In the light of Dr. George Barna’s Reports in February and March this year, I am touching on Bible references that have been foundational and inspirational for me.

The Barna Report in February revealed, “that while 71% of adults” (in America) “believe in the existence of one or more gods or spiritual authorities, far fewer said they believe in the existence and influence of Jesus Christ (59%) or the God of the Bible (40%). Barely half of all adults (54%) said they worship or follow Jesus Christ with only one-third (34%) saying they worship or follow the God of the Bible”.

In this second week in the series, ‘God’s Great Passion’, let me take up another reference that is significant in my ministry: Matthew chapter 28, verses 18-20. In verse 18 we read that the resurrected Jesus said to his disciples, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me”.

Jesus’s words reveal the supreme power and authority over the universe, the whole created order, that has been given to him. He is far superior to all earthly human authority and power that has existed or will exist – be it a president or prime minister, monarch or governor. He is, as we read twice in the Book of Revelation, King of kings and Lord of lords (17:14, 19:16).

On the day of which Matthew speaks, the disciples stood before the High King of the universe. In his words that follow, Jesus set out what we might call his royal mandate: his disciples were to go and as they did, they were to make disciples …

The form of the verb go in the original language is significant: it is an imperative, present participle. It implies that the disciples are to go out, not simply stand still or sit around discussing recent events. They were to go and make disciples of all nations, …

From its outset, Christianity is missional and international. Its message is not just for the Jewish people. All peoples can be beneficiaries of the ministry of the apostles, that is the disciples who were now sent (hence apostles, from the original Greek). We may be Jewish or African, Asian, or European. Jesus offers to all people throughout the world, throughout time, the full and free benefits of his work.

But to be beneficiaries we need to learn of his goodness and beauty, his greatness and his selfless love. We need to be introduced to him and discover just who he is and what he has so wonderfully done for us.

Furthermore, his people are to be baptized in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. In using the singular word name, Jesus is telling us that three persons constitute the one God. Everyone who is baptized is to be instructed, not only in God’s existence, but also his triune nature.

Baptism is the outward mark of a changed attitude towards Jesus Christ and our relationship with God. It signifies our identity with Jesus, in dying to sin and rising to new life with him – as we read in Romans chapter 6, verses 3 and 4.

Furthermore, there is another element to Jesus’s royal mandate: disciples are not only to be baptized, but also instructed in the faith. They are to be taught about Jesus: who he is and what he has done and in turn, the new lifestyle he expects of his people.

The central theme of Jesus’ teaching is that God’s king has come into the world in person. In this age of mercy, he calls on all men and women everywhere to turn to him, the true king, in repentance and in faith, asking forgiveness for the past, and responding to him with love and loyalty.

Matthew chapter 28 verse 19 is Jesus’s very clear commission for the disciples to make disciples of all the nations, baptizing and teaching them. To follow the logic of this, because the apostles would die, the expectation would be that those whom they had discipled, would in turn disciple others in accordance with the apostles’ teaching. Here is the biblical meaning of apostolic succession: ministry that passes on the gospel that Jesus’s apostles proclaimed together with their teaching. It is not the ‘succession of bishops’.

Three themes become evident in the closing scene of Matthew’s Gospel: the King, the Royal Mandate, and thirdly, our task. Every generation is called upon not only to respond to the apostolic gospel and teaching, but also to continue the work of making disciples, who in turn make disciples.

Because the Lord Jesus has all authority, his mandate to make disciples guarantees his own involvement and success in rescuing the lost sheep of the world. His power through the Holy Spirit assures us of this. And so he calls on us to pray and to work as he catches us up in God’s great story.

On this point Jesus’s concluding promise here is so encouraging: “Behold, I am with you always to the end of the age” (28:20). Our English translation always masks a Greek expression that we find only here. It means the whole of every day. Jesus promises to be with us as we make disciples, the whole of every day to the very end of the age. We are not alone.

Making disciples who become disciple-makers is central to our work. Disciple-making ministries build God’s new society. God’s people who are progressing in the faith will increasingly want to know and honor the Lord in their lives, serving him in serving others – in their needs and with the gospel.

