DEEPER SPIRITUALITY

I don’t normally share like this so please excuse me for being a bit more personal than I am normally in these Pastor’s Desks. Last Sunday morning I awoke with a strong sense that I needed to incorporate the vision of Ezekiel’s Temple as a framework for us to think about our year ahead in my sermon for that day. I had to re-jig my presentation (which as you might be aware involves a bit more work than they way most other preachers do their slides). This is why I arrived at church a little later than I normally comfortable in doing. I was particularly gripped by this divine vision given to Ezekiel of the Holy Spirit’s outpouring in the New Covenant with Christ Himself being the Temple-Source (John 2:19-21). While I was preaching to our church community (in-person and online) I was also preaching to myself. As a result, Kim and I continued  in prayer and fasting for the rest of our Sunday. I now want to invite you to consider again Ezekiel’s picture of the Spirit-filled Christian life as the map for going deeper with God.

“FORMAL” CHRISTIANITY IS LIFELESS, POWERLESS, AND BORING

It’s my guess that most people regard Christianity as an outdated institution that is largely irrelevant. Sadly, I suspect that too many people who would consider themselves Christians regard Christianity as merely about them and their particular religious observances such as: attending church services, participating in the Eucharist (also referred to as Holy Communion, the Lord’s Supper), and performing other religious observances such as lighting prayer candles or contributing to the church’s weekly collection. In the words of the apostle Paul, these people might have a “form” of Christianity but they do not know God or His power in their lives (2Tim. 3:5). Having a form of Christianity like this, but never having experienced the power of the Holy Spirit in transforming your soul into the image and likeness of Christ is a rather lifeless form of Christianity. If that’s where you’re at, I invite you to go deeper into the water of God and seek to experience more of the power of the Holy Spirit (Eph. 3:19). 

And do not get drunk with wine,
for that is debauchery,
but be filled with the Spirit
Ephesians 5:18

In Ezekiel’s vision of the New Covenant which Yahweh revealed to him, he saw it as a ‘Temple’ twice the size of Solomon’s Temple with a headwater of the Holy Spirit’s life-giving, soul-transforming, miracle-working ‘water’ flowing out from under the Temple’s east door’s threshold Ezek. 47:1). The further that water traveled east, the deeper it got, and in the vision, Ezekiel was invited to walk further and deeper into it. This was a picture of what it’s like to walk with Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit (Rom. 15:13, 19; 1Cor. 2:4; Eph. 3:16). Coincidentally, the eastward direction from the Jerusalem Temple is largely dry wilderness, then desert. But Ezekiel is shown that wherever the water of the Holy Spirit goes, what was once barren becomes lush and fertile (Ezek. 47-8-9). This is a challenging picture that reveals that the purpose of the Spirit-filled life is not for the believer’s amusement, but for the empowering of the believer’s response to Christ’s summons to take the hope of rescue and soul-healing to a people lost a harsh world of barren spiritual darkness (Acts 26:18).

GO DEEPER IN YOUR CHRISTIANITY

How does Ezekiel’s vision of the New Covenant (Christianity) expect the faithful to go deeper? It begins with surrender and living to make God, His Word, and His will our highest priority (Matt. 6:33; Rom. 12:1-3). While formal Christianity is all about external appearance, real Christianity is a matter of the inner-life of the believer. The true believer is being transformed by the Holy Spirit who abides in them (Jn. 14:17). The Holy Spirit takes us deeper by transforming our priorities, our passions, our past-times, our praying, and especially our concern for people. The Spirit-filled life is a life walking daily with Christ with our spiritual ears attentive to His voice and leading.

It is no mere coincidence that both the Holy Spirit (Jn. 7:38-39) and the Word of God (Eph. 5:26) are depicted as water. Both are indispensable for going deeper with God (Jn. 3:5). Both relate to how we pray. The Spirit leads the faithful to pray (Eph. 6:18). When a new believer starts out in their new life with Christ they learn that they can talk with God (Gal. 4:6). The Spirit invites the child of God into the Father’s presence to talk freely with Him (Heb. 4:16). As this new believer becomes a seasoned believer they discover while we continue to talk freely with our heavenly Father, we must also appreciate that our Father is the King, the King of the Universe, the All-Mighty King and Judge (Mat. 25:31-46; Rev. 20:12). The Spirit opens our eyes to this awareness of the magnitude of God. The growing awareness of the Father’s greatness increasingly transforms our prayers into petitions for the eternal destiny of people (Rom. 8:26; Col. 1:29) because we walk deeper into the eastward flowing water of the Holy Spirit. 

