Christmas at FBC 

We're celebrating Christmas at Faversham Baptist Church, and everyone is invited!

On Sunday 22 December at 4pm, we're singing carols, eating mince pies and celebrating the Christmas story. Suitable for all ages, and free for everyone. 

Is Our Church Doing Well? 

👤 Geoff

Last week at Cafe Church we were talking about evaluating how well we are doing in our faith. In the same vein, we might want to ask ourselves how well we think our church is doing. This online article by John Ortberg reflects on exactly that question 'How is your church doing?' One thing he writes about is what it actually means for a church to do well:

I was talking with somebody in our church recently about his work. He said: "Publicly we would talk about excellence and quality and service, but the reality was we would wake up every morning and think: 'How can we put the competition out of business?' We didn't put this on our website. But we wanted to demoralise and defeat the competition"

Who is your competition?

It's not other churches. Every church is our partner and ally. Thank God for Lutherans and Episcopalians and Methodists and Quakers and Congregationalists and Non-denominationalists. Jesus, our Founder and Leader, defined the competition: "I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hell will not prevail against it." (Matthew 16:16ff)

In other words, our competition is hell. Hell is at work wherever the will of God is defied.

Every time a little child is left unloved, unwanted, uneducated, unnoticed. Every time a marriage ends. Every time racial differences divide a street or a city or a church. Every time money gets worshipped or hoarded. Every time a lie gets told. Every time generations get separated. Every time a workplace becomes de-humanizing. When families get broken up. When virtue gets torn down. When sinful habits create a lives of shame or a culture of shamelessness. When faith gets undermined and hope gets lost and people get trashed. That's when hell is prevailing.

It is not acceptable to Jesus that hell prevail. Your job is not to meet a budget, run a program, fill a building, or maintain the status quo. Your job is to put hell out of business.

That's what it means for your church to do well.

Full article: How's Your Church Doing?

"Get up! Pick up your mat and walk."

👤 Rachel 

Healing is a complex matter. I have found that often Jesus asks us to play a proactive role in our own healing. In John chapter 11 Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead but in vs. 43 Jesus calls to Lazarus to come out of the tomb. Jesus provides the power but he doesn’t go into the tomb to drag Lazarus out, he asks Lazarus to walk out of the darkness.
Jesus often asks us to help each other with our healing. In vs. 44 Jesus asks others to take off Lazarus’ grave clothes and to let him go. Christians were never meant to be isolated and sometimes we cannot get better without the help of others. I have found that others can provide the expertise and gifts to ‘unbind’ me when I cannot do so myself. God has designed it to be that way in the body of Christ.

Jesus also often waits for us to want to be healed. In John chapter 5:6 Jesus meets a man who has been unwell for 38 years. Jesus first question is “do you want to get well?” This may sound strange, but sometimes people are fearful of becoming well when they have been ill for a long time. When I worked in the NHS I commonly found this. We can fear many aspects of becoming well; increased responsibility, reduced attention, wanting to stay where is familiar, change in identity and so on. Therefore the best prayer to start with for many people is that they have the motivation and courage to become well.

Interestingly the man by the pool avoided Jesus’ question saying he had no one to help him get better (vs. 7). As with Lazarus, Jesus once again asks the man first to play a proactive role in his healing by telling him to “get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” (Vs. 8). Often Jesus wants us to take personal responsibility rather than waiting for someone else to make us better.

In my journey of healing, there have been countless ways in which Jesus has asked me to play a proactive role, take responsibility and to “pick up my mat and walk”. Whether to seek counselling, reach out to someone for prayer or help, exercise, take a Sabbath, listen to a podcast and many other examples. Jesus provides the power but he does often ask that we follow his call to walk out of our own darkness. Sometimes I have gaslit God and blamed him for not helping me. But then I usually find that when I am waiting for him, he is actually waiting on me.  

If you think this applies to you, perhaps there is a step God is asking you to take today towards your healing. I pray you will clearly hear Jesus direct you as he gives you his power.

God Is Still God 

👤 Geoff

Last Sunday we saw what happened when Moses had a bad day (Exodus 5:1-23). Moses, having learned to be obedient, did what God asked him to and it blew up in his face. He went to see Pharaoh to deliver God's message ('Let my people go!') but Pharaoh hadn't read the script and said no. To add insult to injury, the Israelite people were forced to make bricks without straw. For details, listen to the sermon.

Not surprisingly, Moses ask the ‘Why?’ question (verse 22). He’s listened to God, and obeyed, and it’s gone wrong. Now his people are suffering more than they were before.

How does that work?

Why do things often get worse before they get better?
Why so much pain and suffering?
Why does God sometimes leave us in the dark?
Why so often does life feel like making bricks without straw?

Tony Campolo directs us to a story by Soren Kierkegaard, the story of a boy trying to learn maths. The teacher gives him a book full of problems to solve. In the back of the book is a list of the answers to the problems, but the teacher tells the boy never to look at the answers in the back of the book, but to work out the answers for himself. However, the boy cheats. He looks in the back of the book. 

Kierkegaard points out that while it is possible for the boy to get good marks this way, he will never really learn mathematics. As difficult as it may prove to be, the only way to become a mathematician is to struggle with the problems themselves, not by using someone else’s answers, even if those answers are the right ones. 