In today’s world this is challenging, but we don’t need to be fearful. First Peter chapter 3, verse 15 says: … always be prepared to give an answer for the hope (or the faith) that you have in Jesus Christ. And Colossians 4:6 says, Let your speech be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.

Let me encourage you to pray for three to five people you would love to see come to know the Lord Jesus. And as you do, let me suggest that you will find, sometimes unexpectedly, an opportunity to open up a conversation about the faith. You don’t need to say much. Indeed, if you will pardon a personal note, you may find it helpful to pass on to them a copy of The Jesus Story: Seven Signs. It takes about an hour to read. You can purchase copies through the link in the banner below.

Prayer. Lord Christ, eternal Word and Light of the Father’s glory: send your light and your truth so that we may both know and proclaim your word of life, to the glory of God the Father; for you now live and reign, God for all eternity. Amen.

© John G. Mason

In a report released this week, Dr George Barna wrote that ‘Americans are increasingly minimizing the role and influence of God in their lives—with a minority of only 40% who believe He exists or influences human lives.

‘As a result, fewer American adults put God at the center of their lives, view their relationship with Him as important, or rely on Him for daily guidance.

‘This shift removing God from the center of American life is being seen inside the church, with the role of God becoming less important to people of faith. But the findings also indicate this shift is bringing a dramatic loss of reliance on God among Americans generally’ (Dr. George Barna, Director of Research, Cultural Research Center, Arizona: March 12, 2025).

Given that authentic ministry is grounded in the ministry of God’s Word, during this season of Lent let me identify some texts that have been foundational and inspirational.

Today, let me focus on Exodus chapter 24 – The God Who Rescues.

Background. We learn from Genesis chapter 1 verse 26, that God created men and women in his image: we are the glory of his creating work. However, tragedy entered in chapter 3, for Adam and Eve wilfully chose to ignore God’s specific command and attempted to usurp his place in creation. From that moment humanity became the shame of God’s creation.

God could have decided to destroy humanity and start again. But that would have been an admission of failure. Rather, he chose to follow a rescue plan, at great cost to himself, that was part of his creation plan.

We get a preview of this in the heavenly conversation that took place on Day 6 of creation. In the opening words of Genesis chapter 1, verse 26 we read: Then God said, “Let us make humankind in our image, after our likeness…”

At this point in the creation narrative the style of the language changes and we sense a break between the creation of the animals and the creation of men and women. It is as though there was a pre-cosmic pause while a conversation took place within the Godhead where a question was discussed: ‘Will we do it?’ The language, ‘Let us…’, implies the question, ‘Will we go ahead with this next and final part of creation? The cost will be great.’

In the New Testament, in his Letter to the Philippians, chapter 2 verse 6, Paul the Apostle opens another window on this pre-cosmic conversation. He tells us that the Second Person of the Godhead made a personal choice to follow through the plan that had been set before creation. Jesus’s coming amongst us as one of us, his crucifixion and resurrection, were not God’s Plan B but key elements in God’s Plan A!

To return to Exodus chapter 24. In verses 1, 9 and 11, we learn that such is God’s nature, it is his delight to rescue us from our guilt and shame and open the way for us to share in his glory, as we read in verses 16 and 17. In Exodus chapter 24 there are echoes of Genesis chapter 3 where Adam is described as walking in the garden with God.

And there are further developments in Exodus chapter 24 that we overlook; the chapter speaks of our not just being with God, but feasting with him and enjoying his presence.

Too often our thinking about our relationship with God is limited to forgiveness and salvation. Exodus chapters 24 through 39 reverberate with the language of ‘glory’ and God being with his people. It is an anticipation of the parable of the wedding banquet that we find in Luke chapter 14, but more specifically and grandly, the scene in Revelation chapter 21.

Furthermore, Exodus chapter 24 verses 3 and 12 spell out what our relationship with God should come to look like; Moses is called upon to write up and declare the ordinances and commandments of the Lord.

With this, another important theme opens up. The Bible is not just a record of God’s redemption: it is the instrument of his rescue. It is not enough to read the Bible. We need to understand that God speaks to us personally through his written, self-revelation. His Word opens the window for us as to what it will be like to know him and to be with him. We ignore God or treat him casually at our peril.

