The workers who were hired about the eleventh hour came and each received a denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. ‘These men who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’ But he answered one of them, ‘Friend, I am not being unfair to you. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go. I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you. Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’ Matthew 20.9-15.

In New Testament times, the working day began at six and ended at six — a twelve hour day (see John 11.9); and a day’s pay was one denarius. In this parable which Jesus told (and of which only the ending is given above), an employer takes men on at 6 am, 9 am, 12 noon, and 5 pm (the eleventh hour); then, at 6 pm, he gives each of them his pay, and each receives a whole denarius. Those who were hired at 6 in the morning begin to complain, “It’s not fair. We’ve worked longer than anyone else, so we should receive more.”

The point of the parable is surely that, as Paul says, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith — and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God — not by works, so that no one can boast (Ephesians 2.8-9). The basis of what we receive from God is not our performance but his generosity to those who are his. It would have been possible for the landowner to pay each man what he deserved — there was a coin called the pondion which was a twelfth part of a denarius — but, as someone has said, there is no twelfth part of the love of God!

This parable has sometimes been called “The Gospel of the Penitent Thief” because, though the thief on the cross next to Jesus turned to him only in Jesus’ dying minutes, Jesus promised him “Today you will be with me in paradise” (Luke 23.43). He encountered the generosity of God in Jesus and was “saved” at the eleventh hour.

I once came across this epitaph of a man who had died in a riding accident which expresses hope in the same truth …

Between the stirrup and the ground
I mercy sought, and mercy found!

The truth of the parable of the workers in the vineyard is well-expressed in that Dennis the Menace cartoon that I am so fond of. Dennis and his friend are walking out of Mrs Wilson’s house with cookies in both hands. Dennis’s friend wonders what they had done to deserve the cookies, so Dennis explains: ‘Mrs Wilson doesn’t give us cookies because we are nice. We get cookies because Mrs Wilson is nice.’

Thank you, Lord, that you are such a generous God. I gladly receive all your gifts freely given to me this day, but most of all your great gift of salvation. Amen.

Note: In a few hours time I shall be flying to the Greek island of Skiathos for a week. While I am there, I shall endeavour to continue to post to this blog but whether I succeed or not will all depend on wi-fi access. So if you are a regular visitor, I apologise in advance for any absence of fresh pieces of toast and hope you will maybe help yourself to some bacon and eggs instead!

Judas and Silas, who themselves were prophets, said much to encourage and strengthen the brothers. Acts 15.32.

Apart from what is said in this verse, all we know about Judas Barsabbas and Silas is that they were two of the “leaders” in the Jerusalem church who were chosen by the apostles there to accompany Paul and Barnabas back to Antioch and to deliver the apostles’ letter to the gentile Christians there (Acts 15.22-23). (The letter contained the apostles’ decision that gentiles did not — as some had been saying — need to become Jews in order to be saved.)

The claim to fame of these two men is, however, that they “said much to encourage and strengthen” the Christians in Antioch. To encourage is parakaleo — from which comes the noun parakletos that Jesus uses as a name for the Holy Spirit … the Comforter, the Counsellor, the Helper, the Advocate (John 14.16). He is one called (kaleo) alongside (para) to help, support, defend and sustain, which is the work Judas and Silas undertook for some time in the Antioch church.

To strengthen is episterizo which literally means to stand (sterizo) someone or something firmly upon (epi) something else. It means to confirm or establish, and this also was what Judas and Silas were doing in Antioch.

The words taken together paint a lovely picture of these two men getting alongside these gentile Christians and building them up in the faith, applauding their progress, grounding them in the solid truths of the gospel, showing them how to use their God-given gifts in the service of the kingdom, and gently correcting them where they were in error. It was, in fact, the very work that the Lord Jesus commissioned me to do two decades ago when he called me into the church in which I have stayed to this day. These are the words he gave me — words which I wrote down and then framed so as to be constantly reminded of them —

Fan the ember wherever you see it glowing.
Water the shoot wherever you see it growing.
Clear the stream wherever you see it flowing.
Nurture, cherish, prize …
But never neglect the sowing.

