the living sacrifice

i ushered 2004 in by watching goodbye lenin in the cinemas. in the same tradition, i ushered 2005 in watching the hindi epic devdas on vcd. it was tragic seeing how even in death, the hero devdas couldn't die with paro, his childhood sweet heart, by his side.

the film was almost three hours long and when it first started, i was really quite put off by the mushy lovey-dovey conversations between the 2 leads, but the unfolding love story had me glued to jimmy's television screen as tham, vic and jim all dozed off. it occurred to me that my heart had hardened over the years. the last few years, my tolerance for extravagant scenes in films has decreased -- i couldn't fathom the long winded dance sequences at first, but their sheer beauty and symbolism soon wore the wearied one in me. but it reminded me of the verse from jeremiah 2:2 that was shared over the pulpit during worship at convenant service earlier.

God said in jeremiah 2:2 to israel, "I remember the devotion of your youth, how as bride you loved me and followed me throught the desert, through a land not sown."

i have been in st john's-st margaret's since august of 1999 and have attended every single convenant service since, but none compared to this year's. uncle tony's worship and pastor rennis' sermon was like an arrow to my heart and unless i were a robot, it would be impossible for me not to acknowledge the clarity of the message.

pastor rennis opened his sermon by making a wry observation of post-christmas events in 2004 and 2003. the asian tsunami dominated the news coverage in 2004 while the earthquake in bam, iran dominated headlines in the immediate aftermath of christmas'03. he then raised a question -- do these tragic events hollow out the joy of christmas? can christmas joy survive post-christmas tragedy?

the answer as you would probably have expected, is an emphatic yes. simply because our saviour was born into a real world. he was enough for the world then, he is enough for the world today. Jesus was a refugee with a price on His head even before he could walk. (matthew 2:12-21) Jesus is God's love for us personified and manifest. His love is deeper than the pain. only His love can console because He has been through the range of emotions and have conquered every single tear in doing so.

in pastor rennis' exhortation to remain faithful and trusting in the goodness of God even in the face of such tragedy, pastor reminds that even in such tragic circumstances, somehow in his infinite wisdom, it is all in His will. i was personally reminded of such an instance where Jesus urged his disciples to trust Him at all costs in the closing chapters in the gospel of john. but at the end of it, pastor rennis was calling on the congregation to bring the love of God to those who mourn without comfort.

pastor rennis defines a convenant as "a binding agreement entered volunteerily by 2 people." God initiated this convenant by showing us the extent of His great love for us first. by committing to this convenant with you, God commits to take care of you and also to transform you by recreating you in His image within our unique personality. his committment to this convenant with christians is recorded in romans 8:35-39 where "neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future...nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord." (v38-39)

our part of the "deal" is this -- we commit to 2 things. the first, we commit to trusting God completely -- essentially adopting a committment to a faith posture. and the second, we commit to walking with God in holiness and service. this convenant is thus ethical, binding and justified.

in his usual gentle manner, pastor rennis warns that "believing that God will bless you even if you violate convenant faithfulness is lethal and wrong doctrine." however, he goes on to quantify in no uncertain terms, nobody can upkeep this convenant in it's totality. the thing is nobody can, but we cannot disregard the validity of the convenant we have with God -- we cannot just let His grace cover everything.

pastor rennis draws a link to the jeremiah verse a member of the congregation shared earlier. as if addressing only me, he posed a rhetoric -- have your devotion to God simmered over the years? that you no longer take me as seriously as before?

committing to a convenant is also trusting God to provide the grace and ability to meet our part of the convenant. pastor rennis shows us in romans 2:1-2 that the way to enter a convenant is to "offer our bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God." yet it must be noted that the sacrifice is living, and not a dead one. which means it is a daily affair. the living sacrifice that lived 2000-odd years ago inspires the living sacrifice that all christians are today.

we can achieve it by "not conform(ing) any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind." (romans 2:2)

pastor rennis delivers an application of the word to our position in the world today. he addressed the world's pattern of ensuring self preservation today. so often today, we see the landscape of the world being influenced by that prevalent attitude. the challenge for all christians therefore is to be in this world, but not of this world.

it was a stinging rebuke, reminder even; but no doubt a stirring sermon in pastor rennis' trademark ability to deliver apparent "old" materials in a refreshingly "new" perspective. but pastor rennis was gentle just as he was insistent about it. the point was not lost on me.

in fact, this sense of a mild rebuke was consistent in his sermon on christmas eve as well where he talked about the love deficit that the gift from God in the form of His son was to have address. he based his sermon around three questions -- what does Christ save us from? whom does He save? how are we saved?

Christ was born to save us from our sins, but more crucially our basic sin of failing to accept the divine right of the Messiah over us. this is acutely manifest in other things being our "gods" as they begin to dominate our concerns. most times, we become our own gods in the process as we get caught up in the whole rat race.

what is sin?

sin is a condition of the heart that leads to a way of life. the example of herod in the Bible where he and the priests and religious teachers had all the trappings of religion, but they crucially lack a true love for God. i sensed a veiled warning here. perhaps not as veiled as i made it up to be since pastor rennis reminds that a failure to put God first would lead to all kinds of moral failure.

moving on, pastor rennis expounded on the people Jesus came to save. the universality of Jesus is demonstrated in the fact that even though he was King of Jews, He came to save the world. God is the usherer of peace, but we do not see this reign now because He's not back on earth yet.

we are saved, therefore, when we receive salvation just by believing. a general revelation from God would only bring you so far, but a more intimate revelation would bring you to that point of salvation -- that crucial experience of God's love. faith is trusting in these revelations from God. and this trust in God should not only be shown in our only showing up for services at 'important' christian festivals like easter and christmas.

if we think we are doing God a great favour by coming on only these occasions, then we are guilty of neglecting the divine power the Messiah has over us -- violating the whole notion of God in the first place.

creation is porous, and as the famous john 3:16 verse goes -- for God so loved the world that He gave His one and only son, so that we will not perish but have everlasting love. Jesus was born to save the day for you and for me.

the thing that struck a chord with me as i watched devdas in the wee hours of 1 january 2005 was the nature of God' love. it was undeniably tragic that two childhood sweet hearts, by caste differences and personal mistakes, couldn't be together. just as they were separated as children as devdas was sent to london by his dad because he was hanging around too much with paro. but it struck me that if human love can be so real(or reel -- pun unintended) and everlasting and unconditional, what more God's love?

i leave you with this excerpt of this email i received from an acquaintance:


"i could not help but notice the irony.
a very poignant one that gripped my soul.

i first noticed it on the tv screen above me. cocooned in the comforts of my air-con gym, i was meaninglessly going at it on my step machine when the news showed a scene which was totally incongruous and inconsistent to my superficial activity.

it was one of the numerous other shots documented, of the tidal wave disaster which hit the region recently.

something within me piqued when i saw that figure in that particular scene. it looked like an absurdity, when you consider the mis-en-scene as a whole.

this particular snippet was repeated on the tv mobile half an hour later. again, when it was played, my eyes darted involuntarily to the left corner of the screen. it was that same figure. aloof and detached as the first time my eyes espied it.

in this footage, the flood was surging with an unforgiving velocity. cars and debris and roof tops and furniture, was helplessly swept away, resembling, in morbid manner, toys in a bath.

juxtaposed with this, was an ornate looking altar peeking just above the water level, a portion of what may have been a place of earnest worship and poignant pleas. the flood had risen to a height just so where i could see that idol, their object of reverence and adoration, their divine source of mercy and protection, peering from chest up above the water.

that's when i saw it.

a plastered smile. those huge painted eyes of intricate artwork , evidence of excellent craftsmanship. a shiny lacquered body, gleaming in the middle of the miry waters.

he watched and smiled as the bodies swept by. deaths unnumbered. arms comfortably placed in position. unmoving.

he sat there watching, looking, gazing over even as his devotees clamoured before him, submerging under sinister waters. the fruits and prayers offered over the years did little to move his hand. or to touch his heart.

i could not help but almost see a smirk of mockery.

and that saddened me. everything which they pinned their lives upon could do NO THING. absolutely nothing. just when they needed 'god' most.

this is exactly jeremiah speaks of. of trusting in something which is not. of trusting in something which WILL disappoint.

how costly is the price in this case.

jeremiah 10 ( excerpt)
3 for the customs of the peoples are futile; for one cuts a tree from the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the ax. 4 they decorate it with silver and gold; they fasten it with nails and hammers so that it will not topple. 5 and they cannot speak; they must be carried, because they cannot go by themselves. 8 but they are altogether dull-hearted and foolish; a wooden idol is a worthless doctrine. 9 silver is beaten into plates; it is brought from tarshish, and gold from uphaz, the work of the craftsman and of the hands of the metalsmith; blue and purple are their clothing; they are all the work of skillful men. 10 but the Lord is the true God; He is the living God and the everlasting King. "