Rev. Graham Crawford’s Sermon for the Morning Service at St James on 01 February 2015:
The problem
On Tuesday morning I sat down at my desk and opened an email from a friend.
He is another minister.
He had been reading a magazine for church leaders and had come across an article from a minister by the name of Jarrid Wilson.
Jarrid, like many of us, is concerned about the rise in the number of sayings, quotes and platitudes that seem to find their way onto websites such as Facebook.
They sound very nice, often; they sound plausible, even; but also they are often just plain wrong.
Whereas it used to be that, to find your way into print, you needed to have some credibility in order for a publisher to commit time and resources to publishing what you had to say, people now can get published on the internet or quoted on websites who have no track record, no authority and – what is more – often no academic qualifications to back up what they are saying.
The MMR vaccination as a parallel example
Let me take an example from the medical field.
How many of you believe that there is some connection between the MMR vaccination, measles, mumps and rubella and autism?
Did you know that the supposed exhaustive study consisted of 12 patients? That it was carried out by someone who was employed by a rival vaccine company, and so had financial reasons for coming up with any conclusion he could to discredit the MMR vaccine? And that he has subsequently been struck off the medical register because his study was so deeply flawed? And the way he did his research was deemed to be unethical?
You probably do not know all of this.
In spite of the GMC’s efforts to publicise how deeply flawed the study was, there are a number of celebrities and others that have jumped on the bandwagon and, through the internet, they get so much more publicity.
The same sort of thing happens with our faith.
I see so many quotes and hear so many comments which sound plausible at the outset. They are even very comforting at first. Yet they are actually very deeply flawed and do not stand up to much in-depth scrutiny.
Lessons from Deutoronomy
I think in this regard the words of the Deuteronomist are worth hearing (Deuteronomy 18:15-22; New International Version – UK (NIVUK)) –
15 The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your fellow Israelites. You must listen to him. 16 For this is what you asked of the Lord your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly when you said, ‘Let us not hear the voice of the Lord our God nor see this great fire any more, or we will die.’
17 The Lord said to me: ‘What they say is good. 18 I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their fellow Israelites, and I will put my words in his mouth. He will tell them everything I command him. 19 I myself will call to account anyone who does not listen to my words that the prophet speaks in my name. 20 But a prophet who presumes to speak in my name anything I have not commanded, or a prophet who speaks in the name of other gods, is to be put to death.’
21 You may say to yourselves, ‘How can we know when a message has not been spoken by the Lord?’ 22 If what a prophet proclaims in the name of the Lord does not take place or come true, that is a message the Lord has not spoken. That prophet has spoken presumptuously, so do not be alarmed.
In other words, we are always to be prepared
- to challenge what people say in God’s name,
- to test what they say, and
- to consider what they say in the light of Scripture.
If what they are saying is not confirmed by Scripture, or they have taken a word from God out of context, we need to be ready to take issue and to challenge them.
This is effectively what Jarrid Wilson has done with these eight things Jesus did not say.
So here are 8 things Jesus never said
“No shirt, no shoes, no service.”
Jesus never set up conditions for encountering his love.
Regardless of your past, the love of Christ is available for everyone who is willing to accept it.
Simply put, nobody is too flawed for forgiveness and eternal salvation.
You are not to turn your life around and then seek a relationship with Jesus: you seek the relationship first and then pray for help to turn your life around.
This is a warning to us that we should not judge others who walk through these doors into his church.
Another author, who wrote on this subject recently, pointed out that everyone was welcome to come to the church he serves, but, if you wanted to join the church, you had to make some sort of commitment to trying to live a Christian lifestyle.
Come, just as you are, but be prepared to be more than you ever dreamed.
“Follow me, and I will bring you fame and fortune.”
Jesus never promises fame or fortune, yet these are also not things he opposes if used for his glory.
Like many things in life, they can be used for personal glory or for God’s glory.
If your reasoning for seeking a relationship with God is materially-focused because you think it is a pathway to a comfortable life and personal advancement, you may want to evaluate what god you’re really yearning for.
You also have to be aware of the pitfalls of such prestige.
For you can guarantee that, if you receive fame and fortune, your life will be scrutinised to the “nth” degree and there are people in society who take particular pleasure in knocking down those who claim an allegiance to Jesus Christ.
“Everything will go according to your plans.”
Many of us pray to Jesus thinking that everything we ask of Him we will receive.
The reality is that all prayers will be answered, and that Jesus does have the power to fulfil any prayer that is asked of him.