It is a ministry I constantly try to carry out in God’s strength among his people here at St James Church in Bradford, and count it a joy and privilege to do so. As a young Christian, I used to dream of being a great evangelist, addressing huge crowds of people and seeing thousands turning to Christ; but now I am very content to do the work of Judas and Silas — a work of encouragement and strengthening.

Lord Jesus, thank you for the work to which you have called me. Keep me true and faithful in carrying it out, and let it bear fruit for the kingdom. Amen.

Behold, I come like a thief! Blessed is he who stays awake and keeps his clothes with him, so that he may not go naked and be shamefully exposed. Revelation 16.15.

This cry from heaven is both a warning and a beatitude, and it is breaks out through a description of the terrible events that will take place on “the great day of God Almighty” mentioned in the previous verse. It is, of course, an echo of a warning that Jesus often sounded in his parables when he walked the earth.

In Matthew’s gospel, we hear Jesus saying: “Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into” (Matthew 24.42-43); and Paul takes up that theme in his letter to the Thessalonians: “Now, brothers, about times and dates we do not need to write to you, for you know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night” (1Thessalonians 5.1-2).

The use of the “thief” simile in all three places carries one thought and one thought only and is the thought of the unexpectedness and speed with which that Day of the Lord will arrive and with which its events will unfold. There will be no time then to do what should be being done now.

When we move from the warning to the beatitude, the promise is that God will especially favour those who, on that Day, are not “caught napping” and “asleep on the job” but, on the contrary, are awake, dressed and watching.

But there may be another thought here too. In Matthew 22, Jesus tells the story of a king’s wedding but “when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing wedding clothes.”Friend,’ he asked, ‘how did you get in here without wedding clothes?’ (Matthew 22.11-12). The man is speechless and is thrown out. The king’s wedding of Matthew becomes “the wedding supper of the Lamb” in the Book of Revelation (Revelation 19.19) and perhaps the thought of Christians making sure they “keep their clothes with them” in readiness for that marriage feast, is an echo of that parable too. If so, what does it mean?

Jesus was particularly fond of Isaiah 61 and quotes from it many times in the gospels; and there seems little doubt that when he told the story of the man without a wedding garment, he had in mind Isaiah 61.10: “I delight greatly in the LORD; my soul rejoices in my God. For he has clothed me with garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.” It is the “robe” I talked about on Friday morning — see “The Dreamcoat”. It is the “white garment” that is spoken of again and again through the Book of Revelation. And the thought must be that Christians must be careful never to take off that robe of righteousness, those garments of salvation, which God has supplied. (In the middle east in those days, the groom provided his wedding guests with their wedding garments — they did not buy their own — which does, of course, make perfect sense of the parable.)

Lord Jesus, if you come today I pray that you will find me awake and watchful, and wearing the white robe of salvation you have given me. Amen.

Now Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons, because he had been born to him in his old age; and he made a richly ornamented robe for him. Genesis 37.3.

Israel is, of course, Jacob — who was given his new name, Israel, after his struggle with God at Peniel (Genesis 32.28) — and Joseph is his eldest son by his beloved wife Rachel who had long been infertile. Jacob had eleven other sons by his other wives, but he loved Joseph more than any of them and showed his great love for Joseph in making a special robe for him … now known across the world (thanks to Andrew Lloyd Webber) as “Joseph’s Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat”!

But was that what made it special? Was it indeed of “many colours” (KJV) … or did it merely “reach the soles of Joseph’s feet” (MKJV)? Or was it “elaborately embroidered” (The Message), or did it simply have “full sleeves” (GNB)? No one can be certain because the Hebrew word is simply the plural of pas which means the palm of the hand or the soul of the foot. But what we do know is that the same term is used to describe the royal robe that Tamar wore as a king’s daughter (2 Samuel 13.18) — which is probably why the NIV opts for “richly ornamented”.

At the end of the day, the features of the robe don’t matter at all, of course; because what really made the robe special was that it was a token of Jacob’s great love. And that leads me to think of another robe that was a token of a father’s love — the one put on the stooped, emaciated shoulders of the son who has come back from a far country in that unforgettable parable of Jesus that we call “the Prodigal Son”. “Father,” says the son, “I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.” But the Father says “Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him” (Luke 15.21-22).

