Hebrews 13:3 (ESV)
Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.

Ayaan Hirsi, author of the best selling book Infidel, has written an article in Newsweek regarding the persecution of Christians in Muslim countries. Have a look and then ask yourself, “What is the Christian response to opposition according to the Scriptures?” We’ll talk a little bit about it next week.

Mark 2:5 -  Jesus words to the paralytic lowered through the roof. “Son, your sins are forgiven”.

Consider  the way Matthew puts this in his account of the same event in Matthew 9:2

“Take heart, my son; your sins are forgiven.”

Why should a man who cannot walk take heart in anything? Well, he has hope that he is about to be healed. But Jesus doesn’t tell him that. He tells him something better. Whether he ever walks again, he has been made right with God through the forgivenmess of his sins. Take heart indeed.

Wow.

With all the nonsense that goes on, what a glory it is to hear this from Jesus. There is plenty going on that causes the believer anxiety and fear and depression. There is much that distresses the heart and that should distress the heart. But we can take heart because our sins are forgiven. What a message to receive from God as we seek to petition Him to help us do the work that He has called us to do. We can take heart because our sins are forgiven and our sins are forgiven because the eternal Son of God came to earth to die for us.
God loves me and is concerned that my heart needs a boost. And what will boost it is to consider that my sins are forgiven.

What are you going through? Have you heard these words from the Son of God? Don’t make the mistake of trivializing the forgiveness of your sins while getting distressed over lesser things. Take heart – your sins are forgiven.

Incredible.
Thank you Lord, for this is very good.

Reading in Judges 4 yesterday and I come upon this:

Judges 4:21 – But Jael the wife of Heber took a tent peg, and took a hammer in her hand. Then she went softly to him and drove the peg into his temple until it went down into the ground while he was lying fast asleep from weariness. So he died.

It’s a pretty well known story, probably because of its brutality, bravery, and unusual way of dealing with one’s enemy. The fact that it was done by a woman grabs our attention as well. What grabs you most about this account of Jael’s act? The fact that she was able to do it? Could you drive a tent peg through a sleeping man’s head? Does her loyalty get your attention? Her deception in getting Sisera to trust her? How about the last three words of the verse?  “So he died”.

Well duh. She took a tent peg and hammered it through his skull and actually drove it right through his head and into the ground. She wanted to leave no doubt as to the success of her mission. And she succeeded. So he died. The text is so matter of fact. It is so massively understated. No fanfare. It is one of the greatest understatements in the Bible. But not the greatest understatement. That is reserved for this account:

Ezekiel 37:7-8 So I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I prophesied, there was a sound, and behold, a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to its bone.  [8] And I looked … .

So, you are preaching to a congregation of bones that have been lying in a valley for a very long time. You are preaching to them because God has commanded it. As you preach the bones start to move. They start to join together. They start to form whole skeletons and sinew and flesh. They are returning to their living humanness. This all happens while you are exegeting a text of Scripture and explaining to – whoever – the truth of the Gospel. Would you look? You’d look all right. Your lower jaw would be hitting the ground. Your eyes would be as big as saucers. Your heart would be be visibly pounding its way out of your chest. But all the text says is “And I looked…”.

Back to Jael.
And Sisera died. Of course he died. His brains are pouring out of its container onto the ground. In the next verse, Jael will tell the commander of Israel’s army that she has something to show him. “Come see this”, she says. As if she has an oddly shaped potato to show him.

So what’s the point? Hard to say. It is more than a little humourous that such a violent act and such a sure way to put a man to death is just recorded as “so he died”. Sisera is not the main point of the account and maybe that is the point. We probably have the story because it is a little unusual and it is a tremendous act of loyalty and bravery. And it shames the men. We don’t need more. Jael nailed him good and he died. Now let’s get back to the main point. The main point? The main point is found in verse 23 with another “so”. “So on that day God subdued Jabin the King of Canaan before the people of Israel.” The whole episode is God at work. Does God nail men’s head to the ground? That and more. God defended His people. God honoured the bravery of a woman of faith. God used her actions for the good of His people. To merely sing the praises of Jael would be to miss the point big time. The whole next chapter of Judges is Deborah’s song of praise to God for the victory that was won that day. Jael figures pretty big in it too. But it is a song of praise to God for what He did.

But the understatement is funny and it is worth mentioning.

John 3:1-8

¹ Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. ² This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” ³ Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” ⁴ Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” ⁵ Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. ⁶ That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. ⁷ Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ ⁸ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

Thanks to Tim Challies for this great quote from A.W. Pink, in his classic book “The Sovereignty of God”

The new birth is very, very much more than simply shedding a few tears due to a temporary remorse over sin. It is far more than changing our course of life, the leaving off of bad habits and the substituting of good ones. It is something different from the mere cherishing and practising of noble ideals. It goes infinitely deeper than coming forward to take some popular evangelist by the hand, signing a pledge-card, or “joining the church.” The new birth is no mere turning over a new leaf but is the inception and reception of a new life. It is no mere reformation but a complete transformation. In short, the new birth is a miracle, the result of the supernatural operation of God. It is radical, revolutionary, lasting.

Here then is the first thing, in time, which God does in His own elect. He lays hold of those who are spiritually dead and quickens them into newness of life. He takes up one who was shapen in iniquity and conceived in sin, and conforms him to the image of His Son. He seizes a captive of the Devil and makes him a member of the household of faith. He picks up a beggar and makes him joint-heir with Christ. He comes to one who is full of enmity against Him and gives him a new heart that is full of love for Him. He stoops to one who by nature is a rebel and works in him both to will and to do of His own good pleasure. By His irresistible power He transforms a sinner into a saint, an enemy into a friend, a slave of the Devil into a child of God.

