This week's Paper Pulpit has been written by Rev. William Sinclair, Minister of First Ballymena Presbyterian Church
A favourite band of mine is REM.
One of their iconic songs is entitled 'Losing my religion'. The Pharisees weren't actually losing their religion, but they were using their religion to hide and to avoid true and real engagement with God and his w
orld.
They had become so caught up in the doing of things, in the externals of religion that they had lost sight of God himself and they had lost touch with the real world. They kept themselves safe inside their religion and built fences which they hoped would keep them from being contaminated by the world. This is quite evident if you read Luke 5 verses 17 to Luke 6 verse 11.
These people were trapped in their religion and Jesus came to lead people from the old dead religion to new life. As you read the story of the call of Levi in verses 27-31 you will see how Jesus led Levi to a new lifestyle.
God is the God of surprises.
The Pharisees expected God to speak to them, they did not expect him to speak to or deal with dirty, cheating tax collectors like Levi. He would have been making money hand over fist by taking taxes from the people and he would have enjoyed a lavish lifestyle at the public's expense – sound familiar?
Jesus led this man to a new lifestyle where he didn't have to depend on wealth to keep him happy and comfortable, but instead trusted and relied on Jesus every day.
The very first thing he did after he left his job was to throw a banquet and to invite his guests to meet with Jesus. J.C. Ryle said, "A converted man will not wish to go to heaven alone."
Jesus dared to speak to the resented people of the day. He dared to associate himself with those whom self righteous, religious people thought were unclean. He was out there getting his hands dirty. While others were pointing the finger, Jesus was stretching out his hand.
In our blame culture it is so easy to condemn. Our society is in danger of conducting a witch hunt against all politicians and looking for scapegoats, having already vented their anger on the banks.
The system has been wrong and must be changed, of that there is no doubt. Yet we must make sure we only hate the sin and not the sinner.
Those who follow Jesus ought to be people who love others and do something about it by not being afraid to meet with those whom others isolate and condemn.
We can be smug and we seem to like to be able to point the finger at other people.
Yet, as the woman caught in the act of adultery was to find out: Jesus did not condemn her, but told her to go and sin no more. In our media driven world, make sure we don't follow the crowd, but instead follow Jesus and do what he did – hate the sin but lead the sinner to a new lifestyle. Followers of Jesus don't use their religion to hide from real engagement with God and with his world.
Followers of Jesus lose religion and gain a proper relationship with God. People who follow Jesus will be the real shiny happy people!
