Episodes
Saturday Apr 30, 2016
Gems in the Gospel of John - Part 28
Saturday Apr 30, 2016
Saturday Apr 30, 2016
Part 28 - John6:36-40
Security
I set out to do this series basically about one verse at a time but here we have a small structure that, being a lover of structures, I must bring to your attention. It is what is called officially a chiasm, but I prefer to call it a reflection for reasons that should become obvious. It is a series of clauses which go ABCB’A’, the second part being a reflection of the first half with some significant changes. Such things are surprisingly common throughout both the Old and the New Testaments. This one goes:
- Verse 36 A you have seen me and still you do not believe
- 37 B All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away
- 38 C For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me.
- 39 B’ I shall lose none of all those he has given me, but raise them up at the last day.
- 40 A’ everyone who looks to the Son and believes … I will raise them up at the last day
The 2 outer verses are about seeing and believing – the first negatively, they see and do not believe, the last positively about those who see and do believe. The 2 inner verses are both about what happens to those that the Father has given to Jesus. The central verse explains why Jesus has come down to earth and the consequences, which are that the last 2 verses are both more positive than the first 2.
We cannot see Jesus in any literal sense as they could and the first verse therefore does not make any direct sense to us. But I think we can reasonably change it into the parallel idea of listening and hearing and get the sense that way. You most probably know someone who is very good at listening but doesn’t seem to hear anything much! You talk to them; they give every appearance of agreeing with you; you are sure you have convinced them that what you are saying is right – perhaps some change in the way things are done at work or in church, which they are in a position to make.
But then you discover that absolutely nothing changes. They listened, but they did not hear. So it can be with the way people fail to hear what they are told about Jesus. They read the Bible; they attend church regularly; they enjoy the fellowship; there are all the signs that they are Christians. But nothing really changes in the way they behave; the things they do; the statements they make about faith. They listened but they did not hear, in exactly the same way as the people Jesus was talking to could see him, listen to him, see what he did, but it all made no change in their lives. Be careful. I do hope you are not one of those people who go to a good church to get their regular dose of listening but never really hear anything!
In his second and second last statements Jesus moves on to say that the reason for this is that it is the work of the Father to select those who will truly hear Jesus and follow him. That is both a reason and a promise. If indeed we have set out to follow Jesus we are secure for it was not really our choice but the work of the Father. That does not mean that we do not choose to follow or not. Later on in this chapter we read that many of those who listened to Jesus ‘turned back’. They decided not to follow him. And that is the way it is. From our perspective it is something that we do; from the greater perspective of the Triune God it is something he does. And we shall never be able to make those 2 perspectives meet up and sound the same. Like many of the best things of life: the love of a man and a woman, the things we see beauty in, the joy we can get from many an apparently trivial pursuit; the step of faith is not entirely logical – and none the worse for that.
The second last verse in this structure points out that the true benefit of that is that we are held securely in the Father’s arms and cannot be lost. (Although being frail human beings we always have the potential to walk away ourselves, as most of those listening to Jesus on this occasion seem to have done.) Not only shall we not be driven away in the first place, we are securely in forever, for this life and for the life to come. WOW!
The most important verse is, as usual in these reflective structures, the middle one. All this is possible because Jesus came down to do the will of the Father. We are totally secure in him. Triple WOW!
Click or Tap here to listen to or save this as an audio mp3 file
~You can now purchase our Partakers books including Roger's latest - The Puzzle of Living - A fresh look at the story of Job!
Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Friday Apr 29, 2016
Friday Prayers 29 April 2016
Friday Apr 29, 2016
Friday Apr 29, 2016
Partakers Friday Prayers
29 April 2016
Come and join in praying for the world and yourself, offering praises to God through Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit!