Don’t wait for a prayer meeting to begin praying. Don’t wait for your next Bible Study to take up God’s Word and feed your soul. The deeper life begins now. Pray now. Take up God’s Word now. Be a witness now. May God the Father grant us a greater revelation of God the Son by the power of God the Holy Spirit.

¶ The Spirit and the Bride say,“Come.”
And let the one who hears say, “Come.”
And let the one who is thirsty come;
let the one who desires take the water of life without price.
Revelation 22:17

Amen.

Your pastor,

Andrew

Let me know what you think below in the comment section and feel free to share this someone who might benefit from this Pastor’s Desk.

DIGITAL NATIVE OR DIGITAL MISSIONARY?

YOU WON’T FIND THIS AMUSING 

Whoever gives thought to the word will discover good, and blessed is he who trusts in the LORD.
Proverbs 16:20

I’ve been thinking. We now live in a world that treasures amusement. We once lived in a world that treasured musing. I do not begrudge anyone who enjoys being amused. After all, amusement can take our minds off of our troubles. Amusement can humour and cheer us. However, it is these same benefits of amusement that can also mislead us into believing that we are meant to be happy and occupied all the time. We perhaps shouldn’t be surprised by this because many now spend the greater proportion of their time in a digitalworld where they are unwittingly tricked at every turn. In what some see as a metaphor of our age, this digital world invites us to take a front row seat not just in front of our computer screen, but in the Director’s Seat of the ‘Stage of Life’. Author of, ‘Screens And Teens‘, Dr. Kathy Koch, warns that young people in particular, especially Christian teens, are at risk of being unable to think because of their addictive involvement in the digital world. Let’s think about this…

¶ But when I thought how to understand this,
it seemed to me a wearisome task,
Psalm 73:16

Because the digital world is so vastly different from reality, it can be very difficult for digital natives to adjust back into reality. Dr. Kathy Koch (pronounced, “Cook”) says that when digital natives surf the web, they are in control. But when they interact in the world of reality  they often struggle with the reality that they are not in control of their circumstances – the real God is. In the digital world they can get an abundance of information on virtually any subject which can lead them to think that they don’t need the education which their teachers provide. But there is a world of difference between information and education. Research overwhelmingly demonstrates that students are far better able to retain taught knowledge when it is delivered to them by a person, rather than a screen. Dr. Koch also states that digital natives have greatly diminished attention spans which makes worshipful reading of Scripture virtually impossible. She pointed out that the research is clear about the difference between comprehension and retention levels between those who read from a screen, and those who read a physical book. People who read books on a screen retain less than those who read a hardcopy book. Digital natives are more likely to get ‘bored’ in the world of reality. Parents who use electronic tablets or smart-phones to occupy their children – so that they won’t get bored or need their parents attention – are retarding their children’s creativity and ability to learn, interact with others, and be patient. 

But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.
Romans 8:25

“To most Christians, the Bible is like a software license. Nobody actually reads it. They just scroll to the bottom and click ‘I agree’.”

― Bill Maher, American TV Talkshow Host

DIGITAL INDUCED DEPRESSION

In the digital world, the native is always presented with alternatives to their present experience. ‘Drop Down Menus’ present a digital native with alternate/optional browsing experiences. In the world of reality, the power to change ones present experience doesn’t always exist. The world of reality doesn’t offer us a ‘delete button’ for the negative experiences we go through. 

Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
Second Corinthians 12:8-9

We live in a world of reality where bad things happen to good people. In the digital world we can airbrush away wrinkles. In the actual world we must face reality and accept it, especially the following-

1. We are not sitting in the Director’s Chair of life – God is.
2. We are not the central character in the story of life – God is.
3. We are not the hero of either our life or the story unfolding around us – God is.
4. We are not going to be happy and occupied all of the time. This reality causes us to rest in God’s love and guidance while enjoying the peace He gives despite our emotional state or circumstances. There is a world of difference between doing nothing and being still (Psalm 46:10).
5. We have a better chance of getting what we want if we serve others and help them get what they want. God incarnate is the greatest example of what it means to serve others.
6. We are note always going to get what we want when we want. The world of reality is designed by God to accommodate our patience. 
7. We may acquire information digitally, but not necessarily attain knowledge presented with wisdom by a God-gifted teacher. God has ordained that genuine knowledge can only be received when we demonstrate true humility which enables us to learn from a teacher.

Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be still wiser;
teach a righteous man, and he will increase in learning.
Proverbs 9:9

LET’S THINK

For those who know me, you will know that I am a digital missionary. I am not a digital native. Much to the surprise of many people, I use a pen to write in my spiral-bound notebook organiser. I tell people that this is my “think pad”. I write out by hand these weekly Pastoral articles, then type them up. I am currently producing a series of thinking radio spots which I script by hand. My current reading project is a 450 page (actual pages of paper) book on philosophy which I plan to finish this weekend. Although I do my daily Bible reading with my iPad, I still use a leather-bound printed Bible each day as well. Within my Bible I place hundreds of sticky notes which contain thoughts, comments, lists, outlines, that I have written. My Bible is highlighted and underlined. When I come to our family dinner table, I leave my phone in the other room. We never have the TV on during dinner. All of these enables me to interact better with a book; more deeply with the Sacred Text; more meaningfully with those I eat with. My great fear is that we, followers of Christ, are becoming dual citizens of two worlds – the digital and the actual – instead of being a Kingdom citizen of the real world where Christ is the Lord who then sends us as His ambassadors into a digital world of Social Media (Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Instagram, Tumblr…) not become overcome by it, but to be a light to it. By doing this, I think we will be better equipped to think, contemplate, ponder, muse, be creative, still, patient, and caring of others. In addition to this, we are less likely to be susceptible to certain mental disorders which being increasingly induced by the consequences of digital addiction. 

¶ So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him.  Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.
Romans 12:1-2 THE MESSAGE

Pastor Andrew

WHY WE FEEL AND WE MUST

WE FEEL

An ounce of experience outweighs a ton of argument! As much as I think that the claims of Christianity are reasonable, logical, factual, and true, there are some people who will never be persuaded to accept this. They have been hurt in the name of God. One of the trickiest aspects to reaching such people is that they often hide behind a façade of what they assert are logical and reasonable objections to God. If we are not careful, we might be tricked into thinking that their objections to the existence of God were actually intellectual. If you care, and want to help such ones, here’s some suggestions.

“They’re all hypocrites! All they want is your money!” someone said recently to one of our new converts in our church. “Besides, look at how many children they’ve sexually abused!” they followed up with. This rocked our church member and sowed some seeds of doubt into them. However, it didn’t take long for them to realise that these allegations were weak in the light of their experience. They recalled how people from our church had sat with them in their darkest hours and shown patient support. They remembered that church leaders and other members had taken them into their homes and shared meals and time with them, and offered a caring, supportive, listening ear to them without any sense that they were trying to get something from them. They considered that the church presented its financial accounts to everyone in and outside of the church in a very public fashion for all to see, query, and scrutinise. In those financial accounts were the records of hundreds of people who had been assisted in some way over the past year. And the allegations of sexual abuse of children had nothing to do with this church – and in fact, there were some very accountable guidelines in place for preventing even a hint of this. 

In one sense, such allegations could be seen as an attack against our church. (As it turns out, this person had never been to our church or knew anything about us.) Rather than seeing this as an attack against us, I feel we should see this as an uncurtained window into someone’s heart. It lets us see that they feel hurt by someone who was supposed to be representing God. Their objections to God are grounded in their emotional experiences where they were subject directly or indirectly to someone’s hypocrisy.

THE PHONE CALL

After one of our church TV ad campaigns (which we run every Summer on commercial television stations), a lady phoned our church to attack us. As she shared her anger at our audacity to publicly invite people to church and declare that God loved them, I gently said to her, 

“It sounds like you have a story.”   

“I do!” she replied. “And maybe one day when you’ve got the time, I could tell it to you.” 

