Filling the God shaped hole…

 

A little boy went along to a prayer meeting one day with his father. It was quite an intense prayer meeting where everyone prayed very loudly. Later the little boy remarked to his father, ‘If they lived nearer to God, they wouldn’t have to shout !’

Lent is a time when we traditionally seek to get closer to God, to live a little bit nearer to him, and today in our readings (Jeremiah 31:31-34, Hebrews 5:5-10 & John 12:20-33) we are reminded of some of the promises that we are given by him. We are reminded of the new covenant, the promise that Jesus has made to each one of us, a promise of new life offered in love through his death and resurrection.

As we get closer to the commemoration of Palm Sunday, Holy Week, and ultimately to Easter Day, I think it’s worth just spending a short time reflecting on new life. And in the gospel reading I think we find some points on the subject.

The first is the request to Philip from the Greeks, ‘Sir, we wish to see Jesus’. It is the most simple, most basic thing of all in a quest for new life in Jesus – that is that we want it…

There are people who talk of new life, many people profess faith, attend Churches and so on, and they do so for all kinds of reasons. 

Truly saying ‘we wish to see Jesus’ means that we want to get a closer relationship with him, we want to identify with his pain and suffering, we want to share the love that he shared, we want to meet people as he met them – filled with love and forgiveness, filled with compassion and understanding, filled with a desire to offer people a second, a third, a fourth chance, and many more if they’re needed….

To enjoy the new life that Jesus wants for us, and that Jesus has promised for us, we need to want it – we need to accept his gift and then begin a journey of discovery – discovery of ourselves, discovery of the world around us, discovery of the message and character of Jesus…. Faith doesn’t stop at saying we believe in Jesus, or that he lived and died for us and that he rose again to give new life. Faith certainly doesn’t stop at baptism or confirmation or regular church attendance.

Faith means wanting to be more like Jesus...

And this journey of discovery will lead us to consider a second point and that is to try and understand the words of Jesus as he said, ‘Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life’. 

Sometimes I hear quotes from people and I really haven’t got a clue what they mean but Jesus was good at statements which challenged, and which immediately made people think, and this was one of them... 

Was he saying that life in this world is pointless ? That if we enjoy our lives then we won’t get anywhere near him or the promised eternal life ? 

Was he saying that we had to miserable all the time – some Christians seem to think that !  Or certainly look like it in services sometimes ! Was he saying that we had to be judgmental of all the people around, because we obviously know the truth and others don’t – again some Christians seem to think that !

I don’t think he meant any of that – he was speaking to an audience who needed to assess their lives. He was speaking to an audience who lived by superstition, and by love of material wealth, an audience who had so many other things going on in their lives that they had little time to really think about Jesus or other people…

New life involves an assessment of our lives now – to see what things we are doing, or failing to do, which are preventing us from getting closer to Jesus. A new life, by it’s very nature, must involve a surrendering of our old life.

In the marriage service one of the things that the couple do immediately after their vows and the announcement that they are now married is to walk up towards the altar – and there is lots of symbolism in that action – they are walking towards the altar, a symbol of God, and in doing so they are seeking his guidance and strength for their married lives, and they are walking towards God as a newly created family.

But of course in doing that they are not ignoring the families they are walking away from – they still remain part of the wider family, part of the group that have shaped them and so on. 

And when we seek the new life of Jesus, and surrender our old lives, we don’t surrender the memories that we have and the lessons we have learnt, and we certainly don’t walk away from people we know… We simply walk with a new perspective shaped and influenced by Jesus as our role model.

And the third point of new life in Jesus that I want to think about involves the words of Jesus as he talked about what was to come on the cross for him – he asked if he should pray that he be saved from the suffering, and then answered his own question as he said, ‘it is for this reason that I have come to this hour… Father, glorify your name…’

Sometimes our lives won’t turn out as we hoped or planned – but God is there... Sometimes we don’t understand things, and we don’t need to be afraid to say that, but God is there... Sometimes it doesn’t even seem like he’s there, but he’s there...

In the Lords prayer we pray, ‘Thy will be done’ and I’m sure we sometimes pray it with a kind of extra sub conscious bit built on – ‘Thy will be done as long as it kind of suits me and I can manage it’.

But to follow Jesus isn’t to get an easy life, but to respond to a display of love greater than any before –the display that involved a man living to die, not just for one person, but for every person, whatever they may have done or thought of him.

History is full of people who have died for a cause, who have died for someone they cared for, and there are many great heroes amongst them, but only one person has accepted death for all – even for those who killed him.

Following such a man faithfully, seeking to live as he lived, is never going to be easy…

But following Jesus is also a response to an offer of fullness of life…. Again, I stress, not an easy life, but fullness of life, and the 2 are very different… An easy life judged by our earthly standards may involve good health, lots of money, a comfortable house, a nice car, no money worries, good relations with all the people we meet and so on… it’s a life that’s often desired but rarely really achieved…

But fullness of life can be attained – it is the sort of life that offers us peace in turmoil, that offers hope in despair, comfort in times of discomfort, that helps us to understand that we are loved no matter what we may have done or said or thought…

St Augustine said that within each one of us there is a God shaped hole waiting to be filled, and fullness of life can be achieved when we ask God to start filling that hole…

He could fill it instantly if we really let him – we could know perfect peace, but being human that doesn’t often happen and we hold back and only let him do it slowly as we get closer to him, and understand and trust him more… We often allow him to do it only on our terms...

In our journey through the rest of Lent, through Holy Week and into the incredible celebration of Jesus’ new life, let’s think about that and ask ourselves what we need to open up to get closer to God…

 And let’s pray every day that we will do that, and let’s ask him, and allow Him, to fill that God shaped hole for us so that we may know him better, glorify his name in all that we do, think and say, and in doing that, being a light shining for God in the world - not perfect but a light that will encourage others to encounter the living and life transforming God…  AMEN