Archive for worship

Angels

October 22, 2009 at 9:25 pm · Filed under New Testament, Old testament, worship ·Tagged , ,

 

depiction of a seraph from a mediaeval manuscript

“Are not all angels ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation?” Hebrews 1: 14

 The other day I was walking past a little “New Age”-type shop in the town which often has dubious items in its window. (Some weeks ago there was a display of items connected with witchcraft – occult books, magic wands, crystal balls, etc.) What caught my eye the other day a was a display all about angels – or rather “Angel Therapy”. Apparently a lady by the unlikely name of Doreen Virtue has made this her speciality. She has cornered the market on “angels” and has written books about how you can contact your guardian angel and get help from them. You can buy special Angel Cards which are used rather like Tarot cards to tell fortunes.

I know that none of you would ever have anything to do with such occult rubbish as this. Don’t be misled by the word “Angels” – it really has nothing to do with the angels in the Bible, or not with the good ones anyway. (There are, of course, fallen angels or demonic spirits and it is far more likely to be connected with them.)

So realizing that such a thing as “Angel Therapy” is now quite popular in some circles I thought it was a good idea to look once again at what the Bible has to say about angels. (Looking into my sermon records I see it was eleven years ago when we last looked at this topic.)

People sometimes say, “Do you belive in angels?” And I feel like answering, “Yes, I believe in angels – but not necessarily the same as the angels you believe in. I depends what you mean by “angels”.

Well, what does the word “angel” conjure up for you? If you say someone is an angel you mean they are a very good person or a very caring person. Nurses are often called angels. If you say a little girl looks like an angel you probably mean she is pretty and has fair hair. If you say a child is an angel you mean they are well behaved.

For many people angels are confused with fairies. They don’t distinguish between the former which is a powerful spiritual being mentioned in the Bible and the latter which is entirely fictional. They think of some kind of delicate creature, usually female, with wings. Our ideas have been conditioned by illustrations in fairy-tale books, and by Christmas cards as well as by the paintings of the great masters of the renaissance period.

I think we may have to jettison all these ideas and go back to the Bible if we really want to know what angels are. Think for a moment: how would we react if an angel were to appear before us at this moment. Would we say, “Oh how lovely, how cute!” or would we be struck dumb with terror?

I would suggest the latter. Indeed, most times we read about angels in the Bible, the very first thing they have to say is, “Do not be afraid”. In the Bible people are always struck with awe at the appearance of a heavenly spiritual being.

Let’s try to answer some questions about angels:

 

What is an angel?

Our text says that they are ministering spirits sent to help God’s people. They are also described as fellow-servants with us humans ( Revelation 22:8).

The word Angel comes from “Angelos” in Greek, which means simply a messenger. The Hebrew word is Malak, and that also means messenger.

Here is a dictionary definition: “Angel: a messenger of God, familiar with him face to face, and therefore of an order of being higher than that of man.”

Angels are created beings, just as we are, but holy and uncorrupted. They are moral beings – pure spirits who worship God freely. No wonder that people are always terrified when they meet an angel! Angels shine with some of the glory of God himself. They bring to us a touch of his holiness. Sometimes they are called Seraphs or “burning ones” – a reminder to us of the fact that our God is a consuming fire ( Hebrews 12:29).

As purely spiritual beings, angels exist on another plane than ours. They inhabit another spiritual dimension. But Jesus tells us at the Resurrection we shall be like the angels. We shall be raised with a new spiritual body ( 1 Corinthians 15) and we shall share in the incorruptible life of eternity.

 

What do they look like?

Who knows? As purely spiritual beings angels are not visible to us. How they appear to one another we do not know, but when they manifest themselves to us they usually take human form.

Now, if we base our ideas of angels on works of art, or Christmas cards, or children’s nativity plays we might they are delicate, fairy-like, female creatures. (It’s always the little girls who get to play the angels in the nativity play – never the little boys!) But in the Bible, on every occasion the angel appears in the form of a man, with or without wings. In Mark 16:5, for example, we read of a “young man in a white robe” appearing at he tomb of the risen Jesus. On other occasions the angel is always referred to as “he”.