“I’ve got the time now,” I said, “if you’d like to share it with me.“

For the next two hours she shared how she had attended church with her family as a little girl and was all the while being secretly molested by the priest. This took place from the age of 6 up until the age of 17! She was now in her late 50s. She had tried to bury all this pain in her past and forget it, but the recent Royal Commission Into The Sexual Abuse of Children had brought it all back up for her. She told me how she actually longed for a spiritual connection with God, and knew that this necessarily involved being in a community of sincere believers. But her trust had been so egregiously violated that she suffered from involuntary physical reactions even setting foot outside of any church building. This had prevented her from attending family weddings and even funerals. I felt her pain. It was deep and almost incurable. This is not the kind of story that invited a reasoned argument as a response. It required a sincere pastoral response.

¶ “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him if a great millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea.
Mark 9:42

HURT PEOPLE OFTEN BEHAVE LIKE HURT PEOPLE

I recently heard the story Prof. Rosaria Butterfield. She was the Professor of English & Women’s Studies at Syracuse University, in the USA. And, by her own admission, she was also a strident atheist, feminist, and practicing lesbian. She wrote a piece for the New York Times titled, “Why Promise Keepers Is A Threat To American Democracy” (Promise Keepers was a Christian Men’s Movement striving to encourage men to be more godly) in which she attacked “right-wing Fundamentalist Christians”. Her article drew quite a reaction. But one response caught her by surprise. It was from an elderly Presbyterian minister. She later described it as, “The kindest opposition I had ever received.” She found Pastor Smith’s manner very appealing. They began to dialogue. The pastor invited Rosaria over for a meal with him and his wife. Rosaria was keen to publicly dismantle Christianity and was pleased to have this contact with Pastor Smith whom she regarded as “a research assistant”. These dinners became a weekly event, sometimes at Pastor Smith’s home, sometimes at Rosaria’s home. This went on week by week for the next two years. Professor Butterfield fired her objections to the Bible at these dinners and Rev. Smith patiently and reasonably answered each of them. In this time, the Professor read the Bible through from cover to cover seven times – looking for its glaring inaccuracies and fallacies. She couldn’t find any. But this wasn’t the tipping point for her being converted to Christ. It was kindness she received from Rev. Smith and his wife. Several times over those two years one of them would call her after a snow blizzard and ask how she was and whether they could help her in anyway. 

She observed that during their meals together, people would just drop by. Often they would make their way into the Smith’s kitchen and fix themselves a cup of coffee and make themselves at home. This sense of community was something she had come to value among her LGBT friends. Now she was experiencing it firsthand among Christians! She said, “Around this time the Word of God got into me. It was no longer an outside book – it was now inside me!” She was converted to Christ. She came to realise that her “attractions were not her identity”, yet her feelings of same-sex attraction did not disappear with her conversion to Christianity. She became more involved in her new community of fellow believers and the kindness, acceptance, and grace she received from them was transformational over the coming years. Today, she is married to Rev. Ken Butterfield, is a mother, and a home-schooler, who lives with her family in North Carolina. 

but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious…¶ Finally, all of you, have unity of mind, sympathy, brotherly love, a tender heart, and a humble mind.
First Peter 3:4, 8

The Gospels repeated describe Christ as “having compassion” for the people He was with. I suspect that if we could do the same, some of the people who feel hurt by those they expected to more accurately honour God, would eventually come to see that God is real because they can see Him in us as we care for each other and for them. It might take two years of dining each week with them in our homes or theirs, but then again, when the hurt is deep, it might take even longer.

Amen.

Ps. Andrew

WHERE TO MINE IF YOU WANT TRUE RICHES

WHERE TO MINE IF YOU WANT TRUE RICHES 

Great wealth comes from mining. Australia has benefited greatly from its recent mining boom, making us one of the wealthiest nations on earth. Many of Australia’s cities and towns exist because of mining and many of supportive communities have grown as a result. We saw this dramatically a few years ago when the ‘Beaconsfield Mine Disaster’ happened just a few minutes up the road from where our church is and how it affected our community. Of course, without mining, we could not have our precious technology which depend upon the silicon, copper, bauxite, neodymium, gold, and silver being mined. The world owes a lot to mining. Mining is a primary industry. So is farming. But farming has one massive advantage over mining. And curiously enough, I’ve noticed that the farming versus mining disparity not only applies to primary industries but even more aptly to our relationships.  

When I was growing up, nearly all of my uncles (with the exception of just one of the six), was a farmer. Dairy, beef, crops, sheep, and bees were their livelihoods. The thing about farmers is that they are dependent on sustaining their livelihoods. Miners, on the other hand, cannot sustain their supply of what they mine. Once it’s mined, it’s gone

If you drive around Tasmania you’ll see what appear to be roadside forests. But upon closer inspection, there’s something a little odd about these roadside forests: all the trees are in straight rows. As any local can tell you, there’s a reason for that. These aren’t really forests. They’re plantations. Many of them were planted ten or fifteen years ago, some even sooner. Some harvests in life take that long.

Let me jump straight to my concluding point. If we ‘mine’ those around us – especially those closest to us – we are treating them as if they are expendable, something to be tossed aside when we’re finished with them. But if we farm our relationships, we grow them and they are not only enlarged they are sustained. This means: the one who loves best loves the most for the longest. The husband who treats his wife as an object is not farming. He is mining. And because of his neglect he is the one who is depriving himself of some of the richest blessings this life offers.

¶ The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it.
Genesis 2:15

The very first wedding took place in a garden. The symbolism is rich. The original picture takes place in an environment where there has been planning, planting, cultivation, tending, watering and feeding. Marriage began in a garden and, in many respects, is a garden. In the Song of Solomon the love between a husband and his wife is described as being like the relationship between a gardener and a garden. 

¶ Awake, O north wind,
and come, O south wind!
Blow upon my garden,
let its spices flow.
Let my beloved come to his garden,
and eat its choicest fruits.
Song of Solomon 4:16

Farming involves tending, sowing, nurturing, watering, and feeding. To reap a harvest of intimacy you must sow trust and fertilise it with consistency and mulch it with understanding and transparency. This type of farming produces bountiful harvests. This is the essence of being faithful in marriage. The boy who learns to go off partying with his mates looking to ‘pick up’ a girl for a cheap thrill is learning to treat women as objects to be be ‘mined’. No woman deserves to be treated like this! This is why pornography is so insidiously evil and grossly unjust! But the boy who is taught that women are a treasure to be prized, guarded, and respected is learning how to farm for the day when his future love is in his life so that he will reap a life-time-together harvest. This is why “dating” (where there is no realistic expectation that it will lead to marriage) is not really a Biblical concept. Rather, the Biblical prescription seems to be friendship within community leading to a courtship with the permission of relevant authorities within that community (particularly parental approval). Parents play a key role in helping their children to relationally ‘farm’ their love for another.

OUR RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD

Our relationship with God though, has parallels with both mining and farming. Some people inflect a deprived spiritual childhood upon themselves by only ever raking the surface of a relationship with God. If only they would dig like a miner! The treasures they would find! Raking, at best, can summon leaves, twigs, and dirt. But digging can be the means by which one discovers gold, gems, precious metals, and even life-sustaining water. 

¶ My son, if you receive my words and treasure up my commandments with you…if you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures,
Proverb 2:1, 4

The only difference between natural and supernatural mining is that the metals and gems of earth are finite and limited, where as the treasures to found in a relationship with Christ are unlimited and infinite or to use the language of The Mine, they are unsearchable! 

¶ Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!
Romans 11:33

to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ,
Ephesians 3:8b

And our relationship with God is also a farming one. He is the Gardener who plans, plants, tends, prunes, waters, feeds and harvests. 

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.”
John 15:1-2

The Milky Way clearly visible over my house from my backyard. This is yet another example of the incredible riches that are often ours for the taking but yet go unnoticed and ignored.

But God is also a limitlessly fertile field into whom we can sow our time, talent and treasure. 

Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.
Galatians 6:7-8

In one sense, our devotion to God by Scripture reading, study, and memorisation, is mining our relationship with God while our good deeds including prayer, worship, witnessing, serving the Body of Christ, is farming our relationship with God. Australia’s wealth has been based on farming and mining. Even with all the high-tech advances in the global economy, people are always going to what mining and farming give us. While ‘mining’ has no place in our relationships with each other, especially for those who are married, it can and should share the basis of our relationship with God along with ‘farming’. After you finish reading these few brief thoughts, I invite you to begin ‘mining’ your relationship with God through the reading of Scripture and to make a commitment to spiritually ‘farm’ your relationship with God as well by sowing good deeds in the Name of Christ.

¶ The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully …  ¶ He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness.
Second Corinthians 9:6, 10

Your spiritual mining-rights entitlements and harvest awaits.

Amen.

