Psalms in Lent: Psalm 105 - Lockdown Anniversary

The past week marked a year since the UK went into full lockdown.  Nothing in any living Briton's experience of life in the UK prepared us for that day and its subsequent year.

It also marked a year since our household went into lockdown when our nurse daughter came home from hospital with Covid symptoms.

We celebrated the unwelcome anniversary with an Indian curry and a sense of quiet gratitude to God for a year of provision and safety in the storm.

Psalm 105 seemed an apt place to be one day last week in our Lent readings.  In it the story of Israel is recounted, and the providence of God celebrated, which I abbreviate below.  Just one line at the end is, however, significant - that they might observe his statutes, and keep his laws.

When the Lord is merciful to us, it is incumbent on us to respond in faithfulness back to him.  And if not - as Israel was later to discover - it all happens again  . .

O give thanks unto the Lord; call upon his name: 

. . . He is the Lord our God: his judgments are in all the earth.

He hath remembered his covenant for ever,

the word which he commanded to a thousand generations.

When they went from one nation to another,  from one kingdom to another people;

he suffered no man to do them wrong:

yea, he reproved kings for their sakes;

Joseph, who was sold for a servant:

whose feet they hurt with fetters:

he was laid in iron:

until the time that his word came:

the word of the Lord tried him.

The king sent and loosed him;

even the ruler of the people, and let him go free.

Israel also came into Egypt;

and Jacob sojourned in the land of Ham.

And he increased his people greatly;

and made them stronger than their enemies.

He turned their heart to hate his people,

to deal subtilly with his servants.

He sent Moses his servant;

and Aaron whom he had chosen.

They shewed his signs among them,

and wonders in the land of Ham.

He brought them forth also with silver and gold:

and there was not one feeble person among their tribes.

Egypt was glad when they departed:

for the fear of them fell upon them.

He spread a cloud for a covering;

and fire to give light in the night.

The people asked, and he brought quails,

and satisfied them with the bread of heaven.

He opened the rock, and the waters gushed out;

they ran in the dry places like a river.

For he remembered his holy promise,

and Abraham his servant.

And he brought forth his people with joy,

and his chosen with gladness:

and gave them the lands of the heathen:

and they inherited the labour of the people;

that they might observe his statutes, and keep his laws.

Praise ye the Lord.

Psalms in Lent: Psalm 30 Joe Biden's verse?

 It was a great day for our annual Church Motto Text when, in its first month, it was the (lone) Scripture quoted in the new American President's inaugural address.

He chose it for much the same reason, I imagine, as we chose it: looking ahead from within the reality of weeping to a future joy.

As we continue reflecting on the Psalms in Lent it is worth noticing a correction I made when (on my sole preaching Sunday of 2021 so far) in the opening service in January I indicated that this is part of a two part verse.

What (for brevity) we chose not to put on our card - and which for secular purposes Joe Biden probably never considered quoting - is the other, qualifying part of the poetic stanza:

For his anger lasts only a moment,

    but his favour lasts a lifetime;

weeping may stay for the night,

    but joy comes in the morning.

Ah, there is God after all.

It is not some anti-gravitational life force that pulls human hope up out of weeping.  It is the grace, the favour of God.  

Nor, it should be added, is weeping an unforeseen problem foisted on a victim God and his human creation.  It is a consequence perhaps of judgment, perhaps of withdrawn favour (which is similar but not quite the same).

Put another way, our Motto Text is not a lot of use unless we also see God there.  And so we pray . . .

Fallow

I was looking back a year and noticed that last January I highlighted this beautiful song with Sandra McCracken.  And on reflection it is hard to imagine a song that was more appropriate, a few weeks before we were plunged into the fallow life of Covid.

I love the simple truth of this song.  Not every Sunday is a high experience.  Not every Church is in revival.  There is more to the Kingdom than days of feasting . . .

Baptists for a pandemic: 1. Thomas Grantham

I have been reading about some Baptists who I think are very useful for our pandemic season.

First, and on one level most interestingly, I begin with Thomas Grantham.  That I hadn't heard of him on July 12th will be obvious from my blog of that day.   But that is to my shame.  For Thomas Grantham was very well-known in the 17th century.

It is important to note that what I am about to reveal is not at all unique to Thomas.  He was the most famous advocate of the position because at the time because he was, well, famous.  His book Christianus Primitivus was one of the great early Baptist theologies.