He’s that BIG!
But just because a prayer isn’t answered to your own liking does not mean your prayer has been ignored.
God hears all, knows all and knows what’s best for each of us as individuals.
Take a step back and trust in God, his timing and his will.
He may have answered and that answer might be “no”!
We have to be prepared for his answer and not for what we want to hear.
“I will bless you if you pray hard enough.”
How much we want something is no guarantee that we will be blessed with it.
Jesus is not some sort of Genie that grants your wishes.
If your prayers are more like a Christmas wish-list than a heartfelt conversation with God about your part in his kingdom plans, you may want to re-think how your foundation of faith is being built.
God does not have a prayer meter which measures the number of times you pray about a subject and if you reach a target you will receive what you ask for.
We always have to be aware that God knows what is best for us and sometimes what is best for us is not to receive what we pray for.
He has other ideas for us that may be better for us in the long run.
“Life is going to be without rough patches.”
So many people think that, just because they believe in Jesus, it means everything is going to be flawless and perfect.
This really isn’t the case at all.
You may have a relationship with Jesus, but this doesn’t mean life is going to stop moving forward, tough circumstances are going to cease to exist, and rough times will never be a possibility.
Even though Jesus never said life would be easy, he did say he would be there for you in your times of need.
The message of The Gospel isn’t that life will be perfect, but that, in its imperfection, we have a perfect and flawless Saviour who will walk with us and carry us through the toughest passages of life.
We all know the poem “Footsteps …”, that beautifully illustrates this point, in that God carries us through the most difficult times in our lives.
“I will answer prayers according to your schedule.”
Although God is faithful in his answering of prayer, we cannot expect him to answer every prayer to our exact measurements.
Faith is trusting God even when things don’t make sense, and that includes a prayer that we feel may be unanswered or answered at the “wrong” time.
Faith is trusting in God’s timing, not ours.
Sometimes we do not get an answer in our own time in order that we learn a lesson.
Life as a disciple of Jesus Christ is about making that journey towards being more and more like Jesus Christ and that means honing the rough edges as well as growing in faith.
Sometimes those rough edges are only honed when we submit to God’s timing and realise that his will is perfect.
“You’re too far gone to be saved.”
This is slightly different from the first saying Jesus never said.
Not only are there no conditions to accepting the forgiveness of God through Christ, which was the first saying, but also there is nobody who has strayed too far from having a relationship with God.
No matter where life has brought you, you always have the opportunity to look next to you and see the open arms of Jesus.
The forgiveness and love that He offers is not something we can run from, nor can we become too dirty to be able to accept it.
From the thief on the cross to the mass murderer, from the school teacher to the minister, everyone who turns in faith to God can be saved.
This should be great comfort to all of us, for it means that even you and I can be saved.
“You deserve to have nice things.”
Jesus never said you deserve a huge house, nice car, big pay cheque and a sweet job.
In fact, everything in the Gospel points to simplicity rather than luxury.
This isn’t to say that you’re not allowed to have nice things; just realise that Jesus didn’t promise you are going to be given them.
God’s plan for each of our lives is different, and we need to understand that not everyone is going to make the same amount of money, drive the same types of cars or even live in the same type of housing.
What we need to understand is that Jesus did say we need to love our neighbours, help those who are in need, and that the widow and homeless deserve to be loved as Christ loved the church.
You don’t deserve to have nice things, but you do get to experience the love of Christ, and that is worth more than anything this world can offer.
Do not be taken in by those who would have you believe in a wish-list God who is there to serve us but, instead, be a servant to God, learning true love and service that comes from him.
The need to learn “servant leadership”
One of the key strategies of a fourth class system which is the system at The Citadel where Jamie is studying is the belief that before you can lead you have to learn how to follow.
You therefore have no privileges when you start but as you grow and as you succeed in the tasks in front of you the reward is another privilege.
You might be allowed to wear your hair a little longer or get access to a common room to hang out in with your friends and watch a little TV. You may even be allowed to take a shortcut across the parade ground.
God wants us all to become like Jesus Christ.
That is his vision for us.
But, in order to do that, we have to learn servant leadership which means that, from the beginning, we have to learn trust. We have to learn how to love and then, just as a Citadel cadet will start to earn their privileges, so we will earn ours as we become more and more like Jesus himself.
These things take time, they take effort and they take going through some pretty tough lessons in life.
But, with Jesus walking beside us every step of the way, we can learn, we can grow, and we can be the men and women God intends us to be.