How To Really Live This Life

PUTTING THINGS OFF

Following Christ is a wonderful adventure. Like any adventure, the things that make this journey so exciting are the twists and turns, the mountains and the valleys, the beautiful scenery, the walks with companions, the times of solitude, the feasting, the battles, the storms, and the pursuit of our mission. It also requires what any long trek requires – lightening our packs. Thus, the New Testament describes following Christ as a walk and it’s a walk that involves a lot of putting off. 

The longer you follow Christ the more of life’s journey you get to experience and enjoy. This life was meant to be journeyed with Christ on the path of life that He has marked out. 

 For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few. – Matthew 7:14

Geoff, Kim and a reluctant me were beginning our trek along the Port Davey Track. Due to poor weather and visibility the small plane that flew us in there was delayed which meant we were starting our walk near day’s end. Ordinarily that’s not a problem. With appropriate head-lamps a walker can traverse moderately difficult walking tracks in fading light. That is, of course, if the track is clearly visible in broad daylight to begin with. In this instance, the track was overgrown, was not clearly marked, and was not often used. And it was getting dark. The overgrown brush was up to my eye-level and it was a struggle to find the star-droppers which once marked the track. Many people live life like this. Nothing is clear. There are no markers. No one to guide them. And really poor visibility.

 ¶ Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” – John 8:12

We eventually made it to Macquarie Harbour for our first camp of the trek. 

When doing a five or six day trek, every hiker wants to travel as light as possible. When Kim and I did the South Coast Track (which involves going over the Ironbound Range, which my old mate, legs, told me was actually higher than Mount Everest) we were carrying around 26+kg each. That’s a heavy load even on flat, smooth ground, but it’s particularly heavy on rough 60º inclines! This too is similar to how many try to live their lives. They carry a lot of baggage. Unforgiveness, bitterness, past betrayals, disappointments, mistakes and regrets can all weigh a person down and become almost unbearable during life’s ascents. 

 ¶ Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us – Hebrews 12:1

At one point on the South Coast Track, Kim and I had to ascend a thirty-metre high cliff (which also hosted a beautiful waterfall) on about day 3 or 4 of our walk (with two days to go). When we arrived at the top of the cliff we were surprised to find abandoned hiking gear. It looked like someone had not been able to continue on the track. Presumably they were injured  and had to be helicoptered out. They had left their tent and various other essentials. Sometimes in life too when people continue to carry too much baggage it takes a toll on their soul and they are unable to continue on in their life-journey.

 See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no “root of bitterness” springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled; – Hebrews 12:15

John Newton wrote about the Christian walk, “Through many dangers, toils, and snares, I have already come.” Life has its dangers, it times of frustration, and its road-blocks, as Mr Newton, the writer of the hymn, Amazing Grace, had penned. As we trekked up the Port Davey Track, in the south-west corner of Tasmania’s vast wilderness, we had to trudge through a lot of swamp, then bog. In life, people get bogged down with all kinds of ‘snares’. When we walk with Jesus, He helps us to not only see the track, not only guide us along it, but also helps us get through these times where toil is called for.

Deliver me from sinking in the mire; let me be delivered from my enemies and from the deep waters. – Psalm 69:14

There were a few times on the ‘Track that I had to be pulled out of a bog by Geoff. I, of all people, understand why the Ring of Power  (Lord of the Rings) could not merely by carried by Frodo alone – he needed a ‘fellowship’ of the ring in order to complete his mission. In the same way, such a walk through remote wilderness could be done on your own, but it would be most unwise. In the same way, the Christian walk might be possible to be lived out on your own (as recently many Chinese Christians have had to do for years on end as they were imprisoned for their faith in Christ and put in solitary confinement). But our faith in Christ and our walk with Jesus cannot intentionally be solitary.

 ¶ Whoever isolates himself seeks his own desire; he breaks out against all sound judgment. – Proverbs 18:1

Travelling for days on end in the wilderness, through swamps, bogs, forests, around and over hills is made all the sweeter by the company travelling with you. It’s like life. There are times when the walk gets so full of snares and toils that while we long for a companion to ease our anguish, we actually withdraw from the sheep-fold and isolate ourselves – thus making our sense of loneliness even more painful. When Kim and walked the South Coast Track, we were two of an unintended group of five. There was safety, companionship, and reassurance in travelling as a small group. Our spiritual walk is the same. We need the ‘temple’ where we all meet together as the early church did, but we also need the ‘home to home’ small group context. It is in our regular home group meetings that we share together, pray for each other, exhort one another from God’s Word, and provide practical assistance to each other in times of need.  