As far as I know ther is only one reference in the Bible to angels taking a female form, and that was in a vision or dream. The prophet Zechariah had a vision of two angelic creatures in the form of women with wings like those of a stork (Zechariah 5:9).

However, although may use a masculine personal pronoun when speaking of an angel but that does not mean they are men. Because angels are without a biological body they do not have a gender – you do not think of them as male or female.

As for the idea of angels having wings, this seems to have come from Isaiah’s vision of the seraphim crying “Holy, holy, holy!”

“I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him were seraphs, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. And they were calling to one another: “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory.” (Isaiah 6:1-3)

It is interesting to note that they had six wings, not two. Why then are angels usually depicted as creatures with two wings?

 

What do angels do?

One of their tasks is to bring messages from God. Sometimes messages of good news and sometimes messages of judgement, or of warning. Sometime it is a summons to action: “Get up, get going!” For example:

· to Gideon: “Arise and go in thy might”.

· to Elijah: “Arise and eat”.

· to Joseph of Nazareth: “Go quickly”.

· to Philip: “Arise and go”.

It’s all a bit monotonous really – but then, a fire alarm is monotonous!

Sometimes the angels help God’s people in times of trouble. For example, when Elijah was worn out and depressed after the contest on Mount Carmel, the Angel of the Lord came and strengthened him.

Some angels watch over Gods people and preserve them from harm. These are known as guardian angels. In Daniel 10 we read that each a nation has its guardian angel. And Jesus refers to the guardian angels of children: “See that you do not look down on one of these little ones. For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven.” (Matthew 18:10 )

According to Hebrews 2, the angels were active in the giving of the Law to Moses.

In the Book of Revelation it is the angels who will execute God’s final judgement.

 

How many angels are there?

Perhaps God only knows the answer to that one. There must be far more than we can imagine – Daniel 7: speaks of “myriads upon myriads”. But their number is still finite: only God is infinite.

 

How may different types are there?

Again we do not really know, but we do read of various types of angels in the Bible:

 

Cherubs (or Cherubim)

The image suggested by the word cherub is probably of a chubby, red cheeked child. That is how cherubs are depicted in the paintings of Raphael and other Renaissance artists. This image owes more to the pagan Roman Cupid than to the Bible.

Cherubs in the Bible are very different. They are the angels who guard God’s presence. Two statues of cherubs were placed above the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies.

When Adam and Eve were driven out of the Garden of Eden cherubim prevented them from returning: “So the LORD God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.” ( Genesis 3:24)

 

Seraphs (or Seraphim)

These seem to have a similar role to cherubim and they also worship God without ceasing.

We have already referred to guardian angels.

 

Destroying angels

At various times in the history of Israel God would bring his judgement upon the nation and send his destroying angel. The Angel of the Lord Very often the angel sent by God is referred to in these terms.

Sometimes the Angel of the Lord even seems to be a manifestation of God himself – a pre-incarnation manifestation of God the Son or an appearance of the Holy Spirit. If this is so then we are not talking of an angel here but of God himself.

 

Angel Gabriel

According to Jewish tradition there are four archangels: Gabriel, Michael, Raphael and Uriel. But in the Bible only the first two are named, and only Michael is said to be an Archangel.

 

Archangel Michael

He is the guardian angel of the people of Israel.

Reference is made in several places to various ranks of angels, but we haven’t got time to go into these now.

And then there are the fallen angels: Satan and his demons. This will be the subject of another sermon.

But going back to the good angels:

 

How do they work?

Once again we don’t really know. Often their ministry is secret and invisible. Billy graham has written a book entitled “Angels: God’s Secret Agents”. There are many instances, even today, when people have had food provided apparently miraculously, or have been saved from danger by what seems to be angelic intervention.

Only on occasions of supreme significance in the history of our salvation do angels reveal themselves. For example: in the life of Jesus. Angels ministered at his birth, his temptation, at the Garden of Gethsemane, at the Resurrection and at the Ascension.

