A disproportionate reaction is a reaction to an event or occurrence which seems out of proportion to the event itself. People’s reactions to spiders, for example, can be disproportionate to the actual threat posed; people with a real phobia of spiders may scream and become hysterical even at the sight of a small, harmless spider, whereas others may not even notice them! Usually, if we have disproportionate reactions to something, it’s because we can’t see it in a rational or measured way; we are influenced unduly by our fears or by the way we have been taught to see that event.

The crowd’s reaction to Paul’s testimony about God sending him to be a witness to the Gentiles seems disproportionate to us as we read this account (Acts 22:21-30). They shouted and screamed at him to the point where he could not continue speaking; they threw off their cloaks and flung dust into the air. Their speech was hostile (“Rid the earth of him! He’s not fit to live!” Acts 22:22). It can be difficult for us to understand at all why their reactions were so violent, and even if we begin to grasp the historical context of the Jewish people, we are still left with responses which cannot really be rationally explained (because God’s purposes were always that the Jewish people would be a light to the Gentiles and that all people would be blessed.)

When we face reactions that seem so out of proportion – a mother snapping at a child’s misdemeanour, a boss yelling at an employee who is only a few minutes late, a friend bursting into tears over what we thought was an innocent comment – we need to understand that what we see is usually only the tip of the iceberg. Jesus said that we speak out of the overflow of our hearts (Matt 12:34), and reactions or responses reveal what is going on much deeper within us. Our reactions reveal the dashed hopes, irrational fears, anxieties and worries which we may well conceal most of the time from other people, but which ultimately influence us to the point where we cannot hide them forever. If a reaction is disproportionate to the event, we need to dig deeper. What is the underlying fear? What is the real issue? It’s too easy to focus on the actual ‘blowout’ or response. Instead, we need to ask God to search us and help us to understand what is really going on: ‘Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts.’ (Ps 139:23) That way, we can move forward in asking for and giving forgiveness, in understanding what makes us and other people tick, and ultimately in reacting in ways that reflect the self-control which is a fruit of God’s Holy Spirit in us. (Gal 5:22-23)

Some reactions on an individual and political level are also disproportionate: the fierce antipathy towards Christians shown by some individuals and some countries, for example, reflects not only personal bias but a hostility that has spiritual roots, for the enemy does not want to see God’s kingdom come on this earth. Paul reminds the Ephesians that ‘our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.’ (Eph 6:12) We need spiritual wisdom and discernment to understand reactions like this and need to use spiritual weapons to defeat this opposition. (2 Cor 10:5)

For three years I lived in the beautiful city of Oxford as a student, where the vast majority of students travel around on bicycles. Unlike where I live in Yorkshire, Oxford is relatively flat and caters for its many cyclists with cycle lanes; the cycling rate in Oxford is triple the UK average, with 36.6% of people in Oxford cycling at least once a week.

There was just one problem. I didn’t know how to ride a bicycle. This skill, usually acquired by children before they leave primary school, had completely passed me by (which is actually a polite way of saying I had lacked the determination and desire to learn.) I had had a bicycle with stabiliser wheels as a child, but had never graduated to riding solo without them and had managed quite adequately in Yorkshire without a bike.

For the first year I lived in Oxford, I was based in a college that was at a walking distance from anywhere I needed to go and so I walked everywhere. But in my second year, I would live out in rented accommodation, which was further from the city centre, and unless I wanted to spend money on bus fares (which I didn’t have) or spend most of my time walking long distances, I needed to get cycling. So, in the summer holidays before my second year started, I had the unenviable task of learning to ride a bicycle at the age of eighteen.

The principles of learning to balance well enough to ride a bike were exactly the same at 18 as they were at 5 or 6, so what was the difference for me? Fundamentally, the difference was motivation. I now had a reason to learn this skill, whereas before, the indignity of falling over regularly as I learned had seemed greater than the pleasure of independent riding.

My Dad took me to the local park (just as he had done when I was a child) and we started the process again. This time, there were no stabiliser wheels to lull me into a false sense of security. This time, it was just me and the bike.

I can’t remember how long it took, but I learned to ride a bicycle. I learned to balance and pedal. I returned to Oxford and rode on the streets filled with traffic there just like any other student.

Learning to ride a bicycle is considered one of those life skills which (like swimming) is fundamentally important. Both these skills must be learned; they are not natural or instinctive. Some people grasp them more easily than others, but all of us learn to do these things through trial and error. All of us have to overcome fear to do so – the fear of falling, the fear of drowning.

