Luke 1:5-25

Have you ever been in a position when you had some amazing news to share? Something had happened. Perhaps you got engaged or you were expecting a baby or you just got your dream job. When you have big news, who do you tell first? That’s a big decision. For some people, they just explode with sharing and they will tell the nearest person, even if they are a total stranger. For others, they are very strategic. They create a hierarchy within their minds of who must be told before who and all of the timing set out.

Now imagine that you are God. I know that’s dangerous. Not only are you God, it is now time to take that largest step of all eternity. In the past, you have spoken through the prophets and that was fine, but now communication is about to take a whole new level. It is time for the incarnation. Instead of a prophet, God the Son was about to appear as a human being, born as a baby on that little speck called planet Earth.

Who would you tell first? Kings and emperors? Scholars and religious leaders? Who gets the news first? And what does that say about what you value?

Thankfully we are not God and we don’t need to use our imagination because the story is told for us. The first person that God tells is a man named Zechariah. Now to be completely accurate, Zechariah is told about the birth of John the Baptist and not Jesus. But in the biblical story, the coming of John the Baptist is intimately connected with the coming of Jesus Christ. You can’t really separate them. The only reason John appeared was to prepare the way for Jesus. John was the necessary first step.

But what does this revelation to Zechariah say about how God interacts with us?

One question we should ask is whether or not Zechariah was an expected choice. The answer is yes and no.

On one hand, Zechariah makes all the sense in the world. Not only did he have a great Old Testament name, he also was of the tribe of Levi, the one tribe allowed to work in the temple. Not only was he a Levite, he was from a priestly family, one of the descendants of Aaron, able to perform temple duties that other Levites could not. We should not necessarily see Zechariah as a religious scholar, not in the way the Pharisees were. But as a priest, he probably had much more knowledge of the Bible than the average Jew. He held a respected position in society.

I said that he had an Old Testament name, the same name as one of the prophets. There is another Old Testament connection. Zechariah was old and his wife Elizabeth was barren. This is a motif found throughout the Old Testament, with Abraham and Sarah just being the most famous examples. Time after time in the Old Testament, God worked miracles through people just like Zechariah. In many ways, Zechariah almost seems to be an Old Testament figure plucked out and placed in the New Testament.

It was to Zechariah, as he was performing his temple duties, that the angel Gabriel appeared. Now the Jerusalem temple was a special place and the Jews understood God to be dwelling within the temple, but we should not get the idea that angelic visitations were a regular occurrence. In fact, it was generally believed that communication with God had stopped after the last prophet, who was Malachi. No one expected to hear from God, through an angel or any other way. The only way you could hear from God was through the study of the Bible.

So Zechariah was a

John 4:19-24

Have you ever heard of the worship wars? This is a phrase that is used to describe conflict within churches over styles of worship music. It was more intense a number of decades ago but still exists to a certain extent today. Basically, there were people who felt that the traditional hymns were the only way to worship and there were others who felt that the newer songs were the only way to worship. It was a bitter conflict and people would leave the church if they didn’t get their own way. The irony is that long before this, there was another worship war back when hymns were introduced. Previously the church had only sung Psalms and many felt that the introduction of hymns was worldly and irreverent. There are still churches today who have not made the transition from Psalms to hymns and never intend to.

The problem with all of this is that I have read the Bible carefully to find the passages that say that worship is about satisfying our personal preferences and I have still not found them. Even though the impulse to keep worship as being about us is so strong, I cannot find any biblical support for that idea.

Who am I addressing here? Am I pointing fingers at people who want hymns or people who want newer songs? The answer is yes and even more specifically, I’m pointing my fingers at me.

Let me share two quick stories. I try to visit other churches on my Sundays off, so that I can find ideas to steal for our church. I visited one church that had only hymns and they were hymns that I was completely unfamiliar with. I can remember thinking during the service, “Well this is rather boring.” Another Sunday I went to a church that was completely opposite. They had an extremely good band of talented musicians. They were doing all new songs, so new that I did not know any of them. While respecting their musical ability, I found myself getting critical because the unfamiliarity was hindering me from entering into worship.

