What helps you in your faith? What feeds your faith (A sermon preached 26th September 2021)
What helps you in your faith? What feeds your faith,
And what does the opposite, what causes you to stumble?
Picture the scene, one of the disciples taps another on the shoulder and says ‘Ooh look over there, what do you think that person is doing’. And the disciple says ‘it sounds as if he’s using our master’s name to cast out a demon’. We can’t have that. ‘Oi you, stop it, shove off, that my master’s name you’re using, only we can use it, push off, find your own rabbi’.
Well I don’t know you – write the scene.
Do they return to Jesus and think he’ll be impressed that they were preserving his PR image, his integrity or something?
‘Ooh Master you’ll be so pleased, we saw someone driving out demons in your name and we stopped them. Good eh?!’
Honestly. You’ve got to admire Jesus for his calmness and patience. And I daresay he is with us.
I’m screaming at my bible because I want to know more – what do you mean ‘You saw someone casting out a demon’ – lets just pause at that and say ‘What was that all about, what were they doing, did it work?’
Why should it be such a shock?
There’s been crowds of people with Jesus, they’ve seen him feed 5k, rumours of walking on water, of lepers being healed, of demons being cast out.
Why wouldn’t someone from the crowd have some faith, why might they not say to themselves, ‘I can’t get very close to Jesus as he’s always surrounded by those 12 so maybe I could just give it a go and see what happens’.
Why not indeed. Give it a go see what happens.
I’m sure that there are lots of self-taught or perhaps Holy Spirit taught disciples who have found settling into a Church community hard
but they have persisted with the faith. And grown.
If you think of yourself as one of the 12, as a solid regular pillar of the Church, then there’s a cautionary warning here about letting others come in and find their place, where they fit in, what they can do that helps them to be a blessing to the rest of us, helps them to grow in their faith, helps us to grow in our faith.
If you think of yourself as someone who is definitely not, if you feel a bit on the outside, then help us to help you feel loved and welcomed, to know that this is your home, that this is the place for you to come and grow as a disciple, to be part of helping others to grow as disciples.
Jesus gives this simple guide – No one who does a miracle in my name can in the next moment say anything bad about me.
There’s a useful simple applicant.
Its not easy to say something bad about Jesus if you’ve just been caught up in a miracle.
So here’s the first bit of advice for today –
Sing and pray and give thanks to God.
Its really hard to be grumpy if you’re in the middle of singing “O praise ye the Lord”
Try it. Next time you’re feeling cheesed off with me, the Church, with God, with your neighbour, with life- try singing. Putting your energy and focus into praising God has a wonderful curative effect on the soul!
Jesus then goes on to talk quite a lot about Hell, about fires that aren’t quenched, about worms that don’t lose their appetites, about the importance of being Salty.
The 2nd punchline is – Dont cause other people to stumble in their faith.
We usually interpret this phrase ‘little ones’ as meaning Children – Do not cause children to stumble in their faith.
I like that not least as in a couple of weeks we have Safeguarding Sunday coming up and it’s a good reminder for us to remember that the responsibility of caring for each other, for children, old people, vulnerable people, that lies with all of us as a whole community.
Don’t say ‘Oh its probably nothing, I wont both Stefan, or Wendy, or Ruth, or Derreck or myself and so on with it – Don’t dismiss it saying ‘I expect they already know’.
Safeguarding is for all of us.
A little closer analysis and this isn’t especially about being young in age, this is about being young in faith, and lots of us are still babes in our faith.
If lesson 1 today was Sing more – it will help you to stay focused on Jesus, it will help you to exorcise your own demons of grumpiness and not take them out on other people.
Step 2 could be Don’t be the cause of another person stumbling in their faith.
On the one hand this is tricky, I don’t know what I do or don’t do that you find unhelpful in your discipleship.
On the other hand it isn’t.
In this context we see the powerful 12 shutting down someone trying to grow in their faith, trying to pray for someone in need, and here’s someone from the 12 wading in and saying ‘None of that thank you, we’ll take it from here’.
