Pastor’s Thoughts – Spring 2023

Dear friends,

Spring is here and with it the annual cycle of new life. Daffodils are up, the buds are on the trees and the daylight hours are growing. The drudgery of winter seems to be past and there is a greater sense of the joys of life. Of course all of this depends on our circumstances. We are very aware that for many people the joys of spring are dulled by their own situations. Life is not all fluffy chicks and Easter bunnies, but that does give us a clue to the enduring legacy of springtime. It’s not a natural phenomenon at all, but the extraordinary idea that the Son of God, through whom all things were created, died for us on the cross and rose again from the dead.

Perhaps you have visited Cheddar Gorge in Somerset. On the other side of the Mendips is a lesser-known gorge, Burrington Combe. It is less spectacular but very pretty, and as you climb up it, you come to this area of folded rock exposed to the elements and weathered in an interesting way.

Legend has it that the hymn writer A M Toplady sheltered in this cleft in the rocks to get out of a storm that was passing through. If you look closely you can see a grey plaque that marks the spot. As he sheltered there he was inspired to write the hymn Rock of Ages cleft for me, let me hide myself in Thee.

Well this may, or may not, be the way his inspiration for the hymn happened, but Jesus’ death and resurrection are not the things of legend, they are historical facts. They are attested by eyewitnesses whose lives were transformed by the events. None of those who experienced what happened on that first Good Friday and Easter Sunday gained any power, wealth or status from their testimony. In fact, they were insulted, persecuted and in most cases put to death for what they declared to be true. Their testimony, written down in the New Testament, reveals to us the heart of God for us. Jesus Himself summed that up in John 3:14-18:

‘Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in Him.’

For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him. Whoever believes in Him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.

This is exactly what Isaiah prophesied 600 years previously:

Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the Lord makes his life an offering for sin, He will see his offspring and prolong his days, and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand.

Isaiah 53:10 (NIVUK)

God’s heart of love for each one of us led to Jesus’ sacrifice for us. This was real suffering of mind, body and spirit, greater than anything that we have experienced. So we know that in the toughest situations that we face, God does not look at us with pity but with understanding.

The call that God makes to us at Easter is to trust Him, to have faith in Him. To choose not to do that has serious consequences, as Jesus tells us in that passage from John 3, but to trust Him promises us life and a place in His Kingdom.

Toplady goes on in his hymn to say this:

Nothing in my hand I bring,
simply to the cross I cling;

The motto of Spurgeon’s College, at which Gustavo and I trained, is Et teneo et teneor; I hold and am held.

We cling to the cross as our only hope of life and the cross has the power to hold on to us, to deal with our sin and to give us life because Jesus is alive today and forevermore. Hallelujah!

God bless,
John