Bible studies resumed this week, looking at Romans 10:1-13.

Paul continues with his heartfelt desire and prayer that the Israelites should be saved. Despite being known as the apostle to the Gentiles and being called to serve God overseas, he still has a heart for his people. He is well aware of their zeal – how could he not, being a prime example of that himself before he came to know Christ?!- but he knows that that zeal is not based on true knowledge (Romans 10:2). This is always a danger for us: zeal (often known as fanatacism these days) is not enough. We need to know the truth (which sets us free) and we need love also, for knowledge on its own is also not enough (1 Cor 8:1).

Zeal based on our own righteousness is a dangerous thing (Rom 10:3-4). When we refuse the righteousness offered us in Christ, preferring our own righteousness, we are in a difficult position. It’s so tempting to think that salvation can be earned, that the cleanness of our hands will bring us God’s favour. And, as Paul reminds us from Deuteronomy 30, in theory simple obedience to the law is all that is required. For sinful men, however, our hearts do not yield to the Lord and we end up unable to earn our own righteousness. We must neither denigrate the work Christ has already done or try to achieve our own salvation; instead we must simply believe and confess Christ as Lord. The gospel really is simple enough for a child to grasp: “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” (Rom 10:13) Yet, as Paul has said in Romans 9, the very simplicity of the gospel cuts at our self-sufficiency and leaves us asking, “Is that it? Is that all I have to do? It’s too good to be true!”

Believing in Christ may sound simple, but it remains true that that simple step of faith leads to a radical reversal and a new submission. Believing in our hearts changes us. There has to be outward, visible change – ‘fruit’, as Jesus put it. How we speak, how we live, how we act will all change as a result of our faith. We will have a new focus, a new way of living, a new life.

Mark continued looking at the body of Jesus last night, this time looking at the hands of Jesus. How did Jesus use His hands?

First and foremost, Jesus worked with His hands. Mark 6:1-3 tells us that He worked as a carpenter for the majority of His life. He was a working man, used to manual labour – and as such, His hands would reflect that. He was an example of servanthood, washing His disciples’ feet with His hands (John 13:1-5). He showed us that we too should be workers and servants, not afraid to get involved.

Jesus did many miracles with His hands, such as the raising of Jairus’s daughter (Mark 5:35-42), where touching a dead body to bring life shows us the radical nature of how He worked. He was prepared to touch the untouchable to bring life. He healed a deaf and mute man (Mark 7:31-35) by spitting and touching his tongue and ears and healed a blind man (John 9:1-7) in similar fashion, spitting on the ground, making mud and putting it on the man’s eyes. Clearly He had no need to do use His hands to heal, but He did so to inspire faith.

In Matt 14:15-21, Jesus fed the five thousand by taking the bread, giving thanks and breaking it. He was not held back by a fear of failure, using unconventional means at times to bring healing and provision. We too need to be bold in our faith, for the fear of man can bring a snare.

Jesus’s hands also bore the scars of the Crucifixion, a sign of how much He loved us in that He was willing to bear such pain for us. John 20:24-29 shows us how those scars were still visible after the Resurrection. The greatest miracle we see is that of the Crucifixion and Resurrection.

Now we are the hands of Jesus on earth. Let’s work as He did and serve a world which can only see Jesus through us.

We also had a birthday to celebrate!

The parable of the Lost Son (Luke 15:11-32) ought really to be called ‘the parable of the two sons and a father’. Dave preached from this passage this morning, looking at it as a drama in two acts, a parable Jesus told because his audience had been complaining that he associated with sinners.

In the first act, we see how the younger son goes off the rails, insulting his father by asking for his inheritance even before the father has died. The father, patiently enduring a loss of honour and respect, not to mention the pain of rejected, unrequited love, allows his son to go off, squandering his wealth in wild living. In Scene 2, we see this son, ending up in the poverty of the pig-sty, finally returning home in Scene 3, to find his father not only welcoming him home, but lavishing extravagant love and gifts on him. If by ‘prodigal’ we mean ‘recklessly extravagant’, then this adjective applies as much to the father as the son!

But the story does not end here. In Act 2, we see the reactions of the older son, a type, perhaps, of the scribes and Pharisees – the ones who didn’t break the law, but who were yet filled with their own righteousness and pride and were just as far from the Father as the more disreputable ‘sinners’ they despised. The older son, on hearing the commotion caused by his brother’s return, is absolutely furious. He will not join in the celebrations, snubbing his father by remaining outside. The father, however, loves both his sons and tries to reason with him – to no avail. The older son feels unjustly treated. He has been outwardly obedient all his life, but despite appearing to be a paragon of virtue, working hard and being self-disciplined, he does not really have a heart for his father. He has been trying to earn his way to righteousness and has ended up refusing the offer of grace.

The outrage that Jesus’s audience would have felt on hearing this parable is often glossed over. The ‘bad’ son, the ‘sinner’, has entered into his father’s salvation, but the ‘good’ son, who has obeyed the rules not out of relationship but to get things for himself, is left outside. The man of moral rectitude, at this point, is still lost.

It has cost the Father a great deal – the death of His only begotten Son – to purchase our salvation. Are we going to embrace this ‘outrageous grace’ and enter in or are we going to remain on the outside, trying to earn our own salvation through our own righteousness?

Bible studies in Romans resume this coming week (Thursday 15th September at 7.30 p.m.) We’re up to Romans 10 and will be looking at this book every Thursday except the first Thursday in the month, which is a prayer meeting.