Its not difficult to dampen someone’s faith. What’s much harder is for us to notice that that’s what we’ve done.
Where I do that to you – I’m really sorry, I’m trying, I’m growing, I’m sorry.
We so easily don’t notice when we’re putting someone in their place. It takes a special sort of humility and self-awareness to see that.
There’s a daily practice called the Examen where you might look over your day and
give thanks to God for the blessings you saw,
and to ponder whether there’s anything you might need to repent of, to ask God – Did I handle that okay?
Someone sent me an apologetic email – ‘I’m sorry I was rude and dismissive of something I’d said, I do apologise’. And I thought that’s kind. That’s someone who is doing their Examen, reflecting on their day.
Don’t cause another person to stumble in their faith – how do I do that – I think if you yourself are growing in your faith that you will do it less often, I think if you can have a go at the Examen yourself, reflecting on your day about how you were with certain people, that might help.
The Epistle of James today is full of advice on how to grow as a disciple – Are you in trouble? Pray, Are you happy, Sing! Are you sick – Ask others to pray for you!
But here’s the best bit of advice, and I’ve never noticed this before, so I am going to try it and see how it works.
I would like you to pray for me.
And the prayer I would like you to pray is
‘Dear God, help James, help him to resist temptation, help him to spot sin early,
help him to stand against that sin,
help him to repent of it early,
help him to know that you love him and forgive him’.
The ep of James says ‘Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other that you may be healed’.
Because when we sin, we damage ourselves,
we belittle the God who made us, we mar the image of God that we’re made in.
But in being restored to God, we’re healed.
And how much more powerfully does that happen than when you pray for me. When I pray for you.
So next time you’re looking at the list of people that you pray for then pray for them that they would find confessing their sins easy, straightforward,
that they would feel the weight lift off them, and that they would know the peace and joy of being restored and forgiven.
Pray for each other that they would stand against the sin and temptation and addiction that comes to trip us up and trap us.
So, so far what you’re supposed to be doing is Singing more and Praying more.
Jesus talks more about hell than anyone in the bible. I find that disconcerting.
I ought to find it comforting.
At least it is Jesus who is talking about hell rather than some nasty bully type person, this is the one who loves us so much that he comes to us as human and walks with us and weeps with us and promises to make his dwelling in us.
What do you think is the opposite of Hell? Of course your head is saying Heaven obviously.
Jesus says the opposite of Hell is Life. The word he uses is Zoe. And that doesn’t just mean being alive, breathing air, having a pulse, it means living the life that God calls us to, being really alive.
Jesus is inviting us to have a think about stuff that we do, say, get involved in,
be it effort, be it apathy –
anything where we cause our own faith to stumble –
is there anything that we’re doing where we are sort of self-harming our own faith?
You’ve heard it said – Oh well, you know, he is his own worst enemy.
These are really not easy blind spots for us – but if you could see them, if you could see that that that thing is a real hindrance to you living life to the full, and in fact really what’s happening is that it is dragging your down, ensnaring you in its own addiction.
This is the cycle of sin and sin and more sin, it is the gift that keeps giving, it is no wonder that the fire just keeps burning and no wonder that the worms are never satiated.
I think Jesus’ point about the importance of being Salty, is about keeping your faith well preserved, or making sure your faith is tasty. And how do we do that.
We Sing! We pray about our troubles, we pray about each others troubles, we pray for each other in the midst of the sins that you’re struggling with – and we pray even in the midst of the sins that I am struggling with!
Here’s a fun thing –
if I am praying for you and your struggle with sin,
no I don’t know what sin you are struggling with today, but I do know that you will be struggling with sin,
then it might be that that will help me see you differently,
see you as being part of this church family,
see you as being my responsibility to make sure that you and your faith don’t stumble,
it might be that you might see the same thing for me and be keen to make sure that my faith doesn’t stumble because you’re praying for me.
And now how can I lose my saltiness if you’re praying for me, and I’m praying for you. And we’re singing songs and when we’re in trouble we’re calling on each other to be there for each other.
Lets pray, lets Sing. Amen!