This is the robe the Father puts on every returning son and daughter. It is a royal robe. It is the robe of righteousness (Philippians 3.9). And it is none other than Jesus himself, for when I put it on I clothe myself in Christ (Galatians 3.27).

King of kings, Majesty.
God of heaven living in me.
Gentle Saviour,
Closest Friend
Strong Deliverer,
Beginning and End.
All within me falls at your throne.

Your Majesty, I can but bow,
I lay my all before you now.
In royal robes I don’t deserve
I live to serve your Majesty.

Those who were musicians, heads of Levite families, stayed in the rooms of the temple and were exempt from other duties because they were responsible for the work day and night. 1Chronicles 9.33.

It is only a small verse in a long section describing the duties of the Levites in the temple, but it caught my eye and I suddenly saw its significance — In the temple, praise was not merely continual but was continuous; it never ceased. And that was as it should be, for the temple (and the tabernacle in the wilderness that it replaced) was a representation of a heavenly reality and, in heaven, worship continues “day and night” (Revelation 4.8).

The Children of Israel had always found in song a way of expressing their joy and their gratitude to God for his salvation. They sang after they had come through the Red Sea (Exodus 15.1-18). They sang God’s praises at the well at Beer (Numbers 21.17-18). There is the Song of Deborah in Judges 5.1. And David “sang to the Lord” when the Lord delivered him from all his enemies (2 Samuel 22.1). Indeed, that song is in fact Psalm 18, and it was one of many songs that David sang to the Lord and were included in the book of Psalms — the hymn book of Israel. That book’s name, in Hebrew, is Tehillim which means “Praises”.

But it is the “continuous” aspect of praise mentioned earlier that these verses cause me to really focus on this morning. David said, “I will extol the LORD at all times; his praise will always be on my lips” (Psalm 34.1). “My tongue will speak of your righteousness and of your praises all day long” (Psalm 35.28). And a thousand years later Paul says: “Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ (Ephesians 5.19-20). “Rejoice in the Lord always,” he tells the Philippians, “I will say it again: Rejoice!” (Philippians 4.4). And the writer of the Letter to the Hebrews urges us: “Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise — the fruit of lips that confess his name” (Hebrews 13.15).

If my body is the “temple” of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6.19), then I too should have temple musicians in my heart, doing the work of praise “day and night”. But as I glance back at today’s verse, I notice what it is that makes that possible — I notice that temple praise is described as “work”.

Praise can be, and often is, spontaneous; but praise must go on even when there is nothing to make me spontaneously break out in song. At such times … times of darkness or unhappiness or difficulty … especiallyat such times … praise is a work to which I need to put my voice. And I know from past experience that there is a great power in such praise. My testimony is that of Jehoshaphat who “appointed men to sing to the LORD and to praise him for the splendor of his holiness as they went out at the head of the army, saying: “Give thanks to the LORD, for his love endures forever.” And as they began to sing and praise, the LORD set ambushes against the men of Ammon and Moab and Mount Seir who were invading Judah, and they were defeated (2 Chronicles 20.21-22). Praise has often given me the victory in the face of imminent defeat.

Lord Jesus, put a new song in my mouth today that praise may be the fruit of my lips that I can offer back to you. Amen.

“Take the talent from him and give it to the one who has the ten talents. For everyone who has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him.” Matthew 25.28-29.

A man is going on a journey. He entrusts large sums of money to his servants — five talents, two talents and one talent — “each according to his ability” (Matthew 25.14-15). (A talent was 6,000 denarii and a denarius was a day’s wage for a working man, so a talent was about 20 years wages … Jesus loved to use hyperbole to gain attention and make a point!) The first two servants put to work the money with which they have been entrusted and make more money; but the third servant hides what has been entrusted to him in a hole in the ground. On the masters return, he commends the first two servants and promotes them, but he takes the talent that has been entrusted to the third servant and gives it to the firstservant. Does that seem fair? In Luke’s gospel, the evangelist records an occasion when Jesus re-told this parable with minas instead of talents and has the bystanders in the story objecting at the unused mina being given to the one who has most minas (Luke 19.25); but in Mathew’s record which we are looking at this morning, Jesus spells out the principle that is being illustrated — the one who has will be given more, and the one who does not have, will have what he has taken away.

