Two certainties in life. Death and taxes.
So said Benjamin Franklin, one of the founding fathers of America, in 1789. “Our new Constitution is now established, and has an appearance that promises permanency; but in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” Daniel Defoe, the author of Robinson Crusoe actually said the same thing 60 years earlier.
“Jesus is a bit of a killjoy.”
So the objection goes – it’s an increasingly common one from people today. “Following Jesus sounds potentially interesting. But one thing that bothers me is that it’s no fun. If I set out to follow him, he’d sap all the joy out of my life.”
Maybe it’s even been your experience as a follower of Jesus. At times, the list of things you have to do to be a proper Christian, and the things you have to avoid doing, turns life from a fun adventure into a dreary, serious slog.
Father Christmas, so it is said, only brings presents to boys and girls who have been good.
And Jesus, many people suspect, is not so very different from Father Christmas. In particular, he wants people to be good, If you want to know Jesus, there are standards to maintain, especially if you want to stay in his good books, be a proper member of his church.
Let me ask you a question. What is your biggest need? What do you need more than anything else? I it good health or improved health? Is it to have love and friendship, to know that we are valued, that other people cherish us, not to be alone? Is it to be able to contribute to the needs of others, not to be just wrapped up in our own affairs, but to have something to offer to the wider world. What is your greatest need?
Today, we’re going to talk about the problem of evil.
I don’t mean the philosophical problem of evil. There’s no shortage of questions about that. If God made the world good, where did the devil come from? Why does God let good things happen to bad people? What exactly is evil? Why does God not stamp out the badness in the world right away?
There are times in life when you become aware that there are forces beyond your control.
We all like to live in a bubble that says we can determine our own destinies. But then something goes badly wrong, an unexpected illness cuts across our plans, life bowls us a ball we’d never seen coming, and we start to realise we’re not in control.
How do you feel when it sinks in that you’re not in control?
Matthew tells a story about when this happened to Jesus’ disciples. They came face to face with the forces of nature, and they were not the ones in control.
Jesus would have made a terrible salesman.
At times, it almost seems as if he’s trying to put people off from following him.
Bible passages like this are hard to preach from. I’m instinctively a salesman. I’d love everyone to follow Jesus. I want to sell him to people. I want everyone I know to sign on the dotted line. So passages like this are a bit of a nuisance. Jesus takes the small print, and makes it the largest writing on the page, with bright highlighter pen through it. It makes it much harder to sell Jesus to people when it feels like you’re putting them off.
Many of us struggle with poor health. Some of us just have coughs and colds, scratches. Others have more serious things wrong.
Nationally, the NHS is at breaking point. We’re all living longer, and with that come more health problems. The system was never set up to handle the loads that doctors and other healthcare staff are facing.
What does the Bible have to say about our health? Unless the Bible addresses the real issues we face, Jesus is not a saviour worth following.
In Matthew chapter 8, we discover that Jesus came to heal.
He wasn’t the obvious person, and he knew it. The trouble was, he was also desperate.
The centurion was a powerful Roman soldier. Technically, he was supposed to command a hundred Roman troops. That alone was a prestigious position in the mighty Roman army. If one of his soldiers disobeyed him, they were disobeying the emperor. Truth be told, though, it wasn’t exactly a hundred. In this backwater of the empire, he could basically recruit his own men. He’d lost count of exactly how many were under his command.
“Do you trust me?”
That’s the question you find Jesus asking you as you read Matthew’s gospel.
The loyalty Jesus asks for is extraordinary. When he asks us to follow him, he asks us to give him everything.
