Year B, 6th Sunday of Easter (May 13, 2012)

·         Acts 10:44-48

·         Psalm 98 (4)

·         1 John 5:1-6

·         John 15:9-17

Imagine. It's a beautiful sunny afternoon in late May. We often get snow this time of year, but today it's warm and sunny, light southerly breeze, birds singing, plants sprouting. I have the picture window wide open. My brand new flowerbeds are seeded and ready to sprout. My priceless, unique, irreplaceable baobab, sacred to the memory of a dear friend, is sitting out on the balcony for the first time. The dog is sleeping peacefully in the sun. I've just read this beautiful gospel and I'm about to write a sermon about loving my neighbour.

Just then, the guy who's been doing renos two floors up starts dumping all the sanding dust over the balcony. It lands everywhere: my flowerbed, my food crops getting ready to bed out, my baobab, my piano, my dog, everything to within about three feet of the window.

What the f.........!!!!!!!

I storm upstairs and into the apartment. The guy, who was never the sharpest knife anyway, and further dilapidated his brain with some strange experiments in chemical abuse as a teenager, has got the whole apartment drop-clothed and is wearing an N95 respirator, but he's also got the door open, the window open, and he's heaving more dust over the balcony. So not only is it in everyone's apartments below, it's also all over the hallway. This is drywall dust, so it's got silica in it. Breathing in silica dust causes silicosis. Hence the mask. So he knows it's bad for you, but he's still dumping it over the balcony. And he's probably aware of being a huge douchebag, because he starts yelling rudeness at me before I can even open my mouth. Opening my mouth isn't useful anyway since he's deaf. I make my point clear nonetheless. He carries on nonetheless.

WHAT THE F.........!!!!!!!

Yeah, you're not supposed to swear in a sermon, I suppose. But some people are just douchebags. So it took the best part of an hour to look for the landlord and not find him, since he can never be found anyway, leave a message, and clean up the mess.

So then I sit down again to write my sermon, and all I can think is if God wanted me to love my neighbour, he wouldn't have created such f'ing morons.

I asked myself, "what would Jesus do?" Well I figure, silicosis is the oldest occupational disease known to man, and Jesus was a carpenter and wouldn't have thrown things off the edge when working at heights, because no self-respecting carpenter is dumb enough to do that. So I think if the guy did that on Jesus's site, he'd have got the mother of all earfuls. What would Jesus do? Jesus would have sent his arse home for the day, if not for good.

And you know what, Jesus got angry. At the scribes and Pharisees. At the moneychangers in the Temple. At a fig tree. Jesus did not like douchebaggery any more than I do, I'm pretty sure of that.

So what's the difference between Jesus withering a fig tree, and me being spitting mad at some slovenly worker who's wilfully polluting my apartment with hazardous materials?

How does Jesus get over it? How long does it take Jesus to get over it? You know, it's one thing to say, "Father, forgive them, they know not what they're doing." But this guy knew exactly what he was doing. He was tossing hazardous waste to the wind so it got into all the apartments below. And he kept on doing it after being told. That's just perverse. It's not following orders, it's not inadvertent, it's not accidental, it's deliberately, perversely doing what's wrong, knowing that it's wrong. Like the moneychangers in the Temple.

It doesn't say, really, how Jesus dealt with douchebags. He certainly tells them what he thinks of them. But how does he reconcile being angry and fed up with them, and loving them? It doesn't tell us. I guess that's one of the great mysteries of the Bible.

So I decided to back up my hard drive and go do something else. For about six hours, I did something else than my sermon. And I kept being mad. The whole day, it spoiled my mood. But then I wanted to write this sermon before bed, so I sat down again. And I read some psalms. About five of them. And then, I felt better. The guy is still a douchebag, but I can fill my mind with praise for the Lord until there is no room to worry over his douchebaggery.

Does that count as forgiveness? Does that count as loving my neighbour? Close enough, I hope. But it's lucky for me that I'm saved by grace through faith, because if I really had to love my douchebag neighbours, I'd just go straight to Hell.

Praise be to God, the Compassionate, the Merciful.