Order of Service
Opening prayer
Confession
Psalm 65
Prayers for Churches and Christians worldwide
Prayers for others
Silent time (Prayer for your own concerns)
Prayers for the world
Prayer of Benedict of Nursia
Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file
You can now purchase our Partakers books & CDs. Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Wednesday Apr 27, 2016
Church Leadership 04 - Old Testament Leadership Part 2
Wednesday Apr 27, 2016
Wednesday Apr 27, 2016
Church Leadership
Session 4:
What does the Old Testament teach us about leadership?”
Part 2
I mentioned last time about my management training course in which Nehemiah was the case-study. At the time I was thrilled by the use of the Bible in such a context, but I have to admit having forgotten most of what the teacher said – so I don’t know if I became a better manager as a result. But it did lead me to a deeper study of Nehemiah and his exploits.
We find him in Susa – one of the principal cities of the Babylonian and Persian empires and where we also find Daniel and Esther – as a “cupbearer to the king” (chapter 1:11). He was an exile from Jerusalem and having heard of the state of his home city, he determined to do something about it. We don’t have time to go into the whole story – but you can read it in Nehemiah. We focus on some of the lessons we can learn from him:
- Although he wanted to get on with things – he prayed and sought God first (1:4 – 11)
- He planned carefully and got as much help as he could (2: 6 – 9)
- He assessed the situation before he did anything or told anyone what was in his heart (2: 11 – 16)
- Then he told the leaders and the people what his plans were and sought their support (2: 17 – 20)
- He gave the glory to God for the success he expected (2: 20) and for the result (6:16)
- He mobilised the people at all levels (chapter 3) – and they “worked with all their heart” (4:6).
- He did not ignore opposition – but dealt with it prayerfully and practically (4: 4 & 5 and 13 – 21)
- Having done the practical job of rebuilding the wall, he turned, with Ezra, to the spiritual needs of the people (chapters 8 and 9)
- He dedicated what he had done to the Lord and gave Him the glory (12: 27 – 47)
- His last recorded words were: “Remember me with favour, O my God” (13:31).
Now let’s think about Joseph – his story fills most of the last part of Genesis. We don’t have time today to go into the details of his life and I assume most of you will know the major elements of his story. So, some summarised lessons from the one who began as an arrogant “Daddy’s boy”, became a slave, spent time in jail but eventually became Prime Minister of Egypt:
- Even as an arrogant teenager, God was speaking to Him through the dreams he was having. Sometimes if God plants a dream or vision in our spirits, it is better to keep it to ourselves until it begins to come to fruition.
- The brothers’ action was inexcusable – but it was all part of God’s plan. Sometimes things happen to us – or are done to us by others – that are part of God’s purposes for us, but we can’t recognise that until years later.
- The Lord was with Joseph – and his employer prospered (Genesis 39:5). Does our employer (or those we serve) prosper because of our faithfulness to God, our integrity etc?
- He resisted a very real temptation – he ran from it – a real lesson for us. Even when falsely accused – he refused to justify himself (but he was a slave and had no “voice” – remember we said in session 2 that we are Christ’s bond slaves).
- Twice we are told that the Lord was with Joseph in the prison (39: 21 & 23) – and even the prison “prospered” because Joseph was there. We don’t know how long he was in prison – but we must not let today’s circumstances rob us of what we know of God and His word – He will bring to pass His purposes even if we haven’t got a clue how or when.
- Even in the prison – falsely accused and reckoning he might never get out – he was concerned for others– “Why are your faces sad today?” We must not let our own difficulties stop us from caring for others and showing them the love of God.
- Joseph acknowledges that it is God who gives the answers (41:16). We are not here to make a name for ourselves – but to bring glory to God.
- Joseph didn’t just interpret the dream – he offered a solution to the problem.
- Pharaoh saw that the Spirit of God was in Joseph (41:37). Do those around us – those we work with, our employer, those we serve etc see God in us?
- God has his people in high office (41:41 – 44) – don’t be afraid of that if God calls you to it – do the job well and give God the glory
- The brothers bow before Joseph – and that dream is fulfilled – it took at least 20 years. God will do what He says He will do. Joseph puts his brothers to the test to see if they had learned anything over those years – sometimes we take a very long time to learn the ways of God.
Joseph got to his leadership position by a long and difficult route – but God was with him throughout and he acted with wisdom, justice and integrity. And even though others (in this case those very close to him) would seek to thwart God’s plans for him, Joseph was confident in his God and said to his brothers: “You meant to harm me – but God intended it for good” (50:20).
A prayer: “Thank You, Lord, that no matter our circumstances You have promised to be with us. And thank You that You do keep Your promises and are fulfilling Your purposes for us.”
Next time we will look at the characteristics of church leaders as set out in Paul’s letters to Timothy and Titus.
Click or Tap here to listen to or save this as an audio mp3 file
~You can now purchase our Partakers books! Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Monday Apr 25, 2016
Think Spot 25 April 2016
Monday Apr 25, 2016
Monday Apr 25, 2016
Think Spot - 25 April 2016
But please don't assume you know how to show your love and care for them. Ask them how you can show your love and care for them in practise... We are also to love the whole person and to take care of the whole person. We are to care for their whole well-being: their spiritual, physical, emotional, social and mental well-being.
Quite often, we neglect one of those areas. The whole person matters to God. He cares for the whole person. Therefore so must we. How will you refine your love of other people now that you are aware?
Go and love. Love others - all others - an every facet of the other person - spiritual, physical, emotional, social and mental well-being...
Right mouse click here to download as a MP3 audio file
You can now purchase our Partakers books! Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Saturday Apr 23, 2016
Gems in the Gospel of John - Part 27
Saturday Apr 23, 2016
Saturday Apr 23, 2016
Part 27: John 6:29
The work of God in us
Jesus was asked by the crowd, “What must we do to do the works God requires?” They were not starting from the same place we start from. They were Jews; they were already the people of God – or so they thought. They had not realized that the presence of Messiah Jesus meant that things had changed, completely and dramatically. The reply of Jesus relates to that huge change. John did not tell us what Jesus had been talking about on the other side of the lake but we can easily guess. Mark reports his words on another occasion as, “The time has come. The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news.” And we may safely assume he did not say anything very different this time.
They thought they would be automatically transferred into his Kingdom. “No!” says Jesus. You need to do something - you need to take a positive step into the Kingdom by following me, so his answer was, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”
But we need to be careful here. It sounds almost as though Jesus is saying ‘believing in me, that is that I am the Messiah and the Son of God, is all you have to do step into the Kingdom’; or, as he said to Nicodemus, ‘be sure you are born again’ and that is all that matters. But it is not so. You cannot just step into the Kingdom and find a nice seat on a wall or something and watch what happens. You cannot just be born again and stay in the cradle, drink your milk and get your diaper changed for you. You must grow. You don’t have a choice; once you are born you have to grow. If you don’t you are severely retarded – and who wants to be that. If you are born again you are also equally born from above; the power of the Spirit has entered your life and you must grow – just as you cannot opt out of growing physically once you are born you cannot opt out of growing spiritually. And a major part of that is that if you are in the Kingdom you must participate in the work of the Kingdom.
All too often people assume, and are often told, that the first steps: being born again, making a decision for Jesus, giving your heart to Jesus, setting out to follow Jesus; is all that matters and they can now boast of what they have done and they will be ‘all right’ at the last day or when they die. It isn’t quite like that. Only the last way of talking about that first step ‘setting out to follow Jesus’ carries any suggestion that there is work to be done. But there is! Paul says (in Philippians 2: 12, 13), “Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.”
And that is just a bit fuller than what Jesus says here, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”
What Paul says is both a promise and a challenge. It is the great promise that God will be in us and undertake the work. The challenge is that we are to work hard ourselves – to be better people, to relate better to and help other people, to spread the Good News of the Kingdom to other people, etc. And we need to be careful about how we do it – particularly that last one about how we handle the Good News. Paul says, referring to the work that he was doing in spreading the Good News and teaching people in the young churches about it, “By the grace God has given me, I laid a foundation as a wise builder. Each one should build with care. For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. If anyone builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, their work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each person’s work. If what has been built survives, the builder will receive a reward. If it is burned up, the builder will suffer loss but yet will be saved—even though only as one escaping through the flames.” If we do anything about the Good News, as we all should and must, we must realize our responsibility in making sure it is the real Good News and not some distorted version of it.
