The Bread of Life

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The Bread of Life

Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.”

John 6:35

This weekend I visited Debenhams with Claire, my fiancee, to start getting some ideas for our wedding list. One of the things we thought it might be quite nice to ask for was a bread machine. Debenhams had some pretty impressive examples! One had a special tray which you could put seeds of dried fruit into. At a given time during the bread making cycle, it would add the seeds or fruit into the bread. The one that impressed me the most, though, could make lots of different things including doughnuts and – get this – jam! I wondered if it could make bread and jam simultaneously, then slice the bread, and then make a jam sandwich. How brilliant would it be to tip a whole load of ingredients into the machine, and then end up with a round of freshly made jam sandwiches! I’d never go hungry again!

In today’s verse, Jesus declares himself to be the bread of life. Whoever goes to him, he says, will never be hungry or thirsty. Jesus is not some special bread maker, though, who provides bread on demand to his followers. The bread that Jesus refers to is “the bread of life,” the stuff that sustains life itself. It is said that all humans have a “god-shaped hole” in their souls, and that we can never find true peace until we fill that hole with the only thing that will fit it – namely God. Similarly, we can only fill the longing of our souls if we turn to Christ, because he is the only thing that will sustain us in this way. The only source of true spiritual nourishment is Christ. People may look to other religions or new age beliefs. They may try to find true nourishment through money or power, sex or drugs, potions or spells, but there is only one source of true spiritual nourishment. That is Jesus Christ. He knows what it is our souls cry out for, and he can provide it to us. He knows that it is the knowledge of God that we all seek, whether knowingly or not, and he is the only one who can lead us to him. Because of his death on the cross, we can once again approach God in the knowledge that our sin has been paid for.

Do you know Jesus? Do you listen to his words through reading scripture? Do you ask him to support and sustain you? Do you believe in him?

He who has the son has life

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He who has the son has life


And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.

1 John 5:11-12

They say you can tell a police officer by the way he walks. Even if he is not in uniform, he is supposed to have a very distinctive walk. Often, you can tell them by how they speak, too. They all seem to have that rather wordy way of speaking, which presumably comes from years spent giving statements, testifying in court and interviewing suspects. With this two distinctive elements, it’s almost possible to spot a police officer even if they are not wearing a uniform!

The same could be said to be true for Christians. We do not wear a uniform that marks us out as Christians, but it should be clear to people around us that we are indeed Christians. In today’s verses, John says that “he who has the Son has life.” He doesn’t say he who knows the Son, or he who loves the Son, but he who has the Son. When we become a Christian, it’s almost as if Jesus is living in us. As a consequence, it should be clear to those who know us that we are Christians; our behaviour and actions should be distinctly Christian. We should be loving, fair and respectful. We should look out for all those around us. We should be prepared to drop everything to support those in need. Not because these things buy us a place in heaven, but because this is a way of testiying that we have the Son. If we have the Son, we have eternal life. This isn’t something that will happen at some time in the future, perhaps after we die, but is happening now. If we accept Jesus as our saviour, our eternal life has already begun.

Is it evident to those who know you that you have the Son? Is it obvious that you are a Christian, that you are living your life for God? Are you living your life as if it were part of that eternal life that God has given you through the death and resurrection of his son, Jesus Christ?

The judgement seat of Christ

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For we must all appear before the judgement seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.

2 Corinthians 5:10

A few years ago, I had my only run in with the law – to date! It was a very minor incident, so please don’t think I’m about to tell you anything particularly exciting! I was driving out of London heading to Sussex on the A23, when I appear to have inadvertently entered a bus lane. I didn’t even realise I had done it until a week or so later, I got a letter telling me I had to pay a fine, with a picture of my car in a bus lane! It seemed pretty conclusive. I had broken the law, so I paid the £60 fine and tried to forget my first motoring offence. That’s how the law operates in most countries – if you break the law, you take the punishment. Provided the laws are just, it’s a fair system that for the most part works very well.

In today’s verse, we see that we are all to appear before Jesus Christ to account for our actions. The Bible lays down the code that we should live by, and, since the code is fair and just, we must be prepared to pay the consequences if we do not live by it. If we have done bad things whilst “in the body,” we will have to account for those actions to Jesus when the day of judgement comes. Jesus will also judge us for all the good things that we have done – the instances of when we have followed the code God has given us.

