| At the moment I am involved in
another Alpha Course which includes some young men whose Christian background is minimal.
When I asked them why they were there and wanted to know more about the Christian faith,
they simply replied that they had seen how one of their friends had changed so much after
making a life altering commitment to Christ and they wanted to find out why he was now so
different. Although they didn’t actually say it, I think the implication was that
they were looking for something similar! Faith in Jesus Christ
– a belief in the truth of the Easter story and the power of the resurrection –
has, does and will continue to change who people are and what is important and central in
their lives. What people can still relate to is authentic living and practice. When they
see what Christians affirm making their behaviour distinctive, they do want to know
more!
Talking about ‘practising what we preach’ may sound like a
well-worn cliché but it is expected: the tabloids still enjoy reporting in great detail
the failure of a church person particularly when he / she is ordained. Yet there is still
surprise when what one believes is seen to affect how we behave towards others; think of
those Christian families who, in recent years, have lost loved ones to acts of senseless
violence but were still prepared to offer forgiveness to the perpetrators because of their
faith in Christ and the way in which the press seemed to find it “unbelievable”!
Unfortunately much of our contemporary Christian practice is not
seen as being particularly life-changing. If
you were born and raised in a Christian home then the standards were initially set high
and acceptance of the faith might not be as traumatic a step for you as for those who did not have such an upbringing. But the
question must still be asked:
“Does your faith govern how you behave and how you seek to
live your life that others would know that you were a follower of Jesus Christ?”
Or would your friends be surprised to learn that you attend church?
To what extent does being a Christian affect the decisions you take and the commitments
that you make?
And if it doesn’t make a difference, then what does that say
about your faith?
We are drawing near to Easter, a far more important festival than
Christmas, in spite of the fact that it is nowhere near as commercial as the “winterval
event”. But then it is rather difficult selling Good Friday as a “feel good”
day unless you realise the meaning and significance of the Cross.
The events of that day speak of how God Almighty took the human
condition seriously enough to die for humanity in a way that no one would be capable of
forgetting. Jesus practised what he preached; although to be fair he didn’t do that
much preaching - he told stories about a God who reached out in love to a world that so
often did not want to know or respond. The way he lived his life was his best sermon. We believe that the fact that Jesus died at that
place and in that way has universal and eternal significance and that all our destinies
depend on how we react and accept what happened at Calvary.
Life can never be the same again when the Cross is accepted
and understood as the ultimate demonstration of the Lord’s love for the world.
Today the Christian Church has to help others make that decision to accept God’s love
for themselves and to realise that they, as individuals, need his mercy and forgiveness.
The only problem is that we have to honestly realise that it also must apply to us and
that unless we realise that Christ died for each one of us personally, then the rest of
what we say is not that important.
Yours in His Service
Robert Bebb
|
Park End Church, Cardiff 