 

Why are angels so often unseen?

Perhaps it is because if we could see them we would be tempted to worship them, as John was in the Book of Revelation:

I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. And when I had heard and seen them, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who had been showing them to me. But he said to me, “Do not do it! I am a fellow servant with you and with your brothers the prophets and of all who keep the words of this book. Worship God!” ( Revelation 22:8-9 )

In the Early Church there were some groups who worshipped angels. The Letter to the Hebrews was written to combat this heresy. In it the writer compares Christ to the angels and stresses his superiority over them.

 

Why do people so often misrepresent angels?

Why do they persist in seeing angel as fairy-like creatures? It’s surely because every picture they have seen in the media, in books, in popular art has been influenced by the art of the renaissance. This in turn has come down from images of Greek and Roman Pagan gods in classical art. If people read the Bible they would have a much better idea of what angels are.

 

Conclusion

Why should we think about angels? You might be thinking, “This is all a bit theoretical. What practical help is it to the Christian life?” A great deal, I would say.

Angels are holy and awesome beings who reflect God’s holiness and power. Read all the passages in the Bible about angels and you will inevitably be led to think about God’s holiness and to worship him.

Too often we let our worship sink to the merely human, mundane level. But we don’t just come to church to feel better, or to be entertained, or to meet people. We come to worship and honour God.

Often nowadays, in many churches in Wales, it is a small group of ten or less people gathering to worship. For them it is a great source of encouragement to know that the glory of God in worship does not depend on the number of people attending. However small our congregation we know we are joined by countless millions of angels in our worship of God. Let us be encouraged as we remind ourselves that our faith is not just of this world.

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Gehazi’s Greed

February 23, 2009 at 4:42 pm · Filed under Materialism, Old testament, worship ·Tagged , , ,

Elisha refusing Naaman’s gift

by Pieter de Grebber

 

2 Kings 5:15-27

 In our last sermon we heard of Naaman, a proud commander of the Syrian army who was healed of his leprosy when he humbled himself and washed in the river Jordan. Today we shall see the continuation of the story – and what a contrast! The story moves from the nobility and faith of Naaman to the grasping and money-grubbing of Gehazi the servant of Elisha.

 

 Gratitude

It starts, however, with gratitude. As soon as Naaman realised he had been cured of his leprosy, he went back to Elisha and said:

Now I know that there is no God in all the world except in Israel. Please accept now a gift from your servant. The prophet answered, As surely as the LORD lives, whom I serve, I will not accept a thing. And even though Naaman urged him, he refused. ( 2 Kings 5:15b-16)

Now this seems churlish of Elisha . Why couldn’t he accept the gift with good grace and then give the money to the poor? (In fact, you might think that Elisha behaves churlishly all through this story.) But there is a reason for his refusing the silver and fine garments. True, Elisha was a poor man and he could have lived much more comfortably if he had accepted Naaman’s gift, but Elisha’s poverty was voluntary. He had no desire for gold and silver, fine clothes and a comfortable life-style. What Elisha wanted to do was to convey a message – that Gods blessings were gifts of grace. You can’t buy them. He wanted Naaman to realise this fact. He didn’t want Naaman to think that he had paid for God’s favour with his money – it was a free gift.

It appears that Naaman was not offended by Elisha’s refusal. He was so thankful that he resolved only to worship the Lord, the God of Israel. Never again would he offer sacrifices to any other God.

Please let me, your servant, be given as much earth as a pair of mules can carry, for your servant will never again make burnt offerings and sacrifices to any other god but the LORD. (2 Kings 5:17)

So what did he want this soil for? It wasn’t for his garden! No, he wanted to worship the God of Israel upon the soil of the Holy Land. In his way of thinking, you worshipped a god on his own turf. Each god was restricted to a particular area or nation. So if he wished to worship the God of Israel, then he would need some of the Land of Israel on which to stand while he worshipped. Naaman had not yet come to the realisation that there was only one true God, and that he could be worshipped anywhere.

