Based on: Matthew 4: 12-23 and Isaiah 9: 1-4
When my son Sam was little he enjoyed playing with a set of medieval toy soldiers and so I was overjoyed when a medical castle was donated to our church to be sold in the Good as New sale. And it wasn’t a cheap plastic version! This was a castle that had been lovingly played with for many years with layers of wallpaper on top of wallpaper to keep up the repair.
It had a simple drawbridge, which was great considering Sam was only about 5 when I bought it for him. It was on a simple string mechanism that went through a small hole in the castle wall. To bring the drawbridge up you would simply pull the string and to lower the drawbridge you would simply let go. Pull to go up, let go to lower the drawbridge. That drawbridge came to mind when I reflected on today’s bible readings.
At the start of Jesus’ ministry he began to preach, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near” and then calls his first disciples with the simple call, “Come, follow me”.
Repent – a change of mind – come, follow me.
Our minds are truly magnificent. If ever there was proof that God exists, surely its his greatest creation of the 8 billion individual minds, each containing about 100 billion neutrons, that currently exist on earth and the countless others that came before us and will do after us. It literally blows your mind away. There is something bigger than us!
The bible tells us that we are made in the image of God. Some believe that we are separated from God. But if so, what is keeping all the atoms and molecules in our bodies together, what is keeping our hearts beating and the world turning?
However we may often feel separated from God. Our prayers seem to fall on deaf ears; we can feel lonely and isolated. The drawbridge has come up. No matter how many times we come to church and hear God’s promises that he will never leave us or forsake us…..our minds can, almost, play tricks on us. Our thoughts can let us down. “I’m not good enough”, “I’ve failed again”, “Who am I? I’m not worthy”. We pull the drawbridge up and shut God out.
Alternatively our thoughts could run to the other extreme “ I’ve got this”, “I can do this on my own”. Ego kicks in. Again, We pull the drawbridge up and shut God out. Before we know it we are off doing our own thing, under our own steam and then…..blame God when it all goes wrong. The irony!
We are all interconnected and never separated from the God that grows tress from acorns (without our help) but through our thoughts and actions we pull the drawbridge up and shut God out.
So the first thing Jesus tells us to do is to Repent – change your minds, let God in. The first part of our journey with Christ is to to raise our awareness that we need to change our minds – change our thoughts.
Now the ability to choose our thoughts is the gift of free will, given to us by God. But we need to choose our thoughts wisely. And this is where Christ steps in. Step 2. Come, follow me.
Jesus preached ‘Repent’ and the simple call, “Come, follow me”.
The ability to choose our thoughts is the gift of free will but we need to choose our thoughts wisely and be able to change our minds – change our thoughts – our level of Christ Consciousness needs increasing and we do that by following him.
We do that by following his example, as recorded in the Bible. We follow his topsy turvy example of the humble servant. “If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all.” (Mark 9:35). And those who seem to be less fortunate, who look like they are not as “blessed” as we are, turn out to be those who God proclaims as blessed and fortunate.
Christ Consciousness. Our minds ask – What would Jesus do? We raise our mind’s awareness of what is needed in a situation by asking (based on scripture) ‘What would Jesus do?’
We follow his example, we follow his lead!
Repent. Change your mind. Come, follow me.
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So we choose our thoughts and can choose to shut God out but what else could be keeping that drawbridge up between us and God? We cannot be separate from God since we are part of his amazing creation but what else could be that barrier? What else makes us feel separated from God?
The things we do wrong, especially the things we do wrong that we are aware of, can act as that barrier. In the same way that we can not look a person in the eye when we know we have let them down, the things we do wrong (sin) can be that barrier between us and God.
From Isaiah we earlier read ‘See, the Lord’s hand is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear. Rather, your iniquities have been barriers between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you’.
‘Your sins have hidden his face from you”, not you to him, not your face hidden from him – God never put the barrier in – ‘Your sins have hidden his face from you’.
The essence of sin is ignoring God, in the sense of behaving as if he does not exist or choosing to do things that are wrong. If we are honest, we would all have to admit that we do things we know are wrong. Paul wrote: ‘All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God’ (Romans 3:23).
Relative to God’s standards we all fall a long way short. When we follow Christ, when we compare ourselves to Jesus, when we increase our Christ Consciousness, we see how far short we fall.
But, by the Grace of God, that barrier has been dealt with. Once…and for all! That self-made barrier can come crashing down like that castle drawbridge on a wooden floor. Crash!
Because ‘For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God. (Ephesians 2:8-9).
Grace Alone. Faith Alone. God loves, forgives, and saves us not because of who we are or what we do, but because of the work of Christ. By the grace of God that barrier has been dealt with once and for all.
And finally, do you remember how simple the drawbridge mechanism was on my son’s medieval castle? To put the drawbridge up you would pull the string and to lower the drawbridge you would simply let go. Pull to go up, let go to lower the drawbridge. Which was the easiest action?….. Yes, the letting go bit.
‘Let go and let God’. I think that’s my favourite phrase. I wish I always lived by it? I think we can all relate to holding on too tight, wanting to keep control during this journey we call life. But that’s hard work. Pulling on to that drawbridge string. That’s hard work.
We stand there holding tight on to that string, effectively declaring “I’ve got this” – whether it’s a conscious or unconscious thought. Ego kicks in. Do you know what Ego stand for? Edging God out. EGO. Edging God out. Barrier is up!
So why do we do it? Why don’t we do just ‘Let go and let God, increase our Christ Consciousness in our thinking, lower down the barrier to let God’s wisdom, strength and comfort come flooding in?
A friend of mine is studying ‘A course in Miracles’. It’s a course spread over a year and on day 16 he observed that ‘Every thought you have brings either peace or war; either love or fear. There are no neutral thoughts.’ I’ll repeat that, ‘Every thought you have brings either peace or war; either love or fear. There are no neutral thoughts.’
If God is love, then that barrier is fear. If with every thought there is a choice between love and fear. No neutral thoughts. It’s either one way or the other. If God is love and love flows freely from God then that barrier is fear.
Think about those times in your life when you have chosen to do things that are wrong. Those times when we were aware at the time, or with hindsight, that we have fallen short of God’s standards. How many of those where when we acted out of fear.
Fear can be crippling to our lives, our lives as God intended them to be. Of course we have been given the God given gift of knowing when it is a good time to be careful, fear of being hit by car is quite warranted if we step out in front of on-coming traffic. By how many fears and worries do we create because we do not let that barrier down, do not spend time with God. Listening to him, asking him for guidance, letting go of that string that is holding that drawbridge up in fear of what’s going to come in’.
Conclusion
Repent – change your mind. Come, follow me. It’s a simple calling to a promise of life in all it’s fullness. But our thoughts can get in the way.
Thoughts are tricky things. So we need to see who we are beyond our thoughts. We are made in God’s image, we are love. But to see it, we need to be aware of our thinking.
Repent – change your mind. If we want to be closer to God we need to raise our awareness of our thinking (Christ Consciousness – What would Jesus do?);
We need to let go of holding on so tightly to what we think we know is best for or lives (leave that ego to one side); and lower that drawbridge to God’s saving grace and love that never stops flowing…we just need to let it in. Amen.
Debbie Story 