Dave continued his series on revival tonight, looking at possibly the most famous verse associated with this subject: 2 Chronicles 7:14. In context (for ‘a text taken out of context leaves a con…’), this call to humility, prayer, repentance and seeking God did not come during a period of tragedy and mourning, but during the dedication of the temple in King Solomon’s reignm a time of celebration and joy. Whether we are in mourning or in celebration, however, this verse shows us how to respond to God.

Who must do what God says?

God’s people are the ones called to obey God. We are called by God; having His name on us is one way of expressing His ownership (see Is 43:7, Is 65:1). Obviously, in context, this referred to the nation of Israel, but Christians are also known as God’s people (1 Pet 2:9), people who bear the name of Christ. The call to obedience is to Christians.

How must we respond to God at such a time as this?

God looks for us to:

1. humble ourselves (admitting our need for and our dependence upon God, acknowledging that what matters is not how we measure up to other people but how we measure up to God’s holy standards. We are called to submit ourselves to God, resist the devil, grieve, mourn and wail and change our attitudes to humility – see James 4:7-10).
2. pray (acknowledging we are sinners in need of God, crying out to God for mercy. Ps 145:18-19 reminds us that God is near to all who call on Him in truth, fulfilling the desires of those who fear Him, hearing their cry and saving them.)
3. seek God’s face (seeking His favour, realising that sin is the thing that separates us from God’s favour and that we must confess our sins – 1 Jn 1:9 – secure in the atonement Jesus has purchased for us.)
4. turn from our wicked ways (we must repent, turning away from our sins. Christians should not be so influenced by the values and priorities of the world that we become indistinguishable in our behaviour from lost people; there needs to be a radical difference in our lifestyles which can only come about through repentance. Is 55:6-7 reminds us of the need to seek the Lord, forsaking our wicked ways. 1 Pet 4:17 reminds us that ‘it is time for judgment to begin with the family of God.’ We need to take seriously the warnings against sin and complacency and turn from our wicked ways.)

What will happen if we do what God says?

1. God will hear from heaven. God is sovereign and in sovereign power and glory, He will hear us.
2. God will forgive our sin. Sin is the key problem in the world and God has dealt with sin decisively by sending His only Son to die for our sins.
3. God will heal our land. The people in our land need God; for God to heal our land, people need healing, salvation and restoration.

This verse is conditional. It is an ‘if… then’ statement. God looks to us, His believing people, to do what we must do so that He will be free to do what He wants to do for our nation. We can listen to sermon after sermon and be unchanged… or we can take to heart the key word ‘if’ and become the cause of blessing for our nation as we respond in humility, prayer, supplication and repentance.

I believe at the heart of every battle we face in life lies a stark choice. Will we trust what God says, even if we don’t understand it, or will we believe the lies of the enemy that God has motives that are selfish and venal and that He doesn’t have our best interests at heart? Will we believe God or will we believe our own thoughts and desires? Which voice will we listen to?

When I was 40, I was diagnosed as diabetic, and I faced a stark choice. Would I carry on with the same eating habits which had led me to this place or would I be brave enough to change how I lived life? That choice has to be made on a daily basis; there is never a day which goes by when I do not have serious choices to make regarding what I eat and how I live.

In the same way, every day we are called to live by faith and not by sight. (2 Cor 5:7) I don’t think that trusting God is as easy as we might like to pretend. God is continually stretching our faith, taking us out of our comfort zones, urging us on to new challenges. This is so that we don’t rely on ourselves, but continually learn to rely on God (2 Cor 1:9), but it usually involves a battle within. We often don’t talk about these battles, for fear of seeming unspiritual or weak, but we need to be honest with ourselves and with other people and also be accountable. You know your weaknesses, the things that trip you up, those sins that entangle you and cause you to stumble, but are you willing to admit to those things and ask others to pray for you and hold you accountable? I have a friend I will text when I am struggling to think the right things so that she can pray for me and can remind me of truth I might not otherwise be able to access at that time. We all need help to overcome temptation, and the good news is that ‘no temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.’ (1 Cor 10:13)

The Borg in Star Trek told all their adversaries that ‘resistance is futile.’ This is not the Biblical view. We are not in this battle alone. The enemy says that we are: as Casting Crowns sing,

‘Sin tries to make you hide,
Whispers that same old lie:
“Keep all your pain inside
‘Cause no one will understand.”’ (‘Loving My Jesus’, Casting Crowns)

The truth is, however, that we have a high priest who is able to help us in every way because He knows all about temptation and internal battles and He gives us brothers and sisters in Christ to encourage us, come alongside us, pray for us and carry our burdens (Gal 6:2). Don’t give up; don’t give in. Greater is He that is in us than he that is in the world. (1 Jn 4:4) God’s Spirit within us is able to help us to make the right choices when we’re faced with the stark choices.