Thomas Grantham represents a marked strand in Baptist history that rejected congregational singing.  As Baptists, more than most, we are bewailing our loss of freedom to sing in the pandemic.  It is peculiar to note that our forefathers were quite strongly opposed to the practice.  One cantor singing a Psalm was the preferred rule.

We imagine Thomas Grantham to be very 'strict', but that turns out to be false.  Thomas Grantham held the view that 'Christ died for all', which was a 'General' Baptist 17th century interpretation, creating an openness and evangelistic edge that many stricter Baptists (and others) rejected.

The next time I complain of a year without congregational singing I will remember that some of the most formative years of Baptist fellowships were decades without congregational singing.  So no excuses for us complaining that we can't go on like this!

God in the Garden 2. Hidden Problems

It even surprises me.

When we filmed the Easter Morning pandemic recording in the garden there was the awkwardness of a derelict pond motor cupboard, used by a previous resident to create a flowing water feature.  It is clearly many years into its decay.

'Why,' I wondered, 'have I never fixed it?'   

I ventured my best explanation - that in the summer it was hidden, because in truth I could hardly remember thinking about it in days in the garden over the years.

And so it proved to be.  I simply hadn't realised how totally the greenery in the pond left the old cupboard out of sight and out of mind.  Here it is in the summer:

That is why it is never fixed!

As we thought about at Easter, the reason for the coming and sacrifice of Jesus is because sin is never hidden from Him - it required action.  The reason why humankind can be equivocal about, blase towards or disinterested in the great salvation Jesus achieved is because we simply cover up our sinfulness to ourselves and among ourselves.  It doesn't need fixing, so we don't need Jesus.

This strategy fails to take account of the end of the story - where what God sees is the basis of our eternal accountability.

Pandemic Parables 6: Whether or not we're indoors . . .

Jesus also said, “This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. All by itself the soil produces grain—first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come.” 

This is perhaps the most encouraging of parables for the church in a pandemic.  The list of what can be done in building relationships for the Kingdom is very much shorter.  The possibilities for the winter ahead are filled with uncertainties, and even next summer is tough to plan towards.  Whilst some expressions of Christianity are more content with a low-key private or contemplative approach, Baptist and Evangelical Christians have always viewed life as seizing opportunities and working for them when they are missing.  More like Jesus' Galilean ministry than his earlier Nazareth days of carpentry.

Another parable I cited was about the sower sowing the seed.  It reflected different kinds of soil productivity.  This little parable from Mark's Gospel is about providence.  The farmer must do something - sow the seed - but then cannot really do anything.  Whether locked down (asleep) or up and busy, the soil produces the grain.

This does not entirely reflect modern agriculture - but it brilliantly reflects 2020 church work.  Thank you, Jesus!

Pandemic Parables 5. Accountable to myself

Today I availed myself of the Government's 'Eat Out to Help Out' scheme.  Walking around a sparsely populated city block I say a mainly empty cafe and took up the offer of the half priced lunch.  I would have eaten anyway, which seems to me to point up the ludicrous nature of the scheme - but if you're a tax payer - thanks!!  It was nice.  

My table had a QR code.  This was how I was to register for the NHS Test and Trace scheme.  As a diligent enforcer in our church, I felt i ought to co-operate, even though it was hardly prominent.  But I'm not great with QR codes, so after a few complications on my phone I gave up and enjoyed my sandwiches anyway.  As far as I could tell I was the only person in the Cafe even trying to use the code.

That's how we like it.  An important regulation - qualification - that we can choose to ignore.  In the end, it's my decision.

Jesus spoke to them again in parables, saying: “The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son . . .

“Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding banquet is ready, but those I invited did not deserve to come. So go to the street corners and invite to the banquet anyone you find.’ So the servants went out into the streets and gathered all the people they could find, the bad as well as the good, and the wedding hall was filled with guests.

“But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing wedding clothes. He asked, ‘How did you get in here without wedding clothes, friend?’ The man was speechless.

“Then the king told the attendants, ‘Tie him hand and foot, and throw him outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’

“For many are invited, but few are chosen.”

My hunch is that, in the minds of very many people Jesus, the Gospel, salvation, being born again,  believing all figure like the Kingdom of Heaven's QR Code.  Maybe we should attend to him/them but in the end, let's wing it - 'after all my great grandad went to Church' (actually mine didn't as far as I know).