Titus 3:1-2 – Remind them to be submissive to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work,  [2] to speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, and to show perfect courtesy toward all people.

Obey the law, have an obedient spirit, be ready to do good, don’t malign others, try not to quarrel, be gentle and be courteous. Sounds more like an elementary school set of rules for the playground rather than instructions to a pastor regarding what he should teach. The Christian life, for the most part, is not a matter of miracles and great exploits that have the world marvelling. It is about a changed people who now do as a pattern of living what hardly anyone does even at intermittent intervals. They become law abiding and have a general respect for those who are over them in the various avenues of their lives. They keep their eyes peeled for opportunities to do something good for whoever they can. People like to talk to them because their topics of conversation are uplifting and they leave them thinking that life is a little brighter. They aren’t bulls in china shops. They don’t blow their stack in traffic or scream at the waiter when he gets the order wrong. Their children aren’t cowering in fear when they do something wrong. Their spouses are made to feel like they are royalty.

This is what God calls us to. This is what will turn the world upside down. This is what will attract people to the Gospel. This is what is so sorely lacking in the world today and it is far too sparse in the believing community as well. Want to be a demonstration of the power of the Holy Spirt at work in the world? Pray down a Titus 3:1 lifestyle. Apologize to those with whom you have not been like Titus 3:1. Ask others to pray it in for you as you promise to pray it in for them.

Go change the world today. Don’t gossip. Do good. Be gentle. Don’t quarrel. Obey the law. Obey the boss and don’t gossip about him. Treat your family with courtesy.

Life changing stuff. World changing stuff. God honouring stuff.

James 3:5-12 (ESV)
So also the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great things.
How great a forest is set ablaze by such a small fire!  [6] And the tongue is a fire, a world of unrighteousness. The tongue is set among our members, staining the whole body, setting on fire the entire course of life, and set on fire by hell.  [7] For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by mankind,  [8] but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.  [9] With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse people who are made in the likeness of God.  [10] From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things ought not to be so.  [11] Does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh and salt water?  [12] Can a fig tree, my brothers, bear olives, or a grapevine produce figs? Neither can a salt pond yield fresh water.

Last Sunday Pastor Bell preached from James 3, a text that speaks about how we speak to others. His subject was social media. He did a bang up job. A few days ago I cam across this piece of spoken word and thought I would share it with you. Too bad Pastor Bell didn’t have access to it last Sunday.

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Romans 1:16-17 (ESV)
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.  [17] For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.”

A nice little reminder from Ravi Zacharias regarding the value of multi-culturalism and the giving of the Gospel in a multi cultural setting. The best thing in my view about this whole clip is the assertion near the end that at some point people will become open to the Gospel.

Acts 26:19-20 (ESV)
“Therefore, O King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision,  but declared first to those in Damascus, then in Jerusalem and throughout all the region of Judea, and also to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, performing deeds in keeping with their repentance.

Over at the Gospel Coalition Justin Taylor gives a quote from a speech of Abraham Lincoln’s in 1860 regarding slavery. He makes a connection between what Lincoln said about slavery to the battle against abortion. It is a good argument.

Here is the quote:

You say that you think slavery is wrong, but you denounce all attempts to restrain it. Is there anything else that you think wrong that you are not willing to deal with as wrong? Why are you so careful, so tender, of this one wrong and no other? You will not let us do a single thing as if it was wrong; there is no place where you will even allow it to be called wrong! We must not call it wrong in the free States, because it is not there, and we must not call it wrong in the slave States, because it is there; we must not call it wrong in politics because that is bringing morality into politics, and we must not call it wrong in the pulpit because that is bringing politics into religion . . . and there is no single place, according to you, where this wrong thing can properly be called wrong!

You can find the whole speech here .

As a general principle this is true. If we are for something or against something, our stand should be evident in the way we live and speak. It is true that no one can get involved in every cause that needs involvement. But we can get involved in something.  Do we really believe that people who do not believe in Jesus Christ are in danger of eternal damnation? Then will it not show in how we act towards others and in our prayers?

Or perhaps other issues capture the passions. Poverty, child slavery, religious freedom, spouse and child abuse, cancer, public morality, crime, social injustice, racial discrimination and inequality, war, rights for the disabled … . The list is endless, it seems. For a believer to have a heart for issues and have biblical justification for the concern, is to have an obligation to  get involved at some level. There may be legitimate reasons that keep many of us from getting involved in the issues of the day. But there are many illegitimate ones as well. We do well to analyze our own reasons for our lack of action in the things that we oppose and support in our culture and in our churches.Whatever we think about these things it is a fundamental tenet of Christianity that we prove our faith by our lives.

The Lincoln quote in Justin Taylor’s blog is from a new book by Donald Carson (to be released on February 28) entitled “The Intolerance of Tolerance” . Reading this may be a good place to start questioning our stand on the issues of the day. Whatever Carson writes is usually worth having a go at, and his contribution to this question in our culture I am sure will not disappoint.

In any case, Lincoln’s point is well worth considering as we think about how to live in our culture as believers in Jesus Christ.

Matthew 25:31-40 (ESV)
“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne.  Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.  And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left.  Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.  For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me,  I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’  Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink?  And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you?  And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’  And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’

2 Tim. 2:1 (ESV)
You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus

Here is an interesting little article about the unity of the message of the Bible. It’s all about the grace of God. Have a look.