These skills, once learned, become part of us. No matter how long we go between doing these things, when we return to them, we don’t have to re-learn from scratch. We remember how to do them, to the extent that ‘it’s like riding a bike’ has become an idiom for saying that once you learn something this fundamental, you never forget.

In the Christian life, there is much we have to learn by trial and error. A life of faith is not without its falls and trips. We can land on our faces, spattered with mud, just as we do when we first learn to ride a bicycle, and at that point, we have two choices. We can either get up again with God’s help, learn from our mistakes, ask forgiveness when we have sinned and be transformed by the incidents… or we can give up, as I did as a child, preferring the false security of stabilisers rather than the freedom that comes from a learned skill and the freedom that comes from faith.

Paul says that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. (Rom 5:3-5) After a fall, cyclists are urged to ‘get back on the bike‘ and start again. We need to be the same in faith, not allowing suffering and sorrow to be the defining framework of life, but allowing the grace, hope and love of God to define who we are and how we live. Get back in the saddle and get riding!

Resilience is defined as ‘the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness’ and in scientific terms as ‘the ability of a substance or object to spring back into shape; elasticity.’ It’s a word not found in the Bible, but its presence nonetheless permeates the whole book.

God wants to develop resilience in us so that life does not break us or deform us into unrecognisable shapes. He gives us strategies for dealing with the stresses of life so that we can live whole, integrated lives that are pleasing to Him.

Prayer, the truths of God’s word, the virtue from obedience and fellowship (and the encouragement from this) are the key ways resilience is formed in us. As we allow our minds to be renewed by the washing of His word, as we listen for the guidance of the Shepherd, as we learn obedience through suffering and are encouraged in faith by God’s people reminding us of holy truth, resilience and elasticity are grown in us.

Trials, suffering, opposition and persecution can easily dent our confidence, weaken our resolve and leave us feeling broken and defeated. But resilience picks us up, dusts us down and prods us on.

David prayed, ‘create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit in me.’ (Ps 51:10) His actions – lust, adultery and murder – had diverted him from the person God wanted him to be, but the story doesn’t end with defeat and ignominy (and ours doesn’t have to either, even when we stumble and fall.) Steadfastness is the Biblical name for resilience, and repentance and trust the keys to walking this way. Ps 112:7 says of God’s people, ‘they will have no fear of bad news; their hearts are steadfast, trusting in the Lord.’ Being steadfast keeps us in perfect peace (Is 26:3) and the grace of God sustains so that ‘after you have suffered a little while’ we will be restored, ‘made strong, firm and steadfast in God.’ (1 Pet 5:10) Resilience is necessary to keep going, but God is the source of our resilience. We may not have this quality naturally, but we can access it as we hide ourselves in God.

There is a saying ‘familiarity breeds contempt’, and in church circles, this can mean that we become so used to Biblical truth that we fail to appreciate the radical nature of the gospel and can lose focus and become distracted. Our goal as Christians should be to praise and glorify God and to teach and preach the gospel, making disciples of all nations. Dave spoke tonight from 2 Cor 5:17, a verse that reminds us that we are new creations in Christ Jesus.

Before salvation, we were without Christ and without hope. We can attend church services and still be without Christ, for salvation requires that we are born again of God’s Spirit. (John 1:12) When this happens, we are ‘in Christ’. Before salvation, the natural state of all humans is to be ‘in Adam’, affected by his disobedience and sin, but in Christ, we are rescued from sin and given eternal protection (just as the cities of refuge used to provide sanctuary to anyone who had killed inadvertently, protecting them from vengeful relatives.)

To be in Christ means to belong to Him as the branch belongs to the vine (John 15). Runner beans supposedly grow better near sweet peas, but the two things retain their own identity even so. But when we are in Christ, we are given a new identity and no longer have to live according to the old ways. By faith, we cling to the cross and can be changed from within as God’s Spirit lives in us. God’s work is not simply to reform us, but to do a work of re-creation in us. He brings transformation to us and therefore we can live in newness of life. So often, we fail to do this because we do not grasp the radical nature of what God has done and that the chains of sin have been totally broken. When we understand that the old has gone and the new has come, we can live in the light of God’s promises and claim those promises for our own lives.

