Ephesians 6.16

The shield of faith. Paul says that this particular accoutrement is to be worn 'over all'. It is faith which covers the chinks in the rest of the armour. Without it we cannot please God. Hebrews 11.6. We cannot stand and fight for him if we do not trust him. We are those who claim that the invisible has more clout than the visible. 2 Corinthians 4.18. We are blessed precisely because we do not see but keep believing. John 20.29. We press on in certainty that the unseen God is everything he says he is. Hebrews 11.1.  We do not shrink back (Hebrews 10.35-39), even though to the world, and on many days to us, our faith seems futile, our lives seen wasted away. 2 Corinthians 4.16.
And here Satan strikes. His weapon is pointed, precise, sudden, launched out of nowhere when we least expect it. The flaming tips which embed themselves in any exposed flesh and stick deep. A fire which starts small and spreads and spreads. James 3.5. A sin that starts as thought but becomes deadly deed. James 1.15. A niggling doubt that poisons the veins. The devil knows where our weak spots are. Where have we left ourselves open to attack?
And, oh, but my faith is so puny, so insignificant, so faltering. My arms are so weak that I can barely lift up my shield this morning. Take heart, says my commander. Take heart. John 16.33. A mustard seed is enough. Luke 17.6. I am praying for you. Luke 22.32. John 17.17. Hebrews 7.25.Romans 8.34.

Ephesians 6.15

"With feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the Gospel of peace..."

Are you ready? Are you prepared? The word here also has the sense of standing on the right foundation. What is the basis of your good news bringing today? Are you trusting that God is already at work in the lives of those you love? Are you compelled by guilt and obligation instead of flinging yourself into what Paul Weston calls the slipstream of what God is already up to? The Father is doing. John 5.19. We simply join in with that.
And yet. We must speak. Romans 10.14. We are not passive in this partnership. The good news is an announcement, an event, an act that breaks into reality and flips all on its head. This very moment is a moment of opportunity for the good news to break in. Mark 1.14

What is this news? What is God  already doing? What kind of greeting might this be that we bring? Luke 1.29. Paul makes it clear. This gospel is of peace. Eirene. Eiro meaning, beautifully, to tie something together into a whole. God's good news in Jesus Christ is that we can be tied back together again. All our brokenness can be redeemed. All that was lost can be restored. We can receive the gift of God's perfect wholeness, his Shalom. And that is good news indeed. That is the news that this world aches for.

Oh Father God, let us trust in the wholeness of your gospel today. Let us trust in our role as reconcilers. 2 Corinthians 5.11-21. Be ready today. Be prepared. Colossians 4.2-6. 1 Peter 3.15. Check where your feet are standing.

Ephesians 6.13

Stand firm. God gives the armour but we do the standing. We are those who know what it means to tactically withdraw from battle. Retreating not as cowards but as those who know that to wage warfare without our weapons is to lose the battle. We have everything we need (Ephesians 1.3, 2 Peter 1.3) but we need to get ourselves to the armoury to pick it up. What truths do you need to buckle around yourself? What lies are you particularly susceptible to? Satan knows just what to say to throw you off course, to knock the wind out of your sails. At this very second, he is on the prowl (1 Peter 5.8) looking for the words that will devour you, that little nagging doubt of did God really say? (Genesis 3.1) Does he really love you? What about your struggle, your sin, your disappointment, your failures, your unanswered prayer? How can you be loveable? But we pick up our weapons. We follow our commanding officer. We copy his battle strategy. And we say over and over and over. Till we are hoarse and croaking and barely able to whisper. "It is written."(Luke 4.4, 8,12) Gird yourself. Tie yourself up in knots. Bind your heart. Encircle your mind. Buckle your belt today. Pick up the book. And start memorizing.

Ephesians 6.14

"With the breastplate of righteousness in place..."

Our second vital selection from the armoury. Vital because it covers the heart. It guards our emotions. It shields us from doubt. We are the righteousness of God. 2 Corinthians 5.21. We are holy and blameless and free to approach him with childlike abandon. Ephesians 3.12. Hebrews 4.16. No one is going to tell us otherwise.

Once we needed another kind of breastplate. Exodus 28.16 - 30. Once it was the high priest who had to carry us to God emblazoned on his chest, a memorial reminder before God, brought into his presence by another and held there before him, a plea for our forgiveness and our cleansing.

And now, oh wonder of wonders, it is God who is held within us. The Holy Spirit testifies to our new position, to our free access, to our sonship. We are righteous. Forever. Oh soul, dare to believe this precious truth this morning. Be overcome with joy when you think on it. Readjust your breastplate today and check your heart is safe.

When Satan tempts me to despair, and tells me of the guilt within, upward I look and see him there, who made an end to ask my sin. Because the sinless savior died, my sinful soul is counted free. For God the just is satisfied to look on him and pardon me.

