Pondering People

A great time of Prayer Retreat today for the Team at the Bield, in Perthshire. Three reflections to share:

1. For the pastor, there is a paradox in dealing with people. On the one hand people carry problems and pathologies. Their problems haunt and pathologies taunt.

But it is important to see people in the light of the cross and resurrection. That renewed in Christ and by the Holy Spirit, people renewed can flourish and all into the image of God in increasing beauty and splendour.

It is so easy for professionals,  used to working with and helping people, to become cynical and tired in the way we see them.  They can become problems to be managed and pathologies to be dealt with. But ultimately the best we can do is to bring people to the Cross of Christ, at a point that leads them through to Resurrection life.

We need to help people, in their barrenness, recognise the power of the Cross; to lead them into a remoulding and reforming to become those who flourish to the glory of God.

2. Transformation means the inevitable becoming of what we presently are not. This is the reality of metamorphosis: the caterpillar is transformed into the butterfly.

all that we see around us in the present age has a good purpose; but that purpose is regrowth, metamorphosis and flourishing and development into that which we do not yet see. As the place of God's rule grows within us, so too our ability to see temporality, transience and contingency in everything that is in the present.

3. Fulfilment lies in grasping the paradox of self-denial.

The greatest help we can be to one another is to encourage the search towards deeper obedience to God's rule; and to confirm the truth of the Scripture in what God is saying.

Yet disobedience is not the primary problem.  The greatest danger to ourselves is self-hate and the pathology of guilt. This we must die to, in order to find life abundant.

Whenever we lose this sense of paradox, there we lose something of the truth that is the way of Christ.

A good reason

Ovr the next few weeks I will be preaching on the value of being a baptist Christian. So here are some intitial thoughts.


I rejoice in the simplicity of baptism. The symbol of Christian baptism of the believer by full immersion in water, where the man or woman has come to recognise Jesus as the coming of God among us, cannot be overstated.


In some evangelism, there can be a great emphasis on the forgiving power of Jesus' death on the Cross. And this is absolutely right. With some others, the stress is on the Father's love for us. Essential. And for some , there is a stress on how Jesus can and does pour out the Holy Spirit into our lives. Amen!



But none of these, taken by themselves, is a sufficient explication of the Gospel of Jesus, which is the good news of the Kingdom of God come to earth. Each of forgiveness, love and empowerment is a 'primary colour' of the Gospel; but any one isolated from the others is less than the full Gospel. Something else is needed to bring it together. And that is believer's baptism.


The act of Christian Baptism of the new disciple by full immersion in water signifies and conveys, more than any other symbol can, what it means to be fully integrated into the life of Christ. We are called not just to believe about Jesus. We are called into Jesus: into His life through His death and resurrection.


This has certain implications for us. We believe in the responsibility and freedom of every person to make their own response to the invitation to belong to Jesus - the freedom to embrace Him or - tragically - to reject Him. 



But if a person embraces Jesus, we recognise that they are part now of something bigger than themselves, and that discerning the will and way of God together in Christ is very important for us. We believe in discerning and confirming the will of God together, not just individually, trsting all in the light of Scriptural truths and insights.


A resolution to be different by being Christ's ambassadors. Not defined by institution, or ceremony, or traditions, or buildings, or creeds. But walking together with Jesus in our hearts, the Bible in our heads, and our hands held together, embracing a full Gospel. It is good to be a baptist, facing the future with confidence and focussing on our hope through union with Christ.

Empowered

Commissioned

Loved

Forgiven

Identity

Tales from churches 1

This is the first of many quick interviews with pastors, as I travel around Scotland. This one is with Steve, the pastor of Wigtown Baptist Church

Full faith

As I travel around Scotland, I am aware of something. There is, Biblically, a real fullness to faith that has four aspects:

•   Repentance 
•  Knowledge of God's Forgiveness
•  Experience of God's love 
•  Empowerment in the Holy Spirit 

  But often, most noticeably in the hymnody  used, mention of the first is missing. It is good to know and to emphasise both forgivess and love, although there can sometimes be much said about one and not the other. And how can there be any sustained sense of victory without empowerment in the Holy Spirit? It would be good to see a healthy grasp of these four aspects of faith throughout the churches in Scotland. For where any one of these is missing there is something less than full Gospel.