Sermon 22nd January 2011

Today, one of our Lay Readers, Trevor Tayleur, preaches based on the reading from Ecclesiastes 121: v1-14

Wisdom

Some very wise and intelligent people have said some things that have turned out to be completely wrong. Thomas Edison, the inventor of the first commercially practical light bulb, once said, “Radio is just a fashion contrivance that will soon die out. It is obvious that there never will be invented a proper receiver!” In 1957, two weeks before the launch of Sputnik, the first Russian satellite to be put into orbit, Sir Harold Spencer Jones, Astronomer Royal said, “Space travel is bunk.”

Even the most intelligent and wise people can get things very wrong. Today we’re looking at Wisdom Literature in the Bible, as part of our series on the types of literature. Of course, the wisdom I’ll be talking about today isn’t scientific wisdom; it’s not about whether certain inventions will work in practice or whether space travel is possible. Wisdom Literature is about a very different type of wisdom, and even though it was written between 2,500-3,000 years ago, it addresses some very modern questions. The books from the OT that we’re going to be thinking about today as Wisdom Literature are Job, Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. Some commentators include Psalms and the Song of Songs in the list, but Adjoa will be telling us about them in two weeks’ time when she speaks to us about Poetry. So I shall leave them to her, except to say that there are elements of Wisdom Literature in both of them.

One of the commentaries I read said, “Hebrew “wisdom” is readily recognized but difficult to define.” It goes on to say that the wisdom writings have different emphases and are of varied character. The book of Proverbs, unsurprisingly, contains proverbs - basic instructions on how to live. Job and Ecclesiastes contain “contemplative wisdom”; they ponder on the perplexing side of life. But they do have many features in common. They are very interested in the way the world works. They are very interested in the place of humankind in the world. And in particular they are interested in how the world and humankind come under God’s sovereign care. Also, despite the differences between the books, Wisdom Literature also has a number of consistent themes.

One of the main themes in these books is the fear of – or reverence for - the Lord. The fear of the Lord sets the framework for wise living. In the first chapter of Proverbs, these classic words appear: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction.” (Proverbs 1:7) The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And this implies that there are limits to human wisdom. The limits of human wisdom is another recurring theme. There are many questions that human wisdom cannot answer. To be wise, you need to have a good idea of how God has ordered the world and to live in agreement with God’s plans for the world.

Wisdom Literature also reflects on upright people and wicked people in relation to God. This is an ancient problem and a modern one. Some of the proverbs seem to indicate that there is a link between good behaviour and reward and wicked behaviour and punishment. On the other hand, other parts of Wisdom Literature note that the simple link between God rewarding the upright and punishing the wicked does not always seem to hold. And this leads on to the question of justice – one of the deepest mysteries that we face as people of faith. And closely connected to this is the problem of suffering and pain, an issue that the book of Job faces head on.

So let’s have a look at these 3 books, Ecclesiastes, Job and Proverbs. I’ll start with Ecclesiastes. Some scholars think it was written by Solomon, the great King of Israel, in the 10th century BC. Others think it was a later writer. Regardless, the book claims that its wisdom ultimately comes from God.

At first sight, it seems a rather strange book. Much of it seems to be cynical and pessimistic. In this morning’s reading, we heard the words of verse 9 of Chapter 12, a refrain that ring outs out frequently in Ecclesiastes; “’Meaningless! Meaningless!’ says the Teacher. ‘Everything is meaningless!’”

“Everything is meaningless and a chasing after wind.” So, who is this Teacher who says everything is meaningless and a chasing after wind? He is very much like a seminar leader. His job, like any good teacher, is not to give us the answers, but to raise questions, to push us to find the answers. Ecclesiastes is not a place where we find answers. The Teacher’s job is to push us to the logical conclusion of our positions. His job is to challenge the foundation of our lives and to challenge the basis of our thoughts.

He asks this question at the beginning of Ecclesiastes, “What does man gain from all his labour at which he toils under the sun?” (Ecc 1.3) Is there any reason for existence? Does life have any meaning? What do you have to show for all your life under the sun? What difference are you making? The Teacher gives a depressing account of what life without faith is like.

Today some people say that the meaning of life lies in making the world a better place. They hope that when all is said and done, they’ve helped to make the world a better place. They’ve campaigned for human rights; they’ve fought against oppression and racism; they’ve done their best to avoid environmental catastrophe. And if they’ve helped to make the world better, they won’t have lived and died in vain. Now all these things I’ve mentioned are good things to strive for, but if there is no God, what is the point?