What was the problem with those two churches? The problem was that I was there and I had a bad attitude. I showed up looking for my desires to be met rather than to worship God.

The problem with the worship wars is that they are based on an assumption that worship is all about us rather than all about God. But that still leaves us with the question of what our worship is supposed to look like. If the problem with us-centred worship is that it is unbiblical, then we should turn to the Scriptures to find out what real worship is supposed to be like.

Long before there was a battle over styles of music, there was another worship war. This war was between the Samaritans and Jews. The Jews believed the one place to worship God was the temple mount in Jerusalem. The Samaritans believed the one place to worship was Mount Gerazim. This worship war sometimes became literal, as the Jews eventually destroyed the Samaritan temple on Mount Gerizim. I suspect that the Samaritans didn’t shed too many tears when the Romans later destroyed the Jewish temple in Jerusalem.

It is in this context that we have a conversation between Jesus and a Samaritan woman. Jesus had been hitting a little too close to home as he been speaking to the woman on spiritual matters. It seems the woman became uncomfortable and tried to distract Jesus with a religious controversy. Jesus can’t get inside her heart if he is busy debating a controversial issue. Or can he?

The woman brings up the worship war of t

Psalm 100

What is it that we are doing here? What do we call this time together? It’s not a Bible study, even though we read the Bible and hopefully learn something from it. It is not fellowship time, although we enjoy being around each other and we are seeking to build community. It is not a fundraising event, even though we appreciate your financial support through your tithes and offerings.

We call this our worship service. Learning, fellowship and giving are all still important, but they are done as part of our primary goal of coming into God’s presence and worshiping him. But how much do we know about worship? Is worship simply about singing songs about faith? What does worship look like and why do we do it? This message is the first of two looking at the nature of worship. We will look at why we worship and then how we worship.

To do this, we need to clear up some misconceptions about worship. I have talked previously that I spent some time in my life as an atheist. There were many factors that contributed to my atheism but one was based on confusion about worship. I remember having a conversation with a friend about why Christianity didn’t make sense. Christians, so I supposed, thought that God had such a fragile ego that he needed people to tell him how good he was or he would send them to hell. I had no interest in such a God. Thankfully, that is just a completely wrong understanding of worship. Not only is there no statement in the Bible that says “praise God or burn in hell,” it is completely wrong when it comes to God’s desire for worship.

We do not worship God because he has low self-esteem and he needs to be cheered up by us saying nice things to him. God, as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, is an eternal relationship of love and God is complete, even without us. God does not need our existence, much less our worship.

So why do we worship? That is a good question and the Bible has much to say about this subject. To investigate, we will turn to the Psalms, the praise book of the Hebrews.

Many of the Psalms are traditionally attributed to David. Although Psalm 100 doesn’t mention David, it might be worth saying something about David. in 2 Samuel 6, we find the story of the ark of the covenant being brought into Jerusalem. Although we might want to plan a reverent and solemn procession, David was filled with joy and he jumped and danced the entire way. One of David’s wives saw this and thought it was completely undignified and she felt like David had made a fool out of himself. David responded by saying, “It was before the Lord, who chose me rather than your father or anyone from his house when he appointed me ruler over the Lord’s people Israel—I will celebrate before the Lord. I will become even more undignified than this, and I will be humiliated in my own eyes.” (2 Samuel 6:22-23) I want you to see two things here. One is that David only cared what God thought and secondly, his worship was a response to what God had done for him.

We see something similar in Psalm 100. Notice the mention of God’s people as “the sheep of his pasture.” David had been a shepherd and before he led Israel, his job was to lead sheep. The shepherd, as David knew from experience, cared for the needs of the sheep and protected them. This is the story of Israel as well. The Old Testament is filled with stories of Israel getting into trouble and God intervening to save them. The foundational event for Israel was the exodus out of Egypt and their rescue from slavery. To this day, Jews gather to

This is a reflection on what how Remembrance Day and how the courage of the men and women who sacrificed in war points us toward the ultimate sacrifice and victory of Jesus on the cross.

