St Johns Southgate

We forget.

Sometimes we forget the most important things.

One of these things we forget most easily, in our day at least, is that God reigns. God really does reign.

The lamb who was slain has begun his reign. Jesus holds all things and all final outcomes in his hands. All things, and all final outcomes, are determined by his will.

As scripture puts it in one place: “He is the ruler of the kings of the earth” (Revelation 1:5).

Indeed, a central and primary meaning of Jesus’ resurrection from the dead is that he has conquered all the powers that are hostile to God - sin, death and hell; the world, the flesh and the devil - once and for all and now reigns as lord of lords forever.

But we forget. We start to think that things depend on us. We start to think that we must make things come out right by means of our wisdom, insight and strength. But of course these are limited. And they fail. And we are tempted to despair when they do in fact fail; or when death strikes, or sickness, or failure, or sin, or loneliness, or spiritual assault. We are tempted to give up in our forgetfulness.

We forget about God. We forget that God reigns forever and ever that Jesus is the ruler of the kings of the earth and that he holds the keys of death and hell. We forget God, but God never forgets us.

Faith means, in part, learning to let ourselves and those we love fall into God’s hands. It means learning to be faithful no matter what the outcome, because outcomes are God’s business.

It means learning to give God thanks and praise in every circumstance because all final outcomes and all forgiveness and all healing are his. It means letting go of our anxious care and sinking into God’s own grace.

It means learning to know and trust that, “All will be well and all will be well and all manner of things will be well” (Julian Norwich), because Christ has died, Christ is risen and Christ will come again. Faith means dropping my burdens and taking up Jesus’ way of the cross.

Pastor Ian