Let’s assume that this world is all there is – the only life under the sun. We can’t be sure if there is a God or not, as many modern people argue. So let’s assume that this life is all we’ve got and there’s nothing else. In that case all of human history will simply be a flash in the pan. One day our sun will die and the world will end. Planets come and go. And in that context, if there is no God, then everything, in the words of the Teacher, is meaningless. “Everything is meaningless and a chasing after wind.”

If there is no God who created you, if there is no God who sustains the universe, if there is no life after death, you can’t make a difference. You are a like a footprint in the sand that’s right at the ocean’s edge. The tide will soon come in and wash away the footprint. As the Teacher put it; “There is no remembrance of men of old, and even those who are yet to come will not be remembered by those who follow.” (Ecc 1.11) When this planet eventually dies, even the most famous figures in history, the likes of Julius Caesar and Alexander the Great, will be forgotten. Without God, everything is meaningless and a chasing after wind. That is the message of Ecclesiastes. Either there is a God, or everything is meaningless.

The Teacher demolishes all the stock answers about the meaning of life. And he concludes by describing true wisdom; “Now all has been heard; here is the conclusion of the matter: Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment, including every hidden thing, whether it is good or evil.” (Ecc 12:13-14)

The only way to find true meaning in life is to recognise that God is there and to keep his commandments. The book of Proverbs gives us a lot of guidance about keeping God’s commandments. As usual, there is a debate amongst the scholars about when it was written, but it does seem that many of the proverbs date from the time of Solomon (1,000 BC), and indeed Solomon probably composed some of the proverbs himself. However, other proverbs are probably of a later date, perhaps as late as 500 BC. But whatever the origin of the proverbs may be, they are very much about “wisdom”. The Hebrew word for “wisdom” means something like “skill in the art of godly living”. Having wisdom means having insight; it means knowing how things really work and how things really are. And it means knowing what we should do about it. But finding wisdom, being wise, isn’t easy. And Proverbs gives some handy tips. It contains hundreds of pithy sayings, setting out principles by which life normally works. Here’s a very brief summary of some of these principles:

• If you work hard, you will prosper
• If you are lazy, you will be poor
• If you live according to moral absolutes, your life will go well
• If you live a wicked life, your life won’t go well
• If you bring a child up in the right way, then she will love you and be a responsible adult.

That sounds good, doesn’t it. But you may well be thinking; “Life isn’t that simple!” We all know people who have lived according to God’s standards and who have suffered terribly. Some people work hard, but stay poor because of oppression. Wisdom Literature recognises this. The problem of suffering is an issue that the Book of Job confronts.

Job was an extremely righteous man who was very prosperous. Then one day all of his possessions were destroyed and his children were killed. Why did this happen?

According to the first two chapters of the book, God and Satan had entered into a contest. Satan had claimed that Job only loved God because God had put a hedge about him, because Job had prospered hugely in material terms. If Job lost his wealth, then he would curse God. So God let Satan go after Job. Job endured these calamities bravely, without blaming God. And so God allowed Satan to attack Job himself physically, as long as he didn’t kill Job. And Job had a dreadful attack of boils.
Three friends of Job then came to comfort him. They went along with the idea that if you live life morally, then life will go well. So they said to Job, “Hmm, life’s not going well for you, Job, you must be sinning; you must be doing something really bad.”

They’re harsh, moralistic and miserable comforters. They knew there was a pattern, but they only saw one end of it. They thought they could understand it all. They knew that there was a pattern, but they didn’t see any exceptions to it. Proverbs says that if you are faithful and don’t commit adultery, life will go well with you. Now, if you are faithful to your spouse, you certainly increase your chances of a happy and long-lasting marriage. But we know that isn’t always the case. And Job confirms that. If we think that if we live good lives, then things will go well us for, then we’re wrong. On the other hand, if we think that means we can do what we like, that there are no moral absolutes, then we are also wrong.

So, back to Job. Job did break his silence and vented his feeling to God. He did have a go at God, crying out in pain, despair and anger. His friends also told him off for this. God then appeared. God rebuked Job’s friends, saying, "I am angry with you....you have not spoken of me what is right." (Job 42:7) They had failed to see the whole picture; they didn’t know true wisdom.

