Well, you’ve now finally found something
significant about me to mention. So, you have to dig. I’m not – my reaction was not that I don’t
have teddy bears. I do. But I'm not that I'm one of the world's largest
collectors of bears. I don’t know who that would be. Mine are all sentimental bears, and when I
realized what I was doing, I had to justify it in some measure. And so I determined that I would begin amassing
bears, and then if we manage to begin to amass grandchildren, then one of the treats for
my grandchildren would be at appropriate times to be able to begin to remove the bears from
my collection and to make them their own collection. So, that's just to let you get a little sneak
into the softness of my heart. I do have the bear actually that was given
to me on the day I was born in 1952. It was brought to the hospital by my grandmother. It's a sorry-looking bear, but it’s barely
alive. Well, let's turn to the Bible together. We’ve been lead in prayer, and our task
is to consider this matter of mercy. Perhaps I could begin with a quote from C.S.
Lewis from “The Four Loves.” You remember this from the end of the book. Lewis writes, “Those like myself whose imagination
far exceeds their obedience are subject to a just penalty. We easily imagine conditions far higher than
we have actually reached. If we describe what we have imagined, we may
make others and make ourselves believe that we have really been there and so fool both
them and ourselves.” Paul urged Timothy to make sure that he was
watching out both his life and his doctrine. James urged that great care should be taken
about presuming to become a teacher since those who teach will be judged with greater
strictness. And as we come to this pressing and important
question of mercy, not our reception of the mercy of God, but the expression of God's
mercy to others, then I think each of us may be prepared to acknowledge that there is some
distance between what we know what to be true and what we endeavor to make true and what
actually is true. The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to
anger and abounding in steadfast love. That is not all that He is, but it is essentially
what He is. Paul writes to the Ephesians in chapter 5,
and he says to them “I want you to be imitators of God.” So that there is to be a godly, god-like dimension
that marks out those who are the children of God. And God's goodness is expressed in part in
His mercy, in so far as it is displayed towards those who are made aware of their misery and
of their distress. So, if God then sees those who are both distressed
and miserable, and yearns for them with a compassion that is entirely His own, surely
it is impossible for us who testified to His grace and goodness in our lives, to distance
ourselves from this dimension of His character. What I'd like to try and do this afternoon,
I'm not sure whether I should tell you, because if I don't achieve it then you might be disappointed. Then again, you might be encouraged, so. But I feel a bit like the man who said he
was going to preach through the entire Bible in one talk, and he was going on for some
way and he got to Isaiah, and he paused and he said “Now, we've come to Isaiah. What shall we do with him?” And someone on the front row said “Well,
he can have my seat because I'm going home.” So it’s the afternoon. I think I can tell you. I want to look at – just briefly – at
Jesus' instructions, some of His words that we are already launched into as a result of
the sterling work of Cal Thomas earlier in the day. And then to look at a familiar parable of
Jesus, and then to fast forward into the church in the first century, and look at a community
there being brought under the guidance of their pastor to take seriously what this kind
of expression will mean. So it's quite a challenge, but I think we're
going to able to manage it. Luke 6, and we’ll just read from verse 27
to verse 36. And this is not so much our Scripture reading,
as it is that I want to read this and to read it in such a way that you are imbibing it
with me, and then on the strength of that just for us to ask two straightforward questions. Jesus has expressed these woes on the self-sufficient,
and then He says: “But I say to you who hear: Love your enemies, do good to those
who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. To one who strikes you on the cheek, offer
the other also. And from one who takes away your cloak, do
not withhold your tunic either. Give to everyone who begs from you; and from
one who takes away your goods do not demand them back. And as you wish that others would do to you,
do so to them. If you love those who love you, what benefit
is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to
you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. And if you lend to those from whom you expect
to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners to get back the