The question arises whether God's judgment and final entry into Heaven's Kingdom will operate with the laxity of the cafe I visited - or indeed the Government's own enforcement.  If so, a great deal of sin is going to be part of that kingdom and eternity looks very uninviting for us all.   But as Jesus' parable points out, God's Kingdom will ultimately require the right clothes - it is a Wedding Banquet, not a Cafe.  Being dressed right is the only way in, and the only way to be dressed right is to put on the new clothes the King has provided, Jesus, the Gospel, salvation, being born again,  believing.

Pandemic Parables 4. Working with what you've got

So we can't sing; we can't have refreshments, we can't stay long in church, we can't sit near each other, greet each other, touch each other, share communion bread, baptise, organise events for invitees, visit people in their homes, serve people indoors at a soup kitchen . . .

“Again, here is what the kingdom of heaven will be like. A man was going on a journey. He sent for his slaves and put them in charge of his money. He gave five bags of gold to one. He gave two bags to another. And he gave one bag to the third. The man gave each slave the amount of money he knew the slave could take care of. Then he went on his journey. The slave who had received five bags of gold went at once and put his money to work. He earned five bags more. The one with the two bags of gold earned two more. But the man who had received one bag went and dug a hole in the ground. He hid his master’s money in it.

“After a long time the master of those slaves returned. He wanted to collect all the money they had earned. The man who had received five bags of gold brought the other five. ‘Master,’ he said, ‘you trusted me with five bags of gold. See, I have earned five more.’

“His master replied, ‘You have done well, good and faithful slave! You have been faithful with a few things. I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!’

“The man with two bags of gold also came. ‘Master,’ he said, ‘you trusted me with two bags of gold. See, I have earned two more.’

“His master replied, ‘You have done well, good and faithful slave! You have been faithful with a few things. I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!’

“Then the man who had received one bag of gold came. ‘Master,’ he said, ‘I knew that you are a hard man. You harvest where you have not planted. You gather crops where you have not scattered seed. So I was afraid. I went out and hid your gold in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you.’

“His master replied, ‘You evil, lazy slave! So you knew that I harvest where I have not planted? You knew that I gather crops where I have not scattered seed? Well then, you should have put my money in the bank. When I returned, I would have received it back with interest.’

“Then his master commanded the other slaves, ‘Take the bag of gold from him. Give it to the one who has ten bags. Everyone who has will be given more. They will have more than enough. And what about anyone who doesn’t have? Even what they have will be taken away from them. Throw that worthless slave outside. There in the darkness, people will weep and grind their teeth.’

Ah.

So the Kingdom of God is not about what we have or haven't got.  It's about what we do with what we have.

Pandemic Parables 3. What's happened to the seed?

Jesus explains his Parable of the Sower (which we often note is really the parable of the soil - and the seed).

“Listen then to what the parable of the sower means: 

When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in their heart. This is the seed sown along the path. The seed falling on rocky ground refers to someone who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away. The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful. But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.”

Most of us preachers have spoken on this story quite a few times.  But now I see the pandemic here.

It appears in the form of thorns.  

The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful.

The worries of this life.  That's a pandemic.  You don't have to catch it to be choked by it spiritually.  The promises of the Word overwhelmed by the latest Government edict, the light of the word lost behind the clouds of despair, the search for a vaccine a deeper longing than the search for a Saviour.  

Though a seemingly gentle, rustic parable there is brutal reality here.  Farming is quite brutally realistic at times.  The pandemic will find people out.  Assumed spiritual growth will be found to be wanting and corners of the spiritual landscape will deny the Lord of the Harvest.

None of this means that the harvest will be disappointing - to the contrary it will be amazing and wonderful.  But will it include me?  And you?

Pandemic Parables 2. Within 2 Metres

Among the best known of all Jesus' parables is that of the Good Samaritan (Luke chapter 10):

“And who is my neighbour?”

 Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho. Robbers attacked him. They stripped off his clothes and beat him. Then they went away, leaving him almost dead. A priest happened to be going down that same road. When he saw the man, he passed by on the other side.  A Levite also came by. When he saw the man, he passed by on the other side too.  But a Samaritan came to the place where the man was. When he saw the man, he felt sorry for him.  He went to him, poured olive oil and wine on his wounds and bandaged them. Then he put the man on his own donkey. He brought him to an inn and took care of him.