Exodus chapter 24 reveals another great theme: How God Rescues. We can only enjoy God’s promises when the consequences of our transgression have been removed. So in terms of the old covenant, Moses was told to splash in two directions, the blood of perfect animals that had been sacrificed – against the altar, symbolizing the satisfying of God’s justice (24:6) and over the people (24:8) symbolizing the covering of their sin.

Some twelve hundred years later at the Passover meal on the night of his arrest, Jesus said, “This is my blood of the new covenant that is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins” (Luke 22:19-20).

God’s mercy and forgiveness are not cheap. Christ the righteous suffered for the unrighteous so that God might see us as having the righteousness of Jesus Christ. The gospel of the New Testament is foreshadowed in Exodus chapter 24: it is the good news of God’s redemption.

It is essential that we keep God’s gospel front and center in Christian ministry today. Let me say, it is being forgotten or seriously challenged in many churches. If we lose the gospel as God has revealed it in his Word, we have no grounds for hope.

If we turn to God in the way he has designed and implemented, we will discover freedom, joy and the hope of glory.

If you will allow me a personal note, let me mention my newly released book, The Jesus Story: Seven Signs.

Given the interest in the stories of people’s lives today, I have sought to tell Jesus’s story with a focus on his works – signs as John the Gospel writer calls them. Following the order of the seven signs in the Gospel, I endeavor to retell each story in a way that sets out the scene and interacts with questions people might have today.

Copies can be purchased from Amazon using the link in the banner below. Proceeds from sales in 2025 are being used for the Anglican Connection ministry.

My prayer is that as you pray for family and friends you might find it helpful to purchase 3-5 copies of The Jesus Story: Seven Signs, to pass on to others who don’t know what to believe, at an appropriate moment. You may want to start by purchasing one copy to read yourself.

Prayer. Almighty God, we thank you for the gift of your holy word. May it be a lantern to our feet, a light to our paths, and strength to our lives. Take us and use us to love and serve all people in the power of the Holy Spirit and in the name of your Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

© John G. Mason

HG Wells, historian and author of The Time Machine and The War of the Worlds responded to a request from The American Magazine in July 1922, to identify the six most influential people in history. “I am an historian,” he said. “I am not a believer, but I must confess as a historian that this penniless preacher from Nazareth is irrevocably the very center of history. Jesus Christ is easily the most dominant figure in all history”.

Why then was HG Wells, and many like him, not a believer? Perhaps it has something to do with what we might call, God’s deep irony. In First Corinthians chapter 1, verse 22 we read: For Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, …

The Jewish people wanted miracles – something that Jesus recognized in the course of his public ministry. In Luke chapter 11, verse 29 he seems to have strangely observed: “This generation… seeks a sign…” I say, strangely, because Jesus performed many miracles. He objected to performing signs because he knew what was in the hearts of people who asked for them: in their pride they thought they had a right to evaluate him, test his credentials.

Significantly, Paul the Apostle not only knew what was in Jewish minds; he also understood the mindset of the non-Jewish world, the Gentiles. They may not look for signs, but they too had a problem which proved to be an obstacle to faith. They believed they were smart enough to explain the world and life: if God exists, he would need to fit into their philosophical and scientific worldview.

First century Corinth was a world not much different from our own. But Paul came with a very different message – a message about a king who came and who was put to death. In verse 23 he writes: but we proclaim Christ crucified,…

It’s not what we would call a brilliant line! But it sits at the heart of God’s powerful message that can transform people’s lives across the nations and races throughout time. It doesn’t sound wise, but it is the only power that can rescue a lost humanity.

Many Jewish people longed for the coming of God’s Messiah who, they believed, would come in majestic glory and great power. For them, Paul’s message of a crucified Messiah was a contradiction in terms. It was blasphemy to think that God’s Messiah would hang, cursed by God, on a tree. And this is what Paul also thought before he met Jesus in a vision on the Road to Damascus.

Paul, a Roman citizen who had been educated in the University of Tarsus, also understood the non-Jewish world. He knew the Gentiles valued reason and philosophy. They weren’t interested in tales about an uneducated man who was put to death as a felon.

