The Bible with Nicky and Pippa Gumbel Youth

Robbie Williams once went on a shopping spree in Los Angeles. He bought five cars, including a brand new Ferrari, a brand new Porsche and a brand new Mercedes. Within a week he wished he had not bought any of them (as he didn’t even have a driving license!).

I admire Robbie Williams’ openness about himself. He is ruthlessly honest about his self-obsession and addictions. In his song, Feel, he sings:

   I just want to feel real love…

   There’s a hole in my soul

   You can see it in my face

   It’s a real big place.

God implants this desire ‘to feel real love’ in humanity. This ‘hole in my soul’ is common to all human beings. It cannot be filled by cars, wealth, success or drugs. It is a God-shaped hole. It is a spiritual hunger and thirst for God which Jesus told us could only be filled by his wonderful Holy Spirit (John 7:37).

We often tell the story of when John Wimber first visited our church. We saw a remarkable outpouring of the Holy Spirit and several healings. One incident, which occurred on the second night, is indelibly printed in my memory. One of our closest friends was eight months pregnant at the time. The Holy Spirit came upon her with great power. She started to whirl around at high speed. As she did so, she exclaimed over and over again, ‘I feel so strong!’

A few weeks later she gave birth to a son who, from his earliest days, showed not only spiritual and emotional strength but also extraordinary physical strength. He became an outstanding rugby player, a superb athlete and is now a successful model.

To some (like Samson, who we read about in today’s Old Testament passage), the Holy Spirit gives extraordinary physical strength. To all of us, the Holy Spirit gives spiritual strength.

The apostle Paul describes God’s ‘incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead’ (Ephesians 1:19–20).

It was the Holy Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead (Romans 8:11a). The Holy Spirit is ‘his mighty strength’. That same strength now lives in you and ‘will give life to your mortal body through his Spirit, who lives in you’ (v.11b).

I love Eugene Peterson’s translation (of the Ephesians passage) where he speaks of God giving ‘endless energy, boundless strength’!

The great Christian leader, John Stott, was speaking on one occasion at a university mission in Sydney, Australia. On the last night of the mission, as a result of an infection, he had virtually lost his voice.

Nevertheless, he was persuaded to speak. Waiting in the side room beforehand, he whispered a request that the words of the ‘thorn in the flesh’ verses from 2 Corinthians 12 be read to him. The conversation between Jesus and the apostle Paul came alive.

Stott (Paul): ‘I beg you to take it away from me.’

Jesus: ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’

Stott (Paul): ‘I will all the more gladly boast of my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may rest upon me… for when I am weak, then I am strong.’

When the time came to speak he croaked the gospel through the microphone in a monotone, utterly unable to modulate his voice or exert his personality in any way. But all the time he was crying to the Lord to perfect Christ’s power through his weakness.

He went back to Australia many times after that, and on every occasion somebody came up to him and said, ‘Do you remember that final service in the University Great Hall, when you had lost your voice? I came to Christ that night.’

As someone who is very aware of my own weaknesses, I find it encouraging that when I feel weak, I am not alone. As you put your faith in God he turns your weakness into strength.

Walter Nishioka knew that the service was good at the Hawaiian hotel where he ate brunch on Wednesdays. But he found out just how good it was when he was offered something that was definitely not on the menu – one of the waiter’s own kidneys.

Mr Nishioka, aged seventy, was a local businessman. He was seriously ill with kidney disease and had been told by doctors that he needed a transplant urgently. He had almost given up hope of finding a matching donor until the waiter, Jose Rocasa, fifty-two, volunteered one of his own. Nishioka said, ‘I didn't have long to survive and the doctors said that it was unlikely that they could find a match in time. But with this good man here and a lot of help from above, now I am alive and well.’

In the twenty-two years that Mr Nishioka had frequented the hotel, Jose Rocasa had been his waiter, and recalled that he had always been kind and affable – and had tipped generously. ‘I just wanted to help him,’ he said. ‘For years, we have this friendship in which he comes to lunch and I do my best to make him very happy, and he is always good to me in return. So of course I say, “Don't worry – I can give you a kidney.”’

Mr Nishioka sowed generosity and he reaped generosity!

Today, we see that:

You reap what you sow

You reap later than you sow

You reap more than you sow

It was back in 1966 when England last won the football World Cup, yet I can still remember the moment. As children, we were watching the match on a black and white television set. We could never get a very good picture; it was always fuzzy and going into lines. We were quite happy with it since we did not know anything different. One day, we discovered all it needed was an aerial! Suddenly, we found that we could get clear and distinct pictures. Our enjoyment was transformed.

Now, not only do we have colour television, we can get high definition (HD). There are no fuzzy lines or distortions, and it produces a richer, bolder and more vibrant picture than ever before.

Rather than black and white, or even colour, Jesus offers you high-definition life. There are two Greek words for ‘life’. The word ‘bios’, from which we get the word ‘biological’ means the condition of being alive rather than dead – mere existence. The other word ‘zoe’ means the full, abundant, spacious, open-hearted, richness of life that Jesus speaks about – a life of fulfilment and purpose. This is life in high definition.