Advent 24: Waiting to be made clean

We all know - even if only in a Sunday School singsong fashion - that Jesus came to die for our sin. But the Bible tells us that the blood of Jesus on the cross does not just remove the guilt of our sin but the hurt of our shame. 

Jesus came to remove the stain of sin and the stains of those who have been sinned against. By his blood, we are washed clean and made utterly new. We are made white as snow. No matter what we have done or what has been done to us. For those of us who have been subjected to awful things at the hands of others, we need to hear the truth of this. When Jesus died on the cross, he embraced all of our suffering: he took on the sin of the rapist and the shame of the raped, he took the punishment of the abuser and washed the wounds of the abused.

The bible says that Jesus was like one who was despised. (Isaiah 53:3) He was like one that others would turn their faces to avoid. He was humiliated in the most base and brutal manner imaginable. He knows what it is to be ashamed. He knows what it is to feel dirty, and to be looked at with disgust. Jesus hung on the cross bloody and mangled for the whole world to see, a convict condemned to death, a common criminal made an example of, a beaten lump of humanity exposed to the eyes of all the onlookers, the subject of gossip and slander, the one people muttered about in streets and wouldn't allow their children to look at lest they too somehow became contaminated.

But by his death, he cleanses us of all our rubbish. We are tarnished by regret at what we have done, and by the shame of what others have done. Jesus says, Come to me and be clean. Come to me and let me tend to your wounds, let me start to wash away the pain of your past. Come to me and let me make you new.

Reflection: Jesus, thank you that your promise to make us new. Thank you that there is no stain that you cannot remove. Thank you that as we look to you we are made radiant; our faces are never covered in shame. Thank you that you died to wash us clean.

Gungor, Beautiful Things
All this pain
I wonder if I’ll ever find my way
I wonder if my life could really change at all
All this earth
Could all that is lost ever be found
Could a garden come up from this ground at all

You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of the dust
You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of us

All around
Hope is springing up from this old ground
Out of chaos life is being found in You

You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of the dust
You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of us

You make me new, You are making me new
You make me new, You are making me new

Advent 23: Waiting to know we're loved

The bible tells the story of a people who knew that there was a God and that that God loved them. He was their Creator and he had made them in love.

But sin marred the connection between people and God. People forgot that there was a God who loved them. They started thinking all kinds of different things about God instead: that he was a tyrant, that he was distant, that he was flippant and harsh, that he ruled over those he had made with indifference, that this God didn't really care about his creatures at all.  

I question whether God loves me. With all my flaws and failings, it is difficult to comprehend that there is a God of the Universe and that this Almighty, holy King loves me. He loves me even when I turn my back on him. He loves me in the middle of all my mess. He loves me the way that Mark Darcy loves Bridget Jones: Just as I am. 

But Jesus came to convince us of this truth - the truth of a God who loves us as we are even when we consider ourselves utterly unlovely. He came to put God's love for the world and the people in it on display in the most dramatic way possible. He came to prove to us that God is a God of love. He came to show us in a way that we could finally understand what love really looked like. Real love looks like dying in someone else's place. There is no greater definition of love than to willingly lay down your life for someone else, especially for those who have rejected and abandoned you. If we are waiting to know that we are loved then we need to look to the cross to remind ourselves of what love looks like.

Reflection: Food for thought in the form of two songs.

Trip Lee, Love on Display

Misty Edwards, Arms Wide Open

 

Advent 22: Waiting for a way to be made

Jesus is the original pioneer. In Greek, the word used to describe him is archēgon. (Hebrews 2:10, 12:2) He is the one who goes first. The first in a long procession. He is the one who went ahead of us to make a way where there was no way before.

Before Jesus, there was no way back to the Father. No one had yet blazed the trail. No one had done what needed to be done to make it possible to come to God. But Jesus did it. Jesus broke through death and hell so that we could follow him. It is because he was resurrected from the dead that we can have confidence that we too will be raised one day. (1 Corinthians 15:20) 

Jesus' disciples were troubled when he spoke to them of heaven. (John 14:1-14) Thomas was scared that they would't be able to make it there on their own. Jesus told them that they knew the way to where he was going but they were terrified that really they didn't, that they would get lost somehow en route. But Jesus reassured them: he had not only made the way for them; he himself was that way. "I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the father except through me." (John 14:6) It was through him, and through faith in his death and resurrection, that people would be brought back to God. 

The way is open. Heaven's gates swing wide. 

Reflection: Jesus came to make a way. This Christmas, let us remember that the baby who was born was born to die. Jesus willingly came knowing that the only way to bring us back to his Father was by embracing death at the cross. He knew what it would cost him to be our pioneer. He knew the price of what he was about to do but he still chose to come, he chose to become one of the ones he wanted to save. 

"All sufficient sacrifice
So freely given
Such a price
Bought our redemption
Heaven's gates swing wide."