Yesterday i preached three times at Christ Church Kenilworth on the topic of ‘Faith in Active Solidarity’ with the tagline: Friends who carry friends to Jesus.

The passage i was given was Mark 2.1-12 and i imagine many of you will know the story of the four friends who carry their paralysed friend to Jesus and end up having to break through the ceiling of someone’s house because the crowd is so big that they can’t get near him.

i started of course by jumping right to the end of the passage and verse 12 which reads:

‘This amazed everyone and they praised God, saying, “We have never seen anything like it.”‘

i posed this question:

What is the church in Cape Town doing that is amazing everyone?

# is it that we’re taking on the government to win permission to hit our children? For those of you who might not be familiar with the context, a few years ago while tbV and i were in Americaland, we were shocked and disappointed by the news of a local church or churches who were trying to build support against the government so as to not lose the right to hit their children. Videos were made, petitions were signed and it looked like a whole lot of time and energy and resources were poured into taking on the government so that parents could continue to hit their kids. That certainly was amazing everyone, but not in a good way.

Relative to whether you believe the bible promotes being able to use corporal punishment as a form of discipline or not [i am personally of the school of thought of “i was hit as a child and look how i turned out” but also that if there are ways to raise children well without having to hit them, even better] all you have to do is look right when you are driving to the airport from Cape Town to see some of the townships which highlight much of the abject poverty that exists around our nation, including many communities where people have to go outside at night and brave the weather and the danger of being outside alone at night simply to go to the toilet… and if seeing all that, you still choose “Fighting to be able to hit our kids” as your issue, then i think you are getting it quite wrong.

# is is that we can spend hundreds of thousands of rands on making our church buildings look better or upgrading our music systems while people live next door to us or just down the road live in this kind of abject poverty?

Let me suggest that when the church is the church as we are meant to be, it is the greatest evangelistic tool around.

Back to the story: What happens here?

  • We see the preaching is interrupted [not sure many pastors use this to preach precedent]
  • We see Jesus forgive some sins
  • We see Jesus heal a man

The response is that God is praised: We have never seen anything like this.

We see this same sort of thing in Acts 2: Pentecost happens and the Holy Spirit falls on the disciples and we see Peter, this uneducated fisherman, known for putting his foot in his mouth to be fair, preach a sermon and 3000 people are added to their number that day [incidentally more than Jesus seemed to have gotten in terms of followers].

Then we see this stunning paragraph you can read about in Acts 2.42-47 where every day they meet either in the temples or each others’ homes. They break bread together and listen to teaching and see amazing miracles being performed. It says in chapter 4 of acts that any time someone was in need someone else would sell their farm [with the idea that perhaps that would put them in need of being looked after or housed] to meet the need. And it says that in this group of 3000 plus people, no one was in need. So in this community they eliminated poverty. [What an exciting thought!] And it concludes with the words “The Lord added daily to their number.”

So no evangelism programmes needed. No door to door. No special video series. Just the activity of the church being the church. And it was enough that people were signing up every day to get involved.

The church being the church is the most evangelistic tool around.

  • not the church hiding away from the world or separating ourselves or focused on being or preserving our own little club. It has to be done and be lived out in front of the people… because how else will they ever exclaim: “We have never seen anything like this.”

BEWARE THE JUSTICE OF THE SOCIALS

I got an email from a mate of mine a few months ago – a South African Christian guy living in Americaland – he was very concerned because he’d heard rumours [and he’s not on Facebook else he’d have known for sure] that i was dabbling in the horrificly anti-Christian thing known as “Social Justice”. So i wrote him a long email back.

In Luke 4 we see Jesus handed the Scriptures and He reads from Isaiah 61.1-4

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
    because he has anointed me
    to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
    and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
    to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

What might be interesting to some is that He actually stops reading mid sentence and leaves out the bit that says “and the day of vengeance of our God”. [Interesting side thought to wrestle with or bug your pastor about].

