Be Still And Know

Proverbs 25.19 NLT 'Putting confidence in an unreliable person in times of trouble is like chewing with a broken tooth or walking on a lame foot.' What a wise saying this is! The importance of being able to trust reliable people cannot be exaggerated. It’s always important, but when we are going through a tough time it is absolutely crucial. I thank God for the privilege of working with people over the years who have been totally trustworthy and whose word was their bond. I knew that if they promised to do something, it would not only be done, but done well. But I am sure we have also had the experience of people who promised generously to help but who simply didn’t get round to it, or helped so half-heartedly that it would have been better for everyone if they hadn’t started. The powerful and painful imagery of chewing with a broken tooth and walking on a lame foot comes easily to mind. I have no doubt that we all want to be reliable people. We don’t want to make others suffer through our unreliability.

Proverbs 25:18 NLT 'Telling lies about others is as harmful as hitting them with an axe, wounding them with a sword, or shooting them with a sharp arrow.' Lying is a terrible business and the writer of Proverbs captures its awful destructiveness. It is a very tempting route when the truth is hard to face and passing it on feels impossibly difficult. The temptation is to at least massage the truth, so that its sharper edges aren’t obvious. But the fact is, when you start lying it is very hard to stop. Washington Allston, the American artist and poet wrote, “Nothing is rarer than a solitary lie; for lies breed like toads; you cannot tell one but out it comes with a hundred little ones on its back.” Lying becomes nothing less than a tragic way of life for those who choose its path. The writer of Proverbs wants his readers to understand that the only way of life worth living is one where the truth is treasured. Hymn writer, Phillips Brooks, wrote, “Truth is always strong, no matter how weak it looks, and fals

Proverbs 25.16 NLT 'Do you like honey? Don’t eat too much, or it will make you sick!' We can always trust the writer of Proverbs to give us sound advice! His purpose is to help us live life to the full, and to avoid the many traps that lie in wait for us every single day. One of those traps is overeating. He draws attention to honey, which is undoubtedly good but, like everything else, is only good in moderation. If we overdo it, the outcome is inevitable and well worth avoiding. Life is full of good things, but each of them will be spoilt if we give them the wrong prominence in our lives. Later in this chapter, the writer repeats the warning about overindulging on honey and adds “and it’s not good to seek honours for yourself.” Once again, honours are inherently good. It is a blessing to be recognised, appreciated and honoured but if you end up seeking them, you’ve lost the plot. They should simply be regarded as a gift and a blessing. Keeping everything in proportion is crucial to the enjoyment of life.

2 Corinthians 13.14 NLT 'May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.' As Paul concludes this tough letter in which he has responded to fierce criticism of his ministry, he ends by blessing the church in Corinth. These beautiful words are ones that are repeated millions of times every year as Christians meet together. They are the strongest words of blessing that could be imagined and summarise the majestic work of the Trinity. Jesus’ life and ministry are wonderfully summed up in the word ‘grace’. Grace means ‘gift’, and his life and death were God’s perfect gift to the world. In a world in which there is often brokenness, sadness and a distinct lack of grace, it is wonderful to be able to pray for people to experience the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. His grace brings healing, forgiveness and restoration. Many things could be said of God the Father, the creator of the world. He is all powerful and all knowing. No word of praise or ador

2 Corinthians 12.9-10 NLT The Lord said, “My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.” So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me. That’s why I take pleasure in my weaknesses, and in the insults, hardships, persecutions, and troubles that I suffer for Christ. For when I am weak, then I am strong. The apostle Paul revealed that he suffered from a thorn in his flesh. He didn’t give any hint of what kind of thorn it was, and there have been endless suggestions over the centuries. It may well have been a physical difficulty and it has often been suggested that he had a speech impediment. This would account for the fact that he was described as being a poor preacher. But it might just have well have been a emotional, mental or spiritual difficulty. We just don’t know. What is more important is that it really doesn’t matter. What matters is the spiritual lesson that it taught him, namely that God finds it easiest to work in us through our weakne