We might be amused at Naaman’s simplicity – our conception of God is so much more sophisticated. But then, we have the revelation of the whole Bible, Old Testament and New. We have the words of Jesus telling us that God is spirit and that he is to be worshipped in spirit an in truth. He can be worshipped anywhere. Any land can be the Holy Land, any ground is holy ground to the child of God. Naaman did not realise this – his conception of God was more primitive. He wanted to take his mule-loads of soil home so that he could spread it out on the floor in his private chapel. And there he could worship the God of Israel upon the soil of Israel.

Elisha is not averse to this plan. No doubt he hopes that Naaman will find true salvation in worshipping the God of Israel in his own way. But then, Naaman says something which sounds suspect:

But may the LORD forgive your servant for this one thing: When my master enters the temple of Rimmon to bow down and he is leaning on my arm and I bow there also— when I bow down in the temple of Rimmon, may the LORD forgive your servant for this. (2 Kings 5:8)

“Go in peace,” says Elisha. He does not condemn Naaman for what would seem to us to be a total compromise of his faith. To go into a pagan temple and to bow down to the idol there! How can this be countenanced? But then Elisha knew the situation better than we do. Naaman was chief military man of the King of Syria. He had important official and ceremonial duties. One of these was that the had to accompany his master into the Temple of Rimmon. His master leant on his arm and, together, they were supposed to bow to the statue of the god Rimmon. How could Naaman avoid doing this? How could he remain upright while the King bowed? How could he refuse to go into the Temple? How could he fail in his ceremonial duties? To do so would anger the King and possibly result in Naaman’s death. At the very least he would lose his position. I think Elisha saw how important it was for a man like Naaman to retain his official position. So he refrained from judging him.

We must realise that at this stage Naaman is not a strong believer in the God of Israel. He knows very little about his new God except that he had been healed through his power. In time, perhaps, he will come to a deeper understanding of discipleship. So he sets off in peace.

 

Greed

But all this was too much for Gehazi, the servant of Elisha . He couldn’t bear to see all that lovely money disappearing.

Gehazi, said to himself, My master was too easy on Naaman, this Aramean, by not accepting from him what he brought. As surely as the LORD lives, I will run after him and get something from him. ( 2 Kings 5:20)

“My master’s a fool. This man wants to give us money and he refuses it! At the very least I’ll get some for myself.” To those of a worldly frame of mind Gehazi’s way of thinking seems quite justifiable. Why not make a quick buck while you can?  I can’t help thinking that it is that kind of attitude on the part of certain people in the world of high finance that has got us to our present economic crisis.

I read recently about an evangelist in South America who held a huge evangelistic campaign in a certain town. Thousands of people came, hundreds were converted and many were healed or delivered of evil powers. But the local pastors criticised the evangelist for not taking up a collection at these meetings. He was, they thought, missing a God-given opportunity. The people were really grateful, they were willing to give. It would be criminal not to take money. But the evangelist had the same kind of attitude as Elisha. He didn’t want to charge people for God’s grace. It was a free gift.

Gehazi might have thought he was being reasonable but by his actions next he jeopardised the good name of his master Elisha and even brought the name of the Lord into disrepute. So Gehazi hurried after Naaman.

When Naaman saw him running towards him, he got down from the chariot to meet him. Is everything all right? he asked. Everything is all right, Gehazi answered. My master sent me to say, ‘Two young men from the company of the prophets have just come to me from the hill country of Ephraim. Please give them a talent of silver and two sets of clothing.’ By all means, take two talents, said Naaman. He urged Gehazi to accept them, and then tied up the two talents of silver in two bags, with two sets of clothing. He gave them to two of his servants, and they carried them ahead of Gehazi. ( 2 Kings 5:21-23)

Naaman is still grateful – he offer two talents of silver (about 150 pounds weight of silver). This was quite a sum of money – enough to buy a house or an olive grove. But Naaman is only to glad to pay for his healing. Imagine now, some of Naaman’s servants going back home and being asked, “How much did your master pay for his cure?” “Two talents of silver”, they would say. “That seems very reasonable,” the other servants would say – thinking that Elisha had charged for God’s gift. That was exactly what Elisha had wanted to avoid.