Just to bring us up-to-date on what we’ve studied so far…
Romans 1 & 2 look at the plight of the world without God – where we are, whether we’re a Jew or a Gentile, without God.
Romans 3 shows us that we’re all sinners and have fallen short of God’s glory, but God has provided a solution that is not through our own righteousness.
Romans 4 reminds us that the way of faith has always been God’s plan – Abraham was justified not by observing the law, but by believing God and acting in faithful obedience to all He said.
Romans 5 reminds us that there are basically only two ways in the world – the way of Adam (the ‘first man’) and the way of Jesus. Only Jesus can lead us into new life with God.
Romans 6 looks at how easily this gospel of grace might be misinterpreted and at how we have a new master. Freedom from sin is not the same thing as licence to do as we please.
Romans 7 looks at the struggle we all face between our flesh (the sinful way of living) and the spiritual way of life. We just can’t make it on our own.
Romans 8 assures us, however, that there is a new way of living, where there is no condemnation for those in Christ, where we can know that nothing can separate us from the love of God, where we can really understand our inheritance and acceptance into God’s family.
Romans 9 and the chapters we’ll initially be studying look at the ongoing relationship between Jews and Gentiles and the whole question of ‘Israel’. Come along to find out more!

There is a song on the new Aaron Shust CD entitled ‘We Are Free’ and that reminded me of some of the things that we discovered, particularly in Romans 6-8, about the idea of ‘freedom from’ and ‘freedom to’:
“We are more than conquerors
We don’t have to be afraid
Nothing is as powerful as His love.
Oh, the way He gave His Son
To give life to everyone
Not a thing can separate us from His love.

It’s the life and the hope that He brings,
His forgiveness that leads us to sing:

We are free to love like our God has loved;
We are free to give like He gave.
We are free from sin,
We are free to begin to forgive as He forgave.
We are free.

We are living evidence
He restores our innocence
Jesus stands in our defence, all for love
It’s the grace and the peace that He brings
His forgiveness that leads us to sing.

Nothing can separate us
Nothing can separate us, Lord.
Nothing can ever take us from You.
Nothing can separate us
Nothing can separate us, Lord.
Nothing can ever take us from You.”

I think someone else has been studying Romans!
You can listen to the song here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdHs-y5TEPQ

‘Total Recall’ was a 1990 science-fiction film featuring Arnold Schwarzenegger. The plot concerns an apparently unsophisticated construction worker, Doug Quaid (Schwarzenegger), who is either a victim of a failed memory implant procedure or a freedom fighter from Mars relocated to Earth. He attempts to restore order and reverse the corrupt influence of commercial powers, all while faced with the possibility that none of these events are real and pursuing them could damage his brain.

Much as I love science-fiction films, I wasn’t thinking of the film when the phrase ‘total recall’ began reverberating in my mind this week! I was thinking of Jesus’s words to his disciples: “But when they arrest you, do not worry about what to say or how to say it. At that time you will be given what to say, for it will not be you speaking, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you.” (Matt 10:19-20)

So often, we read God’s Word and it seems to wash over us. We can’t always even remember what we’ve read immediately after we’ve closed our Bibles! But if we make a habit of meditating on God’s Word and letting it wash us (Eph 5:26), if we work at memorising Scripture even though it feels at times like a dry chore, we will find that we reap rewards in unexpected ways.

God is able to remind us of His Word at just the right time. He brings His Word to life when we’re least expecting it, reminding us of verses we’ve barely registered reading, showing us just what we need to fight at just the right time. The Holy Spirit works in us to bring the word to life.

We might not always be able to remember the chapter and verse, but the living God is able to bring His word to life in us. Hebrews 4:12 tells us “For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.” My prayer is that we feed on God’s word and find something of its nutritional benefits as God brings it to our remembrance, giving us the recall we often find elusive, at just the right time that we need that word of encouragement, hope or admonition.

Continuing the theme of houses, we looked at the amazing fact that we are God’s house. Hebrews 3:6 says “But Christ is faithful as the Son over God’s house. And we are his house, if indeed we hold firmly to our confidence and the hope in which we glory.” (Heb 3:6) It’s an absolutely amazing truth in the Bible that God chooses not to dwell in buildings but in people. In the Old Testament we read how the glory of God dwelt in the Tabernacle and later in the Temple built by Solomon, but Stephen tells us in Acts 7 that “the Most High does not live in houses made by human hands” (Acts 7:48). We can’t limit God to a building, however ornate or magnificent the building may be… and I’ve visited some pretty magnificent cathedrals lately!

Paul asks the Corinthian church: “Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honour God with your bodies.” (1 Cor 6:19-20)When we become Christians, Paul tells us, we become new creations (2 Cor 5:17). There is a work of regeneration, or new birth, that goes on in us when we accept Christ as our Saviour and from then on, we are becoming a dwelling in which God lives. God’s Spirit is known as the Holy Spirit and therefore we need to be holy too, for “just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; 16 for it is written: “Be holy, because I am holy” (1 Pet 1:15-16). There has to be a spring-cleaning in our lives when God comes to dwell in us. Light and darkness can’t co-exist in the same building. Dirt and cleanliness don’t mix together. God comes in and the cleaning-up process begins.

Fortunately for us, the restoration and renovation work is God’s work in us. He’s the architect and master builder. He is the Builder, as Isaiah 62:5 tells us. All He wants from us is the willingness to let Him in – to open the door of our hearts (Rev 3:20) to allow Him access to every part of our lives so that He can make His dwelling with us.