Hope

How the birth of Jesus offers all of humanity hope

Today is the first Sunday in Advent. It is the start of the build up to Christmas. And, lest we forget, Christmas is about the birth of Jesus, the Messiah. Of course, there are many other things that Christmas has come to be about, but my hope with this and the three iSermons to follow, is that we will be able to take a step back, pause from the relentless present buying, festive preparations, and minor panic attacks about the upcoming extended time with family(!), and ponder afresh the significance of the story of the arrival of baby Jesus.

Let us start by stopping for a moment and wonder at the mere fact we are, two thousand years later, celebrating the birth of one particular baby at all. One little baby boy, born in extremely inauspicious circumstances, is the trigger for celebrations the world over, two millennium later. Why?

Even in secular Britain, the most ardent atheist finds themselves nostalgic for a good old sing-a-long to a few favourite carols, telling the story of Jesus. This isn’t to suggest everyone celebrating the story of Jesus either believes it or understands its significance. But the way one tiny little baby has come to be the centrepiece of the worlds largest annual festival is truly astonishing.

When so many billion other babies have been born in the years that have followed, why does the birth of this one baby Jesus stand out as a birth like no other?

No Ordinary Baby

One answer to this question is: hope. Jesus was no ordinary baby. The circumstances surrounding both the build up to his birth and his arrival are truly supernatural. Mary, without having sexual relations with Joseph (to whom she was soon to marry), ends up up pregnant. Impossible! you say. Of course it is, I reply. That’s kind of the point. The birth of Jesus is about God taking the form of a human being: “‘They shall name him Emmanuel’, which means, ‘God is with us.’” Why? “‘For he will save his people from their sins.’”

If God exists, anything is possible. If God is real, would it really be so hard for him to transcend the laws of nature, enabling Mary to conceive? Of course not. Some try and make out that this is a totally ludicrous belief, but nothing could be farther from the truth. With God, nothing is impossible. And that in itself is a huge cause for hope.

God, by the Holy Spirit, invited Mary to become the carrier of His son. God was so determined to see the world have a future and a hope, that he chose to take on the form of a human being. If ever there was a great myth breaker, this is it. Some hold to a view of God being distant and uninvolved. But in this one story that idea is blown apart. The birth of Jesus reveals a God who cares enough about humanity to become human himself, to walk among us, and to be one of us. Astonishing.

Any God who is prepared to take on the form of one of his created beings, is a very different God from the one that many of us have in our minds. And this is what give us so much hope. One of the very names of Jesus - Emmanuel - means God is with us. We are not alone. God cares.

Saved From Our Sins

One of the primary reasons the Scriptures record for Jesus being born at all is that he was to “save his people from their sins”. Sin is not a very popular word nowadays, but the same Scriptures make it clear that each and everyone of us has ended up, in one way or another, living our lives without fully embodying the goodness we were designed to live out. To differing extents, we all lie, steal, cheat, lust, hate, deceive, and so much more. We hurt people, we make selfish choices, and we fail to ‘love our neighbour as we love ourselves’. And every time we don’t embody the goodness we were made for, we fall short of the life we were designed to live, and of the standards God planned for human kind.

And the outcome of this kind of behaviour is that it keeps building up a barrier between us and God. Step by step, it drives us away from him and from the life he would have us to enjoy. In Old Testament days, the Jewish people had a complex sacrificial system of sacrificing animals as a means of making peace with God for all their shortcomings. But that was always a temporary measure. Jesus, this little baby Jesus, was sent to earth to become the ultimate sacrifice - the sacrifice to end all other sacrifices.

Whether this makes sense to us or not, there is a price to be paid for stepping outside of God’s plans for humanity. In the same ways that so many things in life have inbuilt consequences, the same is true with regard to the things we do that dehumanise both ourselves and others. That consequence is death. When we step away from living life the way God designed it to be lived, we step away from the source of all life - eternal life, the life of the age to come. It is not that God strikes us dead, it is that we starve ourselves from the source of live by our wrongdoing.

This is what Jesus came to save us from. Jesus came to save us from our sins or, rather, the consequences of our sins. He came to save us from a trajectory that would lead us to ultimate death and invite us onto a path that would lead to life. “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly,” said Jesus himself.

Talk about hope!