Very early in the lockdown it occured to me that this parable now illustrates a fundamental Christian problem derived from the pandemic.  This has been reinforced as, with leaders everywhere, I share the agonies of trying to get some sort of meaningful restart to church life.

In this parable social distancing is seen to be the safe course, and the respectable passers by stick, I would imagine, to a good 2 metres.

But the only way to be in the will of God is to get close.  

Now to be clear, this is hardly directly relevant to the church choir standing close, or the greeting hug at the door, or serving communion in a common cup.  It is, however, illustrative of the difficulty of  doing God's will in a pandemic.  

At a stroke it has separated our church - and almost every church - from developing contacts with the lost, the poor and those we meet on the road of life.  We can keep them and ourselves apart and go to our Zoom meeting - but the result is that we are not able to be the neighbours we were told to be.

The pandemic is making it very hard to do God's work.

How can I keep from singing?

It has been a surreal experience to return to the church building for Sunday morning worship these past two weeks.  Certainly things were feeling pandemically safe, but then again so is the local cemetery (for its residents).  We have some imaginative ideas for worship in the weeks ahead: but singing with our voices seems a distance away.

It is easy to OVERestimate the importance of singing.
The viral rise of the Contemporary Christian Music industry (CCM) has left most of us wondering how we ever found God without five of this year's new songs being sung.  Yet astonishingly we did.  You don't have to be a Quaker to object that God is at work when songs are silent.  Countless believers have spent years or lifetimes imprisoned or isolated in such ways as to render congregational singing a distant dream.  The Bible enjoins and reports praying far more often than singing (especially in the New Testament!).

But it is easy to UNDERestimate the importance of singing.
Most religions have some kind of music and song, but Christianity is full of it.  Whole service forms are based around singing, and whole church traditions defined by its forms (Anglican Evensong, Hillsongs, Gaelic Psalms).  One look at our church building gives the clue that singing is part of it . . .

. . . the organ, the choir stalls, the piano, the drums, the screen (mainly for projecting song words).
Singing, in Christianity, is an expression of the fundamental joy of a saving faith.  It is not a necessary rite; it is more than that.  Christianity is a new song.

Good News in a Pandemic: 7. Warning

STAY HOME

STAY ALERT

KEEP YOUR DISTANCE

WASH YOUR HANDS

DO NOT TRAVEL

SELF-ISOLATE

The last few months have multiplied the warnings.  Even though they're becoming more complicated these days they keep on coming.

It's not that warnings, including Government warnings, are anything new.  There is a whole industry of them, like packets of peanuts with warnings that the packet contains nuts.  It is just that they are now serious news - and well received by most, however unpalatable they appear to be for our comfort zone.

The renaissance of the warning as good news is itself good news.  Through increasingly complacent times the idea that the Bible warns has been offensive almost, that God warns irritating, that the Holy Spirit warns best avoided and the Jesus warned (he did it a lot) just perplexing.

Given that the Bible begins (in a perfect relationship between God and Man) with a warning, and that its last chapter is replete with warnings, we should better understand warning as a positive thing.

What is a pandemic if it is not a general warning to humanity?  The birds don't care, the moon doesn't mind, no angel has caught Covid-19 and nobody who died before last November had it either.  It is a warning to the people of now - to me, to you - that life is finite, material things are temporary, relationships are precious, and attention must be given to our soul's relationship with its Maker before we are brought face-to-face with Him.  That's where the Good News of a Saviour comes in - it was the most important thing after all . . .

Good News in a Pandemic: 6. Ascension Day

Charles Haddon Spurgeon explains why, however sad we may feel, this day (perhaps more than any other) reminds us that we now have reason for great joy!!

Our Lord is risen from the dead; 

Our Jesus is gone up on high; 

The powers of hell are captive led— 

Dragged to the portals of the sky. 

I have known that one thought of our Lord’s exaltation lift me up from the borders of despair, in a dread hour, long since past, when reason almost reeled after great calamities had overtaken me. I recovered my balance and my peace of mind, in a single moment, by the recollection of that one text, “Wherefore God also has highly exalted Him, and given Him a name which is above every name.”

So long as He lives and reigns, all is well. Men may rave at me as they will, but what does it matter so long as He is exalted?  I want you, dear friends, to feel like that concerning your ascended Lord. Go home [During the pandemic we would amend to Stay Home!], and worship Him, and be filled with great joy.  

Good News in a Pandemic: 5. NHS (etc.)

Someone writing about the National Health Service was wistfully observing that it seems to have become a national religion.

There is no doubt that the NHS is held in high regard by most Britons - even ones who might tolerate the opposite extreme in the USA were they living there.  The pandemic centres everyone on doctors, nurses and paramedics and in the UK they are synonymous with the NHS.

Thus every Thursday we clap our praise to our religion in the form of community thanks for NHS staff (more recently widened to care workers in general). 

Normally applause is reserved for sportspeople, for actors or for speeches.  But when we are sick, or when we fear we might be sick, we suddenly see the value of the doctors and nurses.

"It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick", said Jesus (Luke 5:31).  "I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance."

It is the person who needs a Saviour - who knows they need a Saviour - who praises Jesus the Saviour.

Good News in a Pandemic 4. Creation

There is no doubt that Genesis reveals human beings as the crown of creation. 'So God created man in his own image; in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.' [Genesis 1:27]

Time and again, though, the Bible demonstrates that they are not the totality of creation.  Take, for example, these verses from Psalm 104:

8 

The mountains rose, the valleys sank down

    to the place that you appointed for them.

9 

You set a boundary that they may not pass,

    so that they might not again cover the earth.

10 

You make springs gush forth in the valleys;

    they flow between the hills;

11 

they give drink to every beast of the field;

    the wild donkeys quench their thirst.

12 

Beside them the birds of the heavens dwell;

    they sing among the branches.

13 

From your lofty abode you water the mountains;

    the earth is satisfied with the fruit of your work.

14 

You cause the grass to grow for the livestock

    and plants for man to cultivate,

that he may bring forth food from the earth 

and wine to gladden the heart of man,

15 

    

oil to make his face shine

    and bread to strengthen man's heart.

16 

The trees of the Lord are watered abundantly,

    the cedars of Lebanon that he planted.

17 

In them the birds build their nests;

    the stork has her home in the fir trees.

18 

The high mountains are for the wild goats;

    the rocks are a refuge for the rock badgers.

The Lord Jesus references creation many times; most starkly on Palm Sunday when he tells the critics of praising children in Jerusalem that if they silence the children the very stones on the hillsides will begin praising instead.

So, a pandemic certainly appears to mute human praise on earth.  Literally, because we cannot meet to sing and speak our praise - but perhaps also psychologically because we are emotionally and mentally reduced by the whole experience of lockdown and its attendant life inputs.

Yet we are but a part of creation.  

And the rest of it seems to be having a much better time!

The Lord may weep with us but He has plenty of reason to smile with many of the creatures and plants he has also made as the streets clear, the air clears and nature finds her voice.

Good News in a Pandemic: 2. Science

Science (from the Latin word for. knowledge) has been good news in the pandemic.  Indeed it offers the only plausible way out for the full resumption of life as we knew it.  Or if the coronavirus miraculously disappeared we would rely on science to find the explanation to reassure us.

I have chosen science as my second area of good news because it is usually placed in opposition to, or more likely in superiority to, God.  It is, more truthfully, a gift from God.

Science is good news when we understand its boundaries.

1. The Information Boundary: It informs but does not decide

As the UK tries to leave national lockdown it is always, we are told, led by the science.  But at the daily news conferences it becomes clear that the scientists in the room (two usually), are quick to point out that there are decisions that will have to be made and that these decisions will be political.  

Or to put it another way - they can see the numbers but do not wish to make decisions about the choices on offer.  Indeed, scientists actively disagree with the ones that appear in Downing Street - creating decisions that need to be made between scientists.  

We misuse science when we imply that it has the answers.  It has the information (in varying degrees of certainty).  Could an all-powerful deity have created the first two human beings?  Scientifically he could have and there are other theories too.  What I believe about that is a decision, not a piece of scientific data. Informed, not led, by the science.

2.  The Finite Knowledge Boundary: It is the best we know but not enough

The advances in knowledge have been phenomenal in recent centuries.  Just take the fact you are reading this via the internet, possibly on a phone.

There is a widespread undercurrent of fake news that assumes science explains everything in the world around us.  Only the most arrogant celebrity scientists allow that view because good scientists know that there is much they do not know.

An important piece of good news in this pandemic has been seeing scientists addressing the public honestly, explaining they do not have an answer when the public are desperate for one.  To treat our knowledge as finite is an important humility for humans.  When we sigh a relief after science has helped us through this virus, we will remember for a generation that science does not yet know the next virus, and so on.

