RebeccaMallinson

Unity is essential. Without unity there are arguments, hatred and occasions for great sin. There is no peace or love. There is a lovely hymn called ‘We are One in the Spirit’ with the chorus line, ‘and they’ll know we are Christians by our love, by our love, yes they’ll know that we are Christians by our love.’ Without unity, how can anyone take us seriously when we witness to them? I think the barriers between Christian denominations must break God’s heart. They have been present in the church from the earliest times and continue to this day.

God’s will is not always clear. Generally speaking God’s desire is not to immediately extract us from the earth, however, we will all die, whether while young or old. While we are here, it is with a purpose. Sometimes we know the purpose and sometimes not. To be ‘in’ but not ‘of’ the world, we have to adhere to God’s values, not worldly values. We achieve this by constant prayer and maintaining our focus.

The Son and the Father are one being. I don’t think it is therefore possible for them to have separate possessions. Jesus wishes us to be one with Him too. He is a generous God. I think of the parable of the prodigal son, where the father says ‘Everything I have is yours, but we must celebrate the return of the son who was lost and is now found.’ We are all welcomed with the same huge generosity. As Jesus came to Earth as an example to us, we need to show the same value of giving of ourselves with unhesitant generosity in the way we live.

Jesus’s pre-existent glory was the majesty of a very great God, the most powerful being of all. In scripture it is described in terms of a king in the midst of his court. During his earthly ministry this glory was veiled so that only on occasion was it seen. His glory was glimpsed when he performed miracles, when God spoke saying ‘This is my Son the beloved’, when the disciples saw him transfigured and ultimately when he rose from the dead and ascended into Heaven. Christ’s glory increased because of his great achievement on earth. I think Jesus wanted his disciples to see him in this glory to encourage them when they are suffering later on and to affirm their faith in him.

The work God gave Jesus to do was to proclaim God’s kingdom and our salvation. It brought glory to the Father by bringing us all to a knowledge of God that was from the heart rather than the law, as it had been previously. The work the Father called me to do is to proclaim God’s kingdom in South Sudan while educating the very poor and giving love to the orphans I live with. If I am bringing glory to the Father, it is through doing this; however I see the concept of me, as a human being, being able to bring glory as a bit too grand. I am more comfortable with saying it is my ‘offering’.

The average person would probably define the words ‘eternal life’ as ‘immortality’, to live forever. Jesus does not define eternal life in terms of time. The key element of his definition is that we will know God on a very personal level. I am drawing closer after many years of feeling very distant. The key for me has been a greatly increased prayer life with a lot of visualisation of God sitting with me.

It is very encouraging to know that we need never be lonely. It is only when we separate ourselves from God through sin or by not giving time to him every day that we need to worry. It is a great comfort when things are tough or we are feeling lonely that the reality is very different from appearances. To deepen our fellowship, I find it helpful to keep up an internal conversation with God but particularly when things are difficult.

Jesus overcame the world through his victory over death (which was a martyrdom). He not only died for the sins of the world, past, present and future, but rose again in glory afterwards. As mere human beings we can’t do anything so spectacular and all embracing. We can do our best to overcome the world by moving away from worldly things and towards spiritual ones. Satan’s power is broken when we free ourselves from worldly temptations, but especially if we manage to follow Jesus to the extent of laying down our lives for our friends through martyrdom. This truly defeats the Devil.

To me personally, I see it as combining the two persons (Father and Son) in prayer. It is very common in evangelical churches in South Sudan to pray ‘in the mighty name of Jesus’. I dislike this because there is too much emphasis on strength which for me makes it hard to pray with gentleness and love. At various points in my life I have had different relationships with the persons of the Trinity, with one or the other being more intelligible to me and therefore feeling more accessible. At my current point, I see a balance between the three persons. It makes complete sense to me to pray as a Catholic, ‘In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit’ so that all three persons of the Trinity are acknowledged in order. Very neatly, the sign of the cross is made at the same time, to remind us of the importance of the cross for our salvation. I don’t think it is scriptural to pray to a saint, but it is done with humility by those who don’t feel they are fit to speak to God. A prayer to a saint goes directly to God in any case. It would be wrong if it took a person away from God, but I have not seen that happen. I meditate on the example of saints’ lives and on their writings. I believe these were often strongly inspired by the Holy Spirit and can be a huge help in our own Christian progress. I do not think that the Holy Spirit’s inspiration stopped with the apostles and it is a shame to ignore some very valuable teachings which are later in date. It is right to pray to the Father directly, as Jesus himself taught us to do by his own example, particularly when he taught us to say the Our Father.

The Holy Spirit will guide us in the correct direction, towards the truth. We just have to be praying and listening to him. This promise applies to all who follow Christ, not just those in the apostolic age. The apostles very helpfully, guided by the Holy Spirit, wrote down what happened and the inspirations that came to them. By reading these writings we receive spiritual guidance. However we can also be inspired directly ourselves. It is a feeling of great joy when it happens.

The Holy Spirit can convict unbelievers in many ways. It can be through reading, listening to the testimony of Christians, seeing their example, through miracles…. It is our job as preachers or lay Christians to convict others with the help of the Holy Spirit. This is very clear from Jesus’s teaching. We cannot claim to be his followers if we do not evangelise. However, we should not do this under our own strength or forcefulness. It should be done with love, gentleness, patience, prayer and example. In this way we are working with gifts of the Holy Spirit, not within our own strength. If we sit in judgement and show no love in our evangelisation, we are not working with the Holy Spirit and will cause animosity instead of convicting people.

The benefit to the disciples of Jesus going away is that they, and we, will be redeemed from our sins through his self-sacrifice. It will also provide us with the gift of the Holy Spirit. Jesus also promised in John 14:12 that because he is going to the Father the disciples will be given the power to do the works that he did and also even greater ones. All this will be done through the gift of the Holy Spirit, not through their own strength.