same amount. But love your enemies, and do good, and lend,
expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the
Most High. For He is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.” So here are the two questions. Question one: How hard is that to understand? Now, I take it from that strange response
that you're saying “Not difficult at all,” and that is exactly right. It may be hard for somebody because of learning
disabilities. But by and large, just a normal grasp of the
English language makes it impossible really for us to say that we do not understand. Well, then it follows surely, that failure
to practice what Jesus has just declared, that failure will not be able to be excused
on account of ignorance. It will be impossible for us to say that our
failure in this realm in the matters as they have been delineated is on account of the
fact that we do not understand. The second question is perhaps a harder question. “How well do you think Christianity in North
America is doing when placed alongside the clarity of the instruction of Jesus that we
have just read? I think that question demands more than the
time we can give it today and it will be nuanced in different ways. But it is an important question and it is
a difficult question, and it is (I suggest to you) a painful question to face. There is a sense in which this is a little
bit like a cardiogram here. It’s a bit like that invasive research that
they do, because they tell you that a stress test will not reveal the real condition. They are going to have to go in to determine
if there is actually any blockage, because it is possible to live for a time at least
with those blockages undetected and to be completely unaware of what awaits us. Therefore it is an important day when that
kind of investigation takes place. It is time, I suggest to you, it is past time
for this kind of searching investigation. I travel a little bit in the country and I
detect a sound in the air. I detect a tone in the talk. I detect an anger in the eyes, a grumbling
spirit, a complaining spirit, a fearful spirit, a slandering spirit, a moaning spirit. I don't need to go out of my bedroom in order
to encounter this. I need only a mirror; both the mirror that
is on my wall and the mirror that is mine as is yours in the Word itself. The person who looks at the mirror, goes away,
does nothing about it, given what he has discovered is a foolish man, whether that is in identifying
some physical characteristic that is in need of attention, or as James says in terms of
the searching gaze of God as it comes to us in the Scriptures. I suggest to you that it is worthy of consideration
that there is for us to be faced – just a spirit, just a tone. You can identify Christians now. It’s a long time since the 60’s, since
we were all singing around campfires: “And they'll know we are Christians by our love,
by our love, and they will know we are Christians by our love.” Now, it's more like “They'll know we are
Christians by our rhrhrmhrrehm.” You don't even need to hear these people saying
anything, you know. Oh, I’ve just got on the bus with a bunch
of Christians. “Can’t believe it! Dreadful! Fearful! No future! More of the same! Buh duh duh duh, duh duh.” Now, maybe I'm on the wrong bus. You say “I don’t understand that.” And of course there is a lunatic fringe, and
you’re not in it, I'm sure. But if like me, you lived the final nineteen
months of Christopher Hitchens’ life with him, what he referred to as the nineteen months
of “Living dyingly.” If you read his articles, if you picked up
his last articles in a book entitled “Mortality,” which was published posthumously, you will
have read there as I read, not only the way in which he wrestled with all of the implications
of his cancer as a devout, forceful, antagonistic in many ways, propounder of atheism. But you will also have read there the kind
of things that people wrote to him, apparently, Christian professing people concerned that
he would be able to encounter the truth. Let me give you just one quote from him. He says: “You haven't lived, if I can put
it like this, until you have contributions such as this on the websites of the faithful:
‘Who else feels Christopher Hitchens’ getting terminal throat cancer was God’s
revenge for him using his voice to blaspheme Him? Atheists like to ignore facts. They like to act like everything is a “coincidence.” Really? It's just a “coincidence” [that] out of
any part of his body, Christopher Hitchens got cancer in the one part of his body he
used for blasphemy. Yeah, keep believing that, atheists. He's going to writhe in agony and pain and
wither away to nothing, and then die a horrible agonizing death, and then comes the real fun,
when he’s sent to hellfire forever to be tortured and set afire.” As he goes on into the chapter, he says: “Apart
from its impact on me, how do think my children felt to read this kind of material that came