Year B, 5th Sunday of Easter (May 6, 2012)

·         Acts 8:26-40

·         Psalm 22:25-31 (27)

·         1 John 4:7-21

·         John 15:1-8

This letter of John's is maybe the hardest reading in the New Testament. "Those who say, 'I love God,' and hate their brothers and sisters, are liars; for those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen. The commandment we have from him is this: those who love God must love their brothers and sisters also."

Well, to be honest, I don't say I [SQG] "love" God. I don't think I've ever said that. Like John said, I've never even met the guy. I know the writings, I know how I perceive God in my life and in my heart, but I can't say exactly that I [SQG] "know" God, as a person. It's like the late Jack Layton, former leader of the NDP. Actually, I did meet Jack Layton once. I have a photo of me and Jack. He was a great leader to our party. But I never had lunch with Jack. I never had a personal conversation with him. I respected him as a leader, but I can't say I ever knew the man, really. Same with God. I respect God. I accept him as a leader. But do I know God personally? Have I played a round of golf with God? Is God my friend on Facebook? No.

So I don't say I love God. It would be more accurate to say that I seek the Lord.

So what about my neighbour? Someone told me a while back "the love of God shines through you." Well that's very kind of her. Clearly I'm doing a good job of hiding the sad fact that I don't even like my neighbour. My neighbours make noise. They smoke tobacco, weed and crack, and I can barely breathe in my own apartment. They litter. They idle their vehicles for hours even when it's warm. They're shoddy workers and dishonest employers. They're ignorant and inconsiderate. They make too many demands on my time. They're bad parents. And what I hate the most is, they're so very, very stupid. Like George Carlin said, if you think about how stupid the average person is, you have to realise that half of them are even stupider than that. And I can't stand stupid people.

But hey, apparently I'm doing a good job of hiding it, at least as long as I don't get into a political debate. Still, I always wonder. I seek the Lord, I serve him, but so help me, I just don't like people. So does that mean that the Spirit does not abide in me? Am I really one of the goats? Am I doomed to the utter darkness?

I think not. Well, at least I won't be in the outer darkness, because I'm saved. That's one thing I love about being a Lutheran: explaining to my non-Lutheran friends that God is not gonna smite me, because I'm saved, by grace, through faith. Thank you Lord for that, because I sure wouldn't get saved on my own merit, especially if I have to like my neighbour.

But the other comforting thought is that I'm not the only one. Not by a long shot. Martin Luther King himself, who seemed like a pretty fine upstanding Christian, said it's lucky for us God didn't ask us to like our neighbours. So I guess Martin Luther King had the same problem I do with liking people.

Now you might say, how can you love your neighbours if you don't even like them? Well, it's actually quite simple. In our modern society, we're misunderstanding love. We think those who love us are the people who make us [SQG] "feel good about ourselves." That's a very useless concept, if you think about it, but we don't really have time to think about it in this sermon. What we can think about though, is that nowhere in the Bible does it say we need to [SQG] "feel good about ourselves." It's really not one of the ideals that God has for us.

What does the Bible tell us about love? Hundreds of things. If you actually read the book, there is more of God's love than God's anger. And Saint Paul summarized the whole thing in 1 Corinthians 13.

If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body to be burned, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.

So, by the grace of God, we know that love is not defined by what we feel, but what we do. You may have heard parents say about their children, "I love him, but I don't really like him." In fact, you might say the greatest love is that we show the people we don't like. It's easy to do things for someone you like. Why wouldn't you do something for them? They're your friends. You like them. Maybe you actually know you like them by the fact that you willingly do things for them. When you start getting fed up with doing things for them, you start to notice you don't like them as much. They're too demanding. They're inconsiderate. They don't do anything back for you. You don't like them very much after all.

Doing something for someone you don't like is much harder. If my neighbour needs his car boosted, I'll boost his car. But if it's the neighbour who's always trying to cause me trouble, then I don't want to boost her car. I don't like her. Plus she's trying to do me harm, so why would I help her? But that's exactly whose car I should be boosting. That's the one that the Lord cares about. The Lord knows I'll boost a hundred cars if I have to. What he wants to see is whether I'll boost the car of the person who's trying to do me harm. Because that is love.

Now I might do it because I seek the Lord. Because I know the Lord wants me to do it. If I do it for the Lord, can I still say I am showing my neighbour love by boosting her car? Well, maybe not. But then again, didn't the Lord tell us, "Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me." (Matthew 25:40) So does it really matter, whether I do it for the Lord, or because I genuinely like my neighbour as a person?

Remember the greatest commandment:

"The first (commandment) is, 'Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.' The second is this, 'You shall love your neighbour as yourself.' These is no other commandment greater than these." (Mark 12:29-31)

So if you don't like your neighbour, serve them as you would serve Jesus Christ himself, with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your strength, for the love you bear the Lord, or at least for the love the Lord bears you.

And if you can't serve your neighbour even for the love of God, well, then thank God Almighty that even so you are saved, by grace, through faith.

Praise be to God, the Compassionate, the Merciful.

Year B, 4th Sunday of Easter (April 29, 2012)

·         Acts 4:5-12

·         Psalm 23 (1)

·         1 John 3:16-24

·         John 10:11-18

That's a good question John asks. "How does God's love abide in anyone who has the world's goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help?"

And then he goes on: "let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action."

So, we're back again to my old leitmotif: do something. Do something material. Do something with the world's goods, to be of help to a brother or sister. Take what you have and give it to someone who needs it. If you have money, give it to someone who is poor. If you have time, give it to someone who is overwhelmed. If you have strength, lend your strength to someone who is weak.

Now you might say, if you're always giving your money to the poor, your time to the busy, your strength to the weak, and so on, they'll take advantage of you. If you share your home with the homeless, they'll trash the place. If you share your food with the hungry, there won't be enough for you.

Well, you're right. But so what?

Yes, whatever you give, people will ask of you until you have none left, and some more. And?

Is that not what Paul calls being "poured out"? Was not Jesus's life poured out for us? If you give until there is none left for you, what of it? Didn't many before you pour out even more? Not only in the church, but in revolutions, in labour action, in the civil rights movement, in suffragism, in non-violence, in war, in countless other ways?

The first line of this reading from 1 John was "we know love by this, that he laid down his life for us – and we ought to lay down our lives for one another." Are you asked to do this? In twenty-first century Canada, practically never. So couldn't you at least give of what you have until there is none left for you? Shouldn't you at least give that much?

It's dreadfully inconvenient, making oneself available to others. A person in a heavy power wheelchair asked me to help her through a door when I had a broken wrist. A person left a child with me for nine days and I didn't even have a bed to put her in. A person kept me up half the night for four days telling me her troubles. A person needed a prayer when he was drunk and I was supposed to be at work. To say nothing of my sponsored children in the Third World who need money I could really use for myself in a hundred different ways. To be perfectly honest, people inconvenience the crap out of me. I don't have the time, I don't have the money, I don't have the patience, I want to blow a big pile of cash on books and sit alone at home with a cup of expensive coffee reading them and ignoring the world.

And?

How does God's love abide in me, if I do that?

It doesn't. If I did that, the love of God would not abide in me. But it's really the other way around, isn't it? If the love of God didn't abide in me, I couldn't help others. I'd be too tired, too broke, too frustrated. And I am. I am tired, and broke, and frustrated. But by the grace of God, because the love of God abides in me, I can still help. I can keep on giving when I don't want to, when I don't think I even could. Not because of my merit, but because the love of God that abides in me will not relent. And not only I can do it after all, but I can do it all with a smile. Not I, but the love of God that abides in me.

What I do for my brother or sister, I do not do it myself, out of my own virtue, but by the grace of God. By the grace of God, I can. In fact, I could barely stop myself if I tried. When I see a brother or sister in need, the grace of God moves me to their help, whether I am tired, angry, frustrated or just terminally lazy. Does it take something out of me? Yes it does. But in the void left by what I have given, I find again nothing but the love of God that abides in me.

By my own merit I am nothing. But by the grace of God, through faith, I can give my brother or sister anything I have to give, and more. Give your life to God, and he will pour you out for your brothers and sisters. And why not? He gave you your life, and he redeemed it for you. Your life belongs to the Lord, and yet he gives you this choice: to let the spirit, the love of God, abide in you, and pour you out for Him and for his sheep, or not. And the Lord will not stand in the way of your choice, but remember again one of my favourite scriptures, Mark 8:34-38:

He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels."

