Research has shown that it takes 21 days to establish a new habit. In a book entitled ‘Psycho-Cybernetics’, Dr. Maxwell Maltz, a plastic surgeon, noticed that it took 21 days for amputees to cease feeling phantom sensations in the amputated limb. From further observations he found it took 21 days to create a new habit and wrote about this development which has been helpful to many people in understanding that change can happen, but perhaps takes longer than we expect.

In the Bible study this week, we looked at Romans 6:1-14, focussing on verse 11, which says “count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.” That means a reckoning, a pausing, a definite stopping to recall the facts revealed to us in the Gospel: namely that Christ died and rose again, therefore sin no longer has mastery over him – and because we are in Christ, it no longer has to have mastery of us. We can, in the words of Ephesians 4, “put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and [to] put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.” (Eph 4:22-24)

Various heresies concerning grace and the Gospel have been around since the New Testament was written. Paul refutes one in Romans 6, namely the view that if grace flourishes where there is sin, we ought to sin more so that grace can abound! This view has a false understanding of both sin and grace and Paul refutes it emphatically here, because if we have a true understanding of what Christ accomplished on the cross, we see that we can’t entertain sin in our lives; we are no longer slaves to sin, running errands for our old nature like a servant eager to do his master’s bidding. We now have a new master!

But another false teaching was that because of all Christ has accomplished on the cross, we can live lives of sinless perfection here and now. John refutes this teaching most emphatically in 1 John 1:8-10, but it is also clear from this passage in Romans 6 that there is a new way of life expected of us. We now have the power to choose. We can choose to obey sin (our old master) or we can choose to obey God. We can offer ourselves to sin, or we can offer ourselves to God.

For most of us, it takes considerably longer than 21 days to work this out in our everyday lives! You could say it takes us a lifetime. But the good news of the Gospel is that we now have a choice. Sin no longer has mastery over us. We can know freedom. We may find it difficult to resist temptation; we may need help in overcoming some of the sins that specifically cause us to stumble (see Hebrews 12), but Christ has shown us that there is a new way of life. The chains of sin have been broken and the symbolism of baptism shows that we are identified with Christ’s death and resurrection. “We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.” (Romans 6:4)

Just as I never thought I would be able to give up my sweet tooth but had to, on being diagnosed as diabetic, so we can live differently through the grace of God and the power of the Holy Spirit. We can learn to RISE:
• Reduce what is wrong in our lives, fleeing where necessary from the things we know cause us to fall
• Increase the good things we can do in our lives
• Substitute good things for the things that cause us to stumble
• Eliminate the problem

This may, indeed, take a lifetime of practice, but we now have an alternative way of living. We don’t have to let sin have the mastery over us – thanks be to God! We can find, in the words of Michael Card, a ‘better freedom’, for Christ has ‘enslaved my soul to set me free’ – another of those paradoxes which make up the mystery of the Gospel!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxxcTvtURP4

Christian Concern ran a campaign last year entitled ‘Not Ashamed’, based on the verses in Romans 1:16 and 2 Timothy 1:12, a campaign for Christians to stand up and be counted. David Barlow, a guest speaker, talked last night about the difference between the Gospel and general teaching and doctrine and how we must be careful not to add our own ideas and thoughts to the gospel given us by Jesus Christ.

The church in Galatia was taken to task by Paul for deserting the Lord and turning to a different gospel (Gal 1:6). The church had been influenced by those who said that circumcision was necessary for salvation; faith in Jesus Christ was not enough.

Paul reminded the Galatians that he received the gospel by direct revelation from Jesus Christ; that the gospel does not originate in human thought and is not man-made (Gal 1:11-12). It is a gospel of faith, not works (Gal 3:1-6).

At the end of His earthly ministry, Jesus gave His disciples the Great Commission (see Matthew 28 & Mark 16). Here, we are told, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation” (Mk 16:5) and after baptising the new disciples we are told the work continues by “teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you” (Matt 28:20). We have a two-fold duty to both preach the gospel and teach those who have made the decision to follow Christ; the two things are not the same. There can be a great variety of opinions about many doctrines within the Christian church, but we have to remain true to the Word of God and must preach the gospel faithfully, declaring all we know of the life, death, burial, resurrection, coronation and glorification of the Lord Jesus Christ so that others may know God’s great plan of salvation.

Forgiveness is at the heart of the Gospel. We are forgiven because of God’s grace and mercy. We have been forgiven so much that we can never begin to repay God. But so often we still find it hard to forgive others.

The principle of forgiveness is bluntly laid out for us by Jesus in Matthew 6:12-15, where we are commanded to pray ‘forgive us our debts (or trespasses) as we have also forgiven our debtors’. The concluding verses in that passage (“For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins”) make it clear that if we don’t forgive others, God is unable to forgive us, for unforgiveness is sin and God cannot look on sin.

In the parable of the unforgiving servant (Matthew 18:21-35), Jesus demonstrates both the extent to which we have been forgiven and the need for us to forgive others. Peter asks Jesus how many times we need to forgive a brother or sister who has sinned against us. His suggestion (“Up to seven times?”) clearly indicates his frustration and exasperation. Most of us would sympathise with Peter at this point. Forgiving when we are hurt just the once is hard enough. If we manage to do it more than once, surely we’ve done something really noble!