Romans 8:35-39

We want God to bless this church. We want God to bless all the churches in our city and surrounding community. We want God to bless every church around the world that calls upon Jesus as Lord. But how do we know if this prayer is answered? How can we know if a church is blessed or not?

There are those who hold to a prosperity gospel, which states that among other things, that God’s blessings and revealed in abundant wealth and physical health. While many Christians reject this message of the televangelists that you need to be rich to be blessed, there are those who hold to what I call “prosperity light.”

Prosperity light is not so dogmatic as to say that God will make everyone rich and heal every disease or injury. But there is an assumption that as Christians, we deserve a certain level of comfort and power. This is manifested in different ways. For example, if you look at the influence the church had in our culture fifty years ago compared to today, things are much different. For some this is something to grieve as it’s felt that it is our right as a church to be the directing influence in culture. Our current marginalization feels unnatural to some.

Aside from political or cultural influence, there are other ideas of what a blessed church looks like. This includes plenty of resources, in terms of people and money. It includes popularity and comfort. It includes an experience that primarily makes us happy.

I’m not criticizing any of these things. They are nice when they are there. But that is not necessarily the picture that the New Testament gives. We don’t see a church that is rejoicing in its power and comfort.

Today, as we recognize the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church, we are going to reflect on what a blessed church looks like. Is the persecuted church less blessed than we are? Is it the comfortable western church or the global persecuted church in the natural state for the Christian church? We will examine Paul’s teaching in Romans to sort through these questions.

It is important to provide some brief background to the church in Rome. This is helpful in general when looking at a passage, but is particularly relevant to our subject today.

The church at Rome probably started after the day of Pentecost when Jewish visitors from Rome became followers of Jesus in Jerusalem before returning to Rome. The first core group of Christians in Rome were Jewish Christians. At some point, Claudius, the Roman Emperor, expelled all the Jews from the city of Rome. This included the Jewish Christians. The Roman church needed to rebuild from the remaining few Gentile (non-Jewish) Christians. Eventually the Jewish Christians were able to return and rejoin their Gentile brothers and sisters.

So we see that some persecution was a part of the Roman church experience from the beginning. But if they thought Claudius was bad, Nero was much worse. There are accounts of Nero tying Christians to stakes and setting them on fire to light up his gardens. The Christians were not trusted because in their confession that Jesus was Lord, it was implied that Caesar was not Lord. The uncertain loyalty and the lack of influence made the Christians easy targets. Fast forwarding a bit, it would be in Rome that both Paul and Peter would be executed. Tradition tells us that Peter was crucified upside down and Paul was beheaded.

It is to this church

Romans 1:16-17

Many children are looking forward to October 31. They enjoy dressing up as their favourite superhero or some other character, and even more the large amounts of sugary treats that they will consume. It is a great time for all.

But this October 31 is much more significant than Halloween. Many people in the church world recognize October 31, not so much as Halloween, but as Reformation Day. It was this day in history that people acknowledge what was the beginning of the Protestant Reformation. And this year, it is exactly 500 years since the start of that momentous movement. It was that event 500 years ago that not only the church, but the entire world was changed. And all this by some guy posting some theological points on a church door. A man named Martin Luther.

Why should we care? We are Baptists and not Lutherans. Some Baptists would even say we are not protestants, but I think that might be a stretch. We are definitely not here to worship Martin Luther. Not only was he a mere human, he was also someone with some significant faults. But perhaps it is in his mistakes that we can find hope. If we take one thing from Martin Luther’s story, it is that God uses imperfect people to fulfill his perfect will.