Let the love of God abide in you. Let it pour you out to help your brothers and sisters. What have you got to lose? Your earthly treasures? You're storing up treasure in heaven.

For today's hymn we will sing #583, Take my Life, That I May Be.

Year B, 3rd Sunday of Easter (April 22, 2012)

·         Acts 3:12-19

·         Psalm 4 (3)

·         1 John 3:1-7

·         Luke 24:36b-48

Some days, the lectionary makes you wrack your brains for hours trying to come up with something somewhat coherent and didactic. And other days, the lectionary says exactly what you wanted to say, in so many words. This is one of those days. But to make it clear what the message is, we have to back-track a little in the Acts and start from 3:1 instead of 3:12.

One day Peter and John were going up to the temple at the hour of prayer, at three o'clock in the afternoon. And a man lame from birth was being carried in. People would lay him daily at the gate of the temple called the Beautiful Gate so that he could ask for alms from those entering the temple. When he saw Peter and John about to go into the temple, he asked them for alms. Peter looked intently at him, as did John, and said, "Look at us." And he fixed his attention on them, expecting to receive something from them. But Peter said, "I have no silver or gold, but what I have I give you; in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk." And he took him by the right hand and raised him up; and immediately his feet and ankles were made strong. Jumping up, he stood and began to walk, and he entered the temple with them, walking and leaping and praising God. All the people saw him walking and praising God, and they recognise him as the one who used to sit and ask for alms at the Beautiful Gate of the temple; and they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him.

When Peter saw it, he addressed the people, "You Israelites, why do you wonder at this, or why do you stare at us, as though by our own power or piety we had made him walk? The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, the God of our ancestors has glorified his servant Jesus, whom you handed over and rejected in the presence of Pilate, though he had decided to release him. But you rejected the Holy and Righteous One and asked to have a murderer given to you, and you killed the Author of life, whom God raised from the dead. To this we are witnesses. And by faith in his name, his name itself has made this man strong, whom you see and know; and the faith that is through Jesus has given him this perfect health in the presence of all of you.

Let me read a third time what Peter said: "why do you stare at us, as though by our own power or piety we had made him walk?"

Notice that Peter and John never prayed over this man. Here is what Peter said to him: "what I have I give you; in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk." It's not a prayer, it's a command. Peter doesn't even ask God anything, let alone tell God. He tells the paralytic himself: stand up and walk. It's not prayer that heals the man, and as Peter points out, certainly not his own power or piety. Now if Peter doesn't think he can heal people through prayer and piety, by what strange flight of fancy does any of you figure you can do it?

What heals this man, in reality? "What I have I give you; in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk." The paralytic beggar is healed the same way you and I are healed: by grace, through face. And I'm rather tempted to say "duh" because how else would Peter heal a paralytic? By works? How would Peter do that? He's only human. By asking Jesus with fancy canned formulae like "we ask this in Jesus's name"? He didn't ask Jesus anything. He commanded the paralytic in Jesus's name. He didn't compel Jesus with prayer; rather, Jesus compels the paralytic.

If you think you can heal people, then do it right. Do it like Peter did it. "What I have I give you; in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk." Can you do that? I can't do that. I guess I don't have faith the size of a mustard seed. I can't tell a terminal cancer patient "in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk." I can't get my dog to do anything in the name of Christ. And I'm quite sure neither can you. Now Peter could do it through faith alone; even he couldn't do it by prayer. So if you can't do it by faith, why do you think you can do it by prayer?

There is only once I know of that Jesus used prayer for healing, which was in the case of a boy with a spirit. When he was done, the disciples asked him "why could we not cast it out?" and Jesus answer "this kind can come out only through prayer." (Mark 9:14-29) It wouldn't actually have occurred to the disciples to try to cast out a demon by prayer. But even so, Jesus still commanded the unclean spirit, and it still depended on faith. Even Jesus doesn't do things by sitting on his hands asking his father. Being God himself, he can create what he declares, which is handy for him, I suppose. But still though he can anoint the patient with all kinds of grace, he also needs the patient's faith.

All right, so what is needed to heal is faith and the grace of God. Prayer? Not even. So how about getting people jobs, boyfriends, new houses, what not?