Both Jewish and Gentile peoples rejected or mocked the message about a cross. But Paul is insistent. In verse 24 he presses his point: but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength.

The Jewish people expected a powerful Messianic ruler, a great King David. They scoffed at the idea of a crucified Messiah. It is a matter of deep irony that Jesus’ death which seems to be a moment of supreme failure, is in fact a moment of God’s supreme power.

For their part, the Gentiles who prided themselves in wisdom, mocked the idea of a crucified hero. Yet again, it is a matter of deep irony that through what seems to be utter foolishness, the profound wisdom of God is revealed.

Which brings us to an all-important question: In What Do You Glory? In verse 26 he says: Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth.

Are you ever impressed when you find you are in a church where there are successful people – perhaps a top surgeon, or successful banker or financier, a top sports person? How easy it is to focus on people like this. But the reality is, in human terms, not many of God’s people are successful. This was true in the church in Corinth.

Back in Paul’s day, churches brought together people from all backgrounds and with a wide diversity of ability and skills. One of the things that came to be noticed about them was this very diversity – of free people and slaves, of rich and poor, of educated and uneducated.

Paul is reminding us of the way that God’s mercy reaches across our social divides. None of us can claim an advantage with God because of birth or family, position, success or wealth.

And Paul comments that even in this very diversity God has a purpose: But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God (1:27).

None of us can boast about anything we have done to secure a place with God. We are not good enough. Our relationship with God is God’s free gift to us. To quote Ephesians 2:8-9: For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.

However, there is one thing about which we can boast: “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord” (1:31).

Typically, we don’t respect people who boast about themselves. It’s rude and arrogant, the height of pride and self-centeredness. Paul’s words about boasting here are of a very different order. He is talking about boasting in God. In fact, another word we could use for boasting is glorying – glorying in the Lord.

In verse 30 he tells us why: He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption, in order that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord”.

Christ Jesus who died and rose again is God’s wisdom. His wisdom secures our righteousness – our legal standing before him. God’s wisdom brings about our sanctification – the special status we have with God. It is God’s wisdom that purchases our redemption – the freedoms we now enjoy as God’s people – freedom from sin, from the power of evil, and from death.

How wonderfully wise is our God. How amazing is his mercy. The more we get to know him, the more we will want to bring every part of our life in line with him – our hopes and dreams, our joys and our sorrows, our laughter and our tears.

Here is the God who is not just worth knowing about, but personally worth knowing.

Prayer. Father in heaven, whose Son Jesus Christ was wonderfully transfigured before chosen witnesses upon the holy mountain, and spoke of his suffering in Jerusalem: give us strength so to hear his voice and follow him, that in the world to come we may see him as he is; who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

© John G. Mason

As The Lord’s Supper is often confusing, let me step aside from my usual practice of providing a Bible reflection and make a few remarks about key themes that were crafted by Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1533-1556.

Cranmer was used by God to re-form the Church of England as a biblically-grounded, gospel-focused church. He achieved this through recovering the unique nature of the Scriptures as God’s written self-revelation, the development of The Thirty-Nine Articles, the Homilies (sermons on essential doctrines of the faith) and his 1552 Book of Common Prayer – which sits behind the 1662 Book of Common Prayer. To this day the 1662 BCP sets out the doctrine and principles of worship for the gathering of God’s people in the Anglican Church around the world.

To understand the shape of The Lord’s Supper we need first to appreciate Cranmer’s view of human nature which Dr Ashley Null summarizes as: ‘What the heart loves, the will chooses, and the mind justifies. Such is the nature of our broken relationship with God that the desires of our hearts dominate us. When we gather as God’s people our hearts need to be addressed and changed, and that can only be achieved by God – through his Word and his Spirit.

So, at the commencement of The Lord’s Supper, we pray: Almighty God, to whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hidden: cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of your Holy Spirit, so that we may perfectly love you, and worthily magnify your holy name, through Christ our Lord. Amen.

We pray for the outpouring of the Spirit of God on the lives and hearts of everyone present, not on the elements of bread and wine on the Table. The prayer rightly calls down the Spirit of God on everyone gathered in the name of Christ Jesus.