My prayer is that, this Christmas season, we would all know beyond a shadow of a doubt that we need hope. But not only that, I pray that each of us would open our hearts and minds to receive that hope. The hope that knows God is with us, that God cares, and that God has made a way to break the hold of the consequences of our sins off of our lives. May these truths permeate our souls. May we know the hope of forgiveness and of the life of the age to come like never before.

‘The Resurrection Of The Body And The Life Everlasting’

The Apostles' Creed - Part 12 of 12

After exploring The Forgiveness Of Sins last week in the Apostles’ Creed series, this week we conclude the series by taking a look at the long held Christian belief in the bodily resurrection of all those who are ‘in Christ’, and in everlasting life.

Most people inside and outside of church are familiar with the belief that Jesus rose from the dead. Less people are aware of the New Testament teaching that Christ’s followers will also experience there own resurrection at the point when Jesus returns to fully and finally establish his kingdom.

Many people - including many Christians - think Christians simply believe in life after death and understand that in a purely spiritual sense. When our bodies dies, our soul or spirit goes to heaven where we’ll then be with God forever more, the thinking goes. This isn’t a remotely accurate view. Or, rather, it’s a significantly incomplete view.

The future God has planned is not one devoid of physicality. The belief that anything physical is bad and only the spiritual is good, is deeply flawed. God created our physical earth and declared it as being good. He then declared humans - the pinnacle of his creation - as being very good. Our physicality is a part of God’s original creation and though now doomed to die, God intends to raise us up again, giving us new bodies in the same manner as Jesus himself.

Not only will he raise us up, giving us new physical bodies that will never know death again, he will also raise up our deeply fallen earth. He will restore and redeem all of creation, re-crafting a new, merged earth and heaven where we will spend eternity.

Eternity In Heaven?

Even the idea that Christians will spend eternity ‘in heaven’ is mistaken. Those who die before the return of Christ are with God in heaven, but this is temporary. The ultimate plan is that we will all receive these new heavenly physical bodies and spend eternity with God on a new/restored earth.

The future God has in mind is of a merging of earth and heaven. both in the broader sense of our planet as a whole, and in the narrower sense of each of us as individuals.

God is the great restorer. Though his creation has fallen so far short of all that it can and should be, he has never given up on it. He has always been looking for ways to restore and redeem and reclaim it for his original purposes. What began as creation being declared good, will soon become a new creation that will be the fulfilment of God’s original dream.

No matter what is going on around us, and no matter how much death may seem to be the final straw, Christians have long being given the wonderful gift of hope. Death isn’t the end. Death doesn’t have the last laugh. In Jesus’ resurrection we’ve seen a foretaste of what is to come. Jesus overcame death so that we too can overcome death.

These present physical bodies of ours will wear out and die. Our time here will come to an end. But this isn’t the real end. In God’s perfect timing, he will send Christ to fully establish his kingdom, raise each of us up with new resurrection bodies, and bring together a new heaven and a new earth where we will be with him forever.

‘The Forgiveness Of Sins’

The Apostles' Creed - Part 11 of 12

We talked last week about the historic belief in their being one, universal Church that transcends all denominations and comprises saints from throughout the ages. This week, as we continue our series through The Apostles’ Creed, we turn to the first statement that focusses on the impact of being a follower of Christ.

So far, the Creed has talked about belief on God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It has talked about Christ’s birth, death, resurrection, and his present work, and future judging of humanity. Now we see what this all leads to and what lies at the heart of what God wants to do for humanity.

The Need For Forgiveness

All of humanity have fallen short of God’s best for our lives. We have done things that, whether directly or indirectly, have been acts of disobedience against God. We’ve made choices that have moved us out of alignment with the desires God has for our lives. The Bible calls this sin.

Genesis records the story of Adam and Eve as being the first humans to step outside of God’s will. And the consequence of this was ‘death’. This is what we explored in a special article called ‘The Pursuit Of Spiritual Aliveness’.

The kind of death that God was talking about in that Genesis narrative goes beyond mere physical death; it is a death that is a consequence of our being separated from the source of all life: God himself. And this death can affect us long before our physical death.

It is our sinfulness that separates us from God and from life. But God doesn’t want us to remain in this state of death and separation. He wants to reconnect with us. He wants to welcome us back into his family. He loves us, and hates the separation.

God hates the separation so much that he sent Jesus to face the punishment for our sin and disobedience on our behalf. He wants to offer us forgiveness, knowing that Jesus has paid the penalty for our stepping out of God’s will for our lives. Despite all our wrong doing, God offers us forgiveness for that wrong doing. He offers us forgiveness of sins.