Notice also how Gehazi compounds his sin by lying. He makes up some story about two needy servants of God from the back country who need financial help. He plays on Naaman’s generous nature. And that’s what happens today sometimes. It’s not unknown for missionaries to exaggerate the need so they can get more money for their mission. Sometimes the whole thing is a scam, a made up story to get money. How such scams dishonour God. And this is just what Gehazi was doing – he was scamming. He didn’t intent to give any of this wealth to any other person. It was pure greed.

And now we have an anomaly. As far as we know, Gehazi had been an exemplary servant before this time. He served is master well and did everything he was supposed to do. But his heart was not right with God. He lived in the household of a man of God but he himself was not converted. He had even had a part to play in the performance of a mighty miracle when Elisha had raised a boy from the dead. Gehazi had seen God’s power at work but his heart had not been changed. It’s a solemn thought that you can see God’s power at work in people’s lives and not be moved. You can hear the gospel and not respond to it. You can be a member of a church, or even a church officer or minister, and still not be truly converted. You can grow up in a godly household and still not be a child of God. Gehazi was that kind of person – an unspiritual man.

 

Punishment

Gehazi accepted the silver and then took steps to hide it away. And then he went and stood before his master, as if nothing had happened.

Then he went in and stood before his master Elisha. Where have you been, Gehazi? Elisha asked. Your servant didn’t go anywhere, Gehazi answered. But Elisha said to him, Was not my spirit with you when the man got down from his chariot to meet you? Is this the time to take money, or to accept clothes, olive groves, vineyards, flocks, herds, or menservants and maidservants? Naaman’s leprosy will cling to you and to your descendants for ever. Then Gehazi went from Elisha’s presence and he was leprous, as white as snow. (2 Kings 5:25-27)

 Gehazi thought he was so clever, and his master was so stupid. So heavenly minded he was no earthly good. But Elisha could see, he was no fool. He had the gift of knowledge from God. He was far more wise and discerning and shrewd than Gehazi. He knew what his servant had been up to and pronounced God’s judgement on him.

We might think Gehazi’s punishment was severe but it seems to have only been a mild form of leprosy. (In later chapters he is at he court of the King of Israel recounting the mighty deeds Elisha had done. So the punishment could not have been that severe.) It probably had a salutary effect on his spiritual state. (It might not have even been leprosy as we know it today. In Hebrew the word for leprosy was used for a variety of skin diseases which made people ritually unclean.)

 

A lesson

Surely, the main lesson from this sorry incident is that it’s all to easy for us to be worldly-minded. The worldly individual always thinks he is wiser than the spiritual person. Just as Gehazi thought his master was stupid. But in the end it was Gehazi who was the fool. In the end it will be the spiritually minded people who will inherit eternal life. As the Apostle Paul writes in Romans:

To be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Romans 8:6 (AV)

Or in a modern version: The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace; (NIV)

And as the hymnwriter John Newton puts it:

Fading is the worldling’s pleasure, all his boasted pomp and show; solid joys and lasting treasure, none but Zion’s children know.

Greed and the love of money can cause great spiritual harm, as Paul tells us:

People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs. (1 Timothy 6:9-11)

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Reformation

November 13, 2008 at 5:04 pm · Filed under Christian living, New Testament, worship ·Tagged , ,

 

Romans 3:19-28,  Jeremiah 31:31-34

If I were to ask you what day it was last Friday I don’t think any of you would have difficulty saying Hallowe’en. (Perhaps the more erudite might say “the Eve of All Saints Day”). We always know the 31st. October as Hallowe’en but it was only fairly recently that I realised it is also Reformation Day. How can this be?  We are Protestants, members of the Presbyterian or Reformed churches -  how is it that we don’t know that this day is Reformation Day? Why have we allowed it to be hijacked by trick and treat and all the other dubious hallowe’en activities?