To testify is to witness, similarly to witnessing in a court case. The Spirit testifies about Jesus through those he inspires. When we are stuck for words, the Holy Spirit can move people on our behalf. Although I was not an eyewitness to Jesus in a physical sense, I can testify as a believing Christian to my own experience of God’s mercy and the gift of the Holy Spirit, which carries on from age to age.

The Scriptures are very clear that the Holy Spirit is a person, not an impersonal force. The type of functions which are normally seen as done by a person, such as encouragement to a holier life, leadership, teaching and counsel are things done by the Holy Spirit. It is so easy to depersonalise the Holy Spirit because we can visualise Jesus easily as he was once a man, and the Father, because we all know what a father is like. It is harder to personalise the Holy Spirit because there is nothing from this world that we can hold onto. Spirits are from the spiritual world, not our earthly one.

I can think of two reasons for persecution of Christians. The first is that Christians are persecuted for not complying with earthly values and showing people’s bad behaviour up simply by following Christ’s example. This type of persecution is generally in the form of social ostracism. The second reason is when there is a clash with another religion, such as Islam, Hinduism or Buddhism. All these religions see themselves as the ‘true’ religion. Although the majority of their believers are reasonable people, there are a small number of fanatics who incite religious hatred against Christians. Christians are often physically persecuted and even killed by these fanatics. This is very similar to the situation in the early Church where Jews such as Saul and Emperors who insisted on Emperor-worship persecuted Christians. Jesus warns his disciples that persecution will come so that they will be prepared and not fall away as a result. If we give in to persecution we are showing a lack of faith and lack of courage. If we don’t react to persecution it shows strength and commitment to our beliefs. They will see that we are strong.

To be a friend of Jesus, rather than a servant, is to obey through love, not duty. Friends have the privilege of intimacy and at least some enlightenment of God’s will. We are very ungrateful if we take this privilege for granted. This is not the way for a true friend to behave, so we will distance ourselves from God.

When we are obedient, as in the example from Pastor Ralph, God is happy with us. We can live together in harmony. There is a lovely hymn which has the chorus line, ‘God and Man at table are sat down’. We can feel a great sense of peace when this happens, even if our earthly life is in turmoil. Obedience is essential to a joyful relationship with the Lord.

The fruit that comes of being connected to Jesus is our own obedience to his call. This can come in many forms depending on the gifts that God has given us. It may be ‘souls saved’, acts of charity or anything else that we are called to do for the love of God. Paramount however is our own close relationship with God. The danger of a narrow definition of fruit in any particular way is that it cuts off and could cause us to neglect God’s gifts to us, which we are supposed to use in ways pleasing to God.

Jesus is speaking of our spiritual life, not our earthly one. The value of things done without Christ will not last for eternity. They will end in this mortal world. I think it is as simple as that.

To abide means to remain with or in a place, in this case, to stay with Jesus. The perseverance of the saints is that we cannot make one reform and then forget to continue to try to improve. We must not backslide after a good start. We must continue day by day through many trials and temptations. Verse 5b supports this doctrine because Jesus says ‘Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing.’ It is not possible to have eternal life except through Jesus who is the Way, the Truth and the Life. This means that we must not separate ourselves from him. The analogy with the branch cut off from the vine demonstrates this very clearly as well. ‘Abiding’ shows a personal relationship and closeness with Jesus, because it helps us visualise how close Jesus is to us. It is an old fashioned word meaning ‘to live with’. I work on ‘abiding’ with Jesus at times more successfully than at other times. Something I find helps is to simply sit quietly and mentally say, 'Lord Jesus'.

We are pruned or cleansed by obedience to Jesus’s words, because our lives are reformed in his image. I don’t think the same is true of ‘exposure’. Some listen but are not obedient. According to John 8:31-32 obedience to his word makes us true disciples and we will be freed by the truth.

Pruning benefits a grapevine by cutting away dead wood and leaving the healthiest parts of the vine. If the vine is left unpruned it will grow wild and be far less productive. God uses suffering and experience to prune our lives. In my experience when the priest gives a sermon containing uncomfortable truths that make people examine themselves and find themselves wanting, this causes some to leave and look for an easy path (the broad way instead of the narrow one). This prunes our congregations. In the same way, when we look for an easy way out, we are resisting pruning. We must constantly examine ourselves and amend our lives to conform to God’s will. I am currently reading the writings of John Cassian. These are full of very helpful insights into self-perception and correction of our faults.

Satan takes advantage of our previous sins by making us despair of achieving a better way of life. He can speak through our past companions, who may jeer at our attempts to reform our lives. He can keep pointing out worldly objections of various kinds. Jesus is able to stay completely free of this bondage because he is without sin. We can free ourselves from bondage to Satan by drawing closer to the church, frequent prayer, true penitence, severing links with those who lead us downhill, finding ways to help the downtrodden in our communities; there are many ways. Fear of exposure, if we have truly decided to reform, should no longer bother us and we must be willing to tell the truth, not continue to serve the Father of Lies. We should be willing to say publicly, “Yes, I did some terrible things. I now realise my mistake. This is what I am trying to do now.”

The peace that Jesus offers us is a ‘peace that passes all understanding.’ We can live in great physical difficulties but have inner peace. It is not dependent on the world, but on God’s Grace. It is the peace given by total faith in God.

The Paraclete is shown to be sent by the Father to remind us of Jesus’s teachings. His teaching/reminding role is important as the apostles have often failed to understand Jesus’s teachings previously. It is also hugely important for us as we never had the benefit of direct face-to-face teaching from Jesus.