2 Corinthians 10.3-4 NLT 'We are human, but we don’t wage war as humans do. We use God’s mighty weapons, not worldly weapons, to knock down the strongholds of human reasoning and to destroy false arguments.' Paul was under attack from people within the church in Corinth. There was a view among some of them that he was quite timid when he was with them in person but extremely bold when he was away from them and expressing himself in letters. It’s never pleasant to be the target of criticism in this way and Paul responds by helping his critics to understand that he wasn’t trying to impress them with powerful oratory and clever arguments. He was content to be thought of as a dull preacher because what mattered was not his clever performance but the declaration of the cross of Christ. That’s where true wisdom is found. When people challenge Christian teaching, it is absolutely right that we should respond and give a thoughtful and sensitive response. But we should never imagine that people will be won over by

2 Corinthians 9.10-11 NLT 'For God is the one who provides seed for the farmer and then bread to eat. In the same way, he will provide and increase your resources and then produce a great harvest of generosity in you. Yes, you will be enriched in every way so that you can always be generous.' I am sure that we can all think of moments when we have been really generous, and times when other people have been generous to us. They are precious moments but that’s just it. They are moments which come and go. What the apostle Paul is talking about here is very different. He is talking about generosity as a way of life, not an occasional and unusual outburst. And he says that God makes it possible for us to always be generous. Generosity has everything to do with our hearts, and little to do with the quantity of what we give. The widow, who Jesus observed giving a tiny gift into the Temple collection box, was supremely generous. Her two little copper coins were just a tiny fraction of what the rich people gave, b

2 Corinthians 9.7 NLT You must each decide in your heart how much to give. And don’t give reluctantly or in response to pressure. “For God loves a person who gives cheerfully.” Some years ago, I was involved with the setting up of a new hospice. There was a desperate need to raise funds and, although I had never done such a thing before, I offered to organise a house-to-house collection. I recruited collectors and off we went. It was the most beautiful experience. Almost everyone was not only keen to give but thanked us for going to the trouble of knocking on their door. I am sure that many of you will have been involved in door-to-door collections and have had a very different experience. I certainly have. On occasions, doors have been slammed in my face but, more often, there has been an attitude of indifference and an eagerness to put some money in my box to encourage me to go away! God loves cheerful givers and it is easy to understand why. He loves to see the cheerfulness because it shows that the gi

2 Corinthians 9.6 NLT 'Remember this—a farmer who plants only a few seeds will get a small crop. But the one who plants generously will get a generous crop.' The law of the harvest is easy to understand. In short you reap what you sow. If you are miserly with your giving, you need to be prepared for a deeply disappointing harvest. However, if you give generously, you can be sure of an amazing crop – probably far larger than anything you had imagined. Money is particularly important because, as Jesus observed, it is a rival god. You have to make a choice between serving God or money. You can’t do both. Money makes huge boasts. It pretends that it can offer security, popularity, contentment and satisfaction, but it demands worship in return. In every generation there have been people who have fallen for the god of money. None of this is to say that money is inherently bad. It is part of God’s creation and so is, in fact, inherently good. The problem is when it becomes our master and begins to drive our

2 Corinthians 8.20-21 NLT 'We are traveling together to guard against any criticism for the way we are handling this generous gift. We are careful to be honourable before the Lord, but we also want everyone else to see that we are honourable.' Paul had spent some time encouraging people to give money towards a collection that would help the Christians in Judaea who had suffered a severe famine. He knew how easily there could be accusations about the misuse of money, so he put in place measures to prevent this happening. One of them was to appoint Titus as his travelling companion when the money was taken to Jerusalem. He wanted to ensure that the way that he handled the money was not only honouring to the Lord, but also to everyone else. Such wisdom in the handling of money is necessary in every generation. Through the years there have been far too many occasions when treasurers of churches and charities have been found guilty of misusing funds. It has often been observed that such crimes are more easily