The second part of that principle makes no sense at all, however, unless we go beyond what is there and add words on the lines of “something to show for what he was given” to the word “have” — which is clearly the point of the parable anyway. The one who has something to show for what he was given will be given more, but the one who has nothing to show for what he was given will have what he was given taken away.

In its original context, this story is about Israel and the way she has buried the truth and light with which God had entrusted her, leaving the world around her in error and darkness. Now she will be relieved of that responsibility (it will be given to the church) and that truth will be taken from her. But the parable has a real and clear application for me also.

God has given me truth and light. And he has given me gifts and “talents” (our usage of the word “talent” for a special skill or ability comes from this very parable) that are to be used to propagate the truth and shed the light; and shame on me if I do not use them. All I have been given is “according to my ability” — I have already been empowered to meet all the responsibilities God is placing on me — so I have no excuse for sitting around, doing nothing with what I have got. And there is that awful warning that if I do, what I have been given will be taken away and given to someone else.

Here’s a sobering thought … When I marvel at the ministry of others in God’s church, might I be marvelling at a ministry that would have been mine had I (way back) used a gift I had been given in the way God wanted me to, and with all the dedication and commitment he expected of me?

Help me, Lord, to use to the full this day, in the service of your kingdom, every gift and talent with which you have entrusted me. Amen.

When Israel came out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from a people of foreign tongue, Judah became God’s sanctuary, Israel his dominion. The sea looked and fled, the Jordan turned back; the mountains skipped like rams, the hills like lambs. Why was it, O sea, that you fled, O Jordan, that you turned back, you mountains, that you skipped like rams, you hills, like lambs? Tremble, O earth, at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob, who turned the rock into a pool, the hard rock into springs of water. Psalm 114.

This little psalm is one of the six (Psalms 113-118) that together form the Hallel which was sung at the festivals of Passover, Pentecost and Tabernacles as well as at the festivals of new moon and dedication of the temple; and no wonder … It is a most glorious celebration of God’s presence in his people on earth.

As the crowds of fleeing, homeless slaves (seen from a human perspective) reach the Red Sea, the waters see something else. They see their own creator present in the midst of this rag-tag-and-bobtail people, making them his own — and the waters back-up in awe (Exodus 14.21). Likewise at the Jordan. As the priests bearing the ark of the covenant stepped into the river, its waters too recognised the presence of their creator and retreated in wonder (Joshua 3.15-17). Mount Sinai “trembled violently” as her creator stood upon her slopes to make a covenant with Moses (Exodus 19.18). The picture is one of all creation falling over itself in awe and excitement at the presence of the Almighty here in the midst of it, in his chosen people. And present not just in some passive way, but present to rescue and save and redeem … taking something as hard and unyielding as a rock and bringing from it the water of life (Numbers 20.11).

Paul tells us “that rock was Christ” (1 Corinthians 10.4) and so carries me forward fifteen hundred years to when God’s presence among his people became of a different order entirely and one that is an even greater cause for awesome celebration. He reminds me that “the Word — who was God and was with God in the beginning — became flesh and made his dwelling among us” (John 1.1-2, 14) but again it is a “hidden” presence. Jesus was seen by many as a person of no consequence — “Isn’t this the carpenter’s son?” (Matthew 13,55) yet the wind and the sea recognised him and were quiet when he told them “Be still!” (Matthew 4.39).

And I know that he is present in me too, today, by his Holy Spirit … and present in all his people, in his church. And that though we too are (from a human perspective and like those fleeing slaves) of little consequence, a rag-tag-and bobtail people, yet all creation recognises the presence of God in us and “waits in eager expectation” for us to be revealed as the sons of God that we are (Romans 8.19).

And the God who is present still brings water from the rock. He breaks open my hard heart and streams of living water flow from within me (John 7.38) … and if I could only see it, the hills (and we have some lovely hills here in Yorkshire) are skipping like lambs!