It was on 31st October, the eve of All Saints Day in 1517, that Martin Luther posted his famous 95 Theses to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg. In those days the church door functioned as a kind of public notice board ( for those who could read). All kinds of public notices were nailed to the church door. So Martin Luther’s action was not the act of vandalism it might at first seem to be to us!

But why did Luther post this notice on Hallowe’en? Well, on the eve of All Saints Day the Castle Church was open to the public. People came to view the large collection of relics of the saints which were held there. It was believed that if you viewed these relics you could obtain a reduction in the time you would spend in Purgatory. In fact it was considered equivalent to buying an indulgence for your sins. So there was a significance in Luther choosing that day to put up his notice.

Well, I’m not going to go into Luther’s 95 Theses now, but I do want us to think about what the Reformation stands for. What does it mean to be a Protestant? In what ways do we differ from our Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox brothers and sisters? In what I am now going to say I do not want anyone to see it as some kind of attack on non-protestants. It’s just that I believe strongly that we ought not to be ashamed of what we believe as Protestants. In these ecumenical times you quite often hear people expressing regret for the Reformation – as if it was an unnecessary splitting up of Christendom. Well, I don’t regret it. It was a necessary return to Biblical truth at a time when the Church had lost its way.

Discarding the untrue

Reformation is about discarding those things which are not Biblical, and which are untrue, and at the same time holding on to Biblical truths which might have been forgotten over time. That is what Luther and Calvin and all the other Reformers were trying to do. And that is what we should be trying to do also.

So what were the things they discarded?

·   The sale of indulgences – you could pay money so that your sins would be forgiven and you would spend less time in purgatory ( it was thought).

·  The doctrine of Purgatory itself – it’s not taught in the Bible.

·  Praying to the saints.

·  Offering worship to the Virgin Mary

·  Praying for the souls of the dead

·  Bowing down to images of saints and angels

·  Bowing to the altar and worshipping the bread and wine of the Eucharist as the actual body and blood of God: the doctrine of transubstantiation.

·  The power of the priesthood, who were believed to be able to forgive people’s sins.

All these things were thrown out by the Reformers. (Unfortunately many of these practices were brought back into the Church of England with the Anglo-catholic movement of the C19th.) You will notice in Presbyterian churches we don’t offer prayers to the saints, or pray for the souls of the dead. Nor do we believe that the bread and wine of the Lord’s Supper actually turn into the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ.

These are the things which we don’t do, but what are the things we do do ? Let’s not be too negative. We might, as Protestants, have a tendency to stress the things we protest about rather than the things we positively stand for. So I want to rectify that – here are the things the Protestant Reformation stressed,  the Biblical truths they rediscovered and emphasized:

 

The priesthood of all believers

Before the Reformation if you wanted to get close to God you thought you had to go to a priest. You had to confess your sins to him. He alone had power to absolve you. He alone could bring God near to you and he did this by offering you the Host – the sacramental wafer which was the Body of Christ.

When you prayed you didn’t unusually pray directly to God the Father, or to the Son. You prayed to the Virgin Mary, or to one of the other saints, or to your guardian angel. They were closer to God – they would act as intermediaries between you and God.

When the Reformation came people realised the truth of the Apostle Paul’s words to Timothy :
 For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. (1 Timothy 2:5)

So, in the name of Jesus you can pray directly to God. In Old Testament times only the priests could enter the Holy Place in the Temple to draw near to God. But now, under the New Covenant, we all have access to God.
In him and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence.  ( Ephesians 3:12 )

We are all priests. Hence the expression: “Priesthood of all believers”.

 
Justification by faith

Before the Reformation you struggled hard to find peace with God. Luther himself had been a monk for many years. He had fasted and flagellated himself and prayed, and yet somehow never got right with God. He was aware of his sins and also became aware that none of these disciplines of fasting and penance could wash them away.

Then, one day as he was studying the Letter to the Romans he came upon this verse:
For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: The righteous will live by faith.
( Romans 1:17 )

Luther realised that it was only the grace of God which could save him. He threw himself on the mercy of God and trusted Christ for his forgiveness. Luther realised these great truths :  no need to make pilgrimages to the graves of the saints, no need to fast on Fridays, no need to flagellate himself, no need to pay the church for indulgences. All he had to do was truly repent of his sins and trust in Christ. This is the great liberating truth of our faith -  Jesus saves.

