Friday 31 October 2014

Half-hearted Discipleship

A depressingly familiar problem

On Sunday morning, during a break from our studies in Ephesians, we looked at the first two chapters from the book of Judges, back in the Old Testament.  Judges looks at the events that unfolded as the Israelites got to grips with living in the Promised Land and the other peoples who dwelt in the area.

Sadly we saw that the Israelites are much like us - half hearted disciples, all too easily turning away from God to chase after the tempting attractions of the world around us.  We identified 3 ways in which they (and we) are half-hearted:

(1) They’re Crisis-driven. Most of the time they’re content doing their own thing, and God only gets a look-in when things go wrong.  Even then, normal service is resumed as soon as the crisis passes.  You can’t grow as a Christian if you’re crisis-driven.
 
(2) They’re people of compromise, content to follow God up to a point, but after that choosing to do things their own way, thinking it makes more sense.   All too often, compromise is done out of fear of the reactions of other people.
 
(3) They’re short-sighted.  Instead of teaching their children and new believers about what it means to be God’s people, they neglected their spiritual legacy.  As a result, the next generation fell away into disaster.
 
All in all, it was quite uncomfortable to see how closely we resemble the Israelites at times.
 
But if there is one thing more powerful in Judges 1 and 2 than the foolishness of the Israelites, it’s God’s mercy towards his people.  Again and again he moves to help them, giving them every chance to embrace him as they should, live with him as they should, receive the blessings and joys that he longs to give them.
 
Will we do that, or will we keep up our half-hearted lives of discipleship: crisis-driven, compromising and short-sighted?  And miss out on so very much?
 

 

You had me at hello.

The Greeting - To whom it may concern

The words 'grace and peace' in Ephesians 1:2 might feel like the equivalent to today's ‘Dear . . . .’, but with Paul's words here Spirit inspired, and very quickly bring us to the heart of this letter.

Grace is God's free saving initiative. Peace is what God has taken the initiative to do.

God in grace takes the initiative to build his new community, by bringing to himself those who are
totally incompatible with him. Have you experienced God’s grace?

The peace of God is knowing we are now compatible with God. A peace from the guilt of sin, a peace from the anxiety of the future, and a peace from the righteous wrath of God, a peace from everlasting separation from the love and favour of God. Do you know peace with God?

If not hear these words of Jesus from Matthew 11:28-30:

‘Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon
you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.’

Letter from...? Who wrote Ephesians?


About the Author

Paul is writing as an Apostle, someone who was commissioned and sent to preach the gospel. Saul of Tarsus, a persecutor of Christians who was converted when he had a vision of Jesus on the road to Damascus, is called an apostle. Many today refer to him as the Apostle Paul.

That means this letter to the Ephesians isn’t a first century tweet or blog by someone who has a half-baked opinion on something vaguely topical.

It’s also not a straightforward historical account of the “horrid Ephesians” for us to pore over at our leisure to learn about a different time and culture, then to put down and forget about.

Paul did not volunteer to be an Apostle. He wasn’t appointed by a church or religious organisation. 
The Apostleship of Paul has its authority in the will of God; he was chosen and commissioned by
Jesus Christ himself.

“This is no private individual venting his personal opinions, this isn’t even a gifted but fallible t
eacher or speaker, nor is it even the memoirs of the churches greatest missionary hero. But an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God and therefore as a teacher whose authority is precisely the authority
of Jesus Christ himself, in whose name and by whose inspiration he writes”.

So as we read, we sit up, listen, take note and take action.

Knowing, Showing and Sharing.

Knowing God, Showing God, Sharing God - the truth behind the motto

At RBC, every now and then we might have a theme we explore over a number of Sundays, or even a one-off study on a passage of the Bible that's struck a member of our teaching team.

However, most Sundays you'll find us studying through a book of the Bible together. Just before the Summer holiday season kicked in we finished a year-long journey through the book of Jeremiah together, and in September 2014 we started out with Paul's letter to the Ephesians, where we'll be finding out how God's word sits squarely behind our new Church motto: Knowing God, Showing God and Sharing God.

The recipients

We don’t know for sure where these Christians were from. We call the letter ‘Ephesians’ however many bibles have a footnote which says “some early manuscripts do not have 'In Ephesus'”.

The original destination of this letter is one of the great unsolved puzzles. Various explanations exist, all are at best guesses. The letter could have been a circular and therefore had no designated recipient at first, withPaul adding the personalisation information to the church dear to him.

Paul twice refers to the recipients as  "you Gentiles" (2:11 & 3:1).

These were not Jews who had now come to know Jesus. They were pagans, Greeks, Romans, any non-Jew who had come to faith in Jesus Christ.  This is important because what a Jew and non-Jew experience in coming to know Jesus is different.

For a Jewish Christian the scriptures and the language were familiar, through Jesus they beautifully find their fulfilment.

For the Gentile it was all new, and must have wondered at times “What on earth are they going on about? My friends tell me I’ve got caught up in some little new sect and I’ll grow out of it before long. What am I doing here? Who am I?”

Many of us relate to that when our friends and relatives say:
  • You’re not serious about being part of those Evangelical Christians are you?
  • They are fundamentalists, they believe the whole bible and they try and convert people.
  • They’re so narrow and you have to give them your money and time.
  • I do hope you will grow out of it into a broader perspective on life.”
If this Christianity stuff seems weird and you just don’t get it, then this letter is for you.