3.  The Earthly Boundary:  It is earthly not heavenly

If the plague angel in Revelation 21:9 (remember that angel?) gives a whole new perspective on plagues it is worth reflecting that no science can ever investigate Heaven's perspective.  Science (even cosmology) looks at things from earth and from humans.  Revelation (both the book and the principle) shows us the other side of  things.

Arguably, the other side - the heavenly side - is the only one that ultimately matters, and it is certainly the one that matters most.

Good News in a Pandemic 1. God

There is no shortage of bad news in a pandemic.  As it is over a hundred years since Western societies really had a proper community-battering one we don't know what to think.  Whereas in the busy rush of working, travelling, dealing, chilling, training, coffee-drinking, sport-watching, family visiting and so on there is precious little time to think, we now have time to think.  But think about what?

"Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things." Philippians 4:8

Guaranteed to tick all these boxes is . . . God.  Let's think about God.

No, wait, Western societies don't do God any more.  This is a pandemic for the politicians and the scientists.  The odd mention or two for religion - the Pope at Easter, the Jews at Passover and the Muslims now in Ramadan.  But no National Day of Prayer - because collectively we don't believe in God.

And so we miss the good news.  Here's Revelation 21.

5 And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.” 6 And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment. 7 The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God and he will be my son. 8 But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulphur, which is the second death.”9 Then came one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues and spoke to me, saying, “Come, I will show you the Bride, the wife of the Lamb.” 10 And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great, high mountain, and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God, 11 having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal.

Why is this significant just now?

Verse 9.

An angel points John to the most amazing vision of the people of God, the bride of (Jesus) the lamb.  But this is one of the angels who also had the bowls of the plagues (described with all-too-graphic power in chapter 16).

Looked at through the lens of God plagues are an ordered and holy thing (chapter 15).  They may intrude upon the churches of earth and our patterns of worship but they ultimately speed the Church's finest hour when this earth is over and glory begun.

The Lord travels with us through earthly agonies as our Saviour and Friend - but do not ever mistake his loving presence for weakness, his sharing of our journey for a lack of sovereignty, his passion and compassion for powerlessness.

No, the world's bad news is part of the divine good news.  The very angels under whose watch humanity is brought low, pull the believer away to a sight where human beings in Christ are brought indescribably high by grace alone. 

In the words of Jesus (Luke 21), 'There will be signs . . . on earth dismay . . . when these things begin to happen look up because your redemption draws near!

Psalm 91: A Psalm for a Pandemic in Lent

The text of a sermon preached at Muswell Hill Baptist Church on March 15, 2020.  This was the church's last meeting before the growing pandemic led the Government to instruct all religious groups to stop gathering in order to hold back the spread of the COVID-19 virus.

We are in unusual times – for us.  

But these are far from unusual times for the human race.  More locally, these are far from unusual times in London.

Every so often you may be checking out the increasingly grim coronavirus statistics.  But in the Diary of Samuel Pepys we find him reading the 17^th century Bills of Mortality:  

Thus this month ends, with great sadness upon the public through the greatness of the plague, everywhere through the Kingdom almost. Every day sadder and sadder news of its increase. In the City died this week 7496; and all of them, 6102 of the plague. But it is feared that the true number of the dead this week is near 10000 - partly from the poor that cannot be taken notice of through the greatness of the number, and partly from the Quakers and others that will not have any bell ring for them. As to myself, I am very well; only, in fear of the plague . .

So we are not at all the first London congregation to turn to Psalm 91 as a pestilence happens around us.

1. This Psalm is for You - personally

Psalm 90 begins this 4th book of Psalms. 

1 Lord, you have been our dwelling-place

throughout all generations.

. . .4 A thousand years in your sight

are like a day that has just gone by,

or like a watch in the night.

5 Yet you sweep people away in the sleep of death –

they are like the new grass of the morning:

It makes uncomfortable human reading  (until you trust in God.)  The individual human being seems very small, part of a tide.  This is what a global epidemic feels like - numbers and statistics and curves and percentages.  And it always was:

The Bills of Mortality began to be published regularly in 1603, in which year 33,347 deaths were recorded from plague. 1625 saw 41,313 dead.  The 1625 outbreak was recorded at the time as the 'Great Plague', until deaths from the plague of 1665 surpassed it.  The official returns for 1665 record 68,596 cases of plague, but a reasonable estimate suggests this figure is 30,000 short of the true total.

Into all these fearful statistics comes Psalm 91.

1 He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High

will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.

2 I will say of the Lord, ‘He is my refuge and my fortress,

my God, in whom I trust.’

In every ‘you’ in this Psalm it is addressed to the singular.  

HE who dwells – that’s just him, you, me.

The numbers are here of course: 

7 A thousand may fall at your side,

ten thousand at your right hand,

but it will not come near you.

But the number that matters is just you. 

This is a pointed and opportune time to ask this question – how is your personal relationship with God?

ISAIAH 55:6 Seek the LORD while he may be found; call on him while he is near.  7 Let the wicked forsake his way and the evil man his thoughts. Let him turn to the LORD, and he will have mercy on him, and to our God, for he will freely pardon.

If  you must self-isolate in this epidemic – take this Psalm with you – and remember it is for you, not for church.  Provided you too can say:

2 I will say of the Lord, ‘He is my refuge and my fortress,

my God, in whom I trust.’

2. This Psalm is for Salvation but not for Show

a. For Salvation

3 Surely he will save you

from the fowler’s snare

and from the deadly pestilence.

4 He will cover you with his feathers,

and under his wings you will find refuge;

his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.

14 ‘Because he loves me,’ says the Lord, ‘I will rescue him;

I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.

15 He will call on me, and I will answer him;

I will be with him in trouble,

I will deliver him and honour him.

16 With long life I will satisfy him

and show him my salvation.’

There are many troubles in this Psalm:

5 You will not fear the terror of night,

nor the arrow that flies by day,

6 nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness,

nor the plague that destroys at midday.

But His feathers are enough.  They are as a shield, as a rampart.  Feathers so gentle, so powerful.

Lord Craven lived in London when the plague raged. On the plague growing epidemic, his Lordship, to avoid the danger, resolved to go to his seat in the country. His coach and six were accordingly at the door, his baggage put up, and all things in readiness for the journey. As he was walking through his hall he overheard his servant saying to another servant. "I suppose, by my Lord's quitting London to avoid the plague, that his God lives in the country, and not in town." The man said this really believing a plurality of gods.

Lord Craven paused. "My God lives everywhere, and can preserve me in town as well as in the country. I will stay where I am.”

He continued in London, helped his sick neighbours, and never caught the infection.

It is a Psalm to place our trust in because God is personally with us where we are.

b. Not for Show

A Psalm for a Pandemic  - in Lent.  What has it to do with Lent? 

Lent is framed around the forty days when Jesus, in the wilderness, confronted and overcame Satan, the tempter.

LUKE 4:9 The devil led him to Jerusalem and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. ‘If you are the Son of God,’ he said, ‘throw yourself down from here. 10 For it is written [Psalm 91]:

‘“He will command his angels concerning you

    to guard you carefully;

11 they will lift you up in their hands,

    so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.”’

12 Jesus answered, ‘It is said: “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.”’

Satan tempts Jesus with Psalm 91.  It is Jesus’ chance to display his invincibility.  Jesus, instead, shows his obedience to his calling.

Even the most wonderful promises are part of our discipleship, our discipline, our self-denial.  Like the gifts of the Holy Spirit, the promises of God are for Service and for Salvation, not for Show.

Charles Haddon Spurgeon, the great Baptist Preacher in Victorian London told this account of service and salvation in pestilential times:

In the year 1854, when I had scarcely been in London twelve months, the neighbourhood in which I laboured was visited by Asiatic cholera, and my congregation suffered from its inroads. Family after family summoned me to the bedside of the smitten, and almost every day I was called to visit the grave... I became weary in body and sick at heart. My friends seemed falling one by one, and I felt or fancied that I was sickening like those around me… As God would have it, I was returning mournfully home from a funeral, when my curiosity led me to read a paper in a shoemaker's window in the Dover Road. It bore in a good bold handwriting these words: "Because thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the most High, thy habitation; there shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling." The effect upon my heart was immediate. Faith appropriated the passage as her own. I felt secure, refreshed, girt with immortality ... The providence which moved the tradesman to place those verses in his window I gratefully acknowledge, and in the remembrance of its marvellous power I adore the Lord my God.

Nobody can have two homes — two places of ultimate resort. And if the Lord be truly my dwelling place then even in these times, my home is enough and is secure - a home of divine feathers in a hard world.