This might seem to present a rather bleak picture. We all fall short of God’s expectations. We all disobey him, and break his rules and laws. As a consequence, we might expect to be punished for our actions. As Christians, however, if we accept Jesus is our saviour, he has taken that punishment for us. When we stand before Jesus on judgement day, we can stand firm in the knowledge that whilst we are not worthy to approach God on our own merits, because of the death and resurrection of Jesus, we can do so.

Give thanks today that in Jesus we have a fair judge. Praise God even more, though, that Jesus has paid the price for our sin, and taken the punishment that we deserve in our place.

He must suffer, be rejected and be killed

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He then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and after three days rise again. He spoke plainly about this, and Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him.

Mark 8:31-32

I’ve always had a place in my heart for children’s fiction. I grew up on a diet of Enid Blyton and Arthur Ransome, and always wished that I too could spend my time sailing and having adventures. A few years ago, still inspired by the likes of Blyton and Ransome, I wrote my own novel for children, called “Beyond the Door.” I wanted it to be a very traditional style novel, but with a modern twist. I decided early on that I wanted to get away from the all-very-nice kind of book, and that I would kill off one of the main characters. During the process of writing, though, I got very attached to all my creations, and couldn’t bear for one of them to die. I therefore wrote in an entirely new character with the specific intention of killing her off. I couldn’t even bring myself to do that though! She fell into a coma, but eventually woke up and lived happily ever after.

It must be awful to lose a friend. In today’s verses, Jesus tells his disciples that he will be tortured, rejected and killed. Peter, who has grown close to Jesus, cannot bear to hear this, and tells Jesus to stop saying these awful things. Jesus responds by telling Peter that he does not understand the way that God does things. Jesus also tells his disciples that he will rise from the dead after three days. It is this act, dying and rising again, that is the central reason for Jesus being born in the first place. Jesus says that he must suffer and must be killed. There were no other alternatives. He came to die on the cross. When he did, he took on all the sins you and I committed, paying the price for disobeying God that we should have paid. By rising from the dead, though, he defeated death itself. As a result, you and I can approach God, and have eternal life with him in his new creation.

Without Jesus, we would be destined to eternal damnation, because sin is so much a part of us, and is unacceptable to God. Since Jesus paid the price for us, though, we can be saved. Let’s give thanks that God planned for Jesus to save us, and that Jesus went through that pain, suffering, rejection and death on our behalf.

Header image © Terry Cundall (cc-by-sa/2.0)

The Servant King

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The Servant King

“The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

Matthew 20:28

I get very irritated when people “pull rank” and try to use their position to get one over on other people. Some people seem to develop this skill from an early age. When I was at prep school, older boys would say, “older, senior, been here longer!” as a justification for why younger boys should do as they told them. When I worked at a leading retailer, I used to get very annoyed when management would refuse to help fill the shelves. Particularly around Christmas, there would be a lot of work to do before the store opened, but management seemed to think that it was beneath them to fill shelves. Even in teaching, there are some senior managers who will use their seniority in order to get a more junior member of staff to do something that they would not do themselves. To me, the whole notion seems rather immature and silly.

Jesus, as the Son of God, had the ultimate opportunity to “pull rank.” If anyone is more important than anyone else, then surely Jesus is! He is, after all, the messiah promised by God, who is seated at the right hand of the father. He is, in fact, God. Jesus adopted the opposite attitude, however. He is known as the “servant king,” and in today’s verse, he states that he “did not come to be served, but to serve.” He has come to serve us, rather than for us to serve him! The ultimate way that Jesus did this was by giving “his life as a ransom for many.” When he died on the cross, he released us from the captivity of our sins, and freed us to be with him in heaven. We hear this so often that it almost becomes meaningless, but when you think about it, that is quite a remarkable statement. Jesus died for us. For you. For me. He willingly took the punishment for the sin that we have committed, so that we could approach God. He gave up his life to save us. That is surely something that we can give thanks for.

Do give thanks, then, that Jesus did give his life as a ransom. Reflect too on the idea of the “servant king.” As we strive to be more like Jesus, perhaps we should think about whether that humility and service to others is something that we demonstrate every day.

Jesus preaches good news

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Jesus preaches good news

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.”