routinely to my home?” Now I say again, I understand the lunatic
fringe. But listen loved ones, Jesus sent us out to
engage in mission. We have no justifiable basis to change the
charge from mission to one of admonition, to fail to do what we are asked to do in rescuing
the perishing and caring for the dying, snatching them in pity from sin and the grave and from
weeping over the erring one, and picking up the fallen. At what point in the history of evangelical
Christianity did that finally be transmuted into something entirely different? Whereby, we have determined that it is our
calling in life to make sure that we admonish those who are outside of the kingdom of God,
when in actual fact the call to admonish one another is within the framework of the kingdom
of God. Some people might actually think that we have
an entirely different kingdom in mind. Some people might actually think that we are
actually serving an entirely different king. Not a king who is gentle and lowly in heart,
and in whom one finds rest for their souls. Not a gentle king who arrives riding on a
donkey. But apparently, some other kind of king. Only a fool would mention gun control in this
context. So let me mention it. Is it just me that sees those signs that says
“I’m for Jesus and for guns”? And says, how in the world did you get the
two of them put together? Peter had a go at it with the guns of his
day. Either he was tremendously accurate and took
off just an ear or he was horribly inaccurate when he missed the fellow’s head. But Jesus told him “Put it away.” He told him “If my kingdom was a kingdom
down here, then my followers would fight.” They would engage in all kinds of things,
but it's not that kind of kingdom. It's a kingdom that comes in in another way. It’s a kingdom that rides in on the back
of lowliness and kindness and meekness and gentleness and self-control, and Christ-likeness
and godliness. Well, that's enough on Jesus' words. Let's just go forward a few chapters to more
words of Jesus, but this time one of Jesus' stories. I'm sure you know where we're going. Luke 18. How wonderful it must have been when Jesus
– I wish I could see His eyes, when He just says – now, let me just pause here and give
you a story on this one. Let me tell you something, and how they must've
loved it until they realized that He was actually telling it against them. You'll notice Luke 18 begins, “And he told
them a parable, to the effect that they ought always to pray and not to lose heart.” So that's the purpose of the story. He’s encouraging them in that way. You go down to verse 9, and now He tells another
story. “And he told also this parable to some who
trusted in themselves that they were righteous and treated others with contempt. OK? So His target audience in this story is the
presumptuous, pompous, religious type. Presumptuous, pompous and religious. The kind of people that would go to conferences. I'm sorry, but they would. They would have been attending the conferences
of the time, and Jesus has no time for this at all. What is he addressing? He’s addressing the danger of religious
hypocrisy. He's addressing the possibility that exists
of embracing something in a formal and external way of having been able to commit oneself
to the various aspects of it all, and yet to have a heart that is unrenewed by the very
grace that is necessary. Now, just look at the story. There’s a story of two men. You know it well. Many of you have done it for years. Two men went up to the temple to pray. One was a Pharisee. As a Pharisee, he was a separatist. He was a formalist. He was a legalist. And he also, these Pharisees, enjoyed ostentation,
and they liked to make sure that they were seen in the right places. They must've been very happy. And so Jesus, in the hearing of all the people,
said to His disciples “Beware of the scribes who like to walk around in long robes and
love greetings in the marketplaces and the best seats in the synagogue, and the places
of honor at feasts. They devour widows’ houses and for a pretense,
they make long prayers.” Do you know what the next sentence is? “They will receive a greater condemnation.” The other man is introduced to us as a tax
collector. That doesn't mean very much to us until we
do a little bit of background checking and we realize that this is someone who was at
the absolute opposite end of the scale, both religiously and socially. Tax collectors were included with harlots
and another disreputable folks. It would be dreadful to have a tax collector
as a member of your family. You wouldn’t ever want to be answering the
question when you’re out at a party “And so what is it that Levi is doing?” “Oh, he’s a – sorry, I just had something
in my throat there. He’s – he’s a tax collector.” “Oh, I see. Good. Yes, very nice. Excuse me, I must talk to somebody else. I just – ” Tax collectors could not bring
their alms or their gifts to the temple. They were spurned. They were hated. They were disavowed. We know the story that Zacchaeus was up a
tree in order that he could see. I have a sneaking suspicion, even if he hadn’t
wanted to see, it would have been good for him to be up the tree. At least he was safer up the tree than down
on the ground, because nobody had any time for them at all. These were the two men. And then, of course, there were two prayers. The Pharisee, verse 11, standing by himself,
prayed. And you remember his prayer. It’s so loaded with self-congratulation
that it couldn’t even get off the ground. Absolutely hopeless. “I'm not like the other men. No, certainly. Not extortioners, unjust, adulterers or even
like this tax collector, and not like any of these people with those dreadful piercings
in their nose and through their lips. I’m not like any of these people that I
just bumped into there in Whole Foods. That was not a comment about Whole Foods,
I’m sorry. It’s just because I was just in Whole Foods. I could've said Giant Eagle, or a number of
places. Man, people make amazing deductions from throwaway
lines like that. But anyway, you get the point. He says, Plumber, “He glances at God, but
he contemplates himself. He avoided sin and he wants God to know he
practiced piety, and it's important for God to know, and also that God should know, and
everyone else who’s around him, that he is doing far more than is actually required. He is beyond the minimum requirements. I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I get. In other words, he compares himself with others. He grades himself on the curve, and he comes
out very, very high. The second prayer comes from the second man. “But the tax collector, standing far off,
would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful
to me, a sinner.’” He doesn't compare himself with others. He sees himself before God. He sees himself as the very embodiment of
sin. He knows that he’s a rotter. He knows that he's in need of mercy, and he
cries out to God for mercy. Now, if you imagine the people listening to
a story like this, they would assume that, presumably, the religious man would be the
one who will come out on top. Well, they're ready for the sting in the tail
that is there in verse 14. Jesus says, having finished this little parable,
“I tell you,” He says, “this man,” that is, this tax collector, “went down
to his house justified, rather than the other.” He went down propitiated. “For everyone who exalts himself will be
humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.” You see, what the Pharisee had to say about
himself was accurate. It wasn't that he needed to get further down
the road from where he was. The problem was that he was on the wrong road. The Pharisee is the epitome of the religious
person who feels good about himself, feels good about herself; uses the occasion constantly
to stoke their ego and their separation from everything that is foul and evil and unjust
and so on. Often, such individuals have no non-Christian
friends at all. It is a long, long time since any of them
had ever had an encounter with someone that they would regard as disreputable or not in
their social circle, or beyond the realm of their interest and so on. Is this unkind? I searched my own heart. I was playing golf in California some months
ago now. I was with one man that I knew and with three
other men in a fivesome that I didn't know. They began to tell some of the most horrendous
jokes that I’ve ever heard. And after a while, on the back nine, one of
these men said “And what is it that you do?” I wanted to say I teach, you know. I said, I'm a pastor. Frozen silence. One says “Well, how’s business? How was business in, you know, how’s your
business?” I said business is fantastic. I said there's no shortage of sinners. They got the point. We teed off. I was in the middle of the fairway. I remember that because it so happened so
seldom. And one of these wee men came running to me. Actually, he ran across the part of the fairway
and he said “I didn’t like what you said there.” I said, “Sorry, what was that?” He said “You said that I was a sinner.” Well, I said “I didn’t actually say that
you were a sinner. I said there were a lot of sinners around,”
I said, you know. He said “Well, I am not a sinner.” He said “The jokes that I’m telling, they
are jokes about sinners. Those are sinner jokes. But I am not a sinner.” This is literally what he said. “I am not a sinner. I'm telling you about people that are sinners.” I said “Well boy, am I delighted to meet
you.” He said “Why is that?” Because he’s in full mode right now. I said, “Because there's only one other
person in the world that I’ve heard of that meets this designation.” He says “Who's that?” I say “Jesus of Nazareth.” He says “Well, if you’re going to put
it like that.” I said “Well, how else do you want me to
put it?” I said “Listen. Listen. I only need a mirror – given in the same
light – I only need a mirror to see a sinner every morning I wake up.” He says “Well, you said you’re a minister?” “Yeah, I said I’m a minister. I’m a sinning minister.” Well, that calmed him down, and by the time
we got to the end, we were having a very meaningful conversation. He ended up with the notion that if there
is a God, a good God will presumably reward nice people for doing their best. He did not understand that an awareness of
God brings an awareness of sin, that the law, as we say, empties and grace fills. I think we have time to fast forward into
Crete, and if you can come with me into Crete, I hope you have a Bible so that you can follow
along and see that things are actually where we expect them to be, and that is Titus. And probably these three chapters, more than
any of the epistles, drive home this absolute and unequivocal demand for the children of
God to be marked by the character of God. That these individuals that Paul is encouraging
Titus to encourage are to be those who are ready for every good work. You will see that at the first verse in chapter
3. “Remind them to be submissive to rulers
and authorities, to be obedient and to be ready for every good work.” And this is taking place in an environment
where the influential false teachers are, according to verse 16 of chapter 1, “unfit
for any good work.” In fact, Paul speaks very straightforwardly
about them. Crete was a proverbial place for moral decadence. Contemporary historians recorded it as being
almost impossible to find personal conduct more treacherous, or public policy more unjust
than in Crete. OK. Let me just read that to you again. The contemporary historians said “If you
want to think about a place that is gone to the dogs, think about Crete. It's virtually impossible to find a place
where personal conduct is more treacherous and public policy is more unjust.” That's the context. OK? Treacherous and marked by injustice. And Timothy is to watch his life and doctrine,
and Titus is to do the same, and you will notice in verse 7 (is it?) of chapter 2, he
as the pastor in the congregation is to show himself in all respects to be a model of good
works. In Greek, it actually reads “in all respects,
a model of good works.” There’s a time for debate, there’s a time
for diffidence, but he must make sure that he declares these things (verse 15 of chapter
2) that he exhorts, that he rebukes. He does so with all authority, and nobody
is to disregard him. And what does he provide? Well, he is to provide for them a lesson in
civics, in the rights and the duties of citizenship. He is to make sure that the people living
in that alien environment recognize that Christian behavior is absolutely crucial in the furtherance
of the gospel, that their behavior must be in tune with their beliefs, that their profession
must be borne out by their practice, so that in the public square, in the environment in
which they live, in whatever sphere of influence was theirs, their Christian conduct should
stand out in the context of the general population – a population that again was recorded as
being notoriously troublesome, known to be full of agitators and insurrectionists. So here's this little church that Titus is
to shepherd. It's in an environment that is marked by civil
injustice, it’s marked by treachery on the street, people are always fighting and arguing
and complaining and so on. And so he says, remind them to be marked number
one by loyalty. Loyalty. Let me just give you a couple of words here. “Remind them to be submissive to rulers
and authorities, to be obedient and to be ready for every good work.” Faithful allegiance to the legitimate monarch
or government of one's country is a Christian duty. You cannot get to that without recognizing
that that authority ultimately has its source in God Himself. So, says Paul to Titus to say to his people,
make sure that the believers in Corinth are not involved in civil disobedience, but rather
make sure that your church members are known, are marked by the fact that they obey the
law, that they are submissive. Now, if I were teaching this in a class, somebody
would immediately put up their hand, and say “Well now wait a minute, isn’t it true
that there is an exception to that in Acts 5 in verse 29?” Yes. Yes. But why are you bringing it up? That's what I would say. I’ll tell you probably why you’re bringing
it up: because it's far easier to bring up the exception. It’s more important for us to obey God than
to man. It’s far easier to bring up the exception,
than it is to live an exceptional life. And what the call is here is to live an exceptional
life, to be marked by loyalty which is worked out in community. I think that’s the emphasis here. Not so much acts of charity, as engagement
within the community, ready for every good work, good citizenship, demands engagement
in the community, so that the Christian in Crete is to be cooperative, provided no question
of conscience is involved. Alright? But it insumes involvement. It assumes engagement rather than isolation
and estrangement. Loyalty, community, courtesy. I’m not sure that courtesy is a big enough
word for this, but it covers all that’s mentioned here: to speak evil of no one; to
avoid quarreling; to be gentle; to show perfect courtesy toward all people. So, the Christian, then, is to be marked by
grace, politeness, manners, respect, displayed in our gestures, displayed in our demeanor. Not displayed in a bumper sticker as I saw
on one car the other day, that said “Thank God for our troops, especially for our snipers.” It's kind of tough for me to have that on
the one side of the bumper and a fish on the other side of the bumper. I don’t know about you. Do you think we set ourselves up for the charges
that are leveled against us in the media? Is anyone prepared to say that it is without
justification many of the things that are said concerning those of us who would be identifying
ourselves with the cause of Christianity, in particular, evangelical Christianity. Manners? Do you remember manners? I was on a bus coming from the – what do
you call those things? – the shuttle. And I got on the bus and it got jammed and
jammed and jammed. Then I saw the next person who was coming
on was desperately in need of a seat, happened to be a lady, and so I stood up. And it was a black lady, an African-American
lady that was the driver of the bus, she saw this take place in her rearview mirror, and
she stood up and she made a speech. She said “Oh I like that! I can live with that! Did you see that man? He stood up for a woman there.” Can you believe that? I can’t mimic her. But it was amazing. I was thoroughly embarrassed. I wish I’d stayed in my seat. I would’ve been less embarrassed if I just
did what you’re supposed to do. You don’t stand up for a woman. And what about all these baseball hats worn
in church services. For goodness sake! And you guys who are old enough to know better,
sitting in restaurants wearing your hats, where did you come from? Oh, you say “You’re weird.” I’ll freely admit to that. Why would you not wear your hat? Because you shouldn’t. We’re you never in the military? I wasn’t. No, you see, here if you talk to somebody
who is part of the millennial generation, this is what they will tell you. The one person they can't tolerate is the
person who’s mean. Mean. Lacking moral dignity, uncooperative, unkind,
unfair, vicious, nasty, difficult to handle, difficult to deal with, unpleasant. Loyalty? Community? Courtesy? Humility? Humility. And how do we get to that humility of heart? Well, he goes on and he lays it out. It's all grounded in the mercy and the grace
of God. His exhortation, his directive to them is
built on the theology which underpins it. This is not just a sort of a call to some
kind of endeavor to try and be a better person to make people think well of us. No, he says, listen, we ourselves were once
foolish. And then he goes through and he outlines the
unregenerate life marked by all of these things. But here is the mystery, he says, the goodness
and lovingkindness of God our Savior appeared and He saved us not because of works done
by us in righteousness, but according to His own mercy. So the meekness, the gentleness, the demeanor
of the Christian in Crete or the Christian in Cleveland that does not negate moral outrage
but tempers the proud and selfish reactions to which we are prone. These things emerge from the transforming
renewing grace of God. And if this isn't tough enough, look at the
final three words in English of verse 2 – “Toward all people.” Toward all people. The story of the good Samaritan was essentially
told again by Jesus to counteract that notion. All that man wanted to know was who is my
neighbor. Tell me who my little group is. Tell me where I can draw the circle around
myself beyond which I don't have to be engaged in anybody's life, involved in any way at
all. Just tell me. Us four, no more, shut the door. Round the wagons. We can stay away from all these miserable
wretches that are out there. All these dreadful people that are trying
to invade our space. All these people that don't understand that
we're supposed to – we have a divine mandate to live with: apple pie and flags and just
a wonderful – having a wonderful time to ourselves. The “gentle courtesy,” says J.N.D. Kelly, “which is so essential a trait of
the Christian character must be exhibited to the world in general including those who
are most hostile or whom one likes least, and not just to one's fellow Christians or
personal friends.” You see why I began with the four loves? Well, let me finish in this way, because we
have to finish at some point, I don’t know. And the afternoon talks are always the hardest,
and people are full of roast beef and unbelief. That actually is a quote from my little Presbyterian
friend, T.S. Mooney, and it just came to mind. I should have left it. But anyway. Can I come back around to Christopher Hitchens? I don't know how many of you read “Hitch
22” or followed his diatribe and so on. I found it much easier to handle than some
of his contemporary atheistic proponents. I didn't appreciate much of what he said. I would disavow obviously many of his underlying
values and so on. But nevertheless I thought there was in some
measure an honesty about the man. And it comes across in him, you know, it's
impossible for him to be just rotten to people. He’s gone now, of course. But let me just give you a couple of quotes
again from this book that I was quoting earlier. On the day that his big book came out, and
he was doing a presentation at some place, whatever you call it, like signing books or
whatever. He had to drop into a hospital in New York
to have a test. He came out of the test and he and his wife
paused for a moment, and he said to her, he said “You know, they don't know what this
is but there is a very severe chance that it is cancer.” In a little postscript to the book – this
is his wife writing – of that day, in the evening, with all of the exhilaration of this
successful launch of the book and the presentation that he had made, the shadow now had fallen
over them both. But instead of getting in a taxi, they walked
50 blocks back to their apartment. And this is what she says: “Everything was
as it should be except that it wasn't. We were living in two worlds – the old one
which never seemed more beautiful had not yet vanished, and the new one about which
we knew little except to fear it. The new one had not yet arrived.” It's pretty good picture. Isn’t it? We’re now living in two worlds. When the diagnosis was confirmed then that
began the period of time that Christopher Hitchens then referred to as living dyingly. “My chief consolation,” he says, “in
this year of living dyingly has been the presence of friends. For me to remember friendship is to recall
those conversations that it seemed a sin to break off. The ones that made the sacrifice of the following
day a trivial one. That was the way that Callimachus chose to
remember his beloved Heraclitus.” And then I had to go and look up who in the
world those characters were and came across this poem translated by William Corey that
goes like this: “They told me, Heraclitus, they told me you were dead, they brought me
bitter news to hear and bitter tears to shed. I wept when I remember’d how often you and
I had tired the sun with talking and sent him down the sky.” Yes, this is Christopher Hitchens. This is this avowed atheist. This is this man who has become – became
for a period of time reached the embodiment of everything that represents the enemy to
us. Now just picture him as he walks with his
wife, those 50 blocks, with a diagnosis of cancer looming over him. Think of him as he says “If you want to
really know what it was like for me to face these final months, I was there with a longing
for friendship.” Well wouldn’t you have loved the opportunity
not to send him one of those ridiculous emails, but to tell him about a friend? That there is a friend that sticks closer
than a brother, that Jesus called to Himself those he wanted to be with Him, that he befriended
them. He was not only a friend to them but a Savior
to them. To tell them that our belief in God would
not exist in isolation from the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. It would be hard to believe (in all of the
suffering) in God were it not for the reality of the fact of His suffering in the person
of Christ in that cross and on that cross. We could've told them that. I think it would’ve been absolutely worthless
to try and, you know, lay our best apologetics on Him. His own brother tried and couldn’t. The best and the brightest that are represented
here may have had a stab at it as well. I have a sneaking suspicion, and of course,
I only say this with regret, but I have a sneaking suspicion that we might've got him
out with fairytales. Well, I can hear you now saying he’s finally
lost his mind just before he finishes. No. I'm thinking about Tolkien now. Oh and I'm also thinking about the Oscars,
just since I mentioned this. On Valentine's Day, I thought it would be
a nice thing to take my wife to see a film that was called love. “Amour,” OK? Don't go. I'm going to tell you how it ends so you won’t
need to go. I was intrigued. It’s a French film translated to English,
and I was intrigued because it got such amazing reviews. This is a great love story. This is one for the ages and so on. So I said to myself, I said “Why would the
sort of modern literary elite give this film which is apparently the story of an elderly
couple that love each to the end, why would they give it such significance?” Well, I wondered that all up until the point,
until the elderly gentleman took a pillow and suffocated his wife with it as she lay
in the bed. But you see it fits perfectly, because contemporary
literature, contemporary films do not play well with happy endings. Literary people today, by and large, are not
up for happy endings. Tolkien, on the other hand, was very happy
with happy endings. And when he wrote his fairy stories, he said
he wrote them because he knew that they would have lasting influence, because, he said,
men and women as men and women share similar longings. A longing for the supernatural realm, a longing
for a love that is stronger than death, a longing for a good that triumphs over evil,
a longing for a close relationship with nature. And fairy stories do have abiding power because
we wish they were true. I have a number of gnomes in my garden. Sometimes I wonder if they move around in
the evening. They’re always back in place, but I just
wonder, and I actually like the idea of them moving around in the evening. Can you just imagine? Well, you say, what possible point of departure
then is there? Well, let's say we can track along that line
for a while and then say, “You know what? I know it's fairly common for people to suggest
that, you know, if you move in the realm of Christianity, the story of Jesus and His death
and His resurrection and so on, that you’re actually dealing in the realm of a fairytale. I say, now what I want you to do is I want
you to really consider the story as it is delivered to us in the Scriptures, and then
ask whether it is perhaps not the reality. That what we find in the Lord Jesus, in His
death and in His resurrection, is the ultimate reality towards which all the fairy tales
point, because we’re going to live in a new heaven and a new earth. Love in the Lord Jesus triumphs over hatred,
you can go down the line. All the deepest longings of the human heart
are answered in the gospel. But if our gospel becomes another gospel,
an earthly gospel, a time-ordered gospel, a national gospel, a territorial gospel, then
we will lose the opportunity to actually convey this amazing good news to those who are wrestlers
on a troubled sea. Augustine said “The cross is the pulpit
of God’s love.” Ian Murray, in his little booklet, says “Persuading
men and women of God's love is the great calling of Christian ministry.” And yet here we are all these years beyond
the 60’s, and some of us lived through them and we played in some of those albums, those
dreadful songs – “I want to hold your hand, I want to hold your hand, I want to
hold your ha-ha-hand.” And “She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah. She loves you yeah, yeah, yeah. She loves you yeah, yeah, yeah.” Dreadful, dreadful stuff. You can understand why it is that the whole
Christian community down in the South were so opposed to these dreadful characters. Well, we must admit, they were on a continuum. They pushed the boat out, we can't deny that. But in the final interview that Lennon gave
to a Rolling Stone magazine before he was killed outside the Dakota building, they asked
him about various songs that he’d written, and they came to ‘Help’ which he wrote
in 1965. They said, “What about ‘Help’?” Do you remember it? “When I was younger, so much younger than
today, I never needed anybody's help in any way. But now I'm older, I’m not so self-assured. Now, I find I’ve changed my mind, I’ve
opened up the door. Help me if you can, I'm feeling down. I do appreciate you being around. Help me get my feet back on the ground. Won’t you please, please help me.” Lennon said that was the cry of my heart,
but I never got an answer. Well, he wasn’t going to come and seek it
from many of us. And then Maharishi with his funny clothes,
strange beard, pluralistic notions seemed far more amenable. I don’t think he was put off by the exclusive
claims of Jesus. I think he may have been put off by the fact
that we were so unlike those whom Jesus says we must be like if we are children of our
heavenly Father. And Jesus said “Be merciful as your heavenly
Father is merciful.” Gracious God, we thank You for Your Word. It is your Word that is fixed in the heavens
and is utterly reliable. Grant that we might become increasingly, not
only students of Your Word that we understand what it says, but also that we might be increasingly
filled by the Holy Spirit, so that as we go to men and women, as we live amongst our colleagues
and our friends, as we open up our Bibles, we do so in the awareness that it is only
the Holy Spirit that opens blind eyes and softens hard hearts. That we’d recognize too that God, You've
chosen not to work in a vacuum but that you have picked us up and turned us the right
way around and dispatched us. Thank you for such a glorious gospel to share. Grant that our lives will not so intrude upon
our lips that we fail you. Grant that everything that is of Yourself
may find a resting place, anything that is untrue, unkind, unnecessary may be banished
from our recollection. Make us, we pray, more like Your Son, the
Lord Jesus Christ, in whose name we pray, amen.