Jesus’s reply (however we take the maths) indicates that we have failed to understand the Gospel if we are still counting. The parable clearly illustrates the problems caused by unforgiveness and ends with a terrible warning: “This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”

Before we throw up our hands in despair – for it’s obvious that Jesus is talking about more than the mere words ‘I forgive you’ here – we need to look at the practice of God on this very subject. For God never asks us to do something He has not shown us how to do Himself. Psalm 103:10-12 tells us “he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.” Jeremiah 31:33-34 tells us that God will forgive our wickedness and remember our iniquities no more. We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (Rom 3:23), but God has chosen to forgive us. Moreover, we see the ultimate practice of forgiveness on the cross, as Jesus prayed, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” (Luke 23:34)

We therefore have no option, if we want to remain forgiven and to be in that perfect position where we can receive God’s blessing. We have to forgive.

Many of us accept that with our heads, but struggle to put it into practice in our hearts. We feel wronged. We have been offended. We struggle to get past the hurt done to us. Mark concluded by asking the piercing question: “Who is more at fault? – the one who causes the offence, or the one who takes offence?” Whatever the wrong done to us, God expects us to forgive. He has modelled forgiveness for us. May we have the grace to forgive others and to enter into the freedom He has purchased for us.

Last week we looked at how sin entered the world through Adam; this week it was time to look at the parallels between Adam and Christ (Romans 5:13-21).

Adam is a type of Christ. A type is a pattern, a shadow pointing to a greater truth, a symbol, if you like. Whilst it is dangerous to build doctrine on types and whilst all types have their limitations, they are like stained glass windows, illuminating and highlighting aspects of truth which might otherwise remain hidden. Adam is like Christ in that he was a representative of man; he had free choice; his choice affected all manking and he knew what it was to walk with God and to know Him intimately. So too Christ chose to obey His Father (a choice which affects us all, since we partake in His righteousness) and knew His Father; He became the representative for man, freely choosing to live as man was designed to live, showing us to how to be human without sinning. Christ became the provision for sin; Adam, on the other hand, showed us the penalty and power of sin.

In comparing Adam’s trespaass with Christ’s gift of eternal life, we see a number of differences, however. In Adam, sin and death reigned and condemnation was the consequence (see John 3:17-19). In Christ, we are given the gift of ‘reigning in life’ and are justified, given right standing before God: ‘no condemnation now I dread’. Adam’s sin brought condemnation for all; Christ’s right living and sacrificial death brought justification for all.

God’s wonderful gift of grace is described as ‘overflowing grace’ (vs 15). God hasn’t just given grace; He has given an ‘abundant provision of grace’ (vs 17) and we are told that ‘where sin increased, grace increased all the more’ (Rom 5:20). May we know that grace more and more in our lives!

Tony Brown preached from Mark 12:28-31 last night on the greatest commandment. ‘ “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’The second is this: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” ‘

Loving God with all we have is the most important thing we can do with our lives. Love has to be outward, not inward-looking and selfish. God, who is love, demonstrates this to us, since His love reaches out to us (Rom 5:6-8 demonstrates the unselfishness of God’s love for us.) We need to make God the centre of our lives, which we accomplish through obedience, since Jesus told us that if we loved Him, we would obey His commands.

Loving our neighbour as ourselves is only possible when we know who we are and are secure in our own identity in Christ. The Fall of man, narrated in Genesis 3, is more than a mere fable; it was an attack on the God-given identity and destiny of mankind. If we are unsure of our identity in God, we often struggle with insecurity and become focussed on comparing ourselves with others instead of being free to be who we are in God. Inferiority and envy often grow within us as believe other people’s evaluations of us rather than what God says about us. The truth of God’s Word, however, has the power to set us free. We need to meditate on His truth: we are made in His image (Gen 1:27), created by God and unique (Ps 139:13-14), the apple of God’s eye (Deut 32:10), loved and precious to God (John 3:16).

Loving our neighbour with God’s love, as we are commanded to do, transforms our society. Jesus told us to ‘love one another’ (John 15:12-13). Our purpose in life is to become more like Christ so we may reflect the love of God to a dying world. Matthew 7:12, often called the ‘Golden Rule’, teaches us to treat others in the way we would like them to treat us, to spend time with people, to respect others, to accept them and love them (just as Sue Ryder did when caring for the Polish refugees). We reap what we sow: if we sow love, then we will reap love.

Jesus clearly taught us (especially in the Parable of the Good Samaritan) that everyone is our neighbour. We are to love our family, our friends, our colleagues, our literal neighbours. Lev 19:18 tells us “Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbour as yourself.” Unforgiveness will hinder our walk with God and will result in action. It is an obstacle to God’s love, against God’s will and blocks His forgiveness to us, as Matt 6:14-15 makes clear. We insult God when we refuse to forgive, for the Cross shows us the measure of God’s forgiveness and helps us also to see that there is no sin too big for us to forgive.

Forgiveness and gratitude go hand in hand. We have been forgiven so much that we have much to be grateful for. Let’s understand that our relationship with God, with ourselves and with others are all connected and let’s walk in forgiveness and gratitude so that we may love as God loves.

March is obviously a busy month for birthdays! We even celebrated long distance with Pat, who is recovering from a broken leg at the moment and so can’t be at meetings.

Joan & Julie also have birthdays this week: