Saying Goodbye

This past Lord’s Day was a bittersweet occasion for us as a congregation as we said goodbye to Ian H prior to him moving to Dumfries. Ian has been a valued part of the congregation for the last year and has thrown himself into all aspects of church life.

Prior to our church lunch, Stephen presented Ian with a Creeds & Confessions Bible and a copy of the book Love Your Church. He then prayed for God’s blessing and guidance on Ian in this next phase of his life.

We will miss him, but he has been a blessing to us, and we trust we have been to him as well!

The Happy Christian

Stephen wrote the following review in 2015 of David Murray’s book The Happy Christian: Ten ways to be a joyful believer in a gloomy world:

If someone who had never encountered Christianity walked into your home or church, how would they describe the mood? That’s one of the searching questions David Murray asks in a book, which given its neon blue and yellow cover, looks at first glance like just another self-help resource. But behind its frothy exterior comes theological punch as a seminary professor marshals Biblical teaching, scientific research and his own personal experience as a ‘recovering sceptic’ to make the case that the Christian faith has too often been misrepresented by its friends, never mind its enemies.

He sets his sights on a siege mentality in the church, where sermons and prayers often sound more like discontented defeatism than inspirational calls to worship and serve. The Bible is the most positive book in the world – but Murray contends that the church has not always been successful in communicating the Bible’s uplifting and inspiring message.

The book starts with the good news that both the Bible and scientists agree that happiness is mostly not dependent on our circumstances (studies say only 10%). While 50% is based on genetics that still leaves 40% that we can do something about. But rather than going down the ‘Power of positive thinking’ route, Murray says the way to change things is not to believe in yourself more, but to believe in God more.

In a chapter on ‘Happy Media’, Murray points out the harmful effects of listening to a stream of negativity. Challengingly, he applies this not just to secular media but to those who teach God’s word. The reason a doctor can tell what an unhealthy heart sounds like is that he’s listened to 1000s of healthy ones. In the same way we should focus more on the truth than innumerable errors and heresies – and spend more time exalting Biblical marriage than highlighting the latest perversion of it.

In ‘Happy Salvation’ Murray tries to encourage us to stop being discouraged by never ending to-do lists and rest in our completed salvation provided by a Saviour who has already done it all and tells us: ‘It is finished’. God has given us a weekly reminder of this in the Sabbath, which we reject to our peril.

In the battle for happiness, involvement in church plays a key role. Murray points to Yahoo’s new CEO Marissa Mayer having banned all telecommuting as the lack of personal contact resulted in more loss than gain. Statistics show that those who attend religious services at least once a week have a 25% higher life expectancy than those who don’t, probably because church attendance increases social support, which is a proven life-extender. Murray also extols ‘Everywhere Grace’, reminding us that we shouldn’t just look for God’s grace in Christians. We shouldn’t be ashamed to use goods and services provided by non-Christians, or truth discovered by them.

This is a book which Murray would admit himself would not have been written if he hadn’t swapped Scotland for America, and he extols our transatlantic cousins’ ability to praise other people. ‘Scots don’t do praise’ he says. ‘Of God sometimes, but never of one another’. He seeks to unmask the sinful reasons behind this and urges us not to wait for one another, our churches or our children to be perfect before we praise them.

Murray also sets his sights on the ‘Gimme Generation’ (ie the generation most Messenger readers are part of!) whose failure to give their money and themselves is damaging charity, marriage and work, as well as being a poor witness to the secular world.

One of the biggest challenges many people find to being a happy Christian is their work, and Murray devotes a whole chapter to this area, showing that the most mundane job is as valuable as any other if it’s done for Christ. ‘The Lord’s work’ isn’t just something ministers do.

The tide of negativity in our thinking, relationships and churches is having a devastating effect, and Murray’s book is a helpful and invigorating corrective. Anyone could benefit from it and small groups could benefit from discussing and fleshing out some of the issues raised – and then holding each other accountable. Happily, of course!

For a review of Murray’s earlier book, Jesus on Every Page, see here.

Looking for a Leader to Save Us

Last month, The Times had a fascinating article entitled ‘It’s too much to hope the King can save us from ourselves’. The author, A. N. Wilson, said that with the country in economic, political and social turmoil, there was a real sense that the British public were looking to Charles III to turn things around. Commentators have been talking about the King ‘hitting the ground running’ – a phrase more suited to a politician than a monarch. And yet for Wilson, the very strength of constitutional monarchy, as exemplified in Queen Elizabeth II, is to remain above politics. And so although there are tough times ahead, ‘we lay an unnecessary burden on our new King if we pretend that he, or any monarch, is able to solve them’.

But if a constitutional monarch can’t save us, what about a politician? Tuesday marked the inauguration of the third Prime Minister in the lifetime of our seven-week old son. Many people are hoping that Mr Sunak will be able to turn things around. The markets certainly have more confidence in him than they did in his predecessor. But if Wilson is right that the UK is ‘impoverished, dangerously divided and viscerally confused’, then its surely beyond the abilities of any one man to change that.

And yet we keep hoping that someone will. Those who don’t want Sunak as PM still want a Prime Minister – they just think Starmer, or someone else would do a better job. Others conclude ‘they’re all as bad as each other’ – and yet we all have this tendency to pin our hopes on one particular individual. Whether that’s football fans hoping that a new manager will be the one to transform the fortunes of their club, or social media devotees following every move of a celebrity or influencer. There can’t be many of us who haven’t hoped that meeting someone special would change our lives.

Whether we look to celebrities, politicians or romantic relationships, we want someone we can follow, someone we can look up to, someone who will solve our problems. All of us look for someone to hope in. And tragically many live lives of despair, because those they hoped in let them down.

Looking for a human being to save us is nothing new. A commentary on the Biblical book of 1 Samuel, written by the Australian pastor John Woodhouse, is entitled ‘Looking for a Leader’. The book of 1 Samuel recounts the desire of the nation of Israel to have a king ‘that we may be like all the other nations, and that our king may go out before us and fight our battles’ (1 Samuel 8:20). For their first king they choose a man called Saul. He looked the part, but was a dismal failure as a king. Halfway through the book, David, ‘a man after God’s own heart’, was anointed as king in his place. David was Israel’s greatest ever king, and yet he also committed adultery and murder. Still, David remained the standard by which future kings were judged. Throughout the rest of the Old Testament, there is a desire for a king ‘like David’ (2 Kings 14:3).

After centuries of despair, those hopes were finally fulfilled in Jesus Christ, who – as the angel Gabriel told Mary – would be given ‘the throne of his father David’ (Luke 1:32).

Finally, a king had come who really could transform our lives. He is a king who really can ‘save us from ourselves’. From a Christian perspective, the fundamental problem with our society is not the economy, but our rebellion against our Creator. Politicians disappoint us, and yet they reflect our values as a nation. Few would disagree with the statement that ‘Britain is broken’. But why is it broken? As one MP put it last week, after thirty years when there has been a ‘total disregard for the things that give us meaning’ – including the family – ‘we are now reaping the whirlwind: chronic public and private debt, chronic family breakdown and chronic despair’.

And yet the attack on the foundations of society continues. Last week, Keir Starmer called for a more extensive ban on ‘conversion therapy’, which would outlaw aspects of ordinary Christian pastoral care. On Monday, a Conservative MP announced that the UK Government would commission abortion services in Northern Ireland, against the will of the people, and in the face of the resistance of NI’s own health department.  

Despite the current whirlwind we are reaping, we simply press the self-destruct button even harder. We need a King who can save us from ourselves.

The Queen's Funeral: Her gift to us

No doubt many of us were part of the estimated 4 billion people around the world to watch at least part of the Queen’s funeral. Staggeringly, that’s double what the world population was when the Queen was born – and half of it today.

What I found particularly remarkable about it all is that through the readings, psalms, hymns and addresses, the largest TV audience in history got to hear the Christian message of resurrection life in the face of death.

I’m under no allusion that the vast majority of those there on the day – including some taking part – actually believed what they were hearing, singing and reading. But I think we can be fairly confident that the Queen did. And to the extent that she tailored the songs and readings to highlight the hope she had, her funeral was her last – and possibly greatest – gift to us. 

So what was the message of the funeral?

The closing verse of the first hymn pointed beyond the Queen and her Empire, to a greater Monarch, and a greater Empire. Speaking of God, it declared: ‘Thy throne shall never like earth’s proud empires, pass away’. One day all earthly empires will come to an end – but not the kingdom of Jesus Christ.

One of the most moving parts of the services was the removal of the crown, orb and sceptre from the coffin. Elizabeth II had worn that crown with great dignity for seven decades. Eventually, however, she took it off for a final time. Not so with her Saviour: ‘Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and your dominion endures throughout all generations’ (Psalm 145:13)

For many, the thought of giving up whatever small amount of worldly glory or status we may have is a thing to be resisted. Whatever we think of as our ‘crown’, we hold onto for as long as we can. The message the Queen wanted to leave us with at her funeral however was that she gave her crown up willingly. Another hymn spoke of the day when ‘we cast our crowns before thee, lost in wonder, love and praise’.

One of the most counter-cultural messages to come out of the Queen’s funeral was that death is not just a natural part of life. Deep down, we know that already of course. When we stand before the coffin of a loved one, everything inside us cries out ‘it wasn’t meant to be this way!’ The first reading at the funeral described death as an ‘enemy’. However the reading also looked forward to the day when that ‘last enemy’ would be destroyed.

Christianity teaches that death was no part of God’s original creation. But men and women tried to overthrow God’s good and loving reign – and as a result, suffering and death came into the world. But Christianity also teaches that on the cross, Jesus defeated death for his people. That just as the grave was not able to hold him, it will not be able to hold us either.

For me, the most powerful moment of the whole funeral was at the very beginning. Westminster Abbey dropped to a hush and, with all eyes on the coffin, the choir proclaimed Jesus’ breathtaking claim: ‘I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live’.

Hearing that claim is one thing – believing it is another. Yet when it came to Her Majesty, we have reason to believe that she did both. And because of that faith in Jesus, the final words of Psalm 23 (also sung at the funeral) were true for her – as they can be for us: ‘in God’s house for evermore my dwelling place shall be’.

To sum it up, the message of the most watched television broadcast of all time, was that there is a far greater Monarch than Elizabeth II or Charles III. Our late Queen had been reminded of that at her coronation, with the words: ‘Receive this orb set under the cross, and remember that the whole world is subject to the Power and Empire of Christ our Redeemer’.

The sad truth is that every one of us tries to set up our own empire rather than submit to his. And yet the greatest of all Kings laid aside his privileges to come into this world and reconcile us to God through his death.

As the Archbishop of Canterbury said in his sermon: ‘Christ rose from the dead and offers life to all, abundant life now and life with God in eternity’.

Published in the Stranraer & Wigtownshire Free Press, 29th September 2022

Textual Confidence

Has God’s word been deliberately tampered with over the years? Have verses teaching the deity of Christ been systematically removed from our Bibles? Are the differences between ancient, modern and Reformation-era Bibles so significant that some of us have completely different Bibles from our fellow church members? Does admitting uncertainty about any part of the Biblical text (as the KJV translators did in their footnotes), mean that we can’t be certain about any of it?

You can read the rest of this article by Stephen at the Gentle Reformation blog