Good question. Because you know what, at no time in the New Testament does anyone miraculously get a job in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Or a girlfriend. Nobody even thinks of asking Jesus for jobs and boyfriends. They ask for healing and casting out of demons. Nothing else. It just wouldn't even occur to anyone to bother the actual flesh-and-blood Jesus Christ of Nazareth to get them a job. So why are you bothering to pray for these things?

You can pray with your friends when they are afflicted. Use some psalms, or Job, or some other scripture they enjoy. Don't pray for your friend and tell yourself, much less tell them, that you're doing something productive. If you want to do something for your friend, then literally, do something. Prayer isn't "doing something." Neither Jesus nor Peter nor anyone else in the book uses prayer as a substitute for action. Pray with your friend, or do something for your friend. Don't confuse the two.

By the grace of God, through faith, someone may be healed, physically or emotionally. Not by your works or your prayers. Same with jobs, relationships, money, anything you can name, it will not come by your prayers. So if you want to help your neighbour, do something. Because it's simply not gonna get done by you harassing God about it. If Peter couldn't do it, neither can you.

Praise be to God, the Provider, the Withholder, the Eternally Besought, the Patient One.

Back to the wilderness

It's ridiculous how far behind I am. I've been getting really busy with worldly things, some of which serve the Lord, and some of which have a lot more to do with Cesar. So, I haven't been finding time to write sermons. Therefore, this weekend I'm making time. I'm not seeing anybody all weekend. Period. And I will continue spending my weekends in the wilderness until I am caught up on sermons.

Truth be told, I like it in the wilderness. It's peaceful and you can talk to God.

Year B, 2nd Sunday of Easter (April 15, 2012)

·         Acts 4:32-35

·         Psalm 133 (1)

·         1 John 1:1 - 2:2

·         John 20:19-31

Today the lectionary tells us what the disciples did immediately after the Resurrection of Our Lord.

·         They did not claim ownership of any possessions.

·         They sold what they owned and gave the proceeds to the poor.

·         They gave testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus.

·         They believed.

There is something here that they didn't do, and that I have been telling you over and over not to do. They did NOT sit and make lists of what they wanted the Lord to do for them.

Why? Because they were doing what Jesus told them to do.

Mark 10:21: "go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me."

John 20:27: "do not doubt, but believe."

Acts 1:8: "you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."

Where, in the whole book, did Jesus teach people to give the Lord grocery lists? Nowhere. In fact Jesus said quite the opposite. Matthew 6:5-13:

And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. But whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

When you are praying, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do; for they think that they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. Pray then in this way:

Our Father in heaven,

Hallowed be your name.

Your kingdom come.

Your will be done,

On earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread.

And forgive us our debts,

As we also have forgiven our debtors.

And do not bring us to the time of trial,

But rescue us from the evil one."

In fact, if you read through the entire Bible, I don't think you'll find one person praying in the modern way, going on and on about the many things God is gonna do for them. When and how did this fashion start? I have no idea. But it isn't how the Lord taught us to pray, from the very beginning to the time of the first disciples. The Lord made it clear that this isn't pleasing to him. What is pleasing to the Lord is for a Christian to do this: believe, testify, renounce material possessions, give to the poor. And this is what Christians began doing from the very beginning. This is what the people who heard the Lord with their own ears, saw him with their eyes, and touched him with their hands, undertook to do from the very beginning. If any of them sat on his hands asking for loot, he certainly didn't make much of an impression, because he isn't recorded anywhere in the Acts or the letters or anywhere else. We have no known record of a disciple of Christ sitting down after Easter or after Pentecost, hoarding his wealth to himself, and praying devoutly to the Lord to give him more and more loot.

People give me all kinds of arguments why this is righteous and pleasing to the Lord, and why it's perfectly worthy to sit on one's hands asking for loot. None of those arguments come from the scripture. None of those arguments hold any water even on plain logic.

Praying for loot with many words is not pleasing to the Lord and it is not what Jesus Christ taught us to do. Believe, witness, renounce your possessions, give to the poor. It's really pretty simple.

Praise be to God, the Compassionate, the Merciful.