This forgiveness is the pathway out of death into life. It is the only way for the separation with God to end. God, through Jesus, has made a way for each an every one of us to receive this gift of forgiveness. It is open to all. The Scriptures teach that God doesn’t want to see a single person ‘perish’. He doesn’t want anyone to waste away their lives, separated from him and separated from the best version of who they could be.

Realign And Trust (‘Repent And Believe’)

But God doesn’t force this gift on everyone. Whilst God has made forgiveness available to us all, we have to choose to accept it. We have to make a decision to realign our lives with God’s desires and design for our lives. And we have to put our trust in Jesus as the one who has taken the punishment for our wrong doing, and receive the free offer of grace and forgiveness.

To use the words the New Testament uses, we need to repent and believe. As Jesus himself said, starting out his ministry here on earth, “The time has come. The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!” The good news (including forgiveness of sins) has been announced, but we have to choose to receive it by realigning our lives with God and putting our trust and faith in what God has done for us through Jesus.

Whilst there may be a significant first time when we choose to realign our lives, put our trust in Jesus, and receive this gift of forgiveness, it is actually a life-long practice. When we first choose to receive this gift and trust in God, our destiny is changed forever. But this doesn’t mean that we no longer fall short of the life God would have us to live. We need to daily look to the cross of Christ, confess our sins, and receive afresh his forgiveness. We continually need to realign our lives with God’s will and put our trust in God for our forgiveness, life, and hope.

Developing a healthy habit of confession is less about focussing endlessly on our shortcomings, and more about continually placing our attention on God’s love, forgiveness, grace, and life-giving presence. It is a chance to be grateful and remind ourselves of what God has done for us.

Forgiving Others

Forgiveness of sins is something to treasure, remind ourselves of, and forever be grateful for. And one of the best ways we can show that we are grateful is by becoming people who forgive ourselves. The New Testament goes out of its way to remind us that God’s forgiveness of us is directly connected to our forgiveness of others. Jesus, whilst teaching his disciples how to pray, told them that, “if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.” If we are not ready to forgive those who have wronged us, we are not ready to receive the forgiveness God wants to bestow on us.

God wants to change our hearts. He wants us to become forgiven, forgiving people because this is the path to life and life in all its fullness. Let’s allow God’s love and grace to permeate our lives so that we can become the forgiven, forgiving people he longs for us to be.

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‘The Holy Catholic Church, The Communion Of Saints’

The Apostles' Creed - Part 10 of 12

After taking a look last week at the historic belief in the Holy Spirit, today, in part nine of our Apostles’ Creed series, we look at the Church - and the saints who make up that Church. It is interesting that, throughout the centuries, at the heart of this ecumenical Creed, is a belief in the Church, right alongside a belief in Jesus as Lord, and the resurrection.

As I’ve reflected on this statement within the Creed however, I’m so glad that the saints before us saw fit to include it. When we are surrounded by so many different denominations and all kinds of styles of church, it is easy to lose sight of the fact that God never created these; we did. And God doesn’t see all these divides we’ve created amongst ourselves. He sees one ‘holy, catholic church’.

Holy, Catholic Church

By holy, we mean ‘set apart’. The church that Christ founded is set apart and called to God’s purposes. Regardless of our denomination or particular statements of beliefs, we are all united in Christ and called to be his people here on earth, for the benefit of others.

And, by catholic, we mean universal (and not the Roman Catholic Church). The creed is a statement of belief in our being one, set apart, universal church, that transcends every man-made divide. It’s a reminder that, Protestant or Catholic, Baptist or Methodist, we are all one in Christ.

We need to be reminded of this. It’s easy to get so caught up in our particular denominational bubble or stream of church, that we end up cutting ourselves off from all the other expressions of church. We become blinkered. And, sadly, we also all to often start to think that we have everything right and ‘they’ don’t. We start to feel superior. In other words, we open the door to pride.

This one line in the Creed reminds us to humble ourselves and see the Church that God sees. And there’s only one of them. There is only one body of Christ. There is only one bride of Christ.

The Communion Of Saints

Not only does this line in the creed remind us that there is only one Church, it also reminds us of our connection to all the saints throughout the ages. This too calls for humility. It is so easy to think that we are the generation who have got things right and lose sight of the many millions of saints who, for thousands of years, have faithfully served Christ.