And to remind us of God’s expectations, Cranmer called for the recitation of the Ten Commandments. Jesus’ summary of the commandments is sometimes used today – followed by a response: Incline our hearts to keep this law. Cranmer’s intention was to let the Holy Spirit work through the Scriptures to change hearts.

In the flow of the liturgy, the Scriptures are read and a Creed – a statement of belief – is said. A sermon is given, indicating that we can come only to the Lord’s Table through a response of faith to God’s Word. Prayers are said for the church, leaders in the wider community, and the needs of God’s people and others.

The minister then exhorts everyone with words that echo Paul’s warning in First Corinthians chapter 11, about eating the bread and drinking the cup without heartfelt repentance and a deep desire to live out Christ’s commands.

The warning leads into a general confession, followed by a pronouncement of the promise of God’s forgiveness in the Name of Jesus, for all who truly repent of following their heart’s desires rather than God’s holy law. The biblical ground for the promise of God’s forgiveness is underlined by what are called ‘comfortable words’ (e.g., John 3:16;1 John 2:1-2).

With the exhortation and response, Lift up your hearts. We lift them to the Lord. we are exhorted to lift our gaze to the Lord of heaven and earth. We are also reminded that Christ is not physically in the world. Rather, he is in heaven.

In this context our hearts are lifted up to the Lord on high with words from Isaiah 6 and Revelation 4, known as ‘the Sanctus’: Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God of hosts. Heaven and earth are filled with your glory. Hosanna in the highest – period, full stop.

In Cranmer’s 1552 Prayer Book there is no following acclamation: ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!’ – words that reflected a false theology of ‘the real presence’ of Christ in the bread and the wine. If we read Luke 13:35 carefully we will see that Jesus spoke these words of himself and of his forthcoming sacrificial death. This work was completed once and for all through his crucifixion. Cranmer’s aim was gospel clarity, not ambiguity.

The themes of confession of sin, God’s grace and forgiveness, continue with the Prayer of Humble Access. The focus of our prayer is to the Lord whose nature is always to have mercy…

Cranmer’s prayer of consecration – the setting apart of the bread and wine for The Lord’s Supper – follows. It recalls God’s all-glorious act of redemption that was achieved through the Lord Jesus Christ who, in his death on the cross, made there … a full, perfect and sufficient sacrifice for the sins of the whole world and thereby instituted a perpetual memory of his precious death until his coming again.

The prayer continues, asking that the bread and wine become for us the body and blood of Christ – not literally but spiritually in that the Spirit of God feeds our hearts and minds, with the benefits of what Christ has done for us.

It is important to notice that the sacraments are not administered to give us a nice warm feeling. Nor, as Cranmer’s 1552 Prayer Book makes clear, are they are a re-offering of the sacrifice of Christ. They are not something we do to achieve some merit in our relationship with God. Rather, the sacraments bring us through an outward sign, what God has done for us in Christ. For the true believer in Christ, they bring real spiritual benefits.

As God’s people eat the bread, they are exhorted to Take and eat this, in remembrance that Christ died for you, and feed on Him in your heart by faith, with thanksgiving. And in taking the cup all are exhorted to Drink this in remembrance that Christ’s blood was shed for you and be thankful. As we receive the bread and the wine, we are spiritually partaking of the benefits of Christ’s death. When we truly believe in Christ, they bring us spiritual benefits.

How important it is that when we come to The Lord’s Supper, we have reflected afresh on what Christ has done once and for all time to satisfy in full God’s righteous requirements for our sin and for the sins of the world.

The Lord’s Supper concludes with a prayer of self-offering (oblation) based on Hebrews 13:15 and Romans 12:1-2. With these prayers God’s people are sent into to the world to live for Christ and to change the world through the gospel.

A prayer. Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, equip us all with everything good that we may do his will, working in us what is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.

© John G. Mason

With the elections in the UK and the US last year and upcoming elections in other democracies we wonder about the future. Good and upright leaders are rare. Indeed, while every election shows that no leader is perfect, most people long for someone who will use their position to provide for the security and welfare of a nation. In a fallen world the freedom to elect leaders is important and very precious – something for which we should pray.

