The Camino de Santiago, known in English as the Way of Saint James is a walk in the northwest of Spain, leading to where tradition has it, the shrine of the apostle Saint James in the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela. It’s a long walk of possibly 800 kms. Retirees and walking enthusiasts tackle it after much
planning. My friends John and Julie have walked much of it over a few weeks.  It makes me think of the Apostle Paul and Timothy.

As Paul leaned back on the walls of the prison, somehow smooth from the large number of prisoners that had rubbed their back along the wall, he thought about the people in the church at Philippi.  Were they still following Christ and strong enough to resist the social pressure exerted by Roman loyalists?  Paul wrote a concerned but encouraging letter from a Roman jail to his friends at Philippi telling them that he would try to send Timothy to see them in person.

Paul said that the proof of timothy’s character was that he gave himself to Paul as a son would to a father. In ancient times a son had no purpose or expectations independent of his father and indeed lived to fulfil the wishes and will of his father. Timothy had chosen to be as a son to his spiritual leader. He would do whatever was needed.  He was available to Paul. He was able to be sent to Philippi.

Now if the Pastor told me to visit a life group across town or the city it would be only a half hour or at most a two-hour return journey by car but Timothy was going to have to walk.  If I had to walk 20 kilometres it would 4 hours walking one way. If I left at 10:00pm I would be home by 2:00 am.  I’m not sure I’d be too excited; or likeminded or available. But we’re not talking 20 miles were talking 1000 km on foot.  Timothy had to cross the Italian countryside then the Ionian Sea between Italy and Croatia then traverse the mountains and walk the whole country down to Turkey. That’s a whole new level of availability!

And it was not to pick up a large million drachma missions offering or represent at a global conference of apostles but just to bring back news that would encourage the heart of his older father in the faith. For the simple reason that Paul his father, would be encouraged.

Sons have a deep availability and willingness towards the father in ways that church attendees or even servants could never understand. Sons have a passion in their hearts towards the house of God, the people of the house and particularly towards the father of the house.

Friend how is the proof of your character going? Are you a son or daughter to your local church leadership, or still just a member?

Horror movies seek to frighten with images of things long dead coming back to haunt peoples lives.  As believers, we have no fear of spirits or ghosts attending our house but there is a way that the past can still reach out to hurt us - Regret. Regret is a funny word with serious consequences.  Regret comes from an old French word “regreter” which means “bewailing the dead.”   Today regret is sorrow over something we can’t change.  Something that is long dead reaches out to ensnare our emotions or our will.  In a way, regret stretches out its deathly fingers from the grave of the past to grip our life in the present. Whether the past holds the memory of our failures or sins or just lost opportunities that we think will never come again, regret must be kept in the grave.

We have all failed, as its part of being human, but godly sorrow results in joy and gratitude for the wonderful grace of God. Being merely sad about your past without repentance puts us in grave danger of regret and spiritual death.  Don't let regret haunt you or hold you back with shame but let Gods forgiveness and grace fill you with wonder and gladness.  Our Father can bring something clean out of an unclean thing and can bring a great future out of a past failure.  After Aaron the High Priests spectacular “golden calf” failure, he was a more empathetic mediator. Peter’s failure gave him the humility to care for a fledgling church.  The restored Corinthian’s were filled with acceptance and grace for a city churning with sinners.  Repentance is the guillotine that severs the skinny arm of regret and frees you into God's effective future.

But maybe what lies in the grave of your past is not sin but many years of thankless and difficult ministry that are forgotten by everyone but you and Jesus. Don’t let the fingers of regret lubricated with self-pity, slip around your neck. The eyes of Jesus sparkle with delight at the thought of His planned future with you.  His strong hand rests on your shoulder and He assures you "Your labour in the Lord is not in vain".  Billy Borden was an heir to dairy empire in the 1900's.  He was a millionaire before he left high school. On his first trip around the world, he wrote to his parents “I’m going to serve God” He could not be persuaded out of it and wrote, “No reserve” in his Bible. At Yale he had many converts, ending up with 1000 people in Bible studies. When he graduated, he turned down big jobs and wrote in his Bible “No retreat”. He then went to Egypt to learn Arabic so he could reach the Muslims.  While he was there he contracted meningitis and was dead in a month just 25 years old.  While the news headline that swept around the world was “What a waste!” Billy Borden had written in his Bible before he died, “No regrets!”

Friend whether you have wasted part of your life in sin or spent your life in sacrifice for the gospel, don’t let the clammy hands of regret get anywhere near your throat. Were not bewailing things that are dead and long gone but praising Him who is alive and still coming. “And his reward is with him” (Revelation 22.12).

In the movie “Chocolat,” set in a traditional catholic French village in which everything and everybody is under the mayors control, a lady “Chocolatier” arrives in town.  She opens a chocolate shop but the Mayor sets up a crusade against the evils of chocolate.  He tells the priest she is the enemy and instructs him to preach against her.  He was fighting to control his repressed but “perfect” town, but many of the town’s people actually find the chocolatier a friendly confident.   Finally one day the Mayor in desperation to rid his town of the evil, decides he will break into the shop and destroy the chocolate. In his mad flurry of destruction he accidentally tastes a small piece of chocolate. As soon as he tastes it, he falls into eating as much chocolate as he could. In the morning he was caught, embarrassed, humbled and changed!   The mayor was over his denial and self-righteous efforts to control and now free to explore a new exciting life.

   The turning point was the Mayors fall into temptation, where it seems that his failure became his salvation.  How often has the failure of someone worked a work of grace in a person’s life to such a degree, that their usefulness to man and God is taken to levels which could never have been possible before the fall. 

God plans for the failure of our self efforts as much as He plans for our success in Christ. God put Adam into the Garden knowing he would fail. Sometimes more is accomplished by our failure than our victory. Pride and self-confidence can be dealt with by God and failure often opens a person up the possibility of help from others. Failure worked in Peter life after his three denials, to rid him of his self-confidence and thrust him upon the Lord.

Friend, we all hate to fail, but our failures can give us a better perspective of our weakness and our dependence upon Him and that’s the greatest lesson.

Jesus walked along the crowded street on the way out of Jericho. One man called Bartimaeus had been sitting on the side of the road near the town for years. He was blind and begged for a living. He wanted to be healed and he cried out loudly to be heard above the rabble. Jesus heard the cry of faith and stopped to give him his sight back. Immediately upon receiving his sight he followed Jesus along the road. A new life and a new direction! All Jesus had to do for Bartimaeus, to deliver him from being stationary, broke and hopeless on the side of life’s road, was to give him vision. The greatest need we have is to see. When Jesus gives us spiritual sight, He enables us to see who He is and who we are.

The people of Israel stood at the border of the Promised Land and listened to the report of the 10 spies.  Although the land was exceedingly good, there were also giants there. The fearful spies saw themselves as grasshoppers in the face of the giants, and refused to go in (Numbers 13.28-31). It is not what you see in the promised land but what you see in side of you that will determine whether you enter in to all God has planned for you. If we view ourselves as grasshoppers it is unlikely we will defeat giants.  If you see ourselves as a chicken we will never soar as an eagle. A postman goes to deliver mail each day because he knows he is  a postman not a policeman.  If you know you are a son you act like one too. Most often we act beneath our dignity because we have forgotten who we are. A prince or princess with amnesia!

Jesus said He came down from above. He knew where He came from. When the Seed was placed in Mary, a son was born. When we were regenerated, the seed of the Word comes down from Father and like Jesus, your spirit man is born from above. We know ourselves after the flesh and off course identify with our natural father but the real eternal you, came down from your Father in heaven. We are literally new creatures and Father wants us to see ourselves as His own children. Although he calls us sheep, disciples, servants or even friends in the Gospel of John, his final description of us is sons.  After the resurrection Jesus calls us his brothers and like Jesus, all of Gods sons and daughters, are born from above by incorruptible seed.

Friend, our self-identity is formed by how we see Jesus and ourselves. As the 10 spies proved, how we see ourselves is critical because what we believe to be true is more powerful in our lives that the actual facts. Fact: You are truly, actually and absolutely Gods son or daughter. Do you see that?

This week it was pointed out to me by a close friend that I had made a theological error in one of my books. It was a bit embarrassing because my passion for preaching and writing is to understand, to help others understand!

If we learn any theology in Genesis, it is that imperfection and failure run in the family.  Even “perfect” specimens, who never seem to blow up, may be filled with anger, pride or judgmental pettiness.  The fact is that we all fail and, if we don’t give ourselves and others room to fail, we can breed dishonesty.  People fearful of disapproval can’t admit their mistakes and choose to live in denial. Brothers or sisters may be struggling with an issue which could be common to all people, but are afraid to ask for help. They could sink into a sea of despair believing that weakness is unforgivable.  It’s great to have a triumphalist theology where every believer lives in glory and power without error or mistake, but that doesn’t help people in their genuine times of struggle and need.

When Adam and Eve failed in the garden, it was no surprise to God, and He covered their failure with skins by the shedding of blood. God obviously allowed them to sin for a reason. After they sinned, He could do the thing he wanted most: to reveal Himself more fully to them, not just as Creator but as Savior, as Redeemer and Deliverer. Up until his failure, Adam had no idea of the depth and the beauty of God’s love for him.  He felt perfect without need of forgiveness. He also felt no gratitude nor understood God’s mercy. In short, he had no sense of God’s love.

Friend, the next time you feel you have failed, admit your humanity and embrace the mercy of your un-condemning Father, who you can now love with even greater gratitude!

In New Zealand we remember our brave soldiers who went to war in WW one and two. We remember those that fell in battle and those that come home. Every soldier paid a huge price to preserve our freedom from totalitarian and godless regimes. What a great time to remember the certain future for mankind unless Jesus our Saviour, also went to war against Satan and evil. Hell was created for the devil and those who refuse to escape it, and it is not pretty. "The whole extent of hell, the present suffering, the bitter recollection of the past, the hopeless prospect of the future, will never be thoroughly known except by those who go there."- J. C. Ryle.

Because we have never visited hell we don’t know how great a death we have been saved from.  But Paul said “Who delivered us from so great a death, and does deliver us; in whom we trust that He will still deliver us” ( 2 Corinthians 1:10) To deliver us from such great death, God provided a great, chain snapping, bondage breaking, and sin cleansing salvation.  The Bible calls it a great salvation.

“How shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation, which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed to us by those who heard Him” (Hebrews 2:3). In this great salvation, Jesus has saved us, delivered us from death and hell but that’s not all. We are saved from the devil, from shame, hopelessness, and fear.

 Yes!  We are saved from sins power, from the flesh, from bitterness and hatred but greater than the things He saved us from, are the things He saved us for. He saved us for a new life - He saved us for peace and for purpose. He saved us for heaven for His family and for the kingdom of God. He saved us for divine power and for works of ministry but mostly He saved us for Himself.   Jesus purchased us at a great price and He paid the same price for you as he paid for Billy Graham and the Queen. He died to save Englishman and Indians.  He saved tinkers, tailors, soldiers, and sailors; rich men, poor men, beggar men, and thieves.  It is a great salvation!

When Jewish Peter was on a roof wondering if God could love gentiles like us, he saw a sheet came down from heaven holding unclean animals. It was not a handkerchief and it was not a size that could fit inside his lounge. No, it spread out over the earth.  “He saw heaven opened and an object like a great sheet bound at the four corners, descending to him and let down to the earth. (Act 10:11)  Every unclean thing was inside this great sheet. God said, "What God has cleansed you must not call common." Act 10:11).

 Friend, He has cleansed you. You are not common or unclean. God gave Peter a great picture to say that no person is too unclean nor is their sin so great, that God cannot save them by His great Grace. 

David was hiding in the hills from Saul and needed food for his men so he asked a man for help. “The name of the man was Nabal, and the name of his wife Abigail. And she was a woman of good understanding and beautiful appearance; but the man was harsh and evil in his doings.  1Sa 25:3  Nabal didn’t help David but Abigail did.   Eventually, after Nabal died, David chose Abigail to be his wife.  Nabal (meaning fool) saw David as a threat and a thief and dismissed his value completely.  On the other hand, Abigal (meaning source of joy) saw destiny and worth in David.  She decided to do for him what he couldn’t do for himself.  Her honourable heart saw honour, therefore she showed honour and her future was changed forever.   The foolish-hearted died and the joy giver became queen! Her future was the result of how she saw David. Our heart has eyes; therefore our heart determines how we see others.   Your heart, not your circumstances determine the future of all your relationships and your true success in life.