We are in the Lord’s army. Not to fight, but to build. Work hard, work well, build straight and high and we shall meet in that grand final day when all is revealed and we will receive the great reward of all our work – being ushered into the immediate presence of the Lord Jesus to hear his ‘well done, good and faithful servant’.
Click or Tap here to listen to or save this as an audio mp3 file
~You can now purchase our Partakers books including Roger's latest - Finding the Way in AD100!
Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Friday Apr 22, 2016
Friday Prayers 22 April 2016
Friday Apr 22, 2016
Friday Apr 22, 2016
Partakers Friday Prayers!
22nd April 2016
We pray together and when Christians pray together, from different nations, different churches and different denominations - that reveals Church unity! Come! Let us pray together!
with all my soul, my mind and my heart;
and to love my neighbours,
friends and enemies as myself.
~~~~~
Lord, protect me
from evil people and demons,
from impure passions
and all unseemly things.
~~~~~
Lord, You know all things;
Lord, I desire Your goodness;
Lord, let Your will be done, not mine, be done
for You are blessed forever.
~~~~~
For I ask this O Father
in the name of your Son Jesus
and in the power of the ever indwelling Holy Spirit. Amen.
~~~~~
A prayer of John Chrysostom
Click or Tap here to listen to or save this as an audio mp3 file
~You can now purchase our Partakers books! Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Thursday Apr 21, 2016
Glimpses 56
Thursday Apr 21, 2016
Thursday Apr 21, 2016
Glimpses 56
Jackie
My story starts with my birth as mine was rather traumatic. I was born in Aberdeen, north east Scotland. I was a very ill little baby. I was born three months early and weighed less than a bag of sugar. At some point before, during or after my birth my brain did not get enough oxygen. This caused brain damage so now I have cerebral palsy. I wasn’t supposed to live but my doctors decided to try to save me anyway. There were many scary times; including an emergency operation when I was the smallest baby the surgeon had ever operated on. I also stopped breathing and had to be brought back to life a couple of times. But - people all over the UK were praying for me. I started to do things the doctors had said I would never be able to do, like walking, talking, and going to mainstream school, and secondary school. I’ve been to university twice, and have a Master’s degree. It was at a Christian conference called Spring Harvest that I came to know Jesus for myself, as my saviour and friend, just before my ninth birthday. I had believers’ baptism at age 11. I remember it like it was yesterday. God used it to really encourage people. I haven’t always been faithful to Jesus but he’s always been faithful to me. Since I became a Christian I had healthy teenage years but struggled with my faith and was rebellious. Now I wish I’d appreciated that time. When I was 19, and at university, I started becoming ill and had a few very painful hospital admissions. But God used me to witness to doctors, nurses and patients. I had a life changing operation when I was 25, in which I nearly died, and the surgeon said it’s one of the most difficult operations he’s done. I was really carried through that time and so many people were praying. Never ever underestimate the power of prayer! Its four years since that operation and times have not been easy. A while ago my consultant said I have damaged my body from walking and I need to use an electric wheelchair full-time. I now also have carers in to help me and lots of hospital appointments. I am still unable to work and really struggle with that. God is showing me though that he does have a purpose for me. I am writing for The Big Bible Project blog once a month, and Bible Reflections have publish a few of my articles. I also have my own blog. God is using my blog posts to help people. I also try to be a listener for my friends and others in need and am very much still learning how to do that. Somehow God is carving out a ministry for me. Am trying to hold onto all the God has done for me and what He is continuing to do. I hope telling my story this way helps someone to know how powerful God is and how much prayer can do. God is a solid rock and a refuge on whom I can rely. He can do the same for you too!Right mouse click here to download as a MP4 audio file
Click on the appropriate link to subscribe to this website
Subscribe via iTunes
Wednesday Apr 20, 2016
Church Leadership 03 - Old Testament Leadership Part 1
Wednesday Apr 20, 2016
Wednesday Apr 20, 2016
Church Leadership
Session 3: “What does the Old Testament teach us about leadership?” – Part 1
Welcome to the third in this series on Church Leadership. So far we have affirmed that Jesus is the Head of the Church and that the Church is the people not a building. We have also looked at some of the terms used in the New Testament and elsewhere, that, I hope, will help us to be clear on what we are talking about as we look in more detail at leadership in the Church.
