What Can We Say?

Christianity has always been to the British society a bedrock on which the government and people have always had the opportunity to turn to for moral victory and directional wisdom.  I believe it is a fair statement that Jesus Christ has been the eternal compass which has guided our nation for many centuries. Our laws, our statutes and foreign policy is shaped by biblical truth. Our monarch is declared subservient to almighty God, and Parliament by extension therefore. 

However, Jesus Christ being a part of the institution does not necesserily mean he is the national compass, unless in times of struggle and lostness people begin to look towards him as the road to salvation. It is in times like these, as we face renewed challenges which our society must face, together, instead of disjointed and individually, that our government is presented with a decision. Shall we, as Great Britain, move forward, guided by the eternal moralities presented in biblical truth, or will we instead choose our own path and set of values, forged in swaying lines of a political manifesto?

This, is an uncomfortable choice for Gordon Brown and his cabinet. On the one hand, we have a government desperately seeking to avoid the harsh realities of an economic recession from hitting our population but, at the same time, we are only delaying the crisis with a surging value of debt.

I admire Gordon Brown for his priorities. He is, without question trying to shield the vulnerable and the needy, but unfortunately, with the resources he has at hand he is in clear denial of the inevitable result of this deepening crisis. Britannia will have a bloody nose, and it is going to be a painfull one.

So, what can we say as Christians? What can we proclaim to be the direction in which we must travel. Surely simply pointing to Jesus Christ does not outline any practical steps towards a solution, does it? Well, in the Bible, we are told throughout many books of the great Kingdoms of Israel and Judah, in which the biblical prophets travelled the lands proclaiming repentance, declaring salvation, singing worship, and lamenting lethargy and sin. Their message was simple, their cries were obvious. Turn to God. Worship his name. Rejoice in the saviour!

They, did not offer any practical steps towards recovery of the problems their nations were suffering. Why is this? I would suggest that it is because some problems do not mean as much as others. That as long as you have your God, you will have life. As long as you worship His name, you will have purpose, and as long as you pray to Him you will receive answers.

What can we say during this time? I advise that we must say what we always should have. That Jesus Christ is the way the truth and the light. There is nothing without him except emptiness. We need to say, that we must go through the consequences of our national indulgence, but instead of going it alone, we need to travel the road by following our compass, Jesus Christ.

Prayer Answered.

I have good news to declare. On Friday just past, I received in the mail a letter giving £3145 towards my Bible College Fees. This letter came completely out of the blue and without warning in a fantastic God given answer to prayer. For the past year and a half, brothers and sisters have been praying with me for the Lords provision for my time here in Wales, and I would like to take this time to declare that God is a Good and Faithfull God.

Additionally, I have learned that only recently one of my other brothers has decided to commit himself to the Lord, and on top of that, I have received news, that my Father too has started attending church again, to what degree, I don’t really know at this moment in time, but it is worthy of a celebration!

The payment on this amount of money, only leaves me £1500 short to make this years financial target for my Bible College Fees, and just after opening that chunk of mail I got in the post. I am very sure it’s going to come in!

Praise God!

Thought for the day.

For those who are not parents, then I am sure you have seen it. For those who are, than I can guarantee you have experienced it. We have all been there walking down the long supermarket aisles followed by the shrieking cries of an upset toddler, yup I mean that toddler, the one you’re thinking about right now.

But imagine will you, for just a minute, that this shrieking toddler is in fact your shrieking toddler. It is yours, because five years ago you made a mistake by not using the appropriate amount of protection in a moment where you were incapacitated from your senses, because, your senses were too focused somewhere else. And so you have to deal with the consequences that have followed you into the future, even into the supermarket.

This child, the one you never planned for is the consequence. It is dependant on you for its every need for food, water, sanitation, permission to play with its friends, you name it, this child needs you for it, even for survival. Yet, for some reason, this child is never happy. It is consistently trying to grab things it wants off the supermarket shelves, and when you turn around and say no, because quite bluntly you can’t afford to say yes, the said object comes flying towards your face, almost always hitting you square in the nose. And the bystanders, as there almost always are, turn and look at you, with those glances to say “what an awful parent, why doesn’t he/she just puck up and pay the price.”

Now you don’t pay the price, because you can’t afford to. And now, though you don’t mean to, you just naturally start resenting this child, proven by your actions. Because, when you can afford to spend the money on the child you created, you don’t, and instead leave it to make do with what it has.

Now, you are in this supermarket, and this is a particularly bad day. You are frustrated at all the previous visits, and guess what, the kid grabs something off the shelf, with a price tag that you are definitely not prepared to pay. But this time, something different happens. The bystanders, that often ignored the private, but very public fight of wills between you and your kid for some reason decide to get involved. They are fed up with the cries the child is making. They drag you through the supermarket, child in toe, towards the checkout. They take, a prepared weapon out of their pocket and force you to pay the cost of this item, believing that this transaction will end all of the problems, because, the child will now have no reason to cry.

The bystanders believe that they are helping you to make a necessary sacrifice, but, it is in fact more like an execution. They have just foolishly bankrupted you. And now, you have no money to feed yourself, or the child you brought into the world, because you have just been forced to pay a price you could not afford to the detriment of both parent and child, because the child still needs you. After all, its only playing in an adjacent room of your home.

You are understandably upset. You now look upon the bystanders as tyrants because they have just killed everything you had going, and now, the relationship with your child is worse than ever because the child has all of your wealth, poured into a simple object. And although, your child’s success is tied to yours, the bystanders won’t ever let you touch that special item, nestled in your child’s arms.

In fact, the sacrifice that you made, wasn’t a sacrifice at all, because it was a payment given unwillingly. At best it can be defined as a dramatic and unreasonable concession faced with overwhelming odds.

I’m sure you will agree with me, that such a forced transaction upon anyone is unfair, it is illegal, and it abandons all standards set aside by out international community. Furthermore as a Christian, it cheapens the very notion of sacrifice. Sacrifice, is shown in the death of Jesus Christ who sacrificed himself on the cross willingly and unreasonably for everyone. That is the definition of sacrifice, whereas, a forced unwilling payment is to our parent, more akin to an ecconomic execution.

Sadly, though, this unwilling transaction is in fact seen as acceptable in the eyes of most of the international community. Many believe that Israel should be forced into giving away land, which it quite simply can’t afford to do. And to achieve this, many nations place a weapon at Israel’s head calling for them to pay the unwilling and in their eyes reasonable price. Naturally, as we all know, Israel does not believe this price to be anything that approaches reasonable.

As a Christian however, I believe that sacrifice is always a reasonable option. I believe that to sacrifice is in fact to gain. To give what will be the detriment to me, is not a loss, but instead it is an eternal prize. I look to Jesus Christ when I think of this situation, when I think of the Parent and child; Israel and Gaza, as well as the witnessing international community. And I wonder, if people employed biblical humility, and simply loved people as themselves as Christ commanded would there be screaming in the supermarket. Or would both sides be striving to make real sacrifices. Noble sacrifices, instead of lasting, damaging and meaningless concessions that no one wanted to pay.

 

2009

Tester Post.