What came into Abigails “tomorrow” was determined by what was in her heart “today.”  “Out of the heart come the issues of life” Prov. 4:20-23  The condition of our heart is the source of our life. “As a man thinks in his heart so is he.”  Prov 23.7   If we wish to change our life, we only have to change our heart.  Our two choices in relationships are, to be a “Fool or a source of Joy”  We decide what is going to be in our heart; mistrust, faultfinding and negativity or love, faith and honour.

Friend, don’t let your life circumstances determine what goes into your heart,  rather let your heart determine how you go through your circumstances.  Who has God sent into your life for you to help?  How do you see them?  There is only one thing affecting your marriage relationship – and it’s not your wife’s habits. There is only one thing affecting your happiness at work and your ministry in the house of God – it’s what is in your heart. How are you seeing people?

Often time’s, angry people come from angry families because we learn from them. I never actually thought I got angry but my wife says I do and I'm a ‘stuffer’.  I stuffed my anger because my father stuffed his anger.
In an angry family, nobody listens. They think anger is the only way to get anyone to do want they want, so they use anger to make the kids behave; to stop the wife from spending money, to stop the husband from watching too much TV and they might even try to potty train a baby with a bit of anger!
Mostly we get angry because we don’t get what we want. Naaman was angry because the prophet didn’t do what he expected or what he wanted. 2 Samuel 5. 11. Ahab got angry because the guy next to his palace wouldn’t sell his little vineyard to him. Esau didn’t get his blessing and got mad enough to kill. Gen 27. It was a tantrum! That’s the bottom line. Our flesh “can’t get what it wants” Roman 6.2. We get angry if we can’t control people and make them do what we want for us. It's ugly and nearly all the works of the flesh are about controlling others. Now the actions of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity, promiscuity, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, rivalry, jealously, outbursts of anger, quarrels, conflicts, factions, Gal 5:19
Balaam couldn’t even get his donkey to do that he wanted so he was going to kill it. Num22. When we throw a tantrum its usually a  blowing up type of anger (GK.Thumos), where we might yell at people or tear a strip off them.  But there is also stored anger (GK"orge") which is frozen anger. Disappointment in a person is frozen anger. We tend to become depressed or angry when our expectations are not met. We go on strike and don’t offer to help. We might withdraw our affection or refuse to have sex. We let somebody do the work by themselves or give them a cold shoulder.

Friend, both are anger and both are destructive of your health, marriage and family. Is it time to yield your heart to God again and not try to control everyone around you?
 

When I was 16, my father asked me to take our almost new car, to the garage for a warrant of fitness. Like many young men, I was an idiot and thought I’d show my friend how good I was at driving. Cutting a corner we met a Land Rover head on so to avoid hitting it, I swerved back to the right side of the road. Doing so, I lost control, took out a fence narrowly missed the end of a bridge and dived the car into the river.  I had never stopped to consider the high price of my foolish driving before I started out that day.

Before we buy things, most of us evaluate or compare the cost of the item, lest we pay too high a price. We know an ice cream selling for $2000, is over priced.  Before we do something we decide whether the cost is worth the fun of doing it. If the fine for speeding is $20 we can live with it, but if its $2000 and we lose our license, we would think it’s just not worth it.   The price for homosexuality is cheap -the cost could be AIDS. The price of flirting on facebook could cost a divorce.  The price of dishonour and disobedience to my father was a car wreck and it could have been death!

Most people understand price but some are not good at evaluating the actual cost of something.  Right from the start In the garden, the devil was tried to convince Adam that the consequences wouldn’t cost that much.

Friend, Samson and all of history tell us that sin will always take us further than we ever thought it would and the consequences are always a higher price than we ever intended to pay.  Don’t look at Delilah’s’ curves, look at the cost!