 
Centrality of the Bible

“Scriptura sola” -  the Bible alone -  was the Reformers’ great motto. before the Reformation you could only get the Bible in Latin. Only priests could read it and only they could interpret what it said. Also the tradition of the church was held to be of equal importance to the Bible.

So, if the Church taught about purgatory, and indulgences, and Mary being perpetually a virgin and sinless, and Papal authority,  these things must be true – even though they are not in the Bible!  With the coming of the Reformation people threw out these ideas as erroneous and returned to the pure teaching of the Bible. They also had it translated into the language of the people – German, French, English, Welsh – rather than in Latin.

 

The Lord’s Supper as a memorial

Before the Reformation the Lord’s Supper was seen as the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It was believed that the bread and wine actually changed into the Body and Blood of Christ. The priest offered the Body and Blood of Christ as a sacrifice at the altar  – just as the Old Testament priests offered the sacrificial animals. Every time the Mass was celebrated Christ was offered again for the sins of the world. But the Reformers realised the truth of these words from Hebrews:

Unlike the other high priests, he does not need to offer sacrifices day after day, first for his own sins, and then for the sins of the people. He sacrificed for their sins once for all when he offered himself.  ( Hebrews 7:27)

The Lord’s Supper is a meal we share in memorial of our Lord. We take bread and wine as symbols of his Body and Blood. They remind us of his sacrifice on the cross. We do not sacrifice him again.

You won’t find crucifixes in our churches because Christ is not still on the cross. Instead you will see the plain, empty cross – a sign that Christ has risen and is alive today.

 

Conclusion


No, I can’t agree with those who decry the Reformation and seem to want to apologise for it. We cling to the truths rediscovered by Luther and the other Reformers. And a Reformed church is not just one which was reformed 400 years ago – it’s a church which is continually reforming – always looking for new insights in God’s word, and new ways to reach out with the Good News of Jesus Christ.

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Stairway to heaven

July 19, 2008 at 6:54 pm · Filed under Jesus Christ, Old testament, worship ·Tagged , , ,

 

Genesis 28:10-22

“We are climbing Jacob’s ladder,We are climbing Jacob’s ladder, We are climbing Jacob’s ladder, brothers, sisters all.”

These are the words of a children’s song which perhaps some of you sang in Sunday School. The story of Jacob’s Ladder is a popular one in Sunday Schools – I remember hearing it as a child. It has also inspired hymns:

O God of Bethel, by Whose hand
Thy people still are fed,
Who through this weary pilgrimage
Hast all our fathers led.

A lonely exile

It’s the story of a young man away from home for the first time. He had left home in a bit of a hurry – in order to escape the wrath of his brother. For Jacob had stolen  his father’s blessing from  his older brother Esau.

Let’s make no bones about it: Jacob was a cheat. Even at birth he was gripping the heel of his twin brother. It was as if he was, even then, trying to cheat his brother of his rights as first born son! So they gave him the name Jacob, which really means “he who grasps” or “he who deceives”.

Jacob was a cheat and he had left home under something of a cloud. He was now on his way to Northern Mesopotamia to live with his uncle Laban. It was a journey of hundreds of miles. Jacob was weary and lonely and downcast that evening as he camped at a certain place for the night.  He didn’t have a tent –  he just lay down where he was, using an oblong boulder as a head rest. 

As he rested his head on his hard and uncomfortable pillow Jacob was comforted by God in a dream.  There was this ladder or stairway reaching right up to heaven. God stood above it and angels were  going up and down the ladder. (Presumably they were carrying the prayers of God’s people to him, and bringing back to earth God’s grace and help.)
The Lord spoke to Jacob: promising that  all the blessings he had promised to Abraham his grandfather would be fulfilled in Jacob and his descendants.They would be more numerous than the dust of the earth and all peoples on earth would be blessed  through them. “I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” (v15).

