The Big Question

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This is our second welcome evening for students who are newly arrived, or newly back, in town. If that's you, this time of year sets you two questions. (These are questions for all of us, all the time – but certain times bring them sharply into focus.) And the first question is:

Who are you going to be?

A few years back I got a call from the mother of a guy called Simon. And she said, 'He's coming to study in Newcastle and we wondered if you could look out for him.' And she said, 'He's easy to spot because he's re-invented himself over the summer and now has blue hair.' And she was right. So when he first came along, I walked up to him and said, 'This may sound a bit odd, but I just have the feeling your name's Simon – is that right?' And he looked horrified and said, 'This isn't one of those churches where God tells you everything about people, is it?' So I said, 'No… he only tells me names.' And he still looked horrified. So I said, 'That was a joke. Your mother rang me.' But coming to university does give you the chance to re-invent yourself, doesn't? Because the people who know who you've been so far are miles away. So who are you going to be – especially if, so far, you've identified as a Christian? Is that who you're going to be now you're here? The other question this time of year sets is:

What are you here for?

I remember talking to another new student and he said, 'I basically feel the only reason I'm here is that it's the next stage of the education sausage machine – it's what was expected, it's what everyone else at my school was doing, so here I am.' And for a lot of people it's not just the next stage of the education sausage machine. It's the next stage of the life sausage machine: you get a degree to get a job to afford a house to find a partner to have some children to push them into the sausage machine… and round it goes again. But for what? Is that all we're here for? 'Well, no,' says the freshers' week committee, 'You're here to have fun – and, by the way, the definition of fun is to drink to excess and get into bed with people.' Now you'll have better ambitions than that – like getting a good degree, playing for a good sports team, making some good friends. But if you're a Christian, everything you do – work, play, friendship – should be shot through with God's over-riding purpose for your life – which is: that you get to know him better, live for him, and make him known.

And so we're going to look at that second Bible reading we had – because it's all about God's over-riding purpose for our lives, if we're trusting in Christ. And if you're not sure whether that's you – if that's the big area where you've still got to decide who you're going to be – then can I encourage you to keep coming along to church while you do that. Because every year plenty of people settle at our church who need time and space to sort out what they really believe – whether they really believe what their parents do. So we won't assume anything of you. And if you just need to lie low and listen and think, please do. So would you turn in the Bibles to 1 Peter 2.9-12, which we're going to look at under two headings. And the first is:

1. Who Are You and What Are You Here For?

Look down to 1 Peter 2.9. Peter has just been writing about the majority of people around us, who are living in God's world without any reference to God. And then to Christians he says (verse 9):

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for [God's] own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.

That is quoting that Old Testament reading we had from Exodus 19 – where God basically said to his people, Israel, 'I made this world – so I'm the rightful ruler of everyone in it. But they're all doing whatever they want, as if I wasn't there. So I'm choosing you to know me and live for me as human beings should – to show the rest of the world the way it should be for them, too.' He didn't quite put it like that – he said,

You shall be my treasured possession among all peoples… you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation…" (Exodus 19.5-6)

And Peter grabs those Old Testament words and applies them to Christians today. Just look at verse 9 again:

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, so that you may proclaim [him]

In other words, God is saying through this part of the Bible, 'It's your privilege and purpose to know me – so that you can make me known to others.' Now partly that happens by us being 'holy' (to use that Bible word) – in other words, us living differently for God. So for example, I remember a student who put her trust in Jesus here one evening. She'd been weighing that up for a while. And the big issue had been the boyfriend, whom she was sleeping with – against her better judgement. But she finally saw that it was infinitely more important to have Jesus than the boyfriend. So she committed herself to Jesus and went to tell the boyfriend she wasn't going to sleep with him anymore. He said that was outrageous. So she said, 'Then we're not going out anymore, either.' And I met him the following Sunday at the back of church. And I said, 'What brought you along?' And he said, 'My girlfriend's just dumped me for Christianity and I want to know what's got into her.' To which the answer of course was: Jesus.

So being holy, living differently for God, will point people to Jesus – but only if we let them know we're Christians. A few years back, one of the Christian Unions here got into an idea called 'service evangelism' – 'We're going to tell people about Jesus just by serving them,' they said. And so they went round the kitchens in halls doing peoples' washing up and cleaning. But if that's all you do, people won't make any connection with Jesus. They might think you're nice, or weird, or nice and weird – but they're not going to think you're Christian and hear about Jesus unless you actually talk about him. So look at verses 9-10 again:

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvellous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

Those verses show how people need to hear that living without reference to God is a bad idea for two reasons. Reason number one is that it means you're stumbling around in the dark, morally speaking – which is a recipe for hurting yourself and others. And reason number two is that it's an unbelievable offense to say to God, 'Thanks for my life – but now keep out of it' – and it puts you on collision course for when you meet him as your Judge. But above all, those verses show that God wants to love us more than he wants to judge us. That is why he sent his Son to die under the judgement we deserve – so we could 'receive mercy'; in other words, be forgiven back into relationship with him, where we should have been all along. So if you're a Christian student: in your time here, or in the rest of your time here, will you make it your over-riding purpose to make Jesus known? And all of us who are Christians: will we keep plugging away at that?

Now I know it's hard, in a new place or among new people, to know how to begin at that. So, let me tell you about my goddaughter Suzie, who's now a second year student elsewhere. I was on the phone to her in her freshers' week. And she said, 'I'm a bit worried I haven't said to anyone that I'm a Christian, yet.' She said, 'I know my flatmates have seen my Bible out in my room, and they know I tried out a church last Sunday – but I haven't actually sat them down and said, 'Oh, by the way, I'm a Christian' and let them have it – because that just doesn't seem very natural.' To which I said, 'Relax, and just give it a month.' I said, 'I totally agree about not sitting them down and 'letting them have it' (as she'd put it). Just give it a month and then ask whether they know you're a Christian.' And I said, 'If you're open about the fact you're going to church, if the Bible stays out on your table, if you have friends back round from the Christian Union and they ask how you know one another, they'll know in a month's time. And they'll probably start asking questions.' Well, she did that and just two weeks later she said three of the five had already invited themselves along with her to church or CU because they were so intrigued by her – they'd never met a Christian before.

But here's one of the most important things to say tonight. This bit of the Bible isn't addressed to me and you individually – but to us. It says we are "a people for his own possession". And to get to know God better, and live for him, and make him known is a corporate thing – and each one of us needs to be part of God's people in a local church. So if you have just arrived as a Christian student, I would encourage you to link up with the Christian Union on your campus and find the other Christians in your neck of the woods. But your spiritual anchorage, your spiritual base, needs to be in a local church. And we'd love it if you chose to join us for that. So that's, 'Who are you, and what are you here for?' Now onto my other heading – which is:

2. How to Blow That and How to Show That

Look on to 1 Peter 2.11:

Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which war against your soul.

This church Bible we use is an accurate, word-for-word translation, which is good for careful Bible study. But it does throw up some things that are not exactly everyday vocab – like, 'sojourners'. That just means 'temporary residents' – like students in term-time, and 'exiles' just means you don't belong, this isn't home. So this bit of the Bible is saying, 'If you're a Christian, you don't belong to this God-rejecting world and its way of life; you belong to God.' So verse 11 is saying:

Beloved, I urge you as… ['non-belongers'] to abstain from the passions of the flesh [your fallen desires for the wrong kind of things], which war against your soul.

Now you hear people saying how out of date and out of touch the Bible is. So just turn over the page to 1 Peter 4.3-4, to put that to the test:

For the time that is past suffices for doing what the Gentiles want to do, living in sensuality, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties, and lawless idolatry. With respect to this they are surprised when you do not join them in the same flood of debauchery, and they malign you…

So is that out of date and out of touch? Or is that a snapshot of the freshers' week you've just had, or of some of the parties you guys and girls in CYFA know about – not to mention a lot of other life in Britain today? It's a picture of people swimming around – apparently happily – in this pool of passions (including the predictable ones like drink and sex) and saying, 'Come on in, the water's lovely!' I don't know about you, but I'm a cold water wimp. And when I'm on holiday with friends and family and they plunge into the sea and say, 'Come on in, it's lovely,' it gives me the ability to see through that – because we don't go to the Caribbean; we go to Ireland. And I know that if I follow them, it'll be the most unenjoyable experience since last time I believed them. And whether or not we're cold water wimps, God wants us to be 'sin wimps'. So that when we hear the non-Christian world saying, 'Come on in, it's lovely,' we see through it and think, 'I'm not getting into that.' So back to 1 Peter 2.11:

Beloved, I urge you as… ['non-belongers'] to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which war against your soul.

And the first way to blow who we are and what we're here for is to jump into the pool with the world and be no different. And that's how Will the worldly blows it. There he is on the left hand side of the picture below:

Ian Garrett Sermon Illustration: Will Worldly, Pete Pious, Barbara Biblical

So, Will is a Christian – he recognises Jesus as his rightful ruler or King (that's the crown above him in the picture). And he wants other people to hear about Jesus. So he thinks, 'That means I've got to be 'out there', doing what they're doing – otherwise they'll think I'm weird and won't listen.' But doing what they're doing includes Will regularly getting drunk – which means they don't see anything different about him, they don't see Jesus being Lord of him. Plus, he's now ashamed to say anything Christian.

Then the next guy along in the picture is Pete the pious. There he is floating somewhere off the planet, playing his harp. And he plays it at church and at CU and back in his room – a lot. And he can see Will blowing it, and so he quotes verse 11 at Will (in the King James Version). He says, 'Look, you belong to Jesus, not to the drinking culture, so get out of there.' Pete's solution is to live in a bubble of Christian friendships and Christian meetings. But what he doesn't realise is that he's also blown it, not by failing to live differently for Jesus, but by failing to be visible to anyone who isn't already a Christian. So the result is the same: no-one is being pointed to Jesus.

Thirdly in my picture, meet Barbara the Biblical. Trust the women to get it right (and I think they are often better at being unashamedly Christian in front of others; we men are often more proud or fearful). Barbara quotes both verses to these guys. So look at verse 11 again:

Beloved, I urge you as ['non-belongers'] to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which war against your soul.

So Barbara agrees that Pete has a point. But she says, 'You've got to do verse 12 as well':

Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honourable…

Or the New International Version says, "Live such good lives among the pagans [in other words, the non-Christians]". So Barbara agrees that Will has a point, too – you've got to live among them; but you've got to keep your holiness rather than lose it.

Now what if you've already blown it like Will – maybe during the whole of last year if you're a second or third year trying to make a fresh start now; or maybe during your first week, if you're a first year? Well, the answer is: trust God's forgiveness and start again. Because, what did verse 10 say? "You have received mercy" – which means God's commitment on the basis of the cross to forgive you every time you need it between now and heaven. So – trust God's forgiveness and start again.

I remember one Christian fresher, Ben, messing up badly in freshers' week. He got totally drunk and was utterly ashamed of himself. And I remember him telling me he'd blown all hopes of pointing his friends to Jesus. And I said, 'No you haven't.' And he said, 'But I got publically drunk in week 1 – how can I be any kind of witness to Jesus after that?' And I said, 'That depends what you do next. If you pretend to your friends that nothing happened, or that it doesn't matter, you're right, you'll have no Christian impact on them. But if you tell them what you've told me – that you're ashamed, and that that isn't what you should be as a Christian – and if you show them by getting going again that Jesus forgives failures and gives fresh starts, then I think they'll get the gospel loud and clear. And Ben went on to be president of his CU and then a missionary to Japan. If you've blown it, you have not Blown it with a capital 'B'. Trust God's forgiveness and start again. Look at verse 12 to finish:

Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honourable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.

In other words, 'so that… they may come to glorify him as their own Lord and Saviour, just like you do.' That's the aim and hope of what our Christian witness will do, isn't it? But notice that middle bit – which says, 'so that when they speak against you…' Because even if non-Christian people around you respect the way you live – and deep down know it's the right way to live – they'll still speak against you. So they'll respect you for not getting drunk, but mock you for not being able to take your alcohol. They'll respect you for believing sex is for marriage – but mock you for not being able to 'pull' a girl or guy, or for still being a virgin, if you are.

So let me end with this story. There was a student here a while back called Tim. And for two years he was the only Christian in a very non-Christian lads' house – and he had to contend with everything: porn, drink, drugs, girlfriends moving in, you name it – it was a jungle. Actually, 1 Peter 2 would say: it was 'darkness'. And I knew from meeting up with Tim how much grief they gave him for being a Christian. He was constantly discouraged about whether his witness was having any effect at all. Well, as you've heard, after these 6.30pm services, we have supper for you in the hall next door, if you're a student. And at one of the last student suppers of Tim's final year, I met this bloke I'd never seen, and I asked him what had brought him along. And he said, 'I'm Tim's housemate.' And Tim was the other side of the room, so he could say all this to me without Tim hearing. And he said, 'I'm here because for two years all I've done is give Tim stick for what he believes, but I actually respect him more than anyone I know, because he has real integrity, and the rest of us don't. So I knew that before I left uni, I owed it to him to come along and hear what he believes.' Tim was totally unbelieving when I told him about that conversation, because he had no idea what was going on beneath the surface of that housemate. That story's a reminder that, by and large, we won't know what's going on beneath the surface as we try to live out what we've heard tonight. And it's a reminder that this is a long game – often very long.

But what a purpose to live for – that during your time here, and for the rest of your days on earth, people hear the gospel because of the impact of your Christian life. If you're a Christian, that's who you are, that's what you're here for. So settle with your brothers and sisters in Christ in a local church as soon as you can. And live out that purpose with them.

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