Year B, Resurrection (April 8, 2012)

·         Acts 10:34-43

·         Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24 (24)

·         1 Corinthians 15:1-11

·         Mark 16:1-8

There is something I don't understand about the Resurrection. Well, I suppose there are many things I don't understand about the Resurrection, but the one that troubles me is: why?

Why would God promise us eternal life?

More specifically, why would God promise us eternal life after he booted us from Eden to keep us from getting eternal life? It is written in Genesis 3:22-24:

Then the Lord God said, "See, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever" – therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken. He drove out the man; and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim, and a sword flaming and turning to guard the way to the tree of life.

What changed? What makes it acceptable to God that we should have eternal life now, when it wasn't acceptable in the beginning?

Is it because we've grown? Because we've learned? Because of the way our relationship with God has evolved? Does God trust us now more than he did then? Do we deserve that trust?

One difference that stands out, between then and now, is the way in which we can acquire this eternal life. In the garden, we could have gained eternal life willfully, by disobeying God. In the Covenant of Christ, we can gain eternal life not by disobedience, but by obedience – Christ's obedience on the cross, and our obedience in following him. We hear this in Mark 8:34-38:

He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels."

We can consider also, what kind of eternal life is being promised. In Genesis, there are no details of what God is concerned about, but it seems that by eating from the fruit of the tree of life, man would simply live on forever as the same creature he is now. What good could that possibly do? Who would even want such a thing? Many people in our society cling desperately to lives devoid of meaning, joy or usefulness. Why? I cannot fathom. But I think that is the eternal life we would gain by eating from the fruit of the tree of life: as Qoheleth said, "vanity and chasing after wind." (Ecclesiastes 1:14). We would continue to get up in the morning, chase after money all day, and go back to bed just as poor, materially and spiritually, as when we got up.

Instead I love to read Revelation 4:1-11:

After this I looked, and there in heaven a door stood open! And the first voice, which I had heard speaking to me like a trumpet, said, "Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this." At once I was in the spirit, and there in heaven stood a throne, with one seated on the throne! And the one seated there looks like jasper and carnelian, and around the throne is a rainbow that looks like an emerald. Around the throne are twenty-four thrones, and seated on the thrones are twenty-four elders, dressed in white robes, with golden crowns on their heads. Coming from the throne are flashes of lightning, and rumblings and peals of thunder, and in front of the throne burn seven flaming torches, which are the seven spirits of God; and in front of the throne there is something like a sea of glass, like crystal.

Around the throne, and on each side of the throne, are four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind: the first living creature like a lion, the second living creature like an ox, the third living creature with a face like a human face, and the fourth living creature like a flying eagle. And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and inside. Day and night without ceasing they sing,

"Holy, holy, holy,

The Lord God and the Almighty,

Who was and is and is to come."

And whenever the living creatures give glory and honour and thanks to the one who is seated on the throne, who lives forever and ever, the twenty-four elders fall before the one who is seated on the throne and worship the one who lives forever and ever; they cast their crowns before the throne, singing,

"You are worthy, our Lord and God,

To receive glory and honour and power,

For you created all things,

And by your will they existed and were created."

This, indeed, is a worthy and comfortable way to spend eternity. And this, I believe, is the eternal life that the Lord our God is offering to us through Jesus Christ. Not vanity and a chasing after wind, but to praise his name eternally. Not what we can gain for ourselves through wilfulness, pride and disobedience, but what Jesus Christ has gained for us through suffering, humility and obedience. By the grace that Christ gained for us, we are saved, not from physical death, but from an empty life of vanity and chasing after wind. We are resurrected to a glorious life of praising the Lord forever. And it is not at the time of our physical death that we are saved and resurrected to this glorious life, but at the time that we choose, like Yeshua and in obedience to him and to Our Father, to die to sin and be reborn truly as children of the Lord, obedient, good, loving, merciful, and always singing his praise. Indeed we are resurrected, not after our physical death, but from the moment that we truly leave sin behind and willingly take up our cross and follow Jesus Christ.

And so, as we celebrate our resurrection in Our Lord, let us sing the hymn of the living creatures who stand around God's throne praising him forever, night and day without ceasing:

Hymn of the day - #413 Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty