Made alive in Christ
14th May - Laurence Singlehurst - Ephesians 2 v 1-10
Paul wrote Ephesians in prison. His spirit was able to soar and his thinking be wide ranging, even while his body was confined.
God has made us alive. There is something about being alive in Christ that is transformational, passionate, that intrigues and draws other people to Christians.
Laurence
Story of the old missionary with the chalk line down the middle of the hut. The new missionary prayed a prayer of thanks about having a place to stay, and that God was with her. She was alive in her spirit, heart, attitudes. The old lady's heart was eventually melted by her attitude and the chalk line was erased, they started working together and revival came to that part of Africa. All because one of them was alive.
There are two things needed to be truly alive. We are dead to our sins and Jesus makes us alive to Christ. We are still shaped by the world, our environment. We still carry the values of the world around us, we are shaped by the pressure of the world.
It's not enough just to believe in Jesus, but we also need to believe what he said about life. We need to be shaped by the attitudes of God not the world. Be alive not just in spirit but in personality too.
God has created us for good works. They will not get us into heaven, but they are a consequence of us being alive and changed by God.
It's a journey. We still follow the attitudes of the world in areas of our life, because it's so ingrained. But also we will show more and more the attitudes of God as that gets more ingrained and replaces the world in our hearts.
The world is about pursuit of pleasure and avoidance of pain, we are shaped by this. In the 50s there were a lot of Christian values in the world, but that has mostly gone now. We are being conformed to the pattern of a world which no longer has Christian values.
The values of this world are very money-focused, the ads on TV are about pursuit of the 'American dream', about credit cards, managing debt, interest free credit.
Credit cards are very dangerous, spend now pay much later, elastic money. If we are to be generous with our lives, time, energy, money, we have to get our lives under control. We have to draw a line somewhere so we don't spend what we don't have and we can still give. Where the line is drawn is up to us, but it needs to be drawn somewhere.
Generosity changes things, brings in the character and nature of God. Whether it's time, listening, money ...
Consumerism and the 'American dream' brings a halt to generosity. Doesn't mean we have to buy shoddy goods or live on a shoestring, often buying quality is a good investment. But save before you buy, don't buy on credit, and decide where the line is to be drawn.
Relational giving is good, very exciting. Doesn't have to be giving to an institution. Means you can give money, time, listening, prayer etc all to the same person.
We need big hearts, ask God, so we can express his big heart as we do the good works we are designed for. When we give God blesses it, when we listen God enables it, something wonderful happens.
Verse 10 we are God's workmanship, created for good works.
Create space in your time, in your money, in your heart. Do you have more money on your credit card than you should? Does your credit card or your money control you? Be transformed by the spirit of God.
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