IAN GREIG writing in THE LIVING WORD
What is God really looking for, in us? Some times we muddle on in life, doing the best we can, without really knowing what pleases God our Father.
This is Ian Greig of The Living Word, bringing you ‘Faith without the Faff’ and helping you to answer questions like that. And this week’s story entitled “Be real, be attentive, be ready in faith” does just that.
It is about worship of God that comes out of being hospitable and caring for others the way He says — being real with God. Jesus picks this up in teaching His first disciples to be alert and spiritually aware, ready for whatever the Master may do. Then teaching for the Early Church highlights how we combine being confident in hope, which comes out of knowing what God is like, and living by the faith which comes out of hearing what He is saying.
It’s a really empowering message.
We start with a summons to hear God in His righteousness as He gathers the people of His covenant — with a warning for those for whom God and His works are not part of their picture. This is in these excerpted words from Psalm 50:
The Mighty One… the Lord, speaks and summons the [whole] earth. From Zion, perfect in beauty, God shines forth…[summoning] the heavens above, and the earth, that He may judge His people: And the heavens proclaim His righteousness, for He is a God of justice.
“Gather to Me this consecrated people, who made a covenant with Me by sacrifice….Listen… and I will speak…
“Consider this, you who forget God, or I will tear you to pieces, with no one to rescue you: Those who sacrifice thank offerings honour Me, and to the blameless I will show My salvation. “
(Psalm 50:1–8, 22–23 excerpted)
Here’s the problem. The people are in a covenant with God. .
He has made promises to them and in return He expects them to be loyal to Him and to fulfil promises they have made. That’s the way covenants work.
But they are treating it very lightly. They need to BE REAL about who God is and what He has done for them.
- Check out the Medium TLW Bible study page which offers verse by verse commentary and reflections on each reading
- And watch this week’s video Be Real, Be Attentive, Be Ready In Faith… telling the story through the Bible readings
In the early days, in the desert, it wasn’t too difficult to keep.
There were dangers on every side. There was no obvious source of food or water. And although they had been promised a land of their own, they didn’t know where it was, or how to get there.
So they had to depend on Almighty God the Provider.
A few hundred years on, following long and successful reigns of by King David and King Solomon, Israel had become a powerful nation. They enjoyed rest — the attention of God and the lack of attention from their enemies.
But they were making the mistake that we all make. They had grown self-sufficient and independent of God. They had begun to treat each other selfishly and harshly — and the rich grew richer and allowed the poor to become poorer without caring.
That special identity they possessed as God’s covenant people didn’t seem to matter anymore.
It mattered a great deal to God.
This was his special relationship with them that was being treated lightly
And so, through His anointed spokesman, Isaiah, he told them how He felt about it — to get real. Let’s hear this in the words of Isaiah 1:
The vision concerning Judah and Jerusalem that Isaiah saw… “The multitude of your sacrifices — what are they to Me?” says the LORD. “I have more than enough of burnt offerings… I have no pleasure in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats…
“Stop bringing meaningless offerings! Your incense is detestable to me… Your appointed festivals I hate… they have become a burden to Me… When you spread out your hands in prayer, I hide My eyes from you; even when you offer many prayers, I am not listening. Your hands are full of blood.
“Wash and make yourselves clean… Stop doing wrong. Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the fatherless; plead the case of the widow. “Come now, let us settle the matter,” says the LORD. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow… If you are willing and obedient, you will eat the good things of the land; but if you resist and rebel, you will be devoured by the sword.” For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.
(Isaiah 1:1, 10–20 excerpted)
As the people had moved from desert dwellers to city dwellers, the centre of worship had changed from the tabernacle which moved from place to place, to the mountain-top landmark temple built by King Solomon.
And the nature of worship had changed from what we might call ‘low church’, experiencing God day by day in the desert, meeting their needs, healing their sicknesses, and guiding them — to the greater formality of ‘ high church’, more elaborate in its rituals and special days and special people of different ranks.
And there was a lot of it: burnt offerings of every kind, incense and a lot of words in the “many prayers”.
But there was a dissonance between their attention to rituals and lack of attention to how they lived and related. Isaiah speaks for God, saying: “Your hands are full of blood — wash and make yourself clean… Stop doing wrong”,
This is like serving a guest meal with filthy hands and dirty crockery. You’d send it back!
