Confirmation 1 - How are we saved?

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For the next ten weeks we'll be running a 'confirmation course for everyone'.  We'll be going over the things I would teach to those who would like to be baptised, like to confirm their baptismal vows, and join the Methodist Church.

If you would like to be baptised / confirm your baptismal vows, attend for the next ten weeks, speak to me, and we will be able to baptise and confirm you on Sun 28 June.

Some of us just can't make every Sunday for the next ten weeks so there are ways of catching up:  Via podcast (internet broadcast).  Ask me for a CD, or for my sermon notes.

All of these are available on www.paarlmethodist.blogspot.com.

The other thing you will have to is get together with me for some 'one on one' discussion about what this all means.  And if you can, it would be good for you to attend Bible Study on Thursday mornings at 10am, or evenings at 7pm.

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Because, as scripture affirms, there is only one baptism (Eph 4:6) ) if you have been confirmed or baptised in any other denomination we already consider you to be baptised and confirmed.

If you would like to chat about that, lets get together some time.

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Outlines of what we will be speaking about should be in your notices.  The topics may change a little here and there as we go along.

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Saved

This week and next week we're going to talk about the concept of 'salvation' / being saved.

This week:  "How are we saved?"

And next week: "From what are we saved?"

Perhaps the first thing that I should say – as I begin to explain things, is that words about God are not like words about say a machine.

A machine can be understood – all we need is a diagram and an instruction manual.  But God, God is bigger.

My words about God are just signposts that point in the direction of the God we worship – hopefully they'll help us all to find our way.

How are we saved?

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In Ephesians 2:8-9 Paul writes:

"For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— not the result of works, so that no one may boast."

- Ephesians 2:8-9

Grace in Creation

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Paul goes on in Ephesians 2 to say:

"For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life."

- Ephesians 2:10

As Christ folowers, its our job to believe the best of everybody.

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It is even our job to believe the best of ourselves – as disapointed as we may be with what we've done or who we've become.

Maybe you're addicted to sin – like so many of us, and maybe its destroyed your confidence in yourself.

Maybe we've heard or said so many negative things about ourselves that we've started to believe them.

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In Genesis we read that when God created the world he created it good.  That is the 'truth' of Genesis 1 (don't let what some people say about taking 7 days literally distract you from what is most important.)

Not only is creation good but people are created in God's image (Gen 1:26)

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"Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness…"

- Genesis 1:26

The psalmist reflects this Psalm 139:14

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"I praise you because
I am fearfully and wonderfully mad.
Wonderful are your works,
that I know very well."

- Psalm 139:14

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God's grace begins in our creation.  We are created good.  The world we live in is created good.

[No Junk]

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The problem is, we take all that is good – and rather than use it to do good, we use it to do evil.

Why?

Because as good as God created us, he created us to love – and to love you need to be able to choose not to love.

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(It's nice to know that your husband, friends, wife, children love you – but if they simply loved you because they were preprogrammed to do so, it wouldn't be quite right.)

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The goodness of God is there at the beginning, in creation, before we do anything.

Grace in the Law

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In the Old Testament we read lots and lots of laws – what sacrifices to make, when and how.  What to do if your neighbours bull gores your slave – a lot of very useful stuff for our day to day living.

What we learn in these laws is a set of principles for day to day living.

In Exodus 20 we get to what we call the 10 commandments.  10 rules by which God's people are called to live.

Many of us think that we have to live by these laws in order for God to love us.

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I need to remind you, that God started loving people before they were given any laws.

Even in the giving of the law in Exodus 20 we read:

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"I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt…"

- Exodus 20:2

God had already loved his people, had already shown his love to his people by rescuing them from slavery in Egypt.

And now, because God loves people – he says: "Live like this."  Not in order to ruin people's fun, but so that they can have life in the fullest.

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When Jesus is confronted for allowing his disciples to break the law on the Sabbath (Mk 2:23-28), he had allowed them to pluck grain, Jesus' response is to say:

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"The sabbath was made for people, not people for the sabbath."

- Mark 2:28

The law about resting on the Sabbath was made for the sake of people, not for the sake of God.

In the world today we know that the harder we work, the harder we have to work, as people don't spend time with their families, because they have to work 6/7 days a week just to put bread on the table.

Life deteriorates.

