Twyford 03-05-09
Relationships
Let us open in prayer
Father, I pray that you will anoint my words this evening that they may be words for each of us from you. I ask what I say may be relevant in our Christian lives. We ask this through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen
Maddy and I moved to Frisby from New Romney at the end of 2007
Story: As we were taking the bedroom apart, I was surprised to find a small basket underneath our bed with three eggs and £1000.
I was a bit puzzled and so I called Maddy and asked her what this was all about.
She said: “Well I have to be honest with you. Every time you preached a bad sermon, I put an egg in the basket.”
I thought – well three bad sermons in 3 years – not bad going.
But I was still puzzled – “Well, what is the £1000 about”
She replied, as wives always do : “Every time I got a dozen, I sold them”.
I hope this evening won’t be an egg sermon!!
This evening I would like to focus on three words in John 15 and these are the words of Jesus when he said “Abide with me”.
Christianity – in my opinion – is NOT a religion. Let me explain.
For me a religion – is all about DUTY - what WE do to earn salvation or placate an angry God
Take Islam – and I am not knocking it. Islam is very much a religion of DUTY
Muslims have to “do things” – like praying five times a day, observing the Feast of Ramadan, giving to the poor, going on a Hajj… - and hope their prayers and deeds will outweigh what they have done wrong.
Christianity is different
It is all about RELATIONSHIPS – and what Christ has DONE for us – that we receive as a free gift
And John 15 is a chapter in which Jesus talks about RELATIONSHIPS.
RELATIONSHIP to Christ (Jn 15:1-17)
RELATIONSHIP to other believers Jn 15: 12-18 &
RELATIONSHIP to the world (Jn 15:19-27)
And the key, in my opinion for each of these relationships in John 15 can be found in the words of Jesus in John 15:4 when he said: Abide in me.
When Jesus spoke about abiding in Him, I thought of three characteristics of the word.
1. The first characteristic of “abiding in Christ” is making time.
We live in a society that runs in the fast lane almost all the time.
The word "Abide" runs counter current to all that. There is a tranquillity about it.
Jesus was busy - much of the time but he did take time off to draw aside and pray in the midst of a heavy schedule.
We read in the beginning of Mark’s Gospel, after healing many people in a particular town:
Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed (Mk. 1:35)
Story: Back in 2003, I went off to Oxford - bird watching at Pinkhill Reserve at Farmoor Reservoir.
Now I hasten to add, I hadn’t myself
planned to go bird watching.
Maddy and I decided to go down the 25th Wedding Anniversary of good friends of ours from Oxford, Sally and Francis Prittie.
What I didn’t realise was that Francis was an avid bird watcher.
And for part of their silver wedding celebrations, he had organised a group of us to go bird watching.
I spent the week trying to find any excuse to get out of bird watching.
But I couldn’t find a good excuse - so off bird watching I rather reluctantly went.
However, once we got to the hide on Pinkhill Reserve, I found it fascinating watching the common terns, the teal (small ducks), Canada geese with goslings, Coots and Cormorants.
And after an hour when Francis said,” let’s go” I felt like saying: What do you mean - I want to stay!!
I wanted to ABIDE in the hide!
And as I thought about it, I realised that my bird watching experience was a parable about abiding in Christ.
How often do we feel that it is a drag to go to pray.
We are too busy for that.
Yet may I commend it to you.
Spending time with Jesus – Abiding with Jesus - can be very rewarding. And you might find yourself, as I did last weekend in the hide – not wanting to leave.
If we take time to abide with Christ, we will have time to listen – as the hymn writer John G Whittier put it - to that “still small voice of calm” (in the hymn “Dear Lord and Father of mankind” - v. 5).
You never know what Jesus might say to you!!
As Jesus put it in the Garden of Gethsemane “Watch and pray” (Mk 14:38) .
2. The second characteristic of "abiding in Christ" is getting to know him
The founders of all the other great world religions, Mohammed, Buddha, and Confucius are all dead, but Jesus is alive.
That is what Easter is all about.
When I became a Christian, prayer changed.
It didn’t feel like giving God my wish list and hoping it would happen.
I found that when I took time with God – that I would get answers to the questions I asked.
The words of the Bible took on new significance. They seem to jump out of the page like a living Book.
They spoke to me and spoke into my life.
If you hang around someone long enough the
character of that person rubs off on you. And the same is true with Jesus – his character will be formed in us as we abide in him.
One well-known Bible Commentator put it like this:
“The indwelling Christ, or life through the word of Christ, demands and forms a life conforming to his spirit and will and brings about sanctification.”
As we spend time in
prayer,
reading and meditating on God’s word – The Bible and listening to what He says to us,
we will get to know Him.
Going to church is not enough, we must get to know Jesus.
Story: Keith Green once said: Going to church no more makes you a Christian – than going to McDonalds makes you a hamburger.
It is abiding in Jesus that makes us Christians.
3. The third characteristic of "abiding in Christ" is following him – or discipleship
When you are around Jesus, he will change you.
It is our changed lives that are going to impress people about the Christian faith – not our words.
Story: My father was very anti-church when he was alive.
He decided not to send me to the famous Roman Catholic school, Stonyhurst, to make sure I didn’t “go into the church” - as his sister and his aunt had done!!
Two years before he died – about 15 years after I had come to faith - we were sitting in my lounge in Switzerland when he said:
“I can see your Christianity has been good for you, Martin. It is not for me, but I can see
that it has been good for you”
If we are going to share the Good News of Jesus Christ to those around us, it will be by the way we live.
St. Francis of Assisi once said ”Preach the Gospel to all the world – and if necessary use words.”
Story: Richard Wurmbrand was a particular hero of mine, who died a couple of years ago.
Wurmbrand was a Christian Lutheran Minister who was put in prison for his faith in Romania by the Communist authorities for his faith.
While Wurmbrand was in prison, he shared a cell with a young Communist lad, who wanted to have nothing to do with Christianity.
Rations were very low in the prison, and yet Wurmbrand used to share his bread with that young atheist.
One day Wurmbrand was telling the young man about a Christian of whom it was said that he was like Jesus.
The young man turned around to Wurmbrand "If Jesus is like you, I would like to know him" (from the book "In God’s Underground" by Richard Wurmbrand)
What a witness for Christ.
I was challenged when I read that.
I wondered that if I had said that Jesus was like me – would anyone want to know him?
How much of an impact does Jesus have on the way I lead my life?
Story of Mustapha. When Maddy and I used to live in Basle, Switzerland, we had the privilege of running a refugee church.
One Moslem refugee, Mustapha became a Christian because as he put it to the church:
You gave me, a stranger, love and in Islam there is no love.
That is how we are going to reach people for Christ. By being a living testimony to Christ’s love.
Jesus said he wasn’t going to give us a lot of rules – in fact just one:
This is my command : Love one another” (John15:17).
And in it he said it all.
Can I leave you with a parting thought?
If being a Christian were made illegal, would there be enough evidence to convict you?
Story: I have always been impressed by the fact that in September 1997 Mother Theresa – a Christian - was given a state funeral in India, a Hindu country.
Six Hindu general bore her coffin
Doesn’t that speak volumes for the love of Christ that shone out through her life?
A love that came from ABIDING IN CHRIST