Luke 4:18-19

If like me you live in the UK, you can’t have helped but notice that this year is an election year. The Conservative Party launched into election mode on January 1st with a poster campaign sporting a giant airbrushed picture of David Cameron and the slogan, “we can’t go on like this.” Since then, all the main political parties have started their unofficial campaigns, usually saying what they won’t do that their opponents will. There was a time when election campaigns were fought on policies, and parties made pledges about what they what do. Increasingly these days, however, elections are fought by criticising the other parties, and playing on the looks and personalities of the party leaders.

Thankfully, Jesus did more than criticise his opponents. He made plenty of promises about what he would do, and in today’s verses, he quotes Isaiah to outline his aims. He begins by stating that the Spirit of the Lord is on him, Lord being the title usually reserved for God. Jesus begins straight away by affirming that he has been blessed by God. He then says that God has prepared him for a very special mission – to preach good news o the poor. He also says that he has been sent to proclaim freedom for prisoners, to help the blind see, and to release the oppressed. Jesus makes it clear that he has come to give hope and freedom to all those people who find themselves subjected to the unfairness of life. That hope is of a time when people will be freed from the situations in which they find themselves, and able to enjoy eternal life with God himself.

We all have times in our life when we feel we are struggling. We might have money problems, or have lost our job. We might be stuck in a job or other scenario that we hate. We might have lost friends or family, or be subject to illness ourselves. We might be at the end of our tether and think that life is not worth living anymore. Whatever situation we find ourselves in, though, Jesus brings us hope – hope of better things to come.

Judgement based on truth

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Judgement based on truth

Now we know that God’s judgment against those who do such things is based on truth.

Romans 2:2

In my job as a history teacher, truth is very important. A lot of the work that my students undertake involves looking at historical sources, and trying to find out about the past from them. I press upon students that sources are usually created with a specific purpose, which is often trying to prove one point or another. It is, therefore, important to try and study a wide range of sources if we are going to get any where near a true picture of what happened in the past. I also have to warn the students about simply discarding a source because “it is biased” (or “biast” as I frequently see in their exercise books!), and encourage them to try to look beyond this natural bias to see what we can uncover from the source. One of the things that always amazes my students is just how hard it is to get to a true picture of the past, because there are so many conflicting statements. Many books even disagree on something as simple as dates!

Luckily when it comes to God’s judgement of us, there are no such problems with evaluating truth. Whilst history text books might disagree on key historical details, God wrote the text book for his creation, so he is well placed to carry out judgement! He laid out the standards by which we should live, and he set out the rules for his people. He also knows all that we do, and all that we think. When we are judged, therefore, we can be sure that we are being judged according to the same, unchanging standards that are applied to everyone. We can also be confident that we will all be judged fairly. Whilst some history books, particularly biographies, are heavily biased, because the writer is a fan of the subject, or strongly dislikes the person being written about, we can trust that God is fair and just. He does not have favourites. He loves all his people, and wants us to love him back. We are not judged according to our works, after all, but according to the simple fact of whether we believe in Jesus (see John 6:29).

We can rest assured, then, that God is our judge. He is fair and he is just, and we can be confident that we will be judged solely based on truth when it comes to the day of our judgement. This is something we can be thankful for!

Enter through the narrow door

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Enter through the narrow door

“Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to. Once the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside knocking and pleading, ‘Sir, open the door for us.’ “But he will answer, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from.’

Luke 13:24-25

My bedroom door is very irritating indeed. It seems to have a mind of its own. Sometimes it shuts perfectly well, but other times, no matter how hard I try to close it, it just won’t. For some reason, the door no longer fits in the frame! I think it has something to do with the weather conditions. I think when it rains, the door absorbs the dampness in the air, swelling the wood and making it too large for the shelf. It is very strange indeed! There have been a couple of occasions when I’ve just about managed to shut the door before I go to bed, and when I’ve woken up in the morning I’ve had to push the door with all my might, and give it a kick before I can get out!

In today’s verse, Jesus likens getting to heaven to getting through a narrow door. A narrow door way regulates the flow of people getting through it, and makes it difficult for lots of people to make it through. Most worryingly of all, there will come a time when the owner of the house – in this case God – will close the door and prevent anyone else from entering. That day is judgement day and will come at the end of time. On that day, God will judge each and every one of us. If he knows us, because we have known him, we will be granted access to his house. If he does not, because we did not get to know him, we will not be allowed to enter heaven.