But the point being that Isaiah gives over the prophecy, Jesus reads it and announces “this is my mission” which means by extension [as the body of Christ] it is our mission as well. This is a big part of what we have been called into:

    to proclaim good news to the poor.
 to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
    recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
     to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

Which takes us back to this story and the surprising occurrence of Jesus NOT GIVING THE MAN WHAT HE WANTED. The man wanted to walk and Jesus forgave his sins. We can never know, but we can wonder what was going through the man’s mind: Um, thanks but I really wanted to walk? Or was he super stoked about having his sin forgiven?

But then to validate/open the door to giving the man what he really needed [forgiveness of sin] He met the perceived/presenting need [take up your mat and walk].

I WONDER if the people of Cape Town who are living in Extreme Poverty might not be able to hear the good news of the kingdom of heaven over the loud noise of the bad news of their present life circumstances?

Do you think good news to a hungry person is [a] You can be saved? or is it [b] here is a hot meal…?

Which of those two do you think is it?

OR… [and prepare to have your mind blown right off!] is it just possible that it might be both?

Going back quickly to the Social Justice concern my friend had, during the one service i preached at, they stuck up for words from Matthew 22 of the greatest commandment that Jesus responded with when asked which was to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, strength and mind… and to love your neighbour as yourself.”

And i thought to myself for the first time ever… Don’t you think that “Love your neighbour” is the greatest advertisement for “Social Justice” ever.

Because i would never let my best friend live in a place where he had to walk outside at night at the risk of physical threat or having to face the elements just to go to the toilet.

i would never let a family member live in a place where she had to walk outside at night at the risk of physical threat or having to face the elements just to go to the toilet.

And i am reminded of the question that is asked of Jesus: Well, who is my neighbour?

We know what the answer to that was.

How could loving God and loving people [as myself] ever be anything but full of social justice?

As i neared the end of my preach, i just realised that my topic i was given was “Friends who carry friends to Jesus” or also “Faith in Active Solidarity” and i haven’t really dealt with that [or have i?] so let’s sneak it in in a P.S.

vs 4-5 Prepare to have your theology blown

vs 4 “Since they could not get him to Jesus they…”

DID WHATEVER IT TOOK THEM TO GET HIM TO JESUS

vs 5 When Jesus saw [wait for it] THEIR faith, He said to the paralytic, Son your sins are forgiven.”

Wow, theology blown. i don’t know what to do with that.He saw their faith and he forgave the sins of the paralysed man.

Rob the pastor got up after my own preach cos i deflected this verse to him and he said he didn’t understand it either. But [and i loved this] perhaps it is a good reminder to us that God loves to work through community. In a world that is dominated by the “I” and the “me” and the “mine” we see a God who typically chooses to work with families and with tribes and with nations and with the church. The whole idea of “personal salvation’ or “personal calling” is a modern one. God calls us collectively to work together to see His kingdom come.

So to close this off…

Faith in Active Solidarity  is committing to do whatever it takes

– time

– personal buy in/energy

– discomfort

– the embarrassment of breaking cultural norms and literal ceilings

– WHATEVER IT TAKES!

to carry your friends to Jesus.

i finished off with a reminder of this well-known passage from Romans 12.1-2

Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this church… sorry, world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind [and the actions that follow].

The idea is that if we are looking around us and our actions seem to be on par with everyone else, then perhaps something is wrong. Sadly, this is often true in the church as much as it is true in the world. Because a lot of people have settled and compromised and church has just become a weekly ritual rather than a faith-inspiring conversation. So we need to compare ourselves to the Word of God and the really high bar that God has called us to, which summed up looks like “Love your neighbour as yourself.”

i was blown away by a salary conversation i started on Facebook today, which i may try blog on later this week if there’s time, where i asked people what they earned and some of the heights and lows of those sharings were immense. How do we love others as ourselves and allow racism and sexism and xenophobia to surface in front of us and go unchallenged?

If we are going to call ourselves people of faith then we have to start asking the tough questions, and making some tougher decisions perhaps. Or maybe just some more creative ones. And we need to be led by the Spirit.

‘This amazed everyone and they praised God, saying, “We have never seen anything like it.”‘