At the end of such a trek we are a little different because of what we have been through on the journey. Our muscles are more toned, our body-fat is a little lessened, our feet are a little tougher, our core is a little stronger. This journey with Christ also produces strength in us for eternity that can not be attained any other way. It reminds me of the young boy watching the cocoon begin to shake. He realised the emerging butterfly was struggling to break free. Taking his pocket-knife, he cut the cocoon for poor butterfly to get out. Standing back, he saw the head then the wings of the butterfly escape its cocoon only then for the butterfly to fall to the ground and die. What the little boy didn’t know was that the Maker had designed for the butterfly to build its initial wing strength from enduring and persisting through the toil of breaking out of its cocoon. In a similar, our being made ‘fit’ for heaven involves the formation of godliness (Christ-like character) through dealing with life’s struggles/challenges/difficulties in this life with Christ’s help, teaching, and guidance. The godliness we form in this life’s journey is the level of godliness we will have for eternity-

for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. – First Timothy 4:8

There is simply no way to form the Christ-like character traits of love, forgiveness, patience, long-suffering, endurance, forbearance, self-sacrifice, diligence, hope, or gentleness, without adversity, trial, setbacks, betrayal, conflict, or discomfort. Pity help the one who tries to walk the road of life without Christ as their lamp, guide, companion, rescuer, provider, or protector. But perhaps greater pity should be felt for those who have come to know Him as Saviour but are still yet to know Him as Friend (John 15:15). 

So Jesus said to them, “The light is among you for a little while longer. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you. The one who walks in the darkness does not know where he is going. – John 12:35

Journeying with Christ makes you not just fitter for the life to come, but also for this life. You become a more peaceful person. You learn that in times of need and stress that Christ is right there to strengthen, guide, and lead you through it. You discover that the thing you thought you couldn’t do without are sometimes the very things that Jesus asks you to surrender and to put off. Your thought-life changes. Your heart softens towards God and those around you. Your desires change. The further down the track you walk with Christ the more you realise that life is not about you. You become humbler. You want to be taught – to be corrected. This is why the aged Apostle Paul could write to the believers at Ephesus, and say-

¶ Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds.  They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart.  They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity.  But that is not the way you learned Christ! — assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, to put offyour old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. -Ephesians 4:17-24

The journey of life with Christ transforms us. The seasoned Apostle tells us that it requires, “putting off of our old selves (which belongs to our former manner of living” (Eph. 4:22). Thus, the more we journey with Christ, the more we find that we are putting off. The journey helps us to recognise that often our most natural responses and desires are not Christ-like but are actually harmful to us and others. Instead of asking, What’s in it for me? – we put that off and increasingly think: How can I bless someone else with my presence, time, talent, treasure? Instead harbouring bitterness and unforgiveness toward those who have hurt us, we put that toxic attitude off, and increasingly feel compassion for them instead and even initiate acts of kindness toward them. 

No matter what you’re going through right now, no matter how loved or noticed you feel, no matter what others have said about  or done to you, Christ can be your Lamp, Guide, Companion, Strength, Rescuer, Heart-Healer, Defender, Protector, Provider, and Shepherd. Every time I’ve done a long arduous walk and I near the end of it, my heart lifts when I see the carpark! And while a carpark is poor analogy for heaven, there are some parallels. The carpark marks the end of the journey’s trials. The carpark is not my delight, but it contains the means to my delight. In a similar way, heaven is not my eternal goal, but it is the contains the means for my eternal delight: Christ Himself. The carpark means I can finally rest and in the comfort of my car where I am secure against the sub-zero night temperatures, the snow, the hail, the gale-force winds, the pain of mountainous inclines, the scrapes of rocks and broken tree-limbs, and the sticky brown stuff some hikers call ‘coffee’. In heaven we will truly rest. We will be truly secure. We will be finally free of aches and pains. We will no longer be dogged by regrets or disappointments. All of our deepest longings and desires will be perfectly satisfied increasingly for all eternity! If we learn to put off along the journey now. 

Amen.

Pastor Andrew.