It’s worth mentioning that the New Testament is much more liberal in declaring people saints than some church institutions are. Many of us understand saints to be a kind of super-Christian who is or was better than the rest of us. The New Testament however describes all followers of Christ as saints. Anyone who is a part of Christ’s church is a saint.

In the same way that the Church is holy (set apart), the saints are the holy (set apart) people who make up that Church. This being set apart is not to be understood primarily as being set apart from the rest of the world, but rather as being set apart for the rest of the world.

This goes right back to the call of Abram (later Abraham) in Genesis 12 where God called him and set him apart, telling him that, ‘all peoples on earth will be blessed through you’. People are chosen not for the exclusion of others, but for the inclusion - blessing - of others.

What an amazing privilege it is to be part of this universal, set apart Church and to be one of saints, set apart to be a part of God’s great plan to redeem and restore all humanity and all creation.

Let’s not allow of vision and understanding of church to be limited to our particular denomination or local church where we attend. Let’s enlarge our vision and keep sight of the universal Church - the body of Christ - that we are part of. And may we always remember - and celebrate - our connection to the saints throughout the ages.

We are One.

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‘I Believe In The Holy Spirit’

The Apostles' Creed - Part 9 of 12

For the last few weeks of our ‘Apostles’ Creed’ series, we’ve focussed on various aspects of the role and work of Jesus. This week we move on to the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is almost certainly the hardest aspect to our understanding of God to fully grasp. God as Father is something we can easily resonate with. God as Jesus likewise is something we have no problems getting our heads around because he became human like each of us. But God as Spirit is the least tangible and least visible dimension to God.

Despite the Spirit being harder to understand, he is no less God than the Father or Jesus. Throughout the history of the church, there has been a belief in the tri-unity of God. God is one and yet he expresses that oneness through three distinct persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. (It is worth noting that the Bible doesn’t talk about the Spirit as an ‘it’ but, as with the Father and Son, as a person. So the Holy Spirit isn’t merely a presence or a power; he is a distinct person in the trinity.)

The week before last, we explored the question of what in heaven Jesus has been doing since his ascension. It would be easy to think that Jesus came to rescue the world only to abandon it again a short time later. Even before his ascension, Jesus was preparing his disciples for his departure. He even told them: “It is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you.” The Advocate is one of many names attributed to the Holy Spirit.

Imagine how the disciples must have felt about this. They were Jews. Jews who had for years been awaiting for the ‘Messiah’ to come. And then they come to realise that Jesus is the Messiah, only to be told that he’s going to leave them again. I very much doubt that they thought being left with ‘the Advocate’ - the Spirit - was going to be better. It wouldn’t have made sense to them.

Not long after Jesus’ ascension though, whilst waiting in Jerusalem, the Holy Spirit was poured out and, “all of them were filled with the Holy Spirit”. This was the birth of the church. This was Jesus giving the Spirit (who had guided and empowered his own life on earth) to the disciples so that they could carry on his mission.

In others words, the Spirit multiplies exponentially the work of Jesus. Jesus was one person who could only be in one place at one time. The Holy Spirit however can indwell unlimited numbers of people and therefore take the work of Jesus “to the ends of the earth”. This is why it was better for Jesus to leave and send the Spirit in his place.

It is the Holy Spirit who brings us to the place of knowing that we fall short of God’s desires for our lives and who then prepares our hearts and minds to receive God’s forgiveness and acceptance. Having brought us to God, he then guides, empowers, and equips us to live the kind of lives that do match God’s desires for us and that further the mission of Christ on earth.

This serves to remind us that Jesus didn't come to establish a world religion. He didn’t come to get people to join a religious group who simply share the same views on certain beliefs about God. Jesus came to show the world what God is like and to invite people to join him in helping let the whole world see this God. To be a ‘Christian’ is to participate in the mission of God: spreading the message of love and hope that Christ made available to everyone. To be a ‘Christian’ is to be filled with the Spirit - the Spirit of Christ himself - and to carry on the work that he started.

Church was never meant to primarily be a place where we go on Sundays to sing songs and hear teaching. The church that the Spirit gave birth to on that Day of Pentecost was a movement of people commissioned to love and serve the world. And this is not one day a week; it is all day, every day. We do need to meet as followers of Christ, but this should be for the purpose of being equipped and recharged and re-envisioned for carrying out the larger mission of the church. Meeting together as Christians is not the point; we meet together to help us stay focussed on the point.