God also spoke to Job. God described the glories of the natural world in an amazing speech. Philip Yancey, a well-known Christian writer, describes God’s message in this way: “Until you know a little more about running the physical universe, Job, don’t tell me how to run the moral universe.” God did not criticise Job for crying out in anger; the only thing he criticised him for was his limited perspective. Job didn’t know the bigger picture – the cosmic battle between God and Satan, the fight between good and evil. The Book of Job doesn’t answer the question of why people suffer, but it tells us that how we respond to suffering matters. Through his faith Job helped God to gain a great victory over the powers of evil.

The Wisdom Literature deals with some big questions. What is the meaning of life? How should we live? Why do good people suffer? The three Wisdom books between them confront these questions. No one of them provides a complete picture. Proverbs sets out a basic pattern for living, and Job gives us some insight into what’s going on when the pattern breaks down. Through them we can learn wisdom; we can learn insight into how the world works and how to live. But is wisdom just something we can learn?

In Proverbs wisdom is pictured as a woman calling. Wisdom isn’t just an abstract concept, a matter of rules; it’s personal. What if the wisdom of God was a person you could know and love? If you could be in a relationship with that person, it would help to make you wise. What if wisdom was a person?

Several New Testament scriptures identify Jesus with the personified wisdom pictured in Proverbs. Indeed, Jesus is wisdom personified. Ultimately wisdom is knowing Jesus. It is in Jesus that we can find true wisdom. Jesus is the wisdom of God to us – the wisdom of God in the form of a person.

Let’s pray.
Father, thank you for making us wise to where wisdom is, in Jesus. Now make us wise in knowing him. Show us a parish how to know and love him, to make us wise. Help us this year to grow more and more into the likeness of Jesus.
Amen.

Sermon 15th January 2012

Today, our Curate, Gill Tayleur, preaches based on the reading from Joshua 1: verses 1-9.

It was a dark and stormy night, the brigands and chiefs began to fight. And one said, Antonio, tell us a story. Antonio said, It was a dark and stormy night, the brigands and chiefs began to fight. And one said, Antonio, tell us a story. Antonio said, It was a dark and stormy night...

When our kids were little, Trevor used to tell them that story, as his father had to him.

And of course it was a joke because the story doesn’t go anywhere, just round in circles, rather annoyingly.

We’re thinking about stories this morning. Louie Giglio, a North American Baptist pastor wrote:

Life is the tale of 2 stories, one finite and frail, the other eternal and enduring. The tiny one – the story of us – is as brief as the blink of an eye. Yet somehow our infatuation with our own little story – and our determination to make it as big as we possibly can – blinds us to the massive God-story that is unfolding all around us. We can live our entire life completely oblivious to the grand story of the Creator of the universe that is being played out all around us. It’s the story of God and his marvellous and extraordinary dealings with humankind. It’s The Story of life and love for all time. It’s God’s story, his story, and we can play a part in it! All of his-tory is ultimately His Story, God’s story.

(Thanks to the North American Baptist pastor Louie Giglio for some of that train of thought.)

... ... ...

This morning we’re thinking about God’s story, His-story, in the history books of the Bible. Last week Cameron introduced this series on the Bible, and we looked briefly at the first type of literature it contains, the law or Torah, the books from Genesis to Deuteronomy.

In those books we read about creation, God’s relationship with humankind, how people rebelled against him, and the beginnings of God’s rescue plan to re-establish a relationship with humanity. God made a covenant, the deepest sort of binding promise, between himself and a particular people, the Israelites. They would be his own special people, through which he would reach ALL peoples everywhere.

This week we’re looking at the history chunk of the Bible - that is the books of Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 & 2 Samuel, 1 & 2 Kings, 1 & 2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah and Esther.

They cover about 1000 years of history, from when the Israelites went into the promised land of Canaan with their leader Joshua, to life there under judges and later kings, the splitting of the nation into 2 rival kingdoms, the downfall and exile in both, and Judah’s return from exile. This history involved many ups and downs, twists and turns – but through it all, it’s the story of God, God’s relationship with his people. It’s a God story, His story, history.

The reading we just heard at the very beginning of the book of Joshua is when God’s people were on the brink. On the brink of entering the land God had promised them, where God’s people would live as he said, in relationship with him as their God, living his ways and obeying his law, with his presence and blessing.

The book of Joshua tells the story of the Israelites taking and settling in the land, starting with the miraculous crossing of the River Jordan and the fall of Jericho.