2 Corinthians 8.11-12 NLT 'Give in proportion to what you have. Whatever you give is acceptable if you give it eagerly. And give according to what you have, not what you don’t have.' People often ask what amount of money they should give to the Lord and I think Paul’s words here are incredibly helpful. It is more than likely that the majority of people in the Corinthian church were quite poor and his intention wasn’t to make their lives more difficult. But, at the same time, he knew that it was very important that they should give in a disciplined and thoughtful way. And so he encouraged them to give money in proportion to what they had. I was brought up in a family which practiced tithing. One tenth of my father’s income went into a small wooden box in the sideboard in our dining room. What impressed me as a child was that that box seemed to have more money in it than anywhere else in the house! It showed me, from the beginning of my life, how important it was to set aside money for God. I don’t believe

2 Corinthians 8.10-11 NLT 'Here is my advice: It would be good for you to finish what you started a year ago. Last year you were the first who wanted to give, and you were the first to begin doing it. Now you should finish what you started. Let the eagerness you showed in the beginning be matched now by your giving.' Does any of this ring a bell with you? It certainly does with me! We begin to do something and we feel very enthusiastic about it, but then other things get in the way. Here in Corinth, the church had shown a desire to give money to support Paul’s collection for the Christians living in poverty in Judea. But, over time, they seem to have forgotten about it. Paul is now eager to remind them of their earlier enthusiasm and encourage them to turn that into action. It is said that the path to hell is paved with good intentions. That is to say, anyone can have good intentions, but what matters is that we do something about them. Another wise saying is that people with good intentions make promises

2 Corinthians 8.9 NLT 'You know the generous grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. Though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty he could make you rich.' The Christian life is, before anything else, characterised by giving. Because that’s how Jesus lived. As we follow in his footsteps, our lives need to be shaped by giving generously. His generosity was so complete that he gave everything and became totally poor in order to make other people rich. This is a huge challenge to all of us in a society that is deeply acquisitive. The assumption is that life is found in acquiring more and more, but Jesus turns that thinking completely on its head. There is an old proverb which says, “He who takes but never gives, may last for years but never lives.” That’s a scary thought and should redouble our determination to work out how we should go about our giving. I believe that we need to find a deeper understanding of where our money and resources come from. When we realise that they have all

2 Corinthians 8.7 NLT 'Since you excel in so many ways— in your faith, your gifted speakers, your knowledge, your enthusiasm, and your love — I want you to excel also in this gracious act of giving.' This is a remarkable verse. The two letters that Paul wrote to the church in Corinth lift the lid on a community which was very divided, disorganised in its worship and in which there were serious disciplinary issues that hadn’t been addressed. And yet Paul was able to come up with a long list of their good qualities! I love the fact that he is so encouraging to them. It’s so easy to become overwhelmed by the failures of people and churches. We get depressed by their inadequacies, but the danger is that we could overlook their qualities, and everyone has some. It would be a good exercise to think about the most annoying person that you know and write down a list of their excellent qualities. The trouble is that if we concentrate too much on people’s shortcomings we will never see their finer qualities, and ou

Psalm 101.1-2 NLT 'I will sing of your love and justice, Lord. I will praise you with songs. I will be careful to live a blameless life— when will you come to help me? I will lead a life of integrity in my own home.' This is one of David’s psalms and we hear him as he here reflects on his responsibility as king to care for the whole of society and to ensure that justice prevails. The final verse of the psalm gives us a powerful picture of his daily work “to ferret out the wicked and free the city of the Lord from their grip.” It was no easy task, but he knew that it was impossible to bring justice and integrity to his community if he wasn’t practising it at home. Whenever we are told that a politician’s private life is their own personal matter and of no consequence to their public duties we know that they are talking nonsense! King David was far from perfect, but he was clear that it was vital for him to live a consistent life of integrity, even when he was at home and far away from his kingly duties. Li