This is why the Spirit is such an important part of the belief system of followers of Christ. We don’t need to understand everything about the Holy Spirit. He is mysterious and our heads will never fully fathom everything about his work in and through us. We simply need to know that the Spirit is God’s gift to us, helping us to become the very best version of ourselves, and to serve the world around us.

Read other sermons in the 'Apostles' Creed' series >>

‘From There, He Shall Come To Judge The Living And The Dead’

The Apostles' Creed - Part 8 of 12

In last week’s iSermon we looked at the ascension of Christ and explored what Jesus has actually been doing these last few thousand years. Today, in our latest instalment in this Apostles’ Creed series, we’re going to take a look at two future aspects to the work of Christ: his return and his judging of humanity.

This is another of the twelve pillars that make up this Apostles’ Creed and lies at the heart of the beliefs held by followers of Christ throughout the ages. Not only have we believed that Christ came, but we believe that he will come again.

Some have taught that the return of Christ will be in two stages: Christ will come and ‘rapture’ those who believe whilst leaving everyone else for a further period of time where they’ll still be opportunity to respond to God’s welcome. Then Christ will come fully at the end of this period of time. This view was popularised by the fictional ‘Left Behind’ series. Unfortunately, this is very misleading.

The idea of multiple stages of Christ’s return - and of a preliminary ‘rapture’ of believers - is fanciful and without true biblical support. Interestingly, there is also very little historical record of Christians holding this view either. It is only recently (last few hundred years) that this unusual belief is known to have been held by Christians.

With that said, the Bible is very clear in announcing that, having ascended into heaven, Christ is going to return. He will return to fulfil what he started. And yes, he will return to judge.

I’m somewhat nervous even mentioning the word ‘judge’ if I’m honest. Christians have developed such a terrible reputation (sometime fair, sometimes not) for being judgemental, that I’m very cautious about even using the word and often go out of my way in trying to distinguish myself from being ‘that type of Christian’. But, as a follower of Christ, it is not possible to take the Bible seriously without also accepting that God’s judgement is something real.

But here’s the thing. Must of us have an incomplete understanding of judgement. If we only have negative associations, then we don’t have a true and full picture of what it’s about. There is a painful side to judgement. There’s no denying that. But judgement - in the true, biblical sense - is also a thoroughly beautiful thing.

When the Bible talks about ‘Judgement Day’, it is about God wanting to put the world to rights. It is about justice. It is about evil being seen for what it truly is. And it is about good being seen for what it also truly is. The judgement of God is part and parcel of God’s grand plan to restore all of humanity - and indeed all of creation - to its original intended glory.

Judgement is both positive and restorative. Each of us will see our lives held up to the light and they’ll be seen for what they truly are. And, of course, that’s frightening. We all know there are aspects of our lives that fall short of all they could be and all that God intended for us be. But the wonderful news is that we won’t be judged purely on the basis of what we did or didn’t do, say, or think. We’ll be judged on the basis that, though we do all fall short, Christ has taken the penalty for that falling short. In other words, there is hope!

Even though our lives have not been all that they could or should be, through Christ we still find acceptance in God’s eyes. We should be afraid of seeing all our shortcomings exposed (and that should motivate us with how we live our lives now), but we can face judgement without fear of rejection. In Christ we are welcome and accepted.

Before wrapping this weeks piece up, we do need to explore one other aspect to God’s judgement. All those who are ‘in Christ’ will face the judgement that we’ve looked at. But before this judgement, there is separation that takes place. This is the moment where God reveals just how far he’s prepared to go in giving us freedom. And those who wilfully and intentionally choose to reject the welcome and forgiveness and salvation that God offers through Jesus, will be separated from those who embrace it.

Whatever differing views there may be around the idea of ‘hell’, in essence it is this being permanently separated from God that is hell. To be separated from God like this is to be separate from the source of true, eternal life. God’s love goes so far however that he refuses to force his forgiveness and acceptance upon us. And so we are free to reject Christ. But this separation will be the outcome.

It is worth finishing by emphasising once again that God’s judgement is part of his over-arching plan to restore humanity and creation to its original glory. It is about God remaking our flawed, sinful, diseased world and making it whole again. It is about destroying all that is evil and dark and allowing the light and love of God to permeate everything. And this simply isn’t possible without judgement. Our world cannot be made whole if evil is not judged.