In this session I want to start to look at a few brief examples from the Bible that will give us some clues as to how God called and gifted leaders. We’ll continue with this next time.
As I was advancing in my career, the Director of the Department I was working in decided that I would benefit from some management training. So a one day course was chosen for me and off I went to join about 100 other people from various parts of the public sector. We were in a lecture hall, with a lectern on which was a book that looked to me like a Bible. At the due time the man who was going to teach us about management introduced himself and then asked the audience: “Who has heard of Nehemiah?” A few hands went up – including mine. He then took the Bible from the lectern, held it up and said: “This is the best textbook you can get on all aspects of life – including management”. He went on to tell us that he was going to use Nehemiah as a case study. He was brilliant! We’ll take a look at Nehemiah’s leadership style next time.
Not only do we find much help from those God chose as leaders – we also see that He chose imperfect people. Most of the saints of old got it wrong from time to time – Abraham lied about Sarah, Noah got drunk, Moses lost his temper, David committed adultery, Elijah was suicidal, Jonah ran away, Thomas doubted, Peter denied Jesus, Paul persecuted Christians – need I go on? The amazing thing is that God forgave them as they repented and He continued to use them. All of us, as leaders, are constantly in need of the grace of God and the empowering of the Holy Spirit as we battle with sin and failure. Praise Him – He is the God of the second (and third and fourth and fifth etc etc) chance as we submit to Him.
We don’t have time today to look at many examples – so here are just two – we’ll look at more next time:
Moses began life as a foundling and was brought up in Pharaoh’s palace at a time when his people were being sorely oppressed. He had a magnificent early training in the best educational establishments that Egypt could offer and, aged 40 years, he went out to deliver his fellow Israelites. But he got it wrong – he was 40 years too soon! He ran away and spent 40 years in the desert looking after his father-in-law’s sheep. It was then that God called him and, at 80 years old, he was able to become one of the greatest leaders the world has ever seen. What do we learn from this?
- Nothing learned is ever wasted – God used his early education in Egypt to help him confront the Pharaoh of the day.
- Attempt things for God in your own strength and you will fail.
- Don’t despise the “wilderness experience”. Moses learned the ways of the desert through which he was to lead Israel.
- Work with others where you can – Moses had Aaron with him, along with the elders of Israel.
- Take advice from others – he listened to Jethro, his father-in-law, and reduced his burden by delegating to others (note, the Bible described those to whom he delegated “able men” – Genesis 18).
- Train the one who will take your place – Joshua, while being God’s chosen man, had to learn the ropes.
Then there is Daniel. I relate to him – after all, he was a government official (that was his “day job”) but also a powerful and faithful prophet of God. He was from the Hebrew elite – but still carried off into exile by the Babylonians. Along with his three friends Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, he refused to compromise on essential matters (eating kosher food and bowing down to graven images for example) and yet surpassed the other students in that year’s intake. You can read about it in the early chapters of the book that bears his name. God used him to interpret dreams, to guide the despotic kings who ruled over many years and to warn where necessary. The famous incident of the Den of Lions – when, incidentally, Danial was an old man, reminds us of his faithfulness over the whole of his career. This is what the first few verses of Daniel 6 have to say:
“It pleased Darius to appoint 120 satraps to rule throughout the kingdom, 2 with three administrators over them, one of whom was Daniel. The satraps were made accountable to them so that the king might not suffer loss. Now Daniel so distinguished himself among the administrators and the satraps by his exceptional qualities that the king planned to set him over the whole kingdom. At this, the administrators and the satraps tried to find grounds for charges against Daniel in his conduct of government affairs, but they were unable to do so. They could find no corruption in him, because he was trustworthy and neither corrupt nor negligent. Finally these men said, “We will never find any basis for charges against this man Daniel unless it has something to do with the law of his God.”
