“The comfort of the Holy Spirit is often like a kick up the backside!”

The above section of the Bayeux Tapestry shows Bishop Odo, who had come across with the Norman forces to England with their invasion fleet. Above him it says, in Latin, Bishop Odo comforts the troops! Look closely and you will see his comfort it a raised mace about to strike his own forces. What happened in the battle of Hastings was that Harold’s English forces had the higher ground and used that advantage for all it was worth. The Norman’s were famed for their cavalry and so William sent the cavalry forth to try and gain an advantage, and turn the tide of the battle. To his dismay the cavalry were forced back and began to run back down the hill away from the English. Now enter Bishop Odo into the story. On seeing the Norman Cavalry retreat he charges forward on his horse and uses his Bishop’s mace to force the cavalry back up the hill by striking the horses rumps with that mace! His actions worked and the next cavalry charge alongside a volley of arrows from the archers started to win the day and bring about the ultimate victory for the Normans. Its a spectacular image and shows a different idea of “comfort” to that which we are used to. We often think of that term as a nice soft place to fall, or a soft, smooth material. Not a smack on the rump by a blunt heavy object!

This story was relayed to me from a pulpit in 1992 by a vicar who was announcing to the congregation that after many years he was about to move on. He told them that whilst he could stay in the parish, where he indeed felt in his comfort zone, the Holy Spirit’s comfort, much like the mace of Bishop Odo, had kicked him up the backside and forced him to realise it was time to move on. He then pointed to the bible to emphasise that this was often how the Holy Spirit works. In Psalm 23 the psalmist writes “Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; for you are with me; your rod and you staff, they comfort me.” (Psalm 23 v4). Think about a rod and a staff and you will realise that these are not cosy cushions or soft things, they are rugged and hard and used to push animals around and prod them when they go the wrong way. So can be the comfort of the Holy Spirit.

At the same time as the vicar was telling us that the Holy Spirit prompting him to move, almost against his will, so I was being prompted to act too. For about 6 months God had been prompting me to respond to my call to the priesthood. A call I kept acknowledging and then ignoring thinking “if this is of God then this will have to happen…” and as soon as that did happen (whatever obstacle or experience I was wanting to happen) then I’d put up another barrier. In fact after hearing this sermon and knowing God was speaking to me to act, I sat on things for a further 4 months. But the Holy Spirit would not let me go, His comfort left me very uncomfortable as if a Bishop’s mace or a shepherds crook was bashing into me! Those images have never left me and I have often felt promptings that are like that when I have been too stuck in my ways or in what I am doing.

So, as we await the feast of Pentecost let us be attentive to the promptings of the Holy Spirit, let us strive to hear what God is saying to us, where he want’s us to be or go or to do. Be sure that if we ignore Him he will let us know in no uncertain terms. Let us find no rest until we find our rest in God.

from “The comfort of the Holy Spirit is often like a kick up the backside!” – Site Title (wordpress.com)
by caterwaulingcanon
I am the Vicar of Frodingham and New Brumby in Scunthorpe. All things I blog about are my own opinions and thoughts. View more posts

Come to the Edge

“Come to the edge,” Jesus said. 

“No,” I said, “I’m afraid.” 

“Come to the edge,” he said. 

“No,” I said, “I’m afraid. 

“Come to the edge,” Jesus said. 

So I came to the edge, and he pushed me. 

And together, we flew!

quoted in Ministry in the image of God : the trinitarian shape of Christian service / by Seamands, Stephen A., 1949-

Wesley Outside of His Comfort Zone

quotation from Ministry in the image of God : the trinitarian shape of Christian service / by Seamands, Stephen A., 1949-

Soon he was preaching in the open air all over England. And that’s what [John Wesley] did for the next fifty years, traveling some 225,000 miles on horseback, preaching 40,000 sermons, winning perhaps as many as 144,000 converts and establishing a vast network of Methodist societies within the Anglican Church. Yet . . .[he] never became fully comfortable with field preaching. As late as 1772 he admitted, “To this day field preaching is a cross to me.”