When we look at that first battle (Gen 3:1-19), we see the different guises of temptation which Satan tends to use. He uses loaded questions to introduce doubt and uncertainty into our minds. He impugns God’s character, making us believe that God is not always good, faithful, honourable and holy. He offers us something which initially looks good, appealing to both the senses and to our reason: ‘When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.’ (Gen 3:6)

The fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil looked good and pleasing to the eye (and wasn’t necessarily an apple, despite the pictures!) Temptation often comes to us dressed in pleasing clothes, and we are people who are easily moved by our senses: what looks good, feels good, tastes nice, smells nice, sounds good must be good, we reason. You’ve only to look at the packaging and advertising of food to see where this has led us. The truth is that ‘temptation and evil almost always appear disguised as good and beautiful.’ (Eugene Peterson, ‘Tell It Slant’, P 191) That’s why it’s so appealing; it doesn’t look dangerous or evil. We have to remember that temptation doesn’t always come in the form of a serpent; the devil also masquerades as an angel of light. (2 Cor 11:14) Not all of our enemies look like enemies. If they did, we probably would find it easier to defeat them. The snake may seem like a classic pantomime baddy as we re-read this story, but so often, we do not recognise the sources of the lies which lead us astray as easily in real life.

The appeal to reason (what could possibly be bad about wisdom, after all?!) also shows us how easy is for us to rationalise our capitulation to temptation. Beware rationalisation and explanations which water down God’s Word and lead us down blind alleys!

Temptation comes to us at different levels, appealing to the senses and to the mind, but in every case, we have a choice between doing something that will lead to life or something that will lead us away from life, between something which is beneficial and something which is harmful, between something good and something better, even.

Temptation isn’t sin and we will all be tempted at some point in our lives. Martin Luther said, ‘Temptations, of course, cannot be avoided, but because we cannot prevent the birds from flying over our heads, there is no need that we should let them nest in our hair.’ The point he was making is that we have no choice necessarily in what temptations come our way, but we do have a choice about how we respond to them. This is where TETIC comes in! – ‘we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.’ (2 Cor 10:5)

However temptation is dressed, we need to put on the full armour of God so that we can stand against the devil’s schemes. James offers us great advice for tackling this battle within: ‘Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God and he will come near to you.’ (James 4:7-8) As we do this, God lifts us up and helps us. Martin Luther ended a letter to a student battling depression and temptation with these thoughts (paraphrased):

1. Rejoice because temptation testifies of God’s mercy to you.
2. Do not dwell on the deadly thoughts of the Devil.
3. Laugh your adversary to scorn.
4. Be around other believers.
5. Proclaim the good news of Jesus for you and your salvation.[1]

[1] Luther: Letters of Spiritual Counsel, trans. and ed., Theodore G. Tappert, 1960, (Vancouver, BC: Regent College Publishing, 2003), 85ff.

Every man has at some point to deal with a loaded question from a woman, a question to which only one answer really is acceptable…There is absolutely nothing wrong with us asking questions of God, of ourselves, of other people. Questions can be a valuable way of learning; Jesus often asked questions to stimulate thinking and conversation. But we have to face the fact that loaded questions are dangerous, because they do not genuinely want the other person’s honest answer; they want an answer which pleases us, even if it’s untrue.

The serpent in the Garden of Eden asked loaded questions. “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?” (Gen 3:1) Not only did he rephrase God’s commands in a wholly negative form, he went on to cast doubt and aspersions on God’s character and integrity, implying that God has only issued this commandment not to eat from that tree to protect Himself, rather than to protect Adam and Eve. He sowed ideas into Eve’s mind, offering the tantalising lure that eating from that tree would lead to man being ‘like God, knowing good and evil.’ The Voice paraphrases the snake’s answer in this way: ‘Die? No, you’ll not die. God is playing games with you. The truth is that God knows the day you eat the fruit from that tree you will awaken something powerful in you and become like Him: possessing knowledge of both good and evil.’ (Gen 3:4-5, The Voice)

Loaded questions can blind us to the fact that they lead us inextricably to one answer only, without letting us discern if that is the correct answer. So often, when we ask questions, we are not willing to face unpalatable answers. We keep asking questions just to get a different answer! But no matter how many times I ask the question ‘What does 2 + 2 make?’, the answer will be 4, even if I don’t like that answer. We need to be careful with loaded questions. No matter how many times we ask God if it’s OK to do something He has forbidden us to do, the answer will be no. If we hear otherwise, we’re kidding ourselves… or listening to the wrong voice. There is a world of difference between honestly asking God something and being willing to accept whatever He says and asking God loaded questions, when it doesn’t really matter what He says, because we’re going to do our own thing anyway. We have to beware loaded questions. The enemy is a master at them and because of that, it’s easy for us to fall into the trap of asking them ourselves…

This morning, in our series ‘Battles and Blessings’, we looked at the very first battle man experienced, which continues to affect every single one of us today (see Gen 3:1-19). We have an enemy who seeks to lead us away from God, who wants nothing more than to separate us from all the blessings God has for us, and even greater, sometimes, than the battles we face with other people is that battle we face with the devil, and with our own flesh.