As I said, Reformation Day is the day we remember Luther posting something on a church door. What he posted was something called the 95 theses, that 95 theological points that he wanted to make. In this he was responding to the Roman Catholic Church. We need to remember that this was not a correction from outside but from inside. Luther had for many years been faithful member of the Catholic Church. His primary goal, at least in the beginning, was not to tear down  the Roman Catholic Church or to start his own sectarian group. His deepest desire was to reform the church, to correct the errors that had crept in and to bring everything back on track. There was one particular error that he wanted to address was something called indulgences. The Roman Catholic Church was on a major building trend, including the building of some very important churches in Rome. Such activity required large amounts of money. The church knew that many people were concerned about how long they would spend in purgatory. Although purgatory is not mentioned in the Bible, people believed that everyone who died, even good Catholics, still had some sin and were not ready to meet God, so almost everyone would have to spend time in purgatory to pay off those sins. Purgatory was not as bad as hell, but was still not some place you would want to spend a long time in. It was also believed that the Pope had the spiritual authority to shorten the time that people would spend in purgatory. This shortening of time was made available for a price by selling indulgences. People could give money to the church and thus would be able to cut time off their time in purgatory and get them into heaven quicker.

I must make clear that none of this is meant as an attack on the Roman Catholic Church as it is today. Even during the time of Luther, there were many who stayed with the Catholic Church but acknowledged that the selling of the indulgences was an abuse. The Roman Catholic Church experienced its own reformation after this event and I would say that the Roman Catholic Church ultimately benefited from Martin Luther’s critique.

Responding to the selling of the indulgences was a large part of what Luther did 500 years ago. But it was so much more than that. It was something that directly affects us, something that is relevant even if we have never heard of indulgences. To do that, we are going to have to back up a bi

Luke 15:1-10

What is it that gets you excited? What is it that makes you want to give a shout for joy? This won’t surprise many but for me it has to do with books. I love books but there is a specific kind of situation that really makes me happy.

From time to time, there is a specific book that I will want to get. I will check it out online and take a look at the price. Then I begin to second guess myself. Do I really need to spend the money? Do I really need another book? I will put it out of mind for a bit and then go back and check it out again. So what is it that gets me excited? After talking myself out of it, I see the exact book that I have been looking at in a second hand bookstore on sale for next to nothing. I take it as a sign and immediately purchase this long sought after book. Does this make me a nerd? I’m okay with that.

You may have something completely different as your motivation for joy. It could be the growing of flowers or the completion of something you have been building. It may be writing a story or writing a song. It could be the learning of a new skill. Each of us are different.

What about God? There is a danger that we see God as an impersonal force. But the Bible describes God as having a personality. While some people focus on God’s anger, the Bible also talks about God being joyful.

Jesus tells us in this passage about what it is that inspires a party in heaven. This is something worth dwelling on, especially since we can have a role in sparking that burst of joy.

In Luke 15, we are presented with three parables that are all interconnected. They are the parables of the lost sheep, the lost coin and the lost son. A good argument could be made to look at all three together. However, the parable of the lost son, often called the parable of the prodigal son, is so rich that it will be looked at by itself. Just realize that the same theme is running through all three parables.

The parable of the lost sheep taps into the feelings that many of Jesus’ listeners would have experienced. Some of them would have had herds and would have experienced something like this. There you have one hundred sheep and suddenly one goes missing. What are you going to do? Do you remain satisfied that you still have ninety-nine and leave it at that?

Amanda and I have five children. If one of them went missing, which has happened, can you imagine us being satisfied that we still have 80% of our children? That would never happen.

The shepherd understand that the sheep are safer in numbers and in danger in isolation. The shepherd leaves the ninety-nine and goes after the one lost sheep. The shepherd is on a mission and will not rest until the lost sheep is found. When the sheep is found, the response of the shepherd is not anger for all the fuss it caused but tremendous joy. Not only does the shepherd feel the joy, he shares it with his friends and neighbours. It is time for a party.

One of the themes that Luke provides in his Gospel is a pairing of male and female examples. He frequently shares two different but similar stories, one featuring a male and the other a female. It is sign of the universality of the kingdom of God.