Be Not Frogs, but Become "Retoold Lizards"

Quotation from p. 169 in Ministry in the image of God : the trinitarian shape of Christian service / by Seamands, Stephen A., 1949-  

In 1989, at the Lausanne II Congress on World Evangelization in Manila, Lee Yih, a businessman from Hong Kong, contrasted how frogs and lizards acquire food. “The frog just sits and waits and lets the food come to him. As soon as an insect gets close enough, all a frog has to do is stick out its tongue and get it. If a lizard behaved in the same way, it would soon starve. It can’t afford to sit and wait. It has to go out into the world where the food can be found and hunt.” Yih went on to suggest that many full-time Christian workers are like frogs. They go off to Bible school or seminary, get a degree, become a pastor or join a staff at a church, and they expect that somehow the people around them will know that they are in the business of meeting spiritual needs. Soon their froglike habit of waiting for others to come to them becomes deeply ingrained. 

Several years ago, guest lecturer Donna Hailson challenged the students at our seminary not to allow this to happen to them: “We can’t just sit in our cozy little God boxes waiting for the world to beat a path to our doors,” she insisted. “To reach the world, the Church has to break out of walls, go out of doors and lead people to the path—the narrow path that leads to life.” Given the increasingly post-Christian environment of North America, she challenged those whose training and experience have taught them to be ministerial frogs to become “retooled lizards.”

One Will Never Experience Or Know Everything

Life Encompassed

How often I have said,
“This will never do,”
Of ways of feeling that now
I trust in, and pursue!

Do traverses tramped in the past,
My own, criss-crossed as I forge
Across from another quarter
Speak of a life encompassed?

Well, life is not research.
No one asks you to map the terrain,
Only to get across it
In new ways, time and again.

How many such, even now,
I dismiss out of hand
As not to my purpose, not
Unknown, just unexamined.

Donald Davie from Collected Poems

Mark Jarman, in Body and Soul: Essays on Poetry, comments: This poem reminds me of the limitations of critical understanding and opinion, and also of the importance and necessity of growth in the life of the mind.

If It Makes You Sit Up

It doesn’t do any good to sit up and take notice if you keep on sitting.

Go and Serve Jesus: A Dialogue

Reading
Scripture Matthew 10:24-39

Reader 1:
Ha! The preacher thinks we should go and serve Jesus. Does the preacher have any idea what that means, you know, leaving the comforts of home. People won’t understand what we are doing. They will think we are nuts! Even our own families won’t get it! Go and serve Jesus? Not me.

Reader 2:
Well, now, the preacher has got it right. If we sit here, or stand here, and proclaim our faith, and sing the great songs, but do nothing we are just spitting in the wind. We really need to do something. People don’t have to understand. God understands. That’s what’s really important. You’re not doing this for the approval of people; you are doing this for God.

Reader 1:
Yeah, right! Listen, God has lots of do-gooders to get things done. What makes you think you can do something special? Are you better than everyone else?

Reader 2:
No, I’m not better than anyone else. I just want to serve God. I want to act on what I say. I know it won’t be easy. That doesn’t matter. I just want to serve. You are welcome to serve also.

Reader 1:
Not me. I can’t serve. I won’t serve. My service is coming to church once a week. That’s all I have to give.

Reader 2:
Perhaps that’s enough for now. Just wait and see. Don’t close the doors to service.

from Cokebury's Worship Connection for Year A, Sixth Sunday after Pentecost June 22, 2008

“Let’s Get to Work”: Sermon Outline by Keith Badowski

“Let’s Get to Work”: Sermon Outline by Keith Badowski

Matthew 21:28-32 (NIV)
Matthew 5:41-42 (NIV)

1. So, does my title suggest I’m talking about “works theology”? Doing hard labor on earth to earn our way into heaven?

Once there was a company that put out an instant cake mix. You only had to add water. It didn’t sell. Market research showed that people thought it sounded TOO EASY; it couldn’t be any good. They reformulated the mix so the instructions were to add water and one egg. It sold fine after that.

Some people are tempted to believe that God’s plan of salvation is to easy too.

2. Ephesians 2:8-9 “By grace you have been saved through faith . . ., it is the gift of God, not of works.”

God’s formula is not about to be changed.

Works do not earn salvation. Works show gratitude, devotion, willingness to yield yourself to God who blesses you whether you work or not. (Of course, chances are if the message of Jesus’ free gift has penetrated your heart and you are grateful for his forgiveness of your sins, you’re going to WANT to work—to express your return of the love God first extended to you.)

3. Did it ever occur to you that if you trust Jesus for your salvation/ forgiveness of your sins/ eternal life . . . you ought to maybe trust him to direct the way you live now?