Awestruck

When Jacob awoke he was  awestruck: “he thought, Surely the LORD is in this place, and I was not aware of it. He was afraid and said, How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God; this is the gate of heaven”. (v16,17)He took the stone he had used as a headrest and raised it up on its end as a memorial. He anointed it with oil and dedicated it to God. And he called that place Bethel – “house of God”.

 (Later it became a shrine – at one time the Tabernacle was housed there. After the kingdom was split in two Bethel became the main shrine for the Northern kingdom Israel. They set up golden calves to worship and the place became a den of idolatry. But that was long after the time of Jacob.)

Jacob was very much aware of God’s goodness to him – undeserved goodness. He had done nothing to merit such blessings. In fact he really deserved to have them taken away for him for all the cheating and deception. Jacob made a vow that if God provided him with food and clothing, and brought him safely back to his father’s house, then he would make a shrine at Bethel and he would give a tenth of all the wealth he earned to God. It seems a bit like trying to make a bargain with God  – something you should never do. But you see, Jacob was not truly converted yet. He had had an experience of God, yes. But his heart had not changed – he was still the same old cheating Jacob. His real conversion came years later, when he struggled with an angel. His pride was finally broken, he submitted his life to God’s will and his name was changed to Israel.  But all that was far in the future.

 

The house of God for us

What is the message to us from Jacob’s dream of a stairway to heaven? Jacob had been wandering in a wild and desolate place – a god-forsaken place you might think. But that place became, for Jacob, “the house of God and the gate of heaven” because there he met with God.

The message to us, surely, is that any place can be the “House of God”.  We may meet with him in a magnificent cathedral or in humble chapel. We may worship at a beautiful shrine or a tin tabernacle We might experience God’s presence on a mountain-top or down in the valley, at home  or in the fields, in the county or on the city street. We can meet with him everywhere. Maybe it was a mistake of Jacob to make Bethel into a shrine, for God had said:  “I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go”. (v 15)

All this is put into perspective for us by the words of Jesus on two occasions in the Gospel of John:

 

1) Jesus the Ladder

In John 1: 50-51 we read of Jesus’ encounter with Nathaniel:

Jesus said, You believe because I told you I saw you under the fig-tree. You shall see greater things than that. He then added, I tell you the truth, you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.  ( v50-51)

Angels ascending and descending – it reminds us of Jacob’s stairway to heaven. Surely, what Jesus is saying is, ” I am the ladder or stairway to heaven”. On another occasion he claimed to be the one way to the Father. Jesus is the ladder, or stairway, or bridge between us and God. Born of Mary, and yet Son of God, he is both human and divine. Thus he brings us to God, and brings God to us. “Emmanuel – God with us” was the title ascribed to him at his birth.

 

2) Spirit and Truth

Later in John’s Gospel ( chapter 4:20-24) Jesus meets the Samaritan woman at the well. They get into a religious conversation. “Where should we worship” the Samaritan woman asks, “On this mountain where we Samaritans worship, or in Jerusalem where you Jews worship?”

Jesus declared, Believe me, woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.( v21) …..  Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshippers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshippers must worship in spirit and in truth. (v23-24).

If you have the right spirit and you know the truth, then you can worship God anywhere. All that is required for Christian worship is the Holy Spirit in your heart and the truth of God’s word in your mind. You don’t need a church or a chapel. You don’t need a pulpit or an altar. You don’t need  hymnbooks or musical instruments. You don’t even need a Bible  ( as long as God’s truth is in your mind). You don’t need to go on pilgrimage to Rome or Jerusalem, or to any other shrine to be near to God. You can be near to  him wherever you are – for God is spirit.

 

Conclusion

This was something which Jacob had not yet realised, but is is the very basis of our faith.  Jesus is the ladder to bring us to God and through him we shall reach heaven.

Through each perplexing path of life
Our wandering footsteps guide;
Give us each day our daily bread,
And raiment fit provide.

O spread Thy covering wings around
Till all our wanderings cease,
And at our Father’s loved abode
Our souls arrive in peace.

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