Help me, Lord, to practice your presence in my life today and to join with creation in recognising it in all your people. Amen.

Though I am free and belong to no man, I make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law. To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law. To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some. I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings. 1 Corinthians 9.19-23.

Jesus had said “whoever wants to be first must be your slave” (Matthew 20.27) and had modelled servitude by washing his disciples feet — “I have given you an example” (John 13.5-15). Now Paul, in deliberate imitation of Christ (1 Corinthians 11.1), has enslaved himself to all (the literal translation of the words in the first line of today’s passage) so as to win even more people for Christ than he would otherwise be able to do.

This self-imposed slavery involves “becoming like” the people he is seeking to win insofar as that was possible within “the law of Christ”. When he was with the Jews, Paul would engage in Jewish ceremonial practices and observe the injunctions imposed by the Torah and the scribal interpretation of it. But when he was with gentiles he would throw all his Jewishness aside and eat and drink whatever they were eating and drinking whether it was “kosher” or not. There is, however, a third group that he becomes like in order to win them, and it is this group that interests me most. It is “the weak”.

“The weak” is a term Paul uses for those who are weak in conscience (1 Corinthians 8.7, 10) … people who are hung up about things that a “strong” Christian knows are perfectly alright before God. In the case of the Christians in Corinth, for example, there were those who thought that meat that had been sacrificed to idols and then put on sale in the meat market was polluted in some way and that eating it was therefore wrong (1 Corinthians 8.7) whereas a “strong” Christian knew that that was nonsense (1 Corinthians 8.4-6). And Paul is adamant that part of his slavery to all so as to win more means becoming like the weak when he is with the weak. That challenges me. For how many times have I hindered the gospel by asserting my “strength” and freedom in the face of others’ “weakness”? Remaining stiffly upright, for example, as I parade into the chancel behind the choir on a Sunday morning … even though everyone else is bowing respectfully to the altar!

This whole passage raises big questions for me. Not only my attitude to “the weak” but my unwillingness to move out of my comfort zone and to be even remotely like the people in the world around me whom I so much want to bring to Christ. Eugene Peterson’s marvellous paraphrase of today’s passage makes the challenge clear:

“Even though I am free of the demands and expectations of everyone, I have voluntarily become a servant to any and all in order to reach a wide range of people: religious, non-religious, meticulous moralists, loose-living immoralists, the defeated, the demoralized — whoever. I didn’t take on their way of life. I kept my bearings in Christ — but I entered their world and tried to experience things from their point of view. I’ve become just about every sort of servant there is in my attempts to lead those I meet into a God-saved life. I did all this because of the Message. I didn’t just want to talk about it; I wanted to be in on it!” (The Message).

Lord Jesus, you stooped to conquer. Help me to do the same. Amen.

When the hour came, Jesus and his apostles reclined at the table. And he said to them, “I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. For I tell you, I will not eat it again until it finds fulfillment in the kingdom of God.” After taking the cup, he gave thanks and said, “Take this and divide it among you. For I tell you I will not drink again of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes.” Luke 22.14-18.

For most of my Christian life (55 years!) the Lord’s Supper, Eucharist, Breaking of Bread, Holy Communion, Mass (cross out whichever you are unhappy with) has been something of an enigma for me. Coming from the evangelical tradition to which I still belong, I cannot take on board the idea of transubstantiation — the idea that, at the consecration, the substance (the underlying reality) of the bread and wine changes and becomes the Body and Blood of Christ while the accidents (the outward appearances) remain unchanged; but nor have I been able to derive much spiritual satisfaction from regarding the bread and wine as mere mementos (”Do this in rememberance of me”). I can remember the death of Jesus without having to eat a wafer and drink a sip of wine, so why make such a big thing of Holy Communion?