This isn’t the time to go into it in detail, but I must briefly acknowledge how our modern ears are disturbed by God’s command to destroy the former inhabitants of the land. To us it sounds like ethnic cleansing. But God is not motivated by prejudice. Moses said “the Lord is going to drive these nations out before you because they are evil.” In his holiness, God was provoked by the awful wickedness of the Canaanites, who practiced child sacrifice, idolatry and immorality. He knew that his people would be corrupted by such evil if it was allowed to stay in the land. And that is exactly what eventually happened. The Israelites failed to destroy the Canaanites completely and they were a corrupting influence for many years.

So the book of Joshua tells the story of the Israelites taking the land, and in time it was divided into the 12 tribes of Israel, the descendants of Joseph and his 11 brothers.

The book of Joshua ends on a similar note to the one it started on, that the people needed to live as God’s people, in obedience and relationship to him, in order to know his presence and blessing.

That’s Joshua. Then there’s the book of Judges, which continues the story after Joshua dies. It makes depressing reading, as the people rebelled against God’s rule again and again. They turned from God to worship other gods. God responded by allowing them to be defeated by their enemies. So they cried out to God for help and he raised up a judge, or ruler, to lead the battle, defeat their enemies and restore peace to the land. But it never lasted long. The people turned away from God again and the cycle was repeated, many times over.

There were 12 judges, military leaders, who also made judgements, and some were prophets. You may know the stories of Gideon, Samson and Deborah, and their enemies the Philistines, Canaanites and Mideonites. The judges were a motley lot, some of very dubious character, but God delivered his people through them anyway.

The next history book is Ruth, a short story of a widow whose devotion to her mother in law, her faith in God and integrity in hostile circumstances were recognised and rewarded by God. This happened in the time of Judges. It showed that God’s goodness extended beyond his covenant people the Israelites.

In the book of 1 Samuel, we see that Samuel was the greatest judge to rule Israel. He served God all his life but when he grew old he appointed his wicked sons as judges in his place. The elders of Israel came to him and demanded that he appoint a king to rule them. They said, “like all the other nations”. God was angry because he knew that their motivation was wrong – they wanted a king instead of God rather than a king under God. Despite their bad motivation, God gave them what they asked for and Saul was anointed king. But the people were not blessed during his reign because he persistently disobeyed God. God therefore rejected him as king.

The focus moved on to David, who had already been anointed as King Saul’s successor. That God was with him was seen early on in his life when he defeated Goliath, the mighty Philistine. But there were problems for David. Saul was jealous of him and tried to kill him. David was forced to live as a fugitive until Saul died in battle and then David became king.

2 Samuel

At last Israel had the kind of king God wanted: David was “a man after God’s own heart”. But David was not perfect. His lust led him to adultery with Bathsheba and then to have her husband murdered. But for most of his life David tried to be faithful to God, and so God blessed him and the people through him. At first, only his own tribe of Judah acknowledged David as king, but a few years later all Israel followed. He established Jerusalem as the capital city and there was peace in the land. The Ark of the Covenant, symbolising God’s presence and rule, was brought into the city. David ruled, not independently of God, but under him. Jerusalem was the city of David, but also city of God. Even so, there were prophesies from God of a king far greater than David to come in the future.

In the book of 1 Kings, Solomon succeeded David as king and ruled wisely, bringing more security and prosperity to the land. A temple was built, providing a permanent symbolic dwelling place for God. These were the best times ever for Israel. It looked as if all God’s promises had come true: God’s people were in the promised place, enjoying his rule and blessing. But it didn’t last. Solomon married many foreign wives and began to worship their gods. After King Solomon died civil war broke out and the kingdom began to disintegrate.

In 2 Kings, soon after Solomon’s son Rehoboam came to the throne, the 10 northern and eastern tribes rebelled against him and set up their own kingdom under Jeroboam. Israel had been united for 120 years under Saul, David & Solomon, but then it was divided. The Northern kingdom, confusingly, was called Israel, with the capital Shechem, later Samaria. The Southern kingdom was called Judah, with its capital Jerusalem. There were occasionally good kings in both kingdoms, but the general direction of their history was downwards. The decline in the north was obvious from the very beginning: Jeroboam was concerned that his people would want to go to Jerusalem in the southern kingdom to worship God, so he built 2 alternative shrines, each with a golden calf to worship!