Isn’t it possible that what he asks (not demands) has your own best interests at heart?

4. Serving others, as many can attest, feels good! Nothing gives the same satisfaction.

Albert Schweitzer was quoted as saying, “I don’t know what your destiny will be, but one thing I know: the only ones among you who will be happy are those who have sought and found how to serve.”

5. Jesus wants WILLING workers who chose Him FREELY, VOLUNTARILY do His work in the world. He doesn’t resort to guilt trips or any kind of manipulation to get us up and out of our seats.

Well, sometimes He can light a fire under us to get us moving. . .

6. Once there was a member of a motorcycle gang who a couple days earlier became a believer in Jesus. The only thing he knew to do was to go to church. As he made his way to sit in the 2nd row, the people of the congregation stared at him as he passed. They whispered to each other about his burliness, his leather chaps, his nose ring. As he sat down, the pastor announced, “We need a helper in to work in the nursery this morning. Can I get a volunteer please?” No one came forward, so the pastor asked again, “We really need a helper in the nursery this morning. Please step forward if you can help out.” Meanwhile the biker was praying, “Lord, I don’t know if you want me to help out, but I will take it as a sign from you that I should if he asks a third time.” The pastor made the third request when no one responded to the first two, so the biker raised his hand, stood up and started walking to the front . . . followed by 50 mothers who suddenly rose to their feet.

7. God shouldn’t have to send a burly biker to get us involved and on our feet.

Why not a motive of gratitude? A desire to show the world in action who Jesus is—the one who acts to help others, who sets himself aside for our well-being.

8. Jesus calls us to enact his grace and love by how we respond to the needs of others.

He wants us to pay no mind to whether the recipient DESERVES love and grace. That’s hard to do at 1st.

Jesus always asks his disciples to do tasks that 1st seem hard, unpleasant.

9. Sacrifice time. As if it’s “OUR time.”

Hard effort, physical strain at times.

Outside our comfort zone.

If we see such difficulties ahead we might delay our choice to serve.

“If you choose not to decide you still have made a choice” –Rush

10.
"Did I ever tell you about the young Zoad,
who came to a sign at the fork of the road.
He looked one way and the other way too
The Zoad had to make up his mind what to do.
Well, the Zoad scratched his head,
and his chin, and his pants—
and he said to himself “I’ll be taking a chance.”
If I go to place One, that place may be hot,
so how will I know if I like it or not.
On the other hand, though, I’ll feel such a fool
If I go to Place Two and find it’s too cool,
in that case I may catch a chill and turn blue.
So Place One may be best and not Place Two.
“Play safe!” cried the Zoad.
“I’ll play safe, I’m no dunce.
I’ll simply start off to both places at once.”
And that’s how the Zoad who would not take a chance
went no place at all with a split in his pants."

--Dr. Seuss

11. Option: remain indecisive when Jesus calls us to serve.

Like the Second son, say “Yes” but do “No”.

Sit quietly and hope he’ll forgot the whole conversation.

Opportunity: be like the First son. He may have said “No” fearing it was too hard or just not for him. But 5 minutes or 2 years later, we can CHANGE OUR MIND.

12. . . . get to work, give the mission to serve our best try.

Realize that God supplies wisdom, power, resources, guidance—to accomplish what it is He asks. God acts through us—He must because what He asks is too HARD to do without Him.

13. Hard Requests:

Someone strikes you, insults, snubs, or criticizes you, FORGIVE THEM. Be vulnerable, risk another stab in the back, love your enemies.

Be GENEROUS, even when the world is take, take, take.

Someone pressures you to work for them, look for EXTRA things you can do for them, go beyond their demands, showing God’s generosity and grace by working HARDER and doing MORE.

14. Be open handed with your resources, not just your leftover pocket change, but your checkbook, your car, your skills, and know-how, your tools, any of your possessions. YOURS? They don’t actually belong to you. They’re on loan from the Creator. Use what you “have” to improve the situation of another person.

15. I know of 3 Christian men who have loaned or given vehicles to needy individuals who are unlikely to ever pay them back. I know 3. I wonder how many Jesus knows. I wonder how many Jesus wants?

16. Jesus has given us a free gift of salvation. Jesus demands no works, no payment. He sets us free because he loves us. He hopes we will seek his directions, his instructions to devote ourselves to working on his behalf.