Remember our story yesterday about Jesus stopping to help a hurting woman?  It wasn’t just about interruptions.  After helping the woman who interrupted his travels, Jesus carried on his way towards Jairus’ house, since he’d asked Jesus to heal his daughter.  It turns out that Jairus’daughter had died in the meantime, but Jesus kept going, and arrived at her bedside and raised her from the dead.  That’s the true point of this story – the resurrection from the dead is what we’re heading toward – ultimate goal.  He gives us a glimpse in this story, showing us that our death will not be the end of us, but that Jesus offers to simply wake us up in his kingdom.  It’s a matter of whether we want to join that party.

Jesus said the main thing was loving God, loving neighbours.  The confidence to live that way, with all its sacrifices in this world, all flows from Jesus’ resurrection from the dead.  It is our resurrection from being dead to sin now, and the physical death still to come.

We can be distracted by other things – even good things – and lose perspective.  We can tell ourselves things will settle down, or that more will be enough, or that everybody lives like this.

But these are distractions.  We can only do so many things well – why not make our specialty what God says is most important?  We’ll have to slow down.

John Ortberg – Love and hurry are fundamentally incompatible.  Love always takes time, and time is the one thing hurried people don’t have.”

Think of the difference between good doctor and bad doctor from a patient’s perspective.  It often has to do with perception of being hurried – does the doctor seem to listen and care?  I know someone who visited the doctor recently, and waiting for an hour in the exam room listening to him talk on the phone about golf, then she heard him tell a drug rep he was extremely busy.  She knew it was a lie, and that he didn’t care about her as a person.

We don’t want to be like that with our neighbours!

Question: What good things might be keeping you from the “main thing” of loving God, who calls you to your neighbours?

We meet for coffee every Wednesday night at Starbucks in the Chapters Store in Ajax, in Durham Region just East of Toronto.  Maybe we’ll see you there?

Ryan Sim - May 2, 2013

Thursday - Act On It - Pompous Prayer

Sermon on the Mount

This week is about the practice of prayer, and our motivations. We've seen this week how God says we can get what we want out of prayer. If we want to pray, wherever, however, to know and love God, then we can have that kind of relationship with him - it's offered to us. If we want to pray in public to impress people with our big words and religiosity, we can have their applause. But that’s it. I think every sitcom has an episode with a high school reunion, where someone scrambles to find the most beautiful, successful date possible to make everyone else jealous. Dating them because of what other people will think, rather than because they truly want to know and love the person. In the same way, we can try and use God, and the outward signs of a relationship with him, to try and impress others. But Jesus gives us an example of prayer, known as the Lord's Prayer He started it out with relationship being number one. He began with Our Father. Actually, he said, Abba, an Aramaic word like daddy. Here’s my paraphrase: Your name is holy. We want your kingdom to come to this earth, for your realm of heaven to be our realm. We trust you to provide for us now and forever, even though we rebelled against you in sin. Because of that you owe us nothing, we owe you everything, but you gave us everything instead. Help us to forgive others in the same way, and keep us from temptation to sin and rebel against you again, so we never stray into evil again, but remain in your light. Every line is a reflection back to him of God’s values and teachings…as we’ve seen them in Jesus. This is not a prayer telling God anything he doesn't know…trying to use or control God. It's not a prayer about how big our words are, or how many there are. It's about relationship… God I know you and what you care about, and want to know and care about the same things. That attitude is most apparent in the line, "Your will be done." Challenge: Pray, this prayer today, quietly, alone. The version in Matthew, might be slightly different from what you may have memorized in the past…but we’ll use it because it’s what we studied today. Start with the whole thing. Then go line by line, and pray to God about each line. “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. (Matthew 6:9-13 ESV)

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