For those who find solace in ritual, this comes as a difficult message — God doesn’t like it! There is too much throughout Scripture about His dislike of form where it lacks the sincerity and humility and personal connection of faith.
God wants a personal, mutual and real relationship with us.
He always did. Back in the desert, there had to be an emphasis on rules and obedience — these were nomadic tribesmen coming out of slavery. The way people experienced God would change, as they changed. But it wasn’t supposed to grow independent.
The first disciples found they were living and learning to minister with someone like them, on the one hand, but who was the complete and perfect representation of God in human form, on the other.
This was an ‘in between’ time, ending the old covenant era and moving into the new covenant in Jesus’ death and resurrection. The gospels are about the kingdom of God and Jesus coaching His disciples to live in the awareness of Him and His kingdom when he was no long with them physically, but very much present spiritually. In Luke 12 we see Him instructing them, not just to ‘be real’ but to ‘be ready’ and spiritually alert — as we say, ‘Constant change is here to stay’.
“Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom.
“Sell your possessions and give to the poor:… treasure in heaven that will never fail, where no thief comes and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
“Be…ready… and keep your lamps burning, like servants waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet, so that when he comes… they can immediately open the door for him.
“It will be good for those servants whose master finds them watching when he comes. Truly I tell you, he…will have them recline at the table and will… wait on them.
“It will be good for those servants whose master finds them ready… in the middle of the night or toward daybreak.
“You…must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect Him.”
(Luke 12:31-40 excerpted)
Being alert and ready for what God is doing requires faith — faith that sees God’s intentions before we see his actions.
We can do this if we have received Jesus Christ into our hearts as Saviour and Lord, because this gives us a whole new dimension of spiritual life.
We weren’t aware of the Holy Spirit teaching us and leading us before, but now we are.
What is faith? It is being real with God and being ready for God but also being in faith for what we see God doing. All of these things are demonstrated by that spiritual giant of ancient times, Abraham, and this definition of faith which builds on hope, takes him as its prime example. Let’s hear this from Hebrews 11, a letter written to encourage Christians of Jewish background:
Faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see…
By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command… not made out of what was visible.
By faith Abraham… called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going… [Making] his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise.
He was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God.
And by faith even Sarah…past childbearing age, was enabled to bear children because she considered He who had made the promise faithful.
And so from this one man…came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky…
All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only… welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth. If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. Instead, they were longing for a better country — a heavenly one.
Therefore God… their God… has prepared a city for them.
(Hebrews 11:1–3, 8–16 excerpted)
Hope is all about confidence in God as a person.
As the ultimate holy Person, God must be true to Himself, meaning His character, His values and His attributes.
God is not fickle; He is utterly faithful, He is mercifully loving, and His goodness and kindness are beyond description.
So if we know God, we know that His intentions are good — and we can have full confidence in them without needing to know the details.
Faith, by contrast, is trusting in something specific that God has said.
On that platform of confidence in His good intentions, He will speak to us and reveal something that He wants us to trust Him in specifically.
That puts us in position to receive the promptings of His Spirit, which are sometimes counter-intuitive and unconstrained by the rules of human logic.
The story of Abraham is the story of someone who was real with God. In a way the prophets were seeking to recapture that kind of relationship. But as we know, there were lapses and failures until Jesus came. Then. being real with God became about being real with Jesus,
It also became being alert to what He would do next. His disciples with Him were sometimes perplexed by His movements.
So we ask the Holy Spirit to help us to be real, to be ready, and to be In faith to join God in what He is doing.
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PRAYER
Holy Spirit, raise faith in us, and help us to be agile and ready for whatever you reveal to us.
Lord, you have shown us through the failures of others in the Bible how you hate acts of worship which are more about us acting out, than worship and submission to You.
Keep us from mere recitations of what is insincere, but so fill us with the Holy Spirit that we will be on fire for You, ready for you to move or even to return.
May we live in confidence and hope, ready to step out in faith for what You show us.
May we be examples of Your goodness, Your presence and Your love to the doubting world as we seek to keep a close walk with you, Jesus.
Amen
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Originally published at https://thelivingword.uk.