by John Mason | Aug 27, 2014 | Word on Wednesday
Anti-intellectual? Christianity is often dismissed as being anti-intellectual: ‘No-one with half a brain could be a Christian’. Many in the West reject Christianity, not because they think it is false, but because they think it is trivial. If they think at all about the meaning of life, they want something that hangs together and makes sense of the complex cluster of their ideas, their longings and their experiences. Many simply want a world-view that makes them feel good.
And if we raise the subject of God, people tell us they don’t like the idea of ‘God’ because he would want to interfere with their life and be a kill-joy. ‘God is all right,’ they say, ‘as long as he doesn’t intrude into my space. I’ll call you, God. Don’t you call me!’
We live in a society where there is a complex set of ideas – longing for freedom, belief that this world is all there is, and a relativism of ‘your truth and my truth’. Yet in the cities of the West there is a lingering memory of the God of the Bible. Most people still agree that, if there is a God, there is only one God and that he exists as a spirit – without a body. People also agree that, if God exists, he is love – not someone filled with hate.
Response? How then do we respond to such a cluster of ideas? In Acts 17:22-31, Luke records Paul’s address to the Areopagus in ancient Athens. In Acts 17:16 we read that when Paul first came to the city he was deeply distressed to see that it was full of idols. John Stott commented, ‘Paul saw that the city was smothered with idols. He felt deeply distressed and provoked by the idolatry because it dishonored the name of God.’
Luke records what Paul did: he argued in the synagogue with the Jews and devout persons, and also in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be there. We can’t help but admire Paul – not content just to be an intelligent tourist, taking in the sights and the culture of one of the most remarkable cities of the ancient world.
Paul’s response was to argue for and defend the gospel of God. It is evidence of his impact that the Athenian philosophers wanted to ask him questions: ‘What is this babbler trying to say?’
Two groups took him to task. The Epicureans, ‘philosophers of the garden’, reckoned the gods were so remote that they had no interest or influence on human affairs. Life was a matter of chance. Men and women should pursue pleasure for there would be no judgment, and no life after death. The Stoics, ‘philosophers of the porch’, said there was a supreme god that they confused with a pantheistic ‘world soul’. They emphasized fatalism, submission and coping with pain.
Into this shopping mall of ideas and beliefs Paul came. When asked what he taught, he stood up at the Areopagus and said: “Athenians, I see how extremely religious you are in every way. For as I went through the city and looked carefully at the objects of your worship, I found among them an altar with the inscription, ‘To an unknown god.’ What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you” (Acts 17:22ff).
It was a brilliant opening to what became both a defense and apresentation of God’s gospel before the Athenian intelligentsia. Without quoting from the Bible yet drawing from what it reveals about God, he engaged with contemporary ideas within Greek thought. He pointed to five features about this ‘unknown God’ – features that I will identify next Wednesday.
In the meantime, you might like to consider the world-views held by people you know. You might also consider questions you could ask them, to get them thinking about the larger issues of life and their place within it all.
by John Mason | Aug 20, 2014 | Word on Wednesday
‘Peace’ is a word that goes to the heart of the Christian message. It was the theme of the angels’ song on the night of Jesus’ birth. It is something we all long for. Yet ‘peace’ is one thing the world does not have.
In fact, with the constant news of war and brutal terrorism, in the Middle East, Syria and Iraq, and so many other places, we can be tempted to ask what the angels meant when they sang of peace and goodwill at the birth of Jesus of Nazareth. It is one of the criticisms about the Christian faith from cynics and genuine enquirers. It’s one of the questions that can tempt professing Christians to doubt the reliability of God’s Word.
The key is in the second part of the angels’ song: “Glory to God in the highest heaven and on earth peace among those whom he favors”. They were speaking about the peace God’s people would know – personal peace with God (John 14:27) and peace with one another as God’s people (Ephesians 2:13-18). In Colossians 3:15, St Paul says, Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful. When we, or others ask, ‘Where is the evidence of the fulfillment of this ‘peace’, the answer is, ‘The people of God’.
But Paul knew very well that this peace doesn’t happen automatically. In Colossians 3:12-17 he identifies attitudes and actions we need to develop. He begins by putting his finger on attitudes that can constantly cause tension and conflict. So, instead of indifference towards the pain, suffering and exploitation of others, he says, put on compassion and kindness; instead of arrogance or pride that thinks only of self, be humble and gentle; instead of impatience or resentment, practice patience.