The end came in 722BC, 200 years after the kingdoms divided. Because of the people’s unfaithfulness to God, he allowed the Assyrians to attack Samaria and destroy it. The Northern tribes never again had a separate existence. Their descendants were the Samaritans, despised by Jews in Jesus’ time.

The Southern kingdom did little better. Even though they had the temple in their midst, the people turned to other gods. There were some periods when they were more obedient to God, e.g. under King Josiah, but the change was not deep enough. The people had repeatedly broken their covenant with God by unfaithfulness and so could not be allowed to stay in the promised land. They were invaded by the Babylonians in 597BC and some inhabitants taken away to exile. Ten years later Jerusalem and its temple was destroyed and more exiles were taken to Babylon.

These were sad, sad times, when God’s people were in exile, not enjoying his rule or his blessing.

The books of 1 & 2 Chronicles cover much of the same history as Samuel and Kings, but from a somewhat different viewpoint. And the last history books are Ezra Nehemiah & Esther.

6 decades after the exile had begun, the Persians defeated the Babylonians and allowed the exiles to return to Jerusalem and rebuild their temple. Only a small number made it back to their homeland, and they faced great opposition when they did, but eventually a new temple was built under the priest Ezra’s leadership.

Soon afterwards, Nehemiah led a party to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem city. They did so, but it was all nothing like as great as it had been in Solomon’s day. They were still waiting for the prophesied golden days of David’s descendant king to come.

The last history book is Esther, who married a great king. When God’s people were in danger, she was brave and asked the king to help them, so God’s people were saved.

And they are the history books!

They tell the story of God’s dealings with his people. The story of God’s love and faithfulness despite their repeated unfaithfulness and disobedience. Again and again – and again! – the people turned away from God, and only when his presence and blessing was withdrawn from them, did they turn back to him. And he forgave and accepted them, again and again and again, because his love was – and is - never ending.

In the history books of the Bible, we keep reading that God’s blessing was dependent on the people’s obedience. The covenant between God and the Israelites meant that the people were under God’s authority, his care, protection and blessing, and thus owed him their love, trust and obedience.

What is this blessing that’s tied up with obedience? Often it’s portrayed as success, victory or prosperity, as it was in our Joshua reading. But we know from other parts of the Bible, like Job who was faithful to God but suffered terribly, and of course look at Jesus who was the ultimate in obedience and faithfulness to God, and see how he suffered. We know from them that the blessing we are promised isn’t necessarily material prosperity – it’s God’s presence. “I the Lord your God, will be with you wherever you go” God said to Joshua. Jesus spoke of trials and suffering for his followers, even that they had to lose their life and die for him – but promised “I will be with you always to the end of the age”. So the blessing that obedience to God brings, may include material blessing, but ultimately it’s God’s presence, which is after all the best blessing of all and lasts forever!

Cameron said last week that all of the Bible points to Jesus, he’s its real focus. There are several ways in which the history of the Israelites we’ve galloped through this morning points to that ultimate focal point of history, Jesus, but I don’t want to steal the thunder of future preachers looking at prophesy and wisdom, as the history books provide the context for them. All I’ll say for now is that the story of God’s people living under judges and kings, was only a sort of preview or sketch of what was to come in Jesus. David was the best king they had, but he was just a shadow of the one true mighty king to come, Jesus. Jesus didn’t rule that land as a king during his life on earth, but he is the ultimate ruler of all history, including us today. He rules with wisdom, justice, mercy and love, and living under King Jesus brings the greatest blessings of all. When history is wound up at the end of time, everyone will see and bow before his kingship, and live under his kingship for all eternity. Maybe more about that in another future sermon, the one on the apocalypse.

But for now, we need to wake up to God’s story as The Story, and to God’s invitation to us to join him in it.

Louie Giglio again: “We don’t have to. We can spend our days trying to hijack the story of God, turning it into the story of us. Inverting reality, we can live every day as if life is all about me, as if life is my own fleeting one act play.

We all have to make a choice. We can choose to cling to starring roles in the little stories of us, or we can exchange our fleeting moments in the spotlight, for a supporting role in the eternally beautiful epic that is the Story of God. Abandoning our story and embracing God’s story, will allow our little lives to be filled with the wonder of God, as we live for his worship and service. And joining our small stories to his, will give us what we all want most in life anyway – the assurance that our brief moments on earth count for something in a story that never ends.”

