Sunday 25 December

Nehemiah 3:1-4:23

That dirty Sanaballat.  He was a baddies’ baddy.  He had obviously listened attentively at Evil School.  He knew well the first two tricks of opposition and he played them like trumps in a game of contract whist.  The first trick of Evil School is to make God’s people feel stupid.  You need to wait until they have played their ace, wait until they have built up a fragile sense of hopeful anticipation, and then you smash down your trump on it.  You add to that a look of utter contempt - or even pity if you can master it - and then add to that some attack on their identity.  Maybe you call them weak.  Or fat,  Or thick.  Or unpopular.  Or maybe you say a fox could knock their best efforts over.  It doesn’t matter quite what you say as long as it wracks the Christian with an overpowering sense of self-doubt.  And if that fails (which it rarely does) then you can pull out trick number two.  Trick number two is less subtle than trick number one but it is equally effective; plot an attack.  The attack is to overwhelm God’s people with fear.  Get in their face, cause them trouble, freak them out.  If God’s people prove resilient to self-doubt then you can often just scare them into inactivity.  It is amazing how often this will work.  But the thing baddies have to be scared of, the thing that will out-trump all of their trumps, the thing that will overcome all of the Evil School tricks is prayer.  Prayer to the great and awesome Lord.  Prayer that leads to hard work and boldness.  Evil School has no answer to that.  

Revelation 17:1-18

I’m sat in Starbucks (I’ve got ahead with my readings).  I’m listening to the lovely twinkly Christmas music and looking at all the delicious treats on offer and I’m finding it hard to equate what I see with what I have just read.  The passage tells me of great powers raging in this world.  It tells of a huge grotesque and adulterous force that is intoxicating us all with worship of false gods.  It says that this force is violently opposed to me and my faith.  It says that it wants my blood, and it has some pedigree.  But everything I see looks so jolly.  Christmas is just so jolly... isn’t it??  I think this is one of the areas of my faith that I struggle with more than anything else.  I think it is because I am middle-class.  I have grown so accustomed to presenting myself and having things presented to me in a way takes the edge of them.  Life is manicured around me.  It has been de-clawed.  It has been jollied-up.  I suppose there is nothing wrong with that except that it belies the truth.  It is fine, as long as I can see through the facade and perceive the truth.  I need to take my middle-class glasses off a bit more often and look with the eyes of faith.  I need to see that in their hearts - in their souls - people are haggard.  People are on the brink.  I need to look, and I mean properly look, at the cancer and the divorce and the loss and the loneliness and the people struck by trains and the slander against Jesus and grasp that this is the work of a disgusting and despicable force.  It is the work of THE MOTHER OF PROSTITUTES.  It is ultimately the work of the Beast.  And I need to hold its gaze.  I need to hold the gaze of this blinged-up force of fetid ugliness.  For when I do that I will see its days are numbered.  I will see its days will be ended by the Lamb.  For the Lamb will triumph.  The Lamb will overcome.  To live blind to this would be a tragedy.  To pretend to be jolly while not realising this truth would be a savage irony.  For we can overcome with Him.  We can overcome.  If we keep on looking.  We can overcome if we remain faithful.

Psalm 147:12-20

“He grants peace to your borders and satisfies you with the finest of wheat” (v14).

I will never look at my weetabix in the same way again.