Psalm 98.7-9 NLT 'Let the sea and everything in it shout his praise! Let the earth and all living things join in. Let the rivers clap their hands in glee! Let the hills sing out their songs of joy before the Lord for he is coming to judge the earth. He will judge the world with justice, and the nations with fairness.' When we think about praising God we will naturally think of people joining together in chapels, churches and cathedrals around the world every Sunday. It’s inspiring to think of millions of people every week sharing in acts of worship. But the psalmist doesn’t want us to think that this is the sum total of worship, because he sees the whole of creation involved in praising God. Nothing is left out! Even the sea joins in. The rivers clap their hands in glee! It is beautiful, poetic language that reminds us that absolutely everything is bound to be part of the chorus of praise, because God is so great. He wants to blast open every attempt that we make to limit the scale and importance of worsh

Psalm 98.1 NLT 'Sing a new song to the Lord, for he has done wonderful deeds. His right hand has won a mighty victory; his holy arm has shown his saving power!' I love the fact that God’s people through thousands of years have enjoyed singing. The psalmist had a very clear reason for encouraging the people to sing, and that was because of God’s salvation. Throughout his dealings with his people, he had shown them his ability to save, most supremely when he led them out of slavery in Egypt. After four hundred years in that land God set them free in the most dramatic way. Nothing has changed. It is salvation that should spur us into singing today. In one sense, salvation never changes because God has always been in the business of setting people free from sin, guilt and lifelessness. But the way in which that salvation is experienced will be unique for every individual. I love hearing the testimonies of other Christians; what always strikes me is that each is a one off. God comes to us as individuals and me

Psalm 97.10 NLT 'You who love the Lord, hate evil! He protects the lives of his godly people and rescues them from the power of the wicked.' One of the signs that we truly love God is that we start to hate evil. That kind of burning hatred is critically important, because the many great evils in the world will never come to an end unless people start hating them. The evil transatlantic slave trade only stopped when people started to identify its horror and start hating it. I once visited the ancient fort at Cape Coast in Ghana, where slaves were held before being ferried to the slave ships. For me, the most horrific discovery was that the dungeons in which the slaves were brutally held was underneath the chapel. As the slave traders worshipped God, they must have heard the cries of the slaves. For centuries, people lived with the slave trade as an acceptable, if regrettable, part of life. It was only when people started to hate it and fight against it that the tide turned. Eventually, albeit far too slo

Daniel 10.18-19 NLT Then the one who looked like a man touched me again, and I felt my strength returning. “Don’t be afraid,” he said, “for you are very precious to God. Peace! Be encouraged! Be strong!” Daniel’s amazing courage comes across powerfully in this book. His willingness to face up to tyrannical kings and even hungry lions is very impressive. But that isn’t the whole story. We also meet Daniel when he is feeling ill and weak. The vision that he received about the future in the previous chapter left him feeling terrible for three weeks. He was in a state of mourning throughout that time and commented, “my strength left me, my face grew deathly pale, and I felt very weak.” (Daniel 10.8). I suspect that, like Daniel, we can all identify times when we have felt on top of the world and then other moments when we have felt completely weak and useless. That is to say, none of us can be strong all the time. And it was in this time of great weakness that God sent precious he was to God. When things go

Daniel 9.5-6 NLT 'But we have sinned and done wrong. We have rebelled against you and scorned your commands and regulations. We have refused to listen to your servants the prophets.' As Daniel reflected on the history of his people, he realised that he needed to come to God with a prayer of confession. He knew that he was part of a nation that had rebelled against God for many centuries. He recognised that their history was a tragic catalogue of failure and disobedience. God had given them every opportunity to put things right, but they had chosen to live in opposition to him. However, Daniel knew that his generous God was ready to forgive their sins if only the people would turn to him. When we confess our sins what we are doing is facing the facts about ourselves and our world. This is something we have to do in everyday life, and it shouldn’t be a surprise to us. My wife’s car recently broke down. The clutch had gone. What we needed to do was to face up to the fact that the old clutch was no longer any