When we read the history of Israel in the Old Testament we learn that the prophets spoke of a unique leader whom God would send. Isaiah chapters 1 through 39 reveal God’s condemnation of his people for their self-worship and their disregard of him. Isaiah had warned of God’s judgement and in 586BC the Babylonians demolished Jerusalem and took its people captive. But Isaiah is not all negative, for he opens a window on something new and lasting that God planned to do through a very special king.

In Isaiah chapter 61 we read: The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me;… Isaiah 61 continues by telling us what this Spirit-led figure will do: He has come to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners; to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor; And the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn… (61:1b-2).

It is not until we come to the New Testament that we see the real significance of these words.

For Luke chapter 4, verses 17 through 19 tells us that Jesus, as guest speaker in the synagogue in Nazareth, opened the scroll of the book of Isaiah at chapter 61. He read: The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me,… to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor. Period. Full stop.

He didn’t complete Isaiah’s words: …and the day of vengeance of our God, but went on to comment: “Today these words are being fulfilled in your midst”.

By leaving Isaiah’s words incomplete, Jesus implies that there are two stages to the ‘Day of the Lord’ – the day of favor, and the day of justice. His first coming inaugurates the time of God’s favor, or mercy – the era of God’s rescue operation. His return will be the time of God’s judgment and the establishment of Jesus’ rule in all its perfection and glory. Everyone will see it and feel it.

It’s important that we notice how Jesus applies Isaiah’s words to his public ministry: he says he has come to the aid of the poor, the captives, the blind, and the oppressed.

When did he do this? After all he didn’t provide food and clothing for all the needy around him; he didn’t release any prisoners, not even John the Baptist. Why? Because he has a bigger plan.

Words such as poor, blind, captive and mourn in Isaiah and the Old Testament as a whole, are often used as metaphors. The poor is often a reference to the spiritually poor, the blind, to the spiritually blind, and the captives, to those who are captive to self, sin and death. Those who mourn are aware of their own broken relationship with God as well as the brokenness of the world in its relationship with God.

That said, there were times when Jesus literally fulfilled Isaiah’s words. He did feed people who were hungry; he did give sight to some who were blind; and he did release people who were captive to the powers of evil. In each instance the miracle is a picture of God’s compassion and his ultimate purpose to provide life in all its fullness and freedom for his people. The events pointed to the beauty and perfection of the rule of God’s king.

By reading from Isaiah chapter 61 in the synagogue in Nazareth that day, Jesus assumed the mantle of the anointed servant-king of Isaiah’s vision. He was announcing that the final great era of God’s mercy had dawned.

Yes, he introduced a tension between the is and the yet to be of God’s rule, but it is a tension we need to work with, for it is God’s plan. It’s important that we see this for we need to live with this tension in our lives.

Many around us have thrown God out of their lives and view political power and their own world-view as the solution to the world’s ills. But no matter how good human leaders might be, they will always fail us. How wonderful it is to know that the day will come when Jesus Christ will return in all his kingly glory to usher in a new heaven and a new earth where truth and righteousness, peace and joy will prevail forever.

Before he departed from his followers, Jesus commissioned them with the primary task of proclamation – announcing God’s good news of release to all nations. What’s more, he continues to raise up men and women to carry on this task, to give people everywhere the chance to turn to God. Isaiah tells us and Jesus repeats: ‘Now is the time of God’s favor – the era of God’s grace’. The opportunity to respond to God’s good news won’t last forever.

Now is the time to listen up and to respond. In Jesus we find the leader we long for: God’s king who will come in all might, majesty, dominion and power.

Do you believe this? Are you prepared? And are you keen to help others to be ready for the return of the King?.

A prayer. Almighty God, we thank you for the gift of your holy word. May it be a lantern to our feet, a light to our paths, and strength to our lives. Take us and use us to love and serve all people in the power of the Holy Spirit and in the name of your Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

© John G. Mason

There are many things in life that baffle and trouble us. If God is almighty and all loving, why does he allow pain and suffering, evil and injustice to run riot through the world? From the wildfires in Los Angeles to conflicts in the Middle East and Ukraine, why does God allow us as individuals to go through so many of the things we do?