If we know Jesus, if we love him, trust our lives to him, and put him at the centre of our lives, then we have an eternity in heaven, God’s new creation to look forward to. As our creator and the one who established the order by which we live, God has every right to do so. The question is – does he know us? Do we know him? Maybe we should ensure that we take the time to get to know him!

He will judge the peoples with equity

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He will judge the peoples with equity

Say among the nations, “The Lord reigns! Yes, the world is established; it shall never be moved; he will judge the peoples with equity.” Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice; let the sea roar, and all that fills it.”

Psalm 96:10-11

In society, there has to be a system to preserve order. In most, if not all countries, this is a legal system with laws that lay down either what you can or cannot do. I remember when I was at university studying the differing conceptions of the “state of nature” – what humans would be like if there was no law or authority. Some philosophers believe humans to be fundamentally good, therefore only requiring a light touch legal system, whilst others believed humans to be fundamentally bad, thereby necessitating a tougher system of laws. As a Christian, I believe that humans were created pure and blameless, but, since “the fall,” when Adam and Eve disobeyed God, humans are living under what is known as “original sin,” which means that we are all inherently sinful, with sin built into our very beings. Even if we think that we are good, honest people who love God, love our neighbours, and obey every law there is, we are still by nature sinful. This is bad news, since God punishes the sinful.

In today’s verse, we get a picture of God as the judge – but, unlike in some more dubious countries, we have a fair and honest judge. He created the world to be pure and perfect, and created an established and unchanging order. Since he is the creator, he has the right to judge us. Since he established the moral principles that underpin humankind, he also has the right to judge us. We can be assured, however, that he will do so in a fair manner. His moral principles are unchanging, so he won’t bend them one way or the other, but will be perfectly fair. He will apply them to all with equity according to the rules and standards that he has laid down. We can also be sure that this applies to all people, since the psalmist maintains that the proclamation that “the Lord reigns” needs to be carried to all nations.

This first part of the verse might seem rather threatening and intimidating, yet the response that the psalmist gives is to instruct the heavens and earth to be glad and rejoice at God’s judgement. Why? Because it is as a consequence of God’s love and promised judgement that the basic order is maintained. If we live by God’s commands, honour him, and do our best to serve him with our entire lives, we have nothing to fear. Indeed, we have much to be joyful for, because those who love God will be rewarded with eternal life in God’s new creation!

Today, then, reflect on God’s judgement. Think about all the things that you need to say sorry to God for, and ask him for forgiveness. Rejoice as well, though, that we have such a fair and loving God, who is honest, reliable and trustworthy in his judgement!

All have sinned

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All have sinned

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.

Romans 3:23-24

I marked a set of my students’ essays today. Some were rather mediocre, whilst others were starting to show promise. I was greatly impressed with one, however, which was detailed, focused and thoughtfully argued. It was pretty much perfect, as near to perfect as a Sixth Form historian can get. It wasn’t perfect, though. That’s the thing about writing an essay. It’s not like completing a set of maths questions, where, if you get all the answers right, you get full marks. Writing a history is about content, shaping of argument and structure. In my career thus far, I have never given an essay full marks, because I believe that perfection in essay writing is unattainable.

There’s a parallel here with today’s verse. No matter how good we think we are, how kind, loving and generous, we can never be perfect. It is clear in these verses from Paul’s letter to the Romans – ALL have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Not a few, not some, not even most, but ALL have sinned. Even if we consider ourselves good Christians and try to live out our lives according to God’s rules, we still fall short, because perfection in life is unattainable. Ever since Adam and Eve first broke God’s command and ate the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, humans have been destined to fail, to sin, and to disobey God.

Luckily, despite this rather bleak picture, there is hope! If we choose to accept Jesus as our saviour, we can be forgiven, and enjoy all the rewards that are associated with leading a sin free life, including a place in the new creation after we die. It’s important to remember that the reward we are given, however, is not because of anything that we have done, but comes to us because God sent his son, Jesus Christ, to take on our sin, and to pay the penalty for our sin – namely, death. Luckily, because Jesus is the son of God, he defeated death and rose again, three days later!

Reflect today on the grace of God in sending his son to liberate we sinners. Why not pray for forgiveness of your sins, say thank you for Jesus, and accept that Jesus died for you?