Playing our part in God’s story, HIS story, is the most exciting way to live! It’s what we were created for! To make our short, little life story part of God’s story. His love and faithfulness reach out to us, today, as they reached out to the people we read about in [the Bible] here, so that we can say YES to God, to living for His worship service and glory. It’s not about you, or me, it’s all about him.

So, will we recognise God’s story as His story, as THE story of life and take up his invitation to play our part?

Then let’s pray:

God of history, God of all space and time, we acknowledge that you are supreme in all creation! We want to play our part in your story, of the life and love you offer us. We want to surrender our story, our lives, to you, for you to weave into your purposes in history. Show us what that means for each one of us today. In Jesus name, Amen.

Thanks to Louie Giglio’s book “I am not but I know I AM” and Vaughan Roberts’ book “God’s Big Picture”.

Sermon 8th January 2012

Today our Vicar, Cameron Barker, preaches based on the reading from Exodus 20, verses 1-17.

“It’s a big book, full of big stories with big characters. They have big ideas (not least about themselves) and make big mistakes. It’s about God, and greed, and grace; about life, lust, laughter and loneliness. It’s about birth, beginnings, and betrayal; about siblings, squabbles, and sex; about power and prayer and prison and passion. And that’s only Genesis”! Welcome to the Bible, then!

That’s a quote from Tom Wright’s book, Simply Christian. I haven’t done any more than dip into it so far, but can still recommend it as a companion to this series. The former Bishop of Durham wrote it quite recently, to describe what Christianity is about. His intent is to commend the faith to those outside it, and also to explain it those on the inside. That makes it, like the Bible itself, for every one of us. And of course Tom Wright put the Bible at the centre of this book. In the same way, we are putting the Bible at the centre of this new series. We are doing that in order to put Jesus more firmly at the centre of our life, as our parish Aim states that we try to do.

It’s always important to be clear about such things from the outset, I think – not least because God has been! That is what leaps out of this huge, sprawling book: God’s plan isn’t hidden or secret, but is plain for all to see in here, from the beginning. That’s why the 16^th Century Reformers made such a big deal of the Bible being freely available in everybody’s native language. We are meant to read it, explore it, know it for ourselves – and be radically changed by it in the process. This book doesn’t just change us; it also changes communities, and the world even. It has done that often before, and it can do the same afresh in every generation. But again it’s Tom Wright who likens how we so often use the Bible to the way that most of us use a computer: we only access a very limited amount of its vast capabilities!

Now, using the Bible isn’t anything new in this church. We have rightly been known as Evangelical (i.e. Bible-based) for a long time now. We may be at the Open, rather than at the Conservative, end of that spectrum. But we do treat, and teach, the Bible very seriously here. Even so, it struck the preachers’ group last year that we’ve been taking rather a lot for granted. To some extent we’ve made assumptions about what people know, or believe, about the Bible. The start of a new year seems like a good time to pause, then. We think that we need go back to key basics. Hopefully we’ll fill in gaps that likely exist for at least some people. So we’re sure that no-one will mind if we start with the very basic facts – which is part of my task in getting this series going today.

So, we are talking here about one book, split into 2 major, but unequal sections: the Old and the New. They are called Testaments, which is an old-fashioned alternative word for the legal term covenant. They are known as that because each section revolves around a covenant that God made with people. One key message of the Bible is that the new Covenant isn’t, in fact, a new one at all. Rather it’s a renewal of the first, or Old, covenant. It’s key to grasp that this was always God’s plan, from the beginning. It wasn’t that Plan A didn’t work, and so God came up with Plan B. What we know as the New covenant is the one that’s based on Jesus’ death on the cross. That was God’s intention since before He made the world, the Bible says. We can read all about that in the part of the Bible that tells the story of the Old covenant. The classic way of expressing it goes like this: the New is in the Old concealed; the Old is in the New revealed.

The major ways in which the Old Testament is revealed in the New are in the life and ministry of Jesus, as we might expect. There are 4 of those books that tell that part of the Bible story, and those are known as Gospels. There are many other Old Testament references to be read in the letters that make up almost the rest of New Testament. Those books were written to or about the early church that grew from Jesus’ life, death and resurrection. There are 27 New Testament books in total, compared to 39 books in the Old Testament. But there is much more content in the Old Testament – about 1 000 printed pages, where the New Testament has more like 300. The entire New Testament was written in a relatively very short time-frame – within about 70 years after Jesus’ death. It was written mostly in Greek, whereas the Old Testament was originally compiled in Hebrew, and done over hundreds of years. It’s worth knowing too that the whole of the Old Testament was translated into Greek in 4^th Century BC – and that (the Septuagint) is what the New Testament writers mostly had to refer to.