If we are to understand the trauma and trials of life, we need more than human wisdom and understanding. Abraham Lincoln once remarked: I have been driven many times upon my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go. My own wisdom, and that of all about me, seemed insufficient for the day.

Wisdom. When the Bible speaks of wisdom it speaks of the complex matrix of intelligence, knowledge and power within a moral framework working together towards a good outcome.

Wisdom is the practical side of moral goodness. Because God alone is good, and because he alone has the power always to achieve his goals, his ways are always wise. Wisdom is an essential part of God’s character.

Isaiah chapter 42, verse 21 through chapter 43, verse 7 provides us with two scenes of God’s wisdom. The first speaks of tough times and God’s justice. The second speaks of peace and contains some of the most tender words of God’s love.

Tough times and God’s justice. The first scene portrays God’s people in exile in Babylon. Like refugees today, they were rootless, homeless, and friendless in a foreign land. But far greater than their personal loss was their sense that God had deserted them. They hadn’t believed prophets like Jeremiah; rather, they had preferred to listen to the popular preachers in Jerusalem who had told them that all would be well.

But it wasn’t. In 586BC their city had been destroyed, the temple demolished, and they had been deported. In Isaiah chapter 42, verse 24 we read: Who gave up Jacob to the spoiler, and Israel to the robbers? Was it not the Lord, against whom we have sinned, in whose ways they would not walk, and whose law they would not obey? Where was this only wise God?

Yet against all the odds, God’s ancient people survived. Indeed, no passage of the Bible expresses the renaissance of these people more clearly than Isaiah chapter 43, verses 1 through 7.

Which brings us to a second scene – a picture of God’s wisdom and love. It opens a window on God’s infinite wisdom and power at work.

In Isaiah chapter 43, verse 1 we read: This is what the Lord said, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.

Isaiah tells us that God took the growing embryo of our life and shaped it according to his good and wise purposes. But more than that, he redeemed us. For even though we have denied him and sought our independence from him, he bought us and brought us back to himself, even at great cost to himself.

We find this picture emerging in the Old Testament when he rescued the slaves in Egypt and shaped them into a nation. And when he returned the exiles in Babylon to Jerusalem and re-instated them as a people. But we see the greatest picture of God’s redemption when we turn to the New Testament. There we read that he has not only created us but has also redeemed us through the death of his one and only Son.

As Paul puts it in First Corinthians chapter 1, verse 18 and especially verses 24b and 25: Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God. For God’s foolishness is wiser that human wisdom, and God’s weakness stronger than human strength. Jesus’ crucifixion seems foolish to world, but God in his infinite wisdom planned it.

Presence. God has not just redeemed his people. He promises to be personally present with us. Back in Isaiah chapter 43 we read in verse 2: When you pass through the waters I will be with you;…  God doesn’t promise that his people will be immune from tough times. He says when, not if. Furthermore, he speaks of his people passing through the waters not over them.

For the people of Isaiah’s day, it meant that God would be with them in the land of exile. For us who live on the other side of Jesus’ cross and resurrection, it’s an even richer statement, for we find that God has come amongst us in our pain and has participated in it.

This is the meaning of the manger in Bethlehem, and the cross outside Jerusalem. Christianity is not about a God who emails us sympathy notes. Rather he bore our sin and carried our sorrow. He descended to the lowest parts of the earth to rescue us. Immanuel: God is with us.

No other religion comes near this – a God who comes into a suffering world and suffers with us; a God who comes into the world and dies for us; a God who comes into the world and becomes a curse on our behalf. No other religion has even dreamed of this, let alone actioned it.

God wasn’t just satisfying some passing whim when he created and redeemed us. His plan and purpose, which he has been working out through history, is to establish a people who love him and glorify him.

Prayer. Lord our God, fountain of all wisdom, you know our necessities before we ask and our ignorance in asking: have compassion on our infirmities; and those things which for our unworthiness we dare not and for our blindness we cannot ask, graciously give us for the worthiness of your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

© John G. Mason