What a man! Would that all leaders – both in church and other spheres of service could be described like that.
Next time we’ll take a brief look at some more leaders from the Scriptures.
A prayer: “Thank you, Lord, that Your word pulls no punches about those you called to lead. Thank you for what we can learn from them and what it tells us about your outrageous grace – for which we thank You – in Jesus Name”
Click or Tap here to listen to or save this as an audio mp3 file
~You can now purchase our Partakers books! Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Monday Apr 18, 2016
Think Spot 18 April 2016
Monday Apr 18, 2016
Monday Apr 18, 2016
Think Spot
18th April 2016
Welcome to Partakers Think Spot!Tucked away in the ancient book of Leviticus is this command: Leviticus 19:18 ‘“Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbour as yourself. I am the LORD.”
Further on in the same chapter is:Leviticus 19:33-34 ‘“When a foreigner resides among you in your land, do not ill-treat them. The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.”
In fact the whole chapter is about loving others as you would want to be loved by others if you were in those situations. The whole law itself is about loving God and loving others.
Jesus exemplified this of course.Speaking in Matthew 5:43-45 ‘You have heard that it was said, “Love your neighbour and hate your enemy.” But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous."
Then later on his ministry, Jesus and taught the Jewish teachers of the law about it. We read in Matthew 22:34-40 Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: ‘Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?’ Jesus replied: ‘“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: “Love your neighbour as yourself.” All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.’
As Christians in the 21st century we are commanded to love. To love God and to show we love God by loving all others – yes including those who hate us and those who mock, vilify and persecute us. Yet every day I see examples in the media, including the Christian media, of just the opposite. Christians hating on others, including other Christians. That doesn’t meant we are to condone the sinning of other Christians, but we can help lovingly restore them.
Jesus loved others and yet gently restored and guided people to go sin no more. Such as the woman caught in adultery and bought before Him in John 8.
Is it easy to love our enemies and our persecutors? No. It can be difficult. Difficult if we try to do it in our own strength. But… But if we ask the Holy Spirit who lives within us to help us love all others as we would want to be loved, then it is possible. We ask Him for help and listen to His guidance. We are to either do as He says to do or we are to not do as He says not to do.
As the church, and as individual parts of the church, we are to mirror and reflect the God we proclaim to serve and worship. God is love. God is trinity. The Father loves the Son and the Spirit. The Son loves the Father and the Spirit. The Spirit loves the Father and the Son. Perfect and matchless love for eternity. God loves humanity, hence the Son entering into the time and space of humanity and loved sacrificially.
Let’s go into this week determined to be obedient to the Holy Spirit in loving all others we meet – in our words, thoughts and actions. If those outside the Kingdom see you loving others, they will see that you love your God! How amazing is that! Ask the Holy Spirit to show you each morning, how you can love others every day. When you feel like you are going seek revenge or bear a grudge, or you are going to ill treat anybody in anyway, ask the Holy Spirit to help you not to do those things and for a way in which you can show love to that person! That’s all for today!
Here is a brief prayer to help us to start using our words and thoughts wisely starting today.
