Blog - Page 48 of 185

Looking at the bigger picture – from a distance.

You’ve probably never heard of them, but have you ever stood on the Bolehills in Sheffield on a clear night? You look up, and it’s lights, twinkles, and shiny things by the bucket load – stars wherever you look, when the weather is playing nicely, that is. Here’s what most folks don’t get; those lights you see? They’re just the ones close enough to wave. Behind them are galaxies full of stars, millions of light years away – unseen, unnamed, but just as real.

And that is what it’s like to be in Christ. You just can’t fathom the infinite richness of what has been done for you, to you, with you.

Yes, you can pull off Berkhof’s Systematic Theology, or Grudem’s more lightweight but more accessible pages of esteemed learning, and immerse yourself in them. And for convenience’ sake, you might find, say, 20 things that are now yours in Christ… but you are looking at a view of the sky that is no bigger than a coin in your pocket. There’s so much more.

Before you can venture further in this, you have to encounter the immediate truth that Jesus says in Matthew 12:30, which cuts through any ambiguity or agnostic shrug of the shoulders: “Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.”

Tumbleweed moment. Pause for breath. There’s gentle Jesus again, meek and mild. But there’s no middle ground. No Switzerland in the Kingdom of God. You’re either with Him or you’re not. You’re gathered or you’re scattered.

And that matters, because eternity’s not decided by vibes – it’s decided by allegiance; not quite seeker-friendly, but it was never meant to be. It’s like, lay down your ‘stuff’ and follow Jesus as King – and then you’ll have more ‘stuff’ than you can ever comprehend, over eternity.

Let’s not kid ourselves. Jesus isn’t begging for fans. He’s Lord. Crucified, risen, reigning, and returning, and every human being either bows at His feet or braces against His judgment. Those are the only categories that matter. If you’re not with Him, you’re already against Him. That’s not harsh – that’s holy.

There has to be a ‘but’, surely? There is! Here’s the scandal of grace: if you are in Him, then everything – every ounce of mercy, every drop of righteousness, every breath of peace – is yours. You don’t earn it. You don’t perform for it. You receive it, like a rebel who’s been adopted into royalty and handed the keys – all of them – to the kingdom.

And most of us don’t even grasp what we’ve been given, or that we have been given anything. We walk around with our heads down, when we’ve been seated with Christ in the heavenly places (Eph. 2:6). It’s as I mentioned, like trying to count the stars in those distant galaxies from a hill, or your ‘hill’ – you can’t see them, but they’re yours. Just because they’re invisible doesn’t mean they’re not real.

So it is with the blessings of being in Christ: adoption, inheritance, access, power, presence, joy, victory, sonship, communion. Just as real as the God-given breath you just breathed.

Here’s the downer. If you’re not in Christ? None of it is yours. Not a drop. Not a single twinkle. And you need to hear that, because some people think they can play the fence and it’s splinters – keep Jesus close enough for comfort but far enough for convenience. Sounds a good ploy, but actually, the fence doesn’t exist. It’s a lie, a myth – a daft idea. Jesus said you’re either gathering with Him or scattering without Him.

The brutal beauty of the gospel is that the One who draws the line is the One who died to pull you across it. The Son of God became sin so that sinners could become sons. He took wrath to give you righteousness. He was forsaken so you could be found. That’s not religion. That’s rescue.

Even at this point, some of my work-friends will sadly scoff, mock, and entice others to laugh along with them. They can’t see the stars.

So no, you can’t sit this one out. You’re already in the story. The only question is which side of it you’re on. And Christ doesn’t call you to clean up first. He calls you to come. To repent. To believe. To follow.

And if you do? Wow – you won’t just get blessings. You’ll get Christ. The treasure of all treasures. The One in whom all the galaxies of grace converge.

So don’t stand outside the door and just wonder. Step in. Drop the pride. Let the gospel change your heart – and build you brand new.

The stars are real. So is the cross. So is the crown. So are all the blessings, consequences, treasures, riches of being ‘in Christ’.

Choose.

When you expected dreams, visions and prophecy …

It’s Pentecost Sunday this week! Pentecost didn’t begin in Acts 2. It wasn’t a sudden gust of divine spontaneity, as if God woke up one morning and thought, “Now seems like a good time to pour out My Spirit.” No, Pentecost was etched into the divine script from the beginning. Planned, purposed. Intended.

You can trace its beating pulse right back to the RHS Chelsea Flower Show of Eden. When God carefully and precisely formed Adam from the mere dust of the Edenic soil, He didn’t just craft a man – He crafted a vessel. And into that vessel, He breathed. Genesis 2:7 says, “The man became a living creature.” That breath – ruach in Hebrew – was life itself. The first breath inhaled by man was the exhaled breath of God, but it wasn’t yet what we now know as the indwelling Spirit. Adam inhaled the breath of life, not the fullness of God’s indwelling presence.

Fast forward to a locked room in Jerusalem, post-resurrection. Jesus appears to the disciples, and once again, breathes (John 20:22), but this time, He says something different, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” Judas Iscariot, privy to the signs and wonders, miracles, healings and death-nullifying works of Jesus – including the laughter, joy, tears and mysterious parables of Jesus’ life and ministry, including His death and resurrection – tragically missed all of this.

Here, the echoes from Eden are deliberate, a new creation is being formed. Where Adam once received the breath that made him alive, the disciples are now themselves receiving the breath that makes them alive in Christ – this time not to till the soil, but to bear witness to a risen King.

As prescribed in the Law of Israel, the Day of Pentecost arrives fifty sleeps after Passover, and the day – that day – would mark the first fruits of a new harvest – not wheat, but people. Not a crop, but a kingdom.

No one knew where it (or more accurately, ‘He’) came from, but the Spirit came with fire and wind, and suddenly in the divine aftermath, people are speaking in languages they never learned. Tongues! That’s what grabbed the headlines of Jerusalem Post. That’s what turned heads and caused bewilderment and confusion.

Pentecost was never just about tongues, the real miracle was not in the sound, but in the significance. Here was the Spirit of God, no longer just visiting, no one-off spectacular light show-thunder and lightning-on-the-mountain manifestation, no longer resting, but indwelling. The church wasn’t just being empowered; it was being birthed and filled – with power.

Some see Pentecost as a reversal of Babel, and in a way, it was. At Babel, humanity tried to reach heaven on its own terms, and God scattered their languages but at Pentecost, heaven came down to humanity, and God spoke every language through His people. But if you stop there – if you think Pentecost was simply about a one-off communication – you miss the weight of what’s unfolding.

The prophet Joel had seen it from a distance. “I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh,” he declared. “Your sons and daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions” (Joel 2:28). Expectation was high. Everyone was on standby. Something was going to happen – God was going to do what He promised; but what? They waited for power, but didn’t expect it to sound like this. Tongues? What kind of strategy is that? Yet God was making a point. The gospel wasn’t going to be confined to one culture, one language, one people. The Spirit’s arrival in tongues was a declaration, “This gospel will go to the ends of the earth.

Dreams, visions, prophecy – these are signs of a whole people reconnected to heaven. A people filled, not merely touched; tongues were not the goal, but the gateway. They signalled that heaven was no longer distant. The Spirit that hovered over the deep in Genesis, the Spirit that filled the tabernacle, now fills human hearts.

Pentecost is not a side note, it’s the fulfilment of a plan set in motion before time began. God didn’t just plan to dwell with His people – He planned to dwell in them. And now, through Christ, He does.

So this Sunday, don’t just ask, “What happened?” Ask, “What does this mean?” because if the same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead lives in you, then Pentecost isn’t just history – it’s your present reality.