So Luke tells a story of another lost item, this time from the perspective of a woman. A woman has ten coins and loses one. She begins a frantic search for the lost coin and

Luke 14:25-35

How much does it cost? When anyone in my family asks me a question, the most likely response that you will get from me is: How much does it cost? My children love to strategize about what presents they want for birthdays and Christmas. They are tech-savvy enough that they can research the things they want online and give me the information. How much does it cost?

Over a decade ago, Amanda called me at the office at my previous church. Logan and Abby were living with us then and we were having a lot of trouble with Logan running away. Amanda had been doing some research and called to tell me that we needed a service dog for Logan. While fully onboard for Logan’s safety, I immediately asked how much this would cost. There was hesitation and then she said twelve. I exclaimed, $1200 for a dog! We used to sell Siamese cats for $50 each and I thought that was a lot. After a bit more silence, Amanda corrected me that it was actually $12,000. We actually ended up raising $28,000 for the dog and the dog we have is worth every penny.

I’m not suggesting that we should look always for the lowest price possible. While there are certain things that are good cheap, many others come under the category of you get what you pay for. I have tried numerous times to cut corners with the cheaper item and it ended up costing me more, not just for replacing but in frustration. What is the cost?

We may not think of following Jesus as having a cost. All we have to do is show up to church from time to time and put a few dollars in the plate. But that is not the biblical picture of following Jesus. According to the Bible, Jesus is not looking for believers, he is looking for disciples. What is a disciple? It is closely connected to the idea of being a learner or a student. But it is much more than the gathering of knowledge. It is about transformation and changing into someone very much like the master or teacher. Discipleship is something that should affect our thinking our words and our actions. Jesus takes this very seriously and he calls us to take it seriously as well.

How do you grow a church? One way would be to make the message as easy as possible. Remove anything that even hints at a challenge or offence. I once read about a church that tried to become as inclusive as possible. I’m in favour of inclusivity in principle, but one church took it to the extreme. They removed all mention of the Bible or Jesus because they knew there were people who reacted negatively to them. There was even discussion of removing the idea of God out of sensitivity toward atheists who might visit their church.

That is far from a typical strategy, even for the most liberal of churches. But there is a temptation for every church, conservative or liberal, evangelical or charismatic. The temptation is to take the posture of a salesperson. We need to sell people on joining the church and becoming a Christian and so we make the offer as attractive as possible. We talk about how fun and enjoyable following Jesus is. We talk about the many blessings that come our way. But what does Jesus say?

I’m not sure that Jesus would have been very successful as a salesperson because he goes the complete opposite of common sensibility. In inviting people to become his disciples, he compares it to carrying a cross. We have to work to understand the power of this image. This is not about a slight inconvenience. A person carried the cross because they were going to their execution. The people who heard this teaching wo

Luke 13:22-30

Make sure to stay on the “straight and narrow.” That is a popular saying that comes from the Bible, even when the person saying it doesn’t realize it. But what does that even mean? Most often when people talk about staying on the straight and narrow, they mean that a person should be following the rules. They should stick to moderation, avoid excess and be a moral person. She should do their homework, finish their chores and complete all their tasks. Basically, it is about being a good respectable person.

However, when Jesus talks about the narrow way in this passage, he is responding to a specific question: Will only a few be saved? Saved from what? Before looking at Jesus’ answer, we need to understand the question.

Remember that this is all taking place in a Jewish context. God had made a covenant with Israel as his people. But who was Israel? This was a subject of debate. Was Israel everyone who belonged to the nation, people born to Jewish parents or people who converted to Judaism? Or was true Israel, the faithful remnant that were faithful to God’s covenant in contrast to those who claimed to be Israelites but were unfaithful? This was an ongoing discussion.

But we aren’t Jews. Does this mean anything to us? Since Luke, a Gentile and not a Jew, records this for us and for the rest of his Gentile audience, this must be relevant.