When we are faced with problems, we sometimes wonder why Jesus doesn’t just spell out the answers so that we know exactly what to do.  God doesn’t give us the answers because He wants us to work out the problems for ourselves. It is only by struggling with the problems as they present themselves, day in day out, that we can develop into the kinds of mature people God wants us to be.

Moses was older and wiser now, but he was still a learner. Aren’t we all? It seems that once we become obedient to him, God routinely puts us in impossible situations so that we are reminded again and again that we can’t, but he can.

Hudson Taylor, founder of the China Inland Mission, knew the secret of strength through weakness. Complimented once by a friend on the impact of the mission, Hudson answered,

“It seemed to me that  God looked over the whole world to find a man who was weak enough to do His work, and when He at last found me,  He said, ‘He is weak enough - he’ll do.’” 

All God’s giants have been weak people who did great things for God because they reckoned on His being with them. Things will work out for Moses, just not in the way he was expecting. Moses discovered, and we can too, that God is still God, even when it’s a bad day, God is still God even when you don’t understand what’s going on, and God is still God even when you’re beginning to think he isn’t.

The Power of Obedience

👤 Rachel

Obedience is not always a popular word. I chose to omit the word ‘obey’ from my wedding vows (a topic for another blog!) Maybe the word ‘obedience’ reminds us of strict parents or teachers who threatened us with fear of punishment to “do as I tell you." Maybe we've been hurt by those in positions of authority.

Throughout his ministry, Jesus demonstrated single-minded obedience to God his Father. Jesus chose to be obedient to his Father’s will, not out of fear but because he loved him and trusted him. God blesses us when we obey him, we even read this in the Old Testament such as Deuteronomy 28. Jesus taught we will be blessed when we obey God. Luke 11:28. Jesus obedience to his Father’s will was the secret of the great power that flowed through him to save, heal and free people. It was Jesus’ obedience to God that enabled his victory over the powers of darkness on the cross.

When we obey God, his power will also work through us to accomplish his will, to do tremendous good to people as Jesus did. We can try to use our own power to accomplish our own will instead, but this leads to people getting hurt. This is called abuse of power and sometimes that sadly happens. Jesus chose to lay down his own power and will, instead choosing obedience because he knew God’s way was best.

We have been looking at Moses in the stories of Exodus. Moses sometimes had a problem obeying God. In Numbers 20 the Israelites had no water. God told Moses to speak to a rock and it would pour out water (vs 8). But Moses hit the rock with his staff instead. Water still poured out because God is merciful. It may seem harsh but this act of disobedience cost Moses a lot. He was prevented by God from entering the Promised Land. He had not obeyed God and God therefore could not trust him. Moses was an influential leader of many people and it can be especially costly if leaders do not obey God.

Sometimes we think our way is better because it feels right and is often the easier path, but disobedience to God can cost us and because he honours our freedom, he will give us over to the consequences if we choose our own way. God doesn’t lead us to obey through fear of punishment. He asks us to freely choose obedience out of love for him, knowing that he deeply loves us like he loves his son Jesus. God asks us to obey because he is entirely trustworthy, more so than any person, including ourselves! He is a good Father who asks us to obey because he knows the best path for us and for others.

I’m still glad I didn’t include ‘obey’ in my wedding vows. It is often right to obey people, but the only one I can always obey is God.

The Day of Small Things 

👤 Geoff

When we lived in Gravesend, one of our neighbours began to rebuild his house from scratch. The house began to take shape, foundations were laid, and for weeks there was the sound of vigorous activity as the walls were framed. Then everybody left - the work stopped. We didn't know why, but for the rest of the time we lived in Gravesend the house stood unfinished on the corner of the street.

Some of God's projects stall, too. Five centuries before Jesus was born, the Israelites returned from exile to find Jerusalem in ruins and their beloved temple destroyed. With great enthusiasm they set about rebuilding it. However, Zerubbabel the governor, got little further than laying the foundation before opposition set in. Neighbours fought the project tooth and nail, finally succeeding in getting a restraining order to halt construction (Ezra 4). Enemies mocked. Supporters became discouraged. For years the site stood silent.

Zerubbabel felt like a failure. His grand dream had fizzled. He was probably like the rest of us when failure looms. We meet further effort with scepticism. We protect ourselves from getting our hopes too high again. We look at the ground rather than the sky, at the past rather than the future.

And then one day a man of God, Zechariah, began to speak words that filled Zerubbabel with fresh hope: "Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the Lord Almighty . . . The hands of Zerubbabel have laid the foundation of this temple, his hands will also complete it" (Zechariah 4:6-7). The project had seemed like an immovable mountain but now with God at work Zerubbabel knew he could finish the temple. The final words of the prophecy jolted him. "Do not despise the day of small things" (v10). He had despised that early start. How weak, how insignificant, how naive he had been. Yet, in spite of all that, God had been in those beginnings.

What little thing, what dream, what false start, might we have despised? Our 'small' church? Our meagre ‘gifts’? Do we despise our failures or apparently insurmountable difficulties? We shouldn't! We should surrender them to the God who delights in taking human weakness and showing his strength. "Not by might, not by power, but my Spirit says the Lord Almighty" (Zechariah 4:6).

And by the way, when we went back to Gravesend a few years later someone had finished that house on the corner of the street.

It looks terrific!