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‘He Ascended Into Heaven And Sits At The Right Hand Of God The Father Almighty’

The Apostles' Creed - Part 7 of 12

After the resurrection comes the ascension. Most people who are familiar with the teachings of the Christian faith have a good understanding of the birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Not only that, most are familiar with the teaching that Christ will come again. But when it comes to the ascension, our familiarity and understanding drops dramatically.

Have you ever wondered what Jesus has been doing for the last two thousand years? We know lots about what happened in his thirty three years of life on earth, but what about since then? Has he been killing time, waiting around? Is there important work he’s been doing? And why so long a gap between his ascension and his return? These questions are what we’ll explore in today’s part of our Apostles’ Creed series.

The ascension itself was the moment that Jesus, having commissioned his disciples, left them to return to heaven. Having come from heaven to earth via a miraculous birth, to heaven he now returns after accomplishing his mission.

And what does he do upon his return to heaven? He sits down. I love this. How many of us, after a really busy and productive day, love that moment when we get home and can - finally - sit down. Knowing that we’ve accomplished what we set out to do, we sit down. We’ve finished what we were doing.

Now, I’m not suggesting that Jesus sitting on his throne is exactly the same as our slumping into our sofas at the end of the day! But I do think it does - in part at least - capture the sense of ‘job done’.

But it would be misleading to suggest that Jesus has been sitting down, slouched in front of crappy Saturday night tele for the last two thousand years! Rather, in the same way that, after winning a battle, and King then sits down to rule, Jesus too, having won the battle against sin, Satan, and death, is now free to rule and to reign.

The author of the book of Hebrews sheds further light on what Jesus is actually doing when he says that he ‘lives to to intercede’ for us. So, having conquered death and ascended back to heaven, Jesus - from his place of authority at the right hand of God - is now dedicated to praying for us and interceding on our behalf. Why? So that we can be ‘saved completely’.

In other words, Jesus’ birth, life, death, and resurrection opened a doorway to God for each and everyone of us. He made it possible for us each to connect to God and find forgiveness and salvation. But that there is an open door, doesn’t mean that we’ll automatically find it or walk through. Hence Jesus continues to pray for us. He prays - unceasingly - that we will find God and find complete salvation. He prays that the eternal life he made available will be received. He prays that the work he started will be completed.

What an incredible thought! Right now, Jesus is praying for you and for me. His love for us didn’t stop at the cross. He gave his life for us in our place on the cross. But even now, two thousand years later, he still has us on his mind. He’s still thinking about us, desperate that we would find and receive the gift of life and hope and salvation that his death and resurrection made possible.

It is worth remembering at this point the prayer that Jesus taught us. He told his disciples that they were to pray: Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as in heaven. This too captures the prayer that Jesus too prays on our behalf. Jesus’ victory of sin, Satan, and death has changed the heavenly reality and dimension of our world. But the victory that Jesus won is a victory that needs to breakthrough from the heavenly dimension to the earthly one.

Every time someone finds God through Jesus, the kingdom of God has broken in a little bit more. Every time a sick person is made well, it’s the kingdom of God breaking in. Every time love overcomes hate, and peace overcomes turmoil, it is the kingdom bursting through from heaven to earth. This is what we are told to pray for. We are told to pray that all the good things of God’s realm would become a reality in our earthly realm. And when we do this, we are actually joining in with the very praying of Jesus himself. What an incredible privilege. We are invited to partner with Christ himself in praying that what God wants for our world - love, joy, peace, healing, hope, freedom, life - would become a reality in our world.

We live in an in-between time. We live in-between the ascension of Christ and the return of Christ. We live at a point in time where the kingdom of God has come in part, but not in full. Jesus has won the victory, but the news is still spreading to the ends of the earth. And so Jesus waits. He waits for as many as possible to hear the news of his victory. Generation after generation are given the time to hear and to respond to the story of God becoming human in the person of Jesus in order that we might all be able to know God. God’s arms remain ever open. He doesn’t want anyone to die without knowing.

And so he prays. And we pray. And, day by day, the kingdom keeps coming. It reaches into new places, touches more hearts, opens more eyes, restores more bodies, revitalises more minds, and redeems more souls.

This is why we mustn’t neglect the importance of the ascension and the ongoing work Jesus continues to do.