A water-bearer in India had two large pots, both hung on the ends of a pole, which he carried across his neck. One of the pots had a crack in it while the other pot was perfect and always delivered a full portion of water. At the end of the long walk from the stream to the house, the cracked pot always arrived half full.

The poor cracked pot was ashamed of its own imperfection, and miserable that it was able to accomplish only half of what it had been made to do. After two years of what it perceived to be a bitter failure, it spoke to the water-bearer one day by the stream:

‘I am ashamed of myself, and I want to apologise to you. I have been able to deliver only half my load because this crack in my side causes water to leak out all the way back to your house. Because of my flaws, you have to do all of this work, and you don’t get full value from your efforts.’

The bearer said to the pot, ‘Did you notice that there were flowers only on your side of the path, but not on the other pot’s side? That’s because I have always known about your flaw, and I planted flower seeds on your side of the path, and every day while we walk back, you’ve watered them. For two years I have been able to pick these beautiful flowers to decorate the table. Without you being just the way you are, there would not be this beauty to grace the house.’

Thankfully, God uses cracked pots! You do not need to be perfect for God to use you. We want our lives to count for something. If you want to be useful to God, here are twelve keys:

I remember so well praying for a baby called Craig. I had been asked to visit a woman in the Brompton Hospital. Vivienne had three children and was pregnant with a fourth. Her third child, who was eighteen months old, had a hole in his heart that had been operated on. The operation had not been a success and, not unnaturally, the medical staff wanted to turn the machines off. Many times they asked Vivienne if they could turn the machines off and let the baby die. She said no, as she wanted to try one last thing. She wanted someone to pray for him. So I went.

Craig had tubes all over him. His body was bruised and swollen. She said that the doctors had indicated that even if he recovered he would have brain damage because his heart had stopped for such a long time. She told me she didn’t believe in God but she said, ‘Will you pray?’

I prayed in the name of Jesus for God to heal him. Then I explained to her how she could give her life to Jesus Christ and she did. I left, but returned two days later. Vivienne came running out the moment she saw me. She said, ‘I’ve been trying to get hold of you; something amazing has happened. The night after you prayed he completely turned the corner. He has recovered.’ Within a few days Craig had gone home.

Vivienne went around all her relatives and friends saying, ‘I didn’t believe, but now I do believe.’

A remarkable healing had occured. This was over thirty years ago and I have kept in touch with the family. This healing was not autosuggestion; he was a baby at the time. It was not positive thinking. It was not the placebo effect. It was a God-sized answer to a God-sized prayer.

Pippa and I met Ah Yin when we visited Jackie Pullinger in Hong Kong. He had become a drug addict as a teenager. His father was an addict. He was brought up in the notorious Walled City. He joined a gang at the age of eleven. They ate, stole, fought and took heroin together. At the age of fourteen, he got caught doing a robbery and spent his first time in detention.

Over the years he tried everything to get off drugs. Nothing worked. Then he met Jackie and, through the power of Jesus, came off drugs with no pain at all. Since then he has become one of the leaders of Jackie’s work in Hong Kong. He has trained many people to pray for the sick and to work with the poor. He is one example of the millions of people whom Jesus has delivered from addiction and set free. Ah Yin has spent the rest of his life testifying about the saviour who always delivers.

Martin Luther King Jr (1929–1968) lived and died to see society transformed. In 1964, he became the youngest person ever to receive the Nobel Peace Prize – for his work to end social segregation and racial discrimination.

He spoke powerfully and memorably of his dream that, one day, he would live in a nation where his children would ‘not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character’.

He dreamt of a transformed world where everyone would be able to join hands and say, ‘Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!’

Martin Luther King Jr was a follower of Jesus. His agenda was the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is not just about the conversion of individuals – important though that is – but about the transformation of society.

Charles Finney, lawyer and evangelist, was speaking in a New York church in the 1830s. At the end of each evening, he gave people the opportunity to come to the front of the room and commit their life to Jesus. A great many lawyers came to hear him. One night, the Chief Justice of New York was sitting way up in the gallery. As he listened to Finney proclaiming the gospel he became convinced it was true.

Then this question came into his mind: ‘Will you go forward like the other ordinary people?’ Something within him made him think that it would be inappropriate to do so, because of his prestigious social position (at the top of the legal hierarchy of New York State). He sat there pondering the choice he had to make. Then he thought, ‘Why not? I am convinced of the truth... why should I not do it like any other person?’

He got up from his seat in the gallery, went down the staircase and came up the stairs at the back to where Finney was preaching. Finney, in the middle of his sermon, felt someone tugging at his jacket. He turned around. The Chief Justice said, ‘Mr Finney, if you will call people forward I will come.’ Finney stopped his talk and said, ‘The Chief Justice says that if I call people forward he will come. I ask you to come forward now.’

The Chief Justice went forward. Almost every lawyer in Rochester, New York, followed him! It is said that 100,000 people were converted in the next twelve months in that area. One person’s choice affected the lives of numerous others.

Life is full of choices. We make choices every day of our lives. You can make bad choices or you can make good choices. Your choices matter. Some choices have life-changing consequences.