Before this point, everything that God had created was good and man’s relationships were good. Adam had been given a helper by God, Eve, and they lived together, naked and unashamed, in the Garden created for them, looking after God’s creation by divine decree. Everything in the garden truly was lovely! The only restriction placed on man was the command given by God in Gen 2:16-17, but the serpent caused Eve to question not only God’s commands, but His intentions, planting the seeds of doubt and uncertainty which, if left unchallenged, can lead to sin.

Questions and temptations are not, of course, the same thing as sin. But as James reminds us (James 1:13-15), they can lead us to sin if we allow ourselves to be enticed by evil desires within. The danger in every spiritual battle we face is that we will succumb to the temptation to believe the enemy’s lies rather than the truths of God’s Word.

Adam and Eve failed in that first battle, succumbing to temptation, but Jesus, in the wilderness, showed us how the sword of the Spirit can be used to defeat the enemy’s whispering lies. (Matt 4:1-10) The blessings we find in the Bible belong to those who do not yield to temptation but who choose to believe God above and beyond what the other voices say. The blessings of God are for those who believe. Paul said, ‘So those who rely on faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.’ (Gal 3:9) Jesus, in defeating temptation not only in the wilderness but also in the Garden of Gethsemane (Luke 22:41), became our great high priest who is able to empathise with our weaknesses, uphold us in our struggles and bring us the victory as He ever lives to intercede for us (see Heb 2:18, Heb 4:15, Heb 7:25). He provides a way out of temptation for us (1 Cor 10:13) and therefore helps us rely on the help and hope He brings to every battle. (Ps 146:5, Deut 33:29)

There’s a lot happening in November, so here is the latest news bulletin!

Sunday 13th November

Don’t forget both meetings will be at Market Street this Sunday (at 10.30 a.m. and 6 p.m.) and the CLC bookstall will be available after both meetings. This is an opportunity to buy Christmas cards and presents (books, calendars, fridge magnets, CDs, DVDs etc.), support our local Christian bookshop and earn 10% commission for the church all at the same time! Please remember to bring any unwanted commentaries or books which would help Bible college students to donate to CLC.

Thursday 17th November

The community choir practice will be at 6.45 p.m. at our church, followed by the Bible study at 7.30 p.m. We will be looking at the start of 1 Corinthians 16 in the Bible study.

Friday 18th November

Furlong Road Methodist Church is holding a day of prayer on Friday (from 11 a.m. until 3 p.m.) Pop in for a time of quiet meditation, prayer, fellowship and a cuppa!

Hope House Church is hosting its ‘arts festival’ on 18th & 19th November, so if you’re in Barnsley, do pop in to have a look at this creative arts festival. The church is on Wellington Street, opposite Morrison’s supermarket.

Saturday 19th November

As well as the arts festival in Barnsley, there is the ‘Winter Wonderland’ in Thurnscoe flower park from 12-6 p.m. This is an opportunity to go ice-skating, visit Santa’s Grotto and buy Christmas food, including chutneys, piccalilli, apple sauce and tomato & basil soup from Turner New Leaf!

Sunday 20th November

The morning meeting will be at Cherry Tree Court at 10.30 a.m., with the evening service at 6 p.m.

Wednesday 23rd November

Come along to help prepare the goody bags for the Christmas Market if you can – we’ll be stuffing bags from 9 a.m. – 11 a.m. This is an opportunity for local community groups to advertise, as we will be including leaflets about what’s on in the area (including our carol service on 18th December). Also in the bag will be Christian comics and leaflets about Christmas, sweets and glow sticks. Please pray for the Christmas Market on 9th December.

Sunday 27th November

Fredrick and Reeba will be here for both meetings (10.30 a.m. & 6 p.m.), so come along to find out more about their work in India and about the missions’ trip next Easter. We are having a buffet meal after the evening meeting (onion bhajis and samosas welcome!), so this is a great opportunity to meet Fredrick and Reeba and find out more about how to support their vital work in Bangalore.