God rarely seems to answer our ‘When?’ questions with a date or timescales. It is often necessary to wait for Him (Ps 130, Ps 27:14), and waiting and hoping are inextricably bound together in Scripture. We might wonder why God works this way: is it just because He is cruel, wanting us to suffer, or just to demonstrate HIs power compared to ours? If we view God in this way, then we will always resent waiting, but if we begin to understand His purposes in waiting, we will learn patience and our characters will be transformed.

Sometimes we have to wait because God is preparing the answer. Daniel had to wait three weeks for an answer to his prayers on one occasion, not because God was unwilling to answer, but because there was a spiritual battle going on in the heavens and it took that long for the answer to reach him. (Daniel 10:12-14) Jacob had to wait seven years for his wife, but ‘they seemed like only a few days to him because of his love for her.’ (Gen 29:20) God may well be working behind-the-scenes and that is why we have to wait. We live by faith and not by sight.

Waiting builds anticipation. It helps us to sift motives and to see what is really important and what is not. So often we are like the toddler who is desperate for something… but who then moves on to the next thing, with no real appreciation of what it has just received. We think we know what we want; we think we know what is best for us, but it’s often in the time of waiting that we discern more of what is really important and learn to look forward and anticipate with faith and trust and hope. Waiting can be extremely difficult, but in the waiting, we learn the meaning of delayed gratification. Some things are just better because we have had to wait for them!

Waiting transforms our character. God’s goal is for us to become like Him (see Rom 8:29) Waiting changes us from being whiny, impatient, selfish toddlers to mature, patient adults. Paul says, ‘we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.’ (Rom 5:3-5) The ability of the child to live in the moment is commendable, but adults need to be able to take the long view. James says, ‘Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.’ (James 1:4)

Waiting increases our intimacy with and dependence on God. It forces us to be real and honest with God as we bring our questions, fears, doubts, anger and frustration to Him. As we learn to wait for Him, though, our hearts are quietened and stilled, like that weaned child in Psalm 131, and we learn to rest in Him. Ps 37:7 advises us to ‘be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him.’ Isaiah 26:8 says, ‘Yes, Lord, walking in the way of your laws, we wait for you; your name and renown are the desire of our hearts.’ The more time we spend with God waiting for Him, the more His name and renown become the desire of our hearts. The more we learn to pray ‘Not my will, but Yours be done,’ the more we realise that God knows best, and whilst we may not understand the delays, we can trust God’s timing. We can trust even when we cannot trace.

In our series exploring the big questions of life using the big question words Who? What? Where? When? Why? How?’, we  reached the question ‘When?’ this morning. Questions concerning God’s timing can dominate our thoughts (When is God going to do all that He has promised to do? How long must we wait for an answer? When is Jesus going to come again?) and as the psalmists make clear, the question of ‘when?’ and ‘how long?’ can make life seem very difficult:

• My soul is in deep anguish. How long, Lord, how long? (Ps 6:3)

• How long, Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? (Ps 13:1)

• How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and day after day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me? (Ps 13:2)

• How long will the enemy mock you, God? Will the foe revile your name forever? (Ps 74:10)

• How long, Lord? Will you be angry forever? How long will your jealousy burn like fire? (Ps 79:5)

• How long, Lord? Will you hide yourself forever? How long will your wrath burn like fire? (Ps 89:46)

• Relent, Lord! How long will it be? Have compassion on your servants. (Ps 90:13)

• How long, Lord, will the wicked, how long will the wicked be jubilant? (Ps 94:3)

• How long must your servant wait? When will you punish my persecutors? (Ps 119:97)

In addition, we are presently facing many difficult questions (When will restrictions be lifted on how we can live our lives? When will we begin to get back to normal? When will it be possible to see friends and family normally again? When will the pandemic end? When will vaccines be fully rolled out? When can we hope to travel again normally?) and it can be even harder to bear hard times precisely because we do not have a timescale to answer these questions.

Gal 4:4-5 reminds us that God has ‘set times’, however, and we know that our times are in His hands. (Ps 31:15) We struggle with these questions because we live in time, but also because God has set eternity in our hearts (Eccl 3:11) and we can therefore never be fully satisfied with purely temporal answers; we need to live in the light of eternity. We must understand the truths of Eccl 3:1-8, that there are times for every activity under earth and seek to discern God’s times. We can be sure that whilst we may not be able to give a time or date for when God will do certain things, we can be sure that He will not forget about what He has promised or fail to do that which He has said. He does not keep us waiting because He is mean or capricious and we can be sure that whilst total fulfilment will probably never be realised on earth (Heb 11:13-16), God’s faithfulness means we can trust His timing.