Don’t worry: there won’t be an exam on all this later in the series! If you do want to refresh your memory, this will be posted on our website, or you can ask for a printed copy. If Tom Wright isn’t for you, try this book by Vaughan Roberts: God’s Big Picture. However you best absorb it, this is the kind of background that we need to have in mind when we read any book, or part, of the Bible. It matters because it’s all part of God’s unfolding story that is still being written today – into which He is calling you! Yes, the canon of Scripture (as the Bible is also known) may be closed, in that there are no new books being added. But the story itself is far from over – again as the Bible makes clear time after time.

I’m sure that we’ll hear much more on that as this series progresses between now and the start of Lent. We’re trying to break the Bible down into more manageable sections in that time. The programme card shows how we’ll do that, by the different types of literature that we find in both the Old and New Testaments. The sharp-eyed will have noticed that there’s nothing planned on Gospels or Epistles though! That’s partly to do with the number of weeks available. But more importantly it reflects the nature of the Bible itself. Even though it is made up of 66 books that fall in 8 basic literary categories, it is one book, with one overarching story, trying to get that across, somehow! And that big story is personified in and through Jesus: he is God’s only Son, who became human so that we can become God’s children.

If you look back at most of our series over the years you’ll see they have overwhelmingly come from the Gospels, or Epistles. That’s quite right too, because to be a Christian is to believe that Jesus is the focal point of the universe. We read all this in the Bible: that the universe was created through Jesus; it was made for him; he holds it together today; he’s waiting to bring it all together in the fullness of time; and he will bring all of humanity with it, on the Day of Judgment. That is when everyone who has ever lived will face Jesus, on his throne, for him alone to decide our eternal fate. How can any truly Bible-based series possibly ignore Jesus then? He IS the context of the whole Bible, and so everything in it points either on, or back, to him.

Again I’m sure that this is what will happen week by week: Jesus will be the context of our learning, and growing. So my other task today is to talk – briefly, now – about the 1^st type of Bible literature. It’s traditionally called Law, though that may not be the most helpful translation of the Hebrew word Torah. Certainly not many of our plethora of lawyers would recognise too much of it as law. It’s also known as the Pentateuch, because it’s the first 5 books of the Bible: Genesis; Exodus; Leviticus; Numbers; and Deuteronomy. To drop in another name, they are often known as the books of Moses as well. At one time people thought that Moses had written them all, but scholars now deem that very unlikely. That name has stuck though, because these 5 books pretty much tell the story of Moses, after the key scene-setting recorded in Genesis.

The scene-setting is crucial because it sets out the pattern that the rest of the Bible then follows. It’s the story of God constantly taking the initiative with the people He made, despite their doubt, antagonism and sin. It’s the story of God’s ever-more gracious forgiveness and promise-keeping, no matter how far people run from Him. The better translation of Torah is guidance, because this is essentially what this part of the Bible is. Much of it is in story form, telling the story of God’s dealings with humanity. They are written not to record history so much as to guide God’s people on the nature of the God they are being called into relationship with. Even when the particular stories seem to tell us how to behave, they are more about the reality and the person of God. He is the one who is always ahead of His people; working His purposes out in and through both people and circumstances, good and bad alike.

The highlight of Torah is God’s giving of His Law to His people here in Exodus. Of course it, like all passages, needs a full sermon (or a series, even) to explore it. But that’s not the point this time. Today we are being invited to see God showing Himself to His people, making them His people, by guiding them how to live as His people, based on who He is. “Be holy because I am holy”, God says. In summary, the 10 Commandments guide God’s people on how to relate to Him first and foremost, and then how to relate to others – based on who God is. It’s practical, sensible stuff – which we fail miserably at time after time!

In one sense the function of the Law is to show us who we are and what we are truly like. It reveals the nature and problem of sin: us wanting to live our own way, not God’s. So it points us on, to our need for a Saviour. He, Jesus, didn’t come to abolish the law but to fulfil it for us and then set us free from it – and on the cross paying the great cost of doing that. Here is the huge book that tells this story so far; and invites you to be part of rest of it. Are you ready to join in, and to be part of God’s on-going story? Let’s pray ...