The Charge of the Light Brigade was a failed military action involving the British light cavalry led by Lord Cardigan against Russian forces during the Battle of Balaclava on 25 October 1854 in the Crimean War. Lord Raglan had intended to send the Light Brigade to prevent the Russians from removing captured guns from overrun Turkish positions, a task for which the light cavalry were well-suited. However, there was miscommunication in the chain of command and the Light Brigade was instead sent on a frontal assault against a different artillery battery, one well-prepared with excellent fields of defensive fire. The Light Brigade reached the battery under withering direct fire and scattered some of the gunners, but they were forced to retreat immediately, and the assault ended with very high British casualties and no decisive gains. The battle has been immortalised in Tennyson’s poem of the same name:

“Half a league half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred:
‘Forward, the Light Brigade!
Charge for the guns’ he said:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

‘Forward, the Light Brigade!’
Was there a man dismay’d ?
Not tho’ the soldier knew
Some one had blunder’d:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do & die,
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.”

The military life is all about what some would call blind obedience to the chain of command. Tom Wright comments on this when writing about Acts 23:23-35, saying of the Roman deputation transferring Paul from Jerusalem to Caesarea that they went from tying him up and preparing to flog him one day to mustering 200 soldiers, 70 horses and 200 spearmen to escort him to safety the next, but ‘soldiering is about doing, not knowing, and doing is what the Romans do best.’ (P 177)

Such blind obedience may be considered laudable or foolhardy, depending on one’s perspective, but there is no doubt that obedience to God is a key element of any disciple’s journey. God told the first king of Israel that ‘to obey is better than sacrifice’ (1 Sam 15:22), and walking in obedience is a key element of success in the Christian life (see Deut 5:33, 2 Cor 9:13). It’s not always easy for us to obey God when we do not understand His ways or see the point of what He is asking us to do, but we have the assurance that He is in sovereign control and, unlike the officers who authorised the Charge of the Light Brigade, is never going to command something which will ultimately harm us.

Providence is defined as ‘the protective care of God’, and this is seen clearly in Acts 23:12-22, when a plot to kill Paul is thwarted by his nephew. Some 40 fanatical Jews wanted to get rid of Paul once and for all and they plotted to kill him, partnering with the chief priests and the Sanhedrin to try to get Paul in a vulnerable position where he could be attacked en route for further questioning. This plot was thwarted by Paul’s nephew, a young man about whom nothing more is known, who heard of the plot, went to tell his uncle directly about it and then, on Paul’s command, told the centurion in charge what he knew. As a result, Paul came once again under the protection of Roman law and ended up being transferred from Jerusalem to Caesarea.

Whilst this passage leaves us with many more questions than answers (we want to know all about Paul’s sister and nephew, how he learned of the plot (‘careless talk costs lives’ is presumably the lesson we can learn here!) and how he managed to have the kind of access to the barracks that he did), it clearly demonstrates for us that God’s hand is on Paul and that He has a plan for him to be His witness in Rome, no matter what other people feel about this situation. Job, after much suffering and many questions, finally came to realise something of God’s sovereignty, saying, ‘I know that you can do all things; no purpose of yours can be thwarted.’ (Job 42:1) This may well leave us feeling like mere pawns in God’s great chess game, but actually, there is something tremendously reassuring and exciting to know that we are part of God’s great plans and purpose, and that His hand of providence is ‘guiding us through choices that we make… reaching out to help us on our way.’ (‘Providence’, Michael W. Smith) Paul’s experience of God’s providence and protection can be ours too. As Isaiah put it, ‘no weapon forged against you will prevail.’ (Isaiah 54:17) God’s purposes will prevail.

Exodus 33:12-23 remains a pivotal passage for me, an ongoing reminder that it is the Lord’s presence with us which distinguishes us from other people and is the ‘bottom line’ for believers. Moses talks with the Lord, demonstrating that an ongoing relationship with Him is necessary. He can’t afford to rest on his laurels or rely on what God has said to him in the past; he needs God to continue to teach him His ways so that he may continue to find favour with Him. As when God originally called him (Exodus 3), the only thing he has to sustain him is God’s presence (see Ex 33:14 and Ex 3:14). Moses recognises that it is this presence which will be the convincing sign to other nations (Ex 33:15) and boldly asks to see God’s glory. (Ex 3:18)

This is becoming my daily prayer: ‘Now show me Your glory.’ (Ex 3:18) It was a vision of God’s glory that commissioned and sustained the prophets Isaiah and Ezekiel; it was a vision of God’s glory in the form of the exalted Christ which fuelled the book of Revelation. God’s glory reminds us of who God is, of His transcendent power, of His personal love and care for us. How did Moses continue through forty years in the wilderness, dealing with a stubborn and stiff-necked people who made an idol the minute his back was turned? How did he cope with the incessant moaning and groaning and complaining which dogged his life? The moments of provision and victory seem overwhelmed by the years of carping and unbelief, and it is hard to see how Moses could retain his sanity in all of that. The answer, I believe, is found in this passage, when God shows him His goodness and proclaimed His name to him. A vision of God is necessary to thrive in this life. Nothing else will satisfy. Nothing else will help us to endure.

Dave spoke tonight from Matthew 15:21-28, a rather surprising story where we see Jesus being apparently quite abrupt and unfriendly towards a foreign woman who came to Him pleading for Him to deliver her daughter from demon possession. The woman was a Syro-Phoenician, Mark tells us; Matthew uses the more Jewish term ‘Canaanite’ to indicate that she came from a pagain heritage. She was distraught because of her daughter’s situation and came to Jesus as perhaps her last hope. She knew that she did not deserve to be heard, but she came to him asking for mercy, and in this story, we see several pointers as to how we too can approach Jesus.

First of all, she sought Jesus out, making a determined effort to reach Him. She cried out to Him for mercy, and the Greek word indicates a continual, persistent crying out which could not be ignored. She appealed for mercy, identifying with her daughter’s suffering and acknowledged Jesus as ‘Lord, Son of David.’ She may have been a foreigner, but she recognised Jesus as the Messiah, the One sent by God to deliver His people.

Jesus, unusually for Him, seemed unwilling to respond to her cry; He ‘did not answer a word.’ He seemed unresponsive, and spoke of His primary calling being to the lost sheep of Israel. In calling her a ‘dog’, He seems to us blunt to the point of rudeness, but we see that He was testing her faith. His first duty was to the Jews, but once rejected and crucified by them, He became the Saviour of the whole world and now we are all given that Great Commission to go and make disciples of all nations.

The woman was so desperate that she was not put off by Jesus’s comments at all. She knew she was unworthy, but she also knew that deliverance came only for Him. In addressing Him as ‘Master‘, she acknowledged that even ‘crumbs’ from Him could save her daughter; she believed and bowed down to Him in a great expression of faith, for which Jesus commended her.

This story teaches us to come to Jesus with persistence, to bow before Him and believe He is able to heal and deliver us. We can tell Him our needs and never be afraid that He will turn us away. Hebrews 11:6 reminds us that without faith it is impossible to please God; we need to emulate the woman’s persistence, insistence, boldness and earnest plea for mercy. We must storm heaven with our prayers, never giving up, asking and keeping on asking until we too receive mercy from God.

Another way in which God works in our world is through testing and temptations. (He isn’t the author of temptation, as James makes clear, but He does use them for our good.) It’s noteworthy that before Jesus began His earthly ministry, immediately after His baptism (which in many ways confirmed His identity as the Son of God to others), He was led by the Spirit of God in the wilderness to be tested. (Matt 4:1) Would He not only do what the Father wanted, but do it in ways that were compatible with how the Father worked?

The first temptation was to turn the stones into bread. (Matt 4:3) Here, we have the temptation to put Himself first, to meet His own needs, to assuage His hunger through miraculous means. Jesus rejected the temptation, reminding the devil, from the word of God rather than from His own strength, that ‘man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’ (Matt 4:4) We must never do God’s work in our own strength, putting ourselves first.

The devil then wanted to use Jesus to dazzle the crowds of the people on the streets below with a miracle, to put a little excitement into their dull lives, jumping from the roof of the temple and seeing God’s angels rescue Him in the kind of miraculous entertainment  and distraction which many of us want from religion. (Matt 4:6-7) Jesus saw this for what it was: putting God to the test, rather than living in trust. Miracles do form part of a life of faith, but they come as God sees fit, not as a distraction to the difficulties of life or a substitute for trust. Every time we seek alternatives to trust, whether that is through our own hard work and effort or other means, we are deviating from the way God works. Trusting is the one ingredient which we can never omit from a life of discipleship.

The final temptation was the temptation to worship the devil and thus gain worldly success: he ‘showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendour. “All this I will give you,” he said, “if you will bow down and worship me.”’ (Matt 4:8-9) In essence, this is the temptation most of us face regularly: doing things the world’s way, calling success what the world calls success, succumbing to worship of the visible and tangible instead of the invisible and spiritual. Jesus’s identity as the Son of God meant He had a greater kingdom than anything the devil could offer; He was there to announce the kingdom of God (Mark 1:15). He didn’t need to do things the devil’s way, and nor do we.

We would prefer not to face trials, temptations and troubles, but God uses these to refine us, strengthen us and teach us repeatedly to trust in Him alone. Like Jesus, we are tested so that we learn to do things God’s ways, rather than our own.

We looked at some of the ways in which God works this morning, trying to discern His ways and means in our world. We saw that God works primarily through love because He is love. (1 John 4:8) Motives are hugely important to God; why we do things is as important as what we do and 1 Corinthians 13:1-8 makes it very plain that love is more important than tongues, prophecy or even miracles. Love motivated God to give His Son for our salvation (John 3:16) and therefore anything we do cannot be motivated by selfishness or self-interest, because this is not God’s way.

Many of the ways that God works seem contradictory to us or confusing because they are not the way the world works. The world is all about personal achievement: getting on in life, putting yourself first, being determined and getting ahead, ‘looking after number one.’ God works in ways that seem paradoxical to us: ‘whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it.’ (Mark 8:35) “You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them.  Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Mark 10:42-45) The path to greatness, Jesus taught, comes through service and self-denial, a message embodied by Jesus. (Phil 2:1-11)

The paradox of the gospel is clearly explained for us in 1 Cor 1:18-25. Only as we embrace God’s foolishness and weakness can we begin to live as He wants us to; we must walk in humility and servanthood if we are to imitate God. God’s ways will always be personal, never forcing His will on us, but always inviting us into relationship and partnership with Him. This will require a constant transformation of how we think and act, a renewing of our minds, a willingness to embrace what may well look crazy to us. That’s what faith is all about – embracing God on His terms, not ours.