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God gets disapointed – not because beaking laws upsets God, but because God loves the people he created in his image.  And when they break each other – he – who loves them, is also broken.

Summary

God's gifts of grace to us so far:

Good creation.
Good laws.

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Grace in Jesus

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And now we see God's gift of grace to us in Jesus:

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God gives us the gift of his son Jesus to show us what he is like, the writer to the Hebrews describes him as:

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"…the exact imprint of God's very being."

- Hebrews 1:2

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God's gift of grace to us in Jesus is the gift of showing us exactly what he is like.

And Jesus presents a quite surprising picture of God.

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I'm sure that most of us have learnt that to be holy is to be separate.  To be set apart.

But when Jesus shows us God's holiness he shows us a holiness that reaches out beyond boundaries.  He loves and touches all the people we might consider unholy and unclean.

Jesus describes holiness as loving your enemies… Holiness looks like love.

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Jesus – in his life – shows us that we are loveable.

Those of us who are miserable sinners.

Those of us who are self righteous and arrogant – who think we know better than everybody else.

All of us, loved by Jesus.

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John 3:16 does not read:

"For God so hated the world that he sent his son so that he would destroy all people."

- Not John 3:16

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It reads:

"For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life."

- John 3:16

Grace in Jesus' Death

Paul writes in Romans 5:6:

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"God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinnners Christ died for us."

- Romans 5:6

Our gospel story for today – a parable which Jesus tells about a landowner who sent his servants and then his son to collect the rent – tells of the inevitability of what will happen to Jesus.

In the Old Testament the prophets are rejected one by one – they call Israel to justice; often, often, often they cry out:  "You neglect the poor…"  They tell the nation that they have rejected God and God's people by not living in love as God commands.

It was inevitable that Jesus' too would be rejected, we are just like that. 

And as he was rejected – he was crucified.

It was not God who crucified Jesus, who flogged him. 

It was people like us, rejecting his challenge to love.

Yet, in his death he saves us – because – when we look to the cross we believe.  We trust.  We know that someone who loves us enough to die for us – loves us.

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"For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— not the result of works, so that no one may boast."

- Ephesians 2:8-9

Jesus Saves

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But this love that Jesus offers is saving love, a gift of God.

It would be silly to save someone who didn't need saving.

In becoming human, living among us, sharing our human nature Jesus binds himself to us, giving himself to us.

He continues to offer his love, even though we will reject and kill him.

But when he is rejected and killed, God raises him from the dead.

And so Jesus who we now know is God's son (God raised him from the dead) continues to love us as he did when he died on the cross.

And somehow – because he has attached himself to us with love, we are also raised up because of him.

How does this happen?  This is where words about God do not really work.

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We can only describe it in our own terms.

The letter to the Hebrews explains Jesus death in terms of a sacrifice.  People would sacrifice animals in order to make peace with God.  Jesus becomes – in his dying for us, a perfect sacrifice.

Paul speaks in legal terms – as if we were in a court of law on charges of sin, we plead guilty, but Jesus takes the punishment on our behalf.

However it works – we are made right with God because of what jesus did.

Faith Saves

In Ephesians we read that we are saved by grace.

God's good gift to us:

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In creation.  Created Good.

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In God's law.  Given to us so that we can have life in abundance.

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In the life of Jesus.  Reaching out to everyone – surprisingly enough, even people like me and you.

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In the death of Jesus.  Jesus who dies because he refuses to stop loving us.

By grace, through faith:

And Paul emphasises that this is not our own effort, it is just faith that saves. 

Faith is not a product of how clever we are.

How hard we can concentrate in order to believe something that isn't proveable.

The faith that saves is a simple yes to what God has already done.

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It is less than lifting a feather, or opening our eyes, or turning our head.

It is simply accepting the fact that this – however it works – is just the way things are.

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"God loves us so much, that he even offers himself."

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When we accept this good gift, we begin to become the people that God created us to be, and we will soon see the Kingdom of God, here in this place.

Response

Because salvation is God's good gift – nothing we can do 'saves' us.  But it is helpful to us to do something, to remind ourselves that God has saved us; for some it is the outward sign of baptism – a way of declaring that this has happened.  Or confirmation.  And – you can simply pray.

If you would like to speak to me about this – please, my numbers in the notices and I am available.