So what does it mean for us to be saved? Saved from what? Some would say saved from hell, but I would say that is only part of the answer. A more biblical answer would be that we can be saved from sin, which disrupts relationships with God and people. Hell after all is eternal separation from God and is a continuation of what sin does to us here.

The mainline church I grew up in never talked about being saved. If it came up at all, it was to criticize people who used that vocabulary. In my twenties, I started attending a much more conservative church and I was informed that all of the mainline churches were not saved, no matter what they believed about or did for Jesus.

Sadly, individual traditions have taken pride in the fact that they are the only ones who are saved. There are Catholics who say they are the only ones saved. There are Pentecostals who say they are the only ones saved. And then there are the Baptists who say only their particular flavour of Baptists are saved and not those other Baptists. I actually had another Baptist pastor email me, pretending to be a non-Christian, to test my theology to see if I was really a Christian.

The problem with all of this talk is that it doesn’t reflect what Jesus says about being saved. Whether we like the terminology of being saved or not, the truth is that sin disrupts our lives and we need to be reconciled to God and to other people. Thankfully, Jesus explains how.

Before getting to what Jesus says, how do most people think one is saved? I have been involved in an interesting activity of asking random people on the street what they would answer if God asked them why he should let them into heaven. I would say that the most common answer is that they were good people. They have never killed anyone one spent significant time in jail. They will perhaps talk about how they live a moral life, but without sharing their definition or measure of morality. Another common answer is that they have some church background. That might mean they were baptized as a baby, attended Sunday school as a child or pr

Luke 13:18-21

This was a big summer for me. For the first time in my life, I had my own vegetable garden. I won’t claim that everything worked, but I had relatively low expectations. My goal was that I would be able to eat just one thing that I had grown from my garden. And I will say that the roasted potatoes that Amanda prepared for me from our garden were some of the most delicious potatoes I have ever tasted.

Beyond being able to eat something we grew, it was fun to just watch what would happen over time. We planted seeds and watered the soil. When that first breaking of the soil took place and we saw the beginning of growth, it was very exciting. It is an amazing thing to be able to watch life grow.

We are going to look at a parable that builds off this miracle. This is a relevant topic for us in our world. We value things that are large. When we check out a business, we look to see how many employees. When we meet someone on social media, we want to know how many followers they have. One of the reasons why some pastors do not like to visit with other pastors is because of the most common question: “So many people are there in your congregation?” I have observed that it is mostly the pastors of larger churches that ask this, hoping that they have more people than the pastor they are asking.

We were visiting some family in a large city. This was a growing and busy city and this carried over into the churches. When family asked about the size of the church I was pastoring, they were dumbfounded by my answer. If they only had that many people in their small group as I had in my congregation, they would shut it down as being unsuccessful.

I believe that what Jesus is teaching in this parable is the message that we need to hear for this church.

Before jumping to our interpretation, we need to ask why Jesus originally told this parable. This parable was told to answer a specific question and that is: “What is the kingdom of God like?”

Many people think of the kingdom of God as being heaven. That is not correct, at least not fully correct. If the kingdom of God was only heaven, this parable would make no sense.

The kingdom of God is the reign of God. The kingdom of God is the dynamic of the people of God obeying the will of God. So yes that includes heaven, but most often when Jesus is speaking of the kingdom of God, he is talking about what that looks like on earth.

One of the things that I love about Jesus is that he didn’t just provide theological lectures. Jesus spoke with images that people were familiar with. That is not to say that there is no depth to his teaching. The gospel is simple but it is not simplistic. Jesus spoke about some very complex theological truths but he did it in a way that people could understand.

In this parable, Jesus brought his audience’s attention to the mustard seed. They would have been very familiar with this tiny seed. To just look at it at that stage, there would be nothing impressive about it. But under the right conditions, that seed will not stay the same.

When that seed is planted in the garden and is cared for it becomes a tree. Not a huge tree but much larger than what it was before it was planted. The tree is big enough for birds to come and find shelter in it. It is an interesting thought that the birds could have consumed the seed as a less than sa