Indifference, pride and impatience. How often are we impatient because we are not prepared to put up with the faults or perceived failures of others? And, how many of us are indifferent to injustice and exploitation – unless it touches us, or our loved ones? We are rightly upset with the atrocities perpetrated by ISIS, especially against people who refuse to convert to Islam, but what of our concern for the teenage girls still hostage to Boko Haram in Nigeria? Or Christians in Palestine, South Sudan, or Afghanistan? And, turning to another example, what concern do we have for the extensive sex-trade networks that are proliferating around the world?
‘Freedom’ a new film (being released in Australia tomorrow) tells a story of the 19th century ‘Underground Railroad’ in North America that brought freedom for tens of thousands of slaves. But it is not just an historical narrative for it opens up a story of Christian faith and courageous compassion for the sake of others. It alerts us to the reality of sex-trafficking today and the need for gospel-motivated action for those being exploited.
At the heart of our attitudes towards one another should be a willingness to work for peace. “Blessed are the peacemakers,” Jesus said. This does not mean that truth is subsumed in the cause of peace. Rather, as Paul goes on to say in Colossians 3:16, we should allow the truth of God, revealed in his Word, to fall upon and direct our relationships, with one another and with the wider community.
The angels song. Returning to the night Jesus was born, the contrast of the shepherds carrying out their work in the dark and the angels doing their work in the brilliant light of God’s glory could not be more vivid. Glory to God in the highest, they sang, and on earth peace among men with whom he is pleased (2:14).
Three themes are set in parallel: Glory and peace, highest and earth, and God and men and women with whom he is pleased. The supernatural realm echoes with joy and honour at the outward manifestation of God’s love (glory). Now men and women to whom God has come can experience the reality of the peace we all long for.
by John Mason | Aug 13, 2014 | Word on Wednesday
We have all been appalled by the events in Iraq over this last week with accounts of the shooting and beheading of men, women and children who have refused to convert to Islam because of their commitment to Jesus Christ. They are truly Christian martyrs.
Our hearts cry out for Christians in Iraq, Syria, Nigeria (there are still more than one hundred kidnapped teenage girls hostage to Boko-Haram), South Sudan, and many other places. And we find ourselves asking with the Psalm writer (Psalm 13),
‘How long, O Lord?’
Where do we look for answers? In the power of western forces? While there is now some action, it is too little, too late. Perhaps one of the reasons for the lack of western involvement lies in the silence of Christians in the West. Over the last forty years our voice has become muted in the public square. We have not been willing to look for ways to ask questions or speak out against the self-interest of our times with wise, clear, bold and reasoned thought.
Consider the opening lines of Isaiah 40: “Comfort, comfort my people, says your God”. Handel’s Messiah opens with these very words. Isaiah was speaking to people who had been brought low by conquering armies. For hundreds of years they had been told they were God’s special people. He had given them their land and success, but now they were under siege by the armies of pagan Babylon. Picture that scene: mothers weeping for their children; people being forcibly taken to another land, their homes and city a smoking ruin.
We can only imagine the shattering effect those events would have had on the faith of those people. The temptation to reject their God would have been enormous. Even the strongest of believers would have been tempted to think, ‘God doesn’t care. How could he do this to us?’
How did the faith of ancient Israel survive? Through the voice of the prophets like Isaiah. His opening words in chapter 40 have a timelessness to them as they speak to people who are suffering in every age: Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. And the tenderness of Isaiah’s words continues in 40:11:
He will feed his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms, and carry them in his bosom…’
How could Isaiah speak like this? When things are going well people tend to forget God. And those who go to church tend to put aside the tough questions. But when tragedy strikes or when your nation, your family, or you, are threatened, the bottom can drop out of your faith.
Let me say, that kind of religion is gutless. In tough times a pocket-sized God is no good to anybody. Only a big God can sustain us. Only a God who can overrule our world when it is falling into chaos around our ears, can say to us, with any degree of credibility, ‘Comfort’.
How can we be sure this is not fiction? Isaiah goes on: The glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken (Isaiah 40:5).
These words were fulfilled in part with the coming of Jesus Christ. Three of the Gospel writers quote this very text. But Isaiah was also speaking of the far, far greater day, when we shall all see Jesus Christ in all his glory. This news about this God cannot and will not be contained: it must be shouted from the rooftops – not just in the cities of Judah, but to the nations of the world, even if in the face of suffering. For here is the God worth knowing – the awesome, true and caring God, who is Lord of all.
Isaiah concludes his great chapter saying that ‘Young men will grow weary; their energy will pass, and their empires will one day be nothing but dust. But the people of the living God will never become extinct.
One of the things we need to do is pray daily for God’s people who are suffering. We also need to ask whether we are being silenced by fear or lack of confidence in God. Jesus warns us that we will encounter challenges and various kinds of suffering. So, let’s pray that the Lord will give us the wisdom to know the questions we should ask and the words to say, and the grace and boldness to speak.