Father, help us this week to love others as we would like to be loved. May we as your church reflect you and show our of you by loving all others... Help me Holy Spirit to show love to all others, including those who mock and scorn me. We ask this, through the mighty name of your Son, Jesus and in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
Cick or tap here to save this as a mp3 file
You can now purchase our Partakers books! Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Saturday Apr 16, 2016
Gems in the Gospel of John - Part 26
Saturday Apr 16, 2016
Saturday Apr 16, 2016
Part 26: John 12:3
Mary’s worship
Now we come to a quite amazing episode: “Then Mary took about a pint of pure nard, an expensive perfume; she poured it on Jesus’ feet and wiped his feet with her hair.” Amazing because up to this point John has recorded many things that Jesus did and said, nothing about what anybody else did of any consequence. Everything flowed out from Jesus; nothing flowed in to him. It is Mary who breaks through in a spontaneous demonstration of an act of pure loyalty to Jesus. Of the two sisters it is the one who sat at his feet drinking in the words and ideas that he said who carries out this wonderful act of dedication. She is a good example for us - it is only as we spend much time learning from the Master that we will get to the point of true devotion to him, and as we shall see in a moment that is all important.
All four gospels record an anointing of Jesus by a woman. It is likely that this happened on 2 occasions. We have to remember that these are the first written accounts of what must originally have been verbal stories told about Jesus passed on from the people who knew him to the next generation. In this case we have 4 written accounts of what are probably 2 incidents: here, and in Luke 7, Mark 14 and Matthew 26. The one in Luke 7 almost certainly refers to a different occasion because although there are some similarities there are also some considerable differences. But the one recorded here and those in Mark 14 and Matthew 26 in spite of some differences, probably all refer to the same event. The main difference in these accounts is in what was anointed: head or feet. Most probably both head and feet were anointed. The two accounts in Mark and Matthew emphasize that it was Jesus’ head that was anointed thus emphasizing his royal standing as the King of the Kingdom. John emphasizes the anointing of the feet of Jesus as he is more interested in his humility. John has moved the event forward to before the entry into Jerusalem to suit his theological requirements rather than stay with the strict historical order. He is intent on telling us about what Mary did before he tells us about Jesus washing the disciples feet.
John seems to have been always more concerned about the order of meaning of the various passages in his Gospel than the historical order so he puts Mary’s action ahead of the very similar washing of the disciple’s feet by Jesus. We have to ask the obvious question - why? The more obvious and natural thing to do would have been to use the historical order and tell us first about the washing of the disciples feet by Jesus and then to tell us about this anointing by Mary as an act of worship. They are probably in the order they are because it is not the obvious order! The obvious order would have highlighted the act of service carried out by Jesus and therefore as something we should imitate. The unobvious order John actually used throws the emphasis of both events on Jesus. Jesus is the target of the act of worship by Mary and he is the one who carries out the act of humble service in the foot-washing incident. As always John has sought to put Jesus first and make him the focus of each event. The foot washing by Jesus is often taken in both writing and preaching to be mainly an act for imitation, but that was not how John wanted us to see it. He wanted to emphasise Jesus as Lord, and as a very special sort of Lord. We too should always place Jesus first in all our thinking - not to let even the most worthy of considerations, like concern for the poor usurp our prime focus on him. That is why this episode emphasizes the over-riding significance of Jesus above all else.
It is difficult, perhaps impossible, to understand what Mary’s motives were. She did not know Jesus would die so soon. She did not know he would die for many years to come. Was it an act of pure worship using what was perhaps the most expensive thing she possessed as a token of homage to him? With so much strong perfume being used some must have got onto his clothes and he would have smelt good right through the ordeals of the following week. That would have been a real encouragement to him.
The basic point in this account is to compare the importance of the worship of Jesus with the importance of caring for the poor. Perhaps rather surprisingly it is the former that is the more important. There are many who would challenge that order of priorities. Yet it is so. When you go overseas to a country that needs much help, both spiritually and practically, it is the evangelicals with their determined focus on the Lord and his Word, just like Mary, who are the active ones in all spheres. The more liberal wing of the church is conspicuous by its absence!
For us it is a great challenge to be always prepared to step out for our Lord in outrageous consecration.
Click or Tap here to listen to or save this as an audio mp3 file
~You can now purchase our Partakers books including Roger's latest - Finding the Way in AD100!
Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!