Bridge of Reason

If you want to know your heart leap for joy at the hope we have in Christ read the first two chapters of Ephesians. Chapter one reminds us of who Christ is, what he has achieved, reminds us that all we have as believers is 'in him.' Then, as though to sober us from our celebrations lest we get cocky about all that we have, Paul reminds us: 'And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked...like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses and sins, made us alive in Christ...'  (Eph.2:1-5) The first thing to realise is you can be dead and alive at the same time, alive to the things of this world but dead to the things of God. The second is that it is the common lot ( like the rest of mankind ) until Christ comes along. The third is that your new life is a work of God, and the fourth is that this new life costs you your old life. The Bible calls relinquis...

  William Wordsworth wrote: The world is too much with us; late and soon, Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;— Little we see in Nature that is ours; We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon! Wordsworth is lamenting the fast withering connection between people and nature because of the all-embracing industrial society of his time, a great theme of his day . I find people are often aware they are somehow disconnected from something bigger than themselves. I sense their longing for they don’t know what, their frustration at an inexplicable sense of fragmentation . Believers can experience this frustration, when ‘the world is too much with us, late and soon, getting and spending.’ T hat sense we have laid waste our powers, given our hearts away while distracted by the demands of life . Like Esau, we can feel we have traded our new-birthright ‘for a mess of pottage.’ Genesis 25:29-33 ‘The world is too much with us, late and soon,’ and l ittle we see in sp...

  This morning I walked the dog, spoke to a few neighbours, and tidied up a little more of my study, a task that seems to have no end. I still seem to be caught up with the idea I am not enough and somehow can’t get away from it. So, I am reflecting on a prayer of David I read last night and asking myself how thankful I am, and how to be as thankful as David. He is at the end of his life, there are rivals for his throne staking their claim, enemies at court that his son Solomon wisely gets rid of later, and he speaks to his assembled officials. David has dedicated a fortune in gold, silver, bronze, and other materials for the temple Solomon would build and invited Israel’s leaders to make a similar freewill offering to the project. There is a lot going on for a man on his deathbed. Then he prays: “ Blessed are you, O Lord , the God of Israel our father, forever and ever. Yours, O Lord , is the greatness and the power and the glory and the victory and the majesty, for all that is...

One of the arresting but often overlooked aspects of the Christmas story is that not Herod, nor the priests with whom he consulted, had any doubt, or were in any way confused about the fact that the well known reference in Micah 5:2 (c.f. Mt.2:5-6) alluded to a person, that he would come from Bethlehem, and be the Messiah. “ But you Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for out of you will come a ruler who will be the shepherd of my people Israel” The final line in this verse finds its parallel in 2 Sam.5:1/2: ‘ Then all the tribes of Israel came to David at Hebron and s aid, ‘Behold, we are your bone and flesh. In times past, when Saul was king over us, it was you who led out Israel, and you shall be prince over Israel.’’ “ A ll the tribes of Israel came to David at Hebron” to make him their king. It was there this son of Bethlehem was crowned, and the parallels with the life of Jesus are so striking as to be prophetic. The Sanhedrin, o...

A Weekly Bible Reading for Bridge Builders The Richmond Briefing has been a weekly feature of the Reachout web site for five years and is now available on the blog. To find out more and read earlier briefings go here Reading – A Shepherd and King (2 Samuel 5:2) One of the arresting but often overlooked aspects of the Christmas story is that not Herod nor the priests with whom he consulted had any doubt or were in any way confused about the fact that the well known reference in Micah 5:2 (c.f. Mt.2:5-6) alluded to a person, that he would come from Bethlehem, and be the Messiah. “But you Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for out of you will come a ruler who will be the shepherd of my people Israel” The final line in this verse finds its parallel in 2 Sam.5:2, which describes how “all the tribes of Israel came to David at Hebron” to make him their king and the parallels with the life of Jesus are so striking as to be prophetic....

A Weekly Bible Reading for Bridge Builders The Richmond Briefing has been a weekly feature of the Reachout web site for five years and is now available on the blog. To find out more and read earlier briefings go here Reading – Saved From Our Saviours (Psalm 78:70-72) We live in difficult times and Christians seem increasingly marginalised and under fire from a world that has lost patience with religion in general and with the church in particular. You can almost hear, as you open the newspapers and listen to the pundits and commentators, “We will not have this man to be our king!” We have an idea in our minds of how we think things ought to be in our picture of “the last days”, “Preparing the church” or “building the kingdom” depending on your eschatology. “The battle belongs to the Lord!” we cry, and wonder why it doesn’t look like it. In such times it is natural to feel that it’s all gone wrong; to cast around looking for someone or something to make it the way it ought to b...