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‘The Third Day He Rose Again’

The Apostles' Creed - Part 6 of 12

Last week we took a very slight detour in our Apostles’ Creed series and took a fuller look at the different dimensions of meaning behind the words life and death when used throughout the Scriptures. Without this understanding, we would miss so much of both the significance of the crucifixion (which we looked at the week before last) and of the resurrection (which we shall explore today).

As with the rest of the series to date, I’ve been keep to stress the importance of the core beliefs outlined in the Apostles’ Creed as being historically founded. Whilst there are many deeper, more theological and metaphorical meanings to so many of these essential beliefs, their power and relevance is founded upon their historical occurrences. It matters that Jesus was an actual human being. It matters that there was an actual virgin birth. It matters that Jesus was actually crucified. And, perhaps most important of all, it matters that he was actually resurrected from the dead.

If an actual, physical resurrection from the dead did not happen, then there is no point to following Christ. Our Christian faith would literally be hopeless. Everything stands and falls on the resurrection being a historical reality. It can be so tempting to focus on the morality of Jesus, or his teaching, or his example, but, important as all these things are, they are not the crux of the why Jesus came. At the heart of everything is the cross where he was crucified and the empty grave he left behind once resurrected. Take these away and you’re left with nothing but man-made religion and philosophy. Jesus didn’t leave that door open to us.

My intent here is not to try and prove that the resurrection happened. There are plenty of great books and resources that explore that in ways that can go much further than this short piece. Instead I want to focus on what was going on with the resurrection, and why it matters.

When Jesus rose from the dead, this wasn’t a mere coming back to life again. The are several stories of other people coming back from the dead within the Scriptures themselves. Jesus was not just another in a line or miraculous risings from the dead. Everyone else who came back from the dead, went on to die again. Theirs was a temporary restoration of life. Jesus’ resurrection, however, was a permanent restoration of life. More than than though, it triggered the defeat of death itself. Jesus didn’t just return from the dead; his resurrection sealed the overthrow of death itself.

This defeat of death wasn’t something simply for him. It (re)opened the door to eternal life for everyone, and the end of death itself. Everyone who puts their trust in Jesus, the Scriptures say, shall not die, but have everlasting life. Again, as was emphasised last week, this is talking about a dimension to both life and death that goes beyond our present physical bodies.

We all know that people are still dying around us every day. Death, on the surface, doesn’t seem to be very defeated at all. But this is why we need to see with the eyes of faith. How? By looking at Jesus. Jesus overcame death, received a new body, and became the first to receive what we will all, in time, receive ourselves too. His resurrected body is a picture for us all to keep before us, reminding us of the resurrection life that awaits all of us.

The dead in Christ shall all be raised up again. For the time being, our physical bodies may continue to die, but we die with the knowledge that, at the right time, when Christ returns, we shall be raised up. We will receive a new, physical body - just like Christ - that will never know death. And we will spend all of eternity with Jesus on a fully restored, new earth. This is the hope that we have.

This too is why the resurrection is so central to the the movement of Christ-followers throughout the generations. Without the resurrection, the entire narrative of the Scriptures completely breaks down. Everything stands or falls on this one moment. That is why a metaphorical take on the resurrection isn’t a credible option. The narrative simply doesn’t work on a metaphorical level. This is about an actual, historical event - or it is nothing.

It is worth adding that, though we may still die physically before the return of Christ and our being raised up like Christ, eternal life starts now. This is what we looked at last week. Eternal life is not simply for the next life. It is for now. ‘I have come that you might have life,’ said Jesus, ‘and life to the full.’ The resurrection of Jesus opens the door to that life now; it is just that the completion of our receiving that resurrection life for ourselves is still in the future.

One of my favourite stories about Jesus is the time that, after his resurrection, Jesus went to meet the disciples. They were out on their boats and so Jesus waited on the beach for them. He didn’t just wait though, he starting cooking them breakfast. And when they all arrived, they ate together. This is such a beautiful, post-resurrection picture. It also highlights the physicality of our post-resurrection future. Too many have made Christianity into a message of purely spiritual hope and a spiritual future. This isn’t what the Bible reveals. Our future is a glorious, fully restored, physical one. We don’t escape from our bodies; we get a new type of body. We don’t escape for this earth; we spend eternity on a fully restored earth.

Heaven and earth coming together: that is what the resurrection means.

Read other sermons in the 'Apostles' Creed' series >>