have such a High Priest, who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens,²a Minister of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle which the Lord erected, and not man.

Jesus is our High Priest and our King, He is the Mediator and the Minister within the sanctuary and that sanctuary is in heaven.

Does that mean we are alone, that God does not dwell with man anymore, have we returned to Genesis 2:18 where man is alone. For we can be sure that loneliness is one of the great killers in our western world, creation in reverse. God desires relationship; the accuser binds people in guilt, shame and isolation. So does that mean we are alone, that God does not dwell with man anymore, certainly not, turn to 1 Cor 3:16

¹⁶Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?¹⁷If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are. You are the temple of God; you are the sanctuary where God dwells.

And Paul again says in 2 Cor 6:16

¹⁶And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you^[1] are the temple of the living God. As God has said:

"I will dwell in them And walk among them. I will be their God, And they shall be My people."

Paul here quotes from Lev 26:12, Jer 32:38; Eze 37:27, the last of these quotes, Eze 37:27 says

²⁷My tabernacle also shall be with them; indeed I will be their God, and they shall be My people.

The dwelling place of God is with His people. How can this be, well by the indwelling Spirit of Christ we are adopted into the family of God and God has become our Father, Abba. So the long awaited new covenant, promised through the patriarchs and the prophets arrived when the Kingdom of God broke through into this present evil age, and in this new covenant the Spirit creates a people with a heart responsive to the Father. Corporately the people who have had their hearts changed, are the temple of the living God, the sanctuary. Our life comes only from the life-giving Spirit who dwells within us. Corporately we are the living temple of God, indwelt by His Spirit because individually we are temples of God indwelt by His Spirit.
So in summary of the two questions

What is the Sanctuary? Where is the Sanctuary located?

We can say from a brief biblical study that the sanctuary is a holy place where God, through His initiative, dwells with man for the purpose of showing forth His glory as a visible witness to all mankind, and this sanctuary is corporately each gathering of believers because each believer of the One true God, the loving, merciful, reconciling, gracious and forgiving Father is a temple of God. We can also say that the biblical record gives a sure testimony, and that testimony tells us that the Father, our Father has an age-long desire to dwell among his people. He was not content to create man alone; from the very beginning He desired to dwell with and have fellowship with man in an intimate relationship of agape love. Sanctuary is so much more than a room, or building, the Sanctuary is where God dwells with us, and where the awesome Shekinah cloud of glory, the symbol of His abiding presence resides.