I found the answer quite recently in the writings of Bishop Tom Wright (see “Surprised by Hope” in Dining Out) and part of it already lay in this morning’s verses from Luke’s gospel. It is that, in the Eucharist, God’s future is coming to meet us in the present. We participate now in the Messianic banquet of the world to come when Jesus again drinks of the fruit of the vine with all his people. Those are my words; here are Dr Wright’s …

“What happens in the Eucharist is that through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, this future dimension is brought sharply into play. We break this bread to share in the body of Christ; we do it in remembrance of him; we become for a moment the disciples sitting around the table at the Last Supper. (My italics.) Yet if we stop there we’ve only said the half of it. To make any headway in understanding the Eucharist, we must see it as the arrival of God’s future in the present, not just the extension of God’s past (or of Jesus’s past) into our present. We do not simply remember a long-since dead Jesus; we celebrate the presence of the living Lord. And he lives, through the resurrection, precisely as the one who has gone on ahead into the new creation, the transformed world, as the one who is himself its prototype. The Jesus who gives himself to us as food and drink is himself the beginning of God’s new world. At communion we are like the children of Israel in the wilderness, tasting fruit plucked from the promised land. It is the future coming to meet us in the present.” (Surprised by Hope, chapter 15)

I shall be experiencing all that again tomorrow morning … becoming for a moment a disciple round that table in the upper room 2000 years ago and sitting too with Jesus at the banquet in the world to come. Hallelujah! It was all there, of course, in that little-sung hymn of Horatius Bonar (1805-1889) …

Here, O my Lord, I see Thee face to face;
here would I touch and handle things unseen,
here grasp with firmer hand th’etemal grace,
and all my weariness upon Thee lean.

Feast after feast thus comes and passes by,
yet passing, points to the glad feast above,
giving sweet foretaste of the festal joy,
the Lamb’s great bridal feast of bliss and love.

When they had brought these kings to Joshua, he summoned all the men of Israel and said to the army commanders who had come with him, “Come here and put your feet on the necks of these kings.” So they came forward and placed their feet on their necks. Joshua said to them, “Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged. Be strong and courageous. This is what the LORD will do to all the enemies you are going to fight.” Then Joshua struck and killed the kings and hung them on five trees, and they were left hanging on the trees until evening. Joshua 10:24.

The five kings were the kings of Jerusalem, Hebron, Jarmuth, Lachish and Eglon who, alarmed at the sweep of the Israelite conquest of the land under Joshua, had formed an alliance against him and were seeking to take the neighbouring large city of Gibeon which was under Joshua’s protection. As we read here, they failed. And Joshua wants his commanders and all the Israelites to be clear about this: that the enemies of God’s people will always fail; that, under God, his people are invincible. So Joshua does something that may offend our sensibilities but was (according to wall paintings and reliefs of Egypt and Assyria) common practice in those days when an enemy was vanquished — he has his commanders put their feet on the necks of the kings and then he executes them.

Joshua and Jesus are one and the same name in Hebrew … Yeshua … and it is important and instructive to read the book of Joshua with that in mind. The book’s key themes are victory and possession, and it is often regarded as the Old Testament counterpart of the epistle to the Ephesians which tells of the Christian inheritance of the “heavenly places” and of the spiritual warfare that is involved, under Jesus, in coming into that inheritance.

So in these few verses there is a great spiritual truth for me to grasp; and I find the clue to it in Psalm 110.1: “The LORD says to my Lord: ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.’” Here is the same picture of feet on the necks of enemies, but here it is a reference to the victory of the Lord’s anointed, the coming king, the Messiah. And, a thousand years later, after Jesus has ascended into heaven (as it happens, yesterday was Ascension Day!) Peter recognises that those prophetic words of Psalm 110.1 have now been fulfilled. On the day of Pentecost, he tells the crowds: “God has raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of the fact. Exalted to the right hand of God, he has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear. For David did not ascend to heaven, and yet he said, ‘The Lord said to my Lord: “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.’” Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.” (Acts 2.32-36).

Here is the great truth — Jesus is now seated at the right hand of God and from there he reigns; and a day is coming when, says Paul, “he will hand over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death.” (1 Corinthians 15.24-26).

In the hope and promise of that conquest I am to live, but meanwhile I am to take Joshua’s words to heart: “Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged. Be strong and courageous.” Or, as Paul puts it: “Be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” (Ephesians 6:10-12).

Lord Jesus, help me to fight the good fight with all my might, knowing that you are my Strength and you my Right. Amen.