2 MARCH
Exodus 20:1-17
The Ten Commandments – God’s Family Law

“The Ten Commandments may seem narrow, but so does every runway on airports around the world. Yet no passenger wants his pilot to miss the narrow runway and land a few yards off the mark in some field or waterway or row of houses! The narrow ribbon of pavement is really the broad way that leads to a safe, comfortable landing. So the seemingly rigid Decalogue guides to "happy fulfilled living” (from “Now a Word from our Creator” by Leslie Flynn).

God is our maker and like everything else we run our lives much better if we follow the maker’s instructions. The Ten Commandments are only a very brief summary of all God’s Laws. The first four Commandments teach us our duty towards God. God wants us to love Him with all our being and to worship Him and no other. We have to honour His name and give Him a tithe of our income and one day a week to keep especially for Him. The last six Commandments teach us our duty towards each other and everyone else on the earth. They teach us to live disciplined lives, to have self control and to be pure, to be kind, honest and truthful and to be content with all that we have. let’s all put God our Father first and trust in Jesus to forgive us and put us right and make us all one. Let’s trust the Holy Spirit to pour lots and lots of love into our hearts. Let’s join with all Anglicans to show we are a truly loving, caring part of God’s family on earth.

PRAYER: Father, thank you for giving us such a wonderful set of instructions. Help us all to keep all your Commandments. Clear our sins and give us the power to love and worship you with everything we have and to show lots and lots of love to everyone else, through Jesus our loving, obedient Saviour. Amen.

TUESDAY 3 MARCH
Psalm 19
The Commands of the Lord Are Radiant

“When we walk with the Lord
In the light of his word,
What a glory he sheds on our way!

While we do his good will,
He abides with us still,
And with all who will trust and obey!

Trust and obey for there’s no other way
To be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey!”

This is one of my favorite hymns and it sums up the whole message of today’s reading in Psalm 19. The Psalm begins by showing us what a wonderful, fantastic world God has created for us. God’s whole creation declares to everyone what a tremendous, magnificent God we have. We have a choice. We can really enjoy God’s creation and be the happiest people on earth or we can live a life of misery and be destroyed. The choice is easy! If we obey God we will truly enjoy His creation. If we disobey God the creation will destroy us. God’s law is perfect and while we obey it we get the very best out of life! We can trust every rule that God has made. He is utterly trustworthy; when even the simplest of us is willing to obey God He makes us wiser than the most intelligent people. So many are absolutely misled. They think it’s cool to disobey God’s laws; they think disobedience is more fun and makes people happier. How wrong they are. Christians who follow Jesus and obey God’s laws are definitely the happiest people on earth. All our actions in this life are first conceived in our minds. We think about all the things we would like to do and then decide to do them. Let’s all let God have a strong influence on the way we think. Let’s study His word in the Bible as much as we can so we think like God.

Then we will say and do what God wants us to say and do.

PRAYER: Father, help us all to get the very best out of this wonderful world you have made. Help us to really value your word and your laws. May they influence our thinking as we meditate on them so we only say what you want us to say and do what you want us to do, through Jesus our wonderful Saviour. Amen.

WEDNESDAY 4 MARCH
1 Corinthians 1:18-25
Jesus the Wisdom and Power of God

There is a true story told of a woman who survived in the sinking of the Titanic. As she was getting into a life boat she said, “I need something please can you reserve this place for me?” Quickly she ran across the sloping deck, through the gambling room where money was strewn over the floor, into her cabin and pushing aside her expensive jewellery she retrieved 4 small oranges and quickly ran back to take her place in the life boat. The things she valued very much, a half an hour before, were useless to her; now she only valued what would help her to stay alive. We would think only a fool would value oranges more than all that money and jewellery.

Jesus did a very foolish thing; He decided to let Himself be captured and crucified. When He told Peter about His plans Peter thought He was crazy and tried to stop Him! Jesus put Peter in his place and told him how his followers would have to change their values. If they valued their earthy life they would lose it; if they were willing to lose their life they would regain it. Why did Jesus do such a foolish thing as going to the Cross? The answer is simple. He valued you and me and everyone born on this earth more than His own life. He valued us so much that, even though He had never sinned or done anything wrong, He accepted the punishment our sins deserve. He shed his blood so all our sins would be washed away and we would be given eternal life!

If we listen to the wisdom of the world and value only what pleases our human natures we will lose everything in the long run. If we let Jesus into our lives and value Him more than everything else we will live forever and have such a good life on earth. His wisdom, which often seems so foolish, will give us the best in life and His power changes us, makes us to be like Him and qualifies us to share eternity with Him.

PRAYER: Jesus thank you that you valued us more than your own life so you paid the price for our sins on the Cross. Help us to follow in your footsteps and value you more than anything. May the things of the world grow strangely dim in the light of all you have done. Help us to be fools for your sake. Amen.

THURSDAY 5 MARCH
Galatians 2:1-10
The Freedom We Have In Christ

When I see young people puffing away on cigarettes and hear of many of them injecting themselves with drugs and drinking alcohol and doing all the things that they want to do I know one thing for certain; they are not free. 40 years ago a woman approached me in Emerald and said, “Is there an AA (Alcoholics Anonymous) Group in this town? My son needs help with his drinking problem”. I said to her, “No there isn’t but send him to me. Jesus will help him”. Alan came to see me and accepted Jesus as Saviour and Lord. Jesus filled him with the Holy Spirit and he was set on the road to freedom. His drinking problem didn’t go away immediately and he recognized that he needed specialist help. I sent him to Teen Challenge in Brisbane. I was thrilled to read his testimony in the Teen Challenge magazine a couple of months later. It was entitled “Strong Drink and Master no Longer”. Jesus had set Alan completely free. I think it was St Augustine who said, “Love God and do what you like.” What he meant was that if we really and truly love God we will only want to do the things that God wants us to do. We will have no desire to do what will destroy our relationship with God and destroy our lives. This is the real freedom Jesus wants all of us to experience.

Paul had experienced being set free by Jesus and he devoted his life to sharing this freedom with the Gentiles (non Jews). He had discovered that Jesus’ freedom didn’t come from legalistically obeying a set of rules but from trusting in the power Jesus released when He died on the cross to change his heart. We are saved from a slavery which forces us to be selfish and sinful only by trusting in Jesus to take the guilt of our sins away and enabling us to live in the freedom He enjoyed.

PRAYER: Father thank you that your word says, “If the son sets you free you will be free indeed!” Help us to put all our faith and trust in Jesus to set us free. Free us from selfishness and sin. Enable us to only like doing the things that will please you. Show us what real freedom is, through Jesus our Liberator. Amen.

FRIDAY 6 MARCH
Mark 14:53-72
Jesus Condemned To Death and Disowned

When Jesus was on trial before the Sanhedrin, the High Priest and the Jewish officials had an almost impossible job. They were trying to find something wrong with the one who was sinless and had done nothing wrong.

No wonder they had no evidence and they had to rely on false witnesses. The grounds for having Jesus crucified came when they asked Him straight out, “Are you the Christ”? When Jesus said, “I am,” He was using the same word the Hebrews used for God, “Yahweh”. He was saying to them in fact, “I am Divine, I am God’s Son, you will see me enthroned at the Mighty One’s right hand”. This made the High Priest furious. He saw Jesus as being blasphemous in claiming to be God so he had Jesus condemned to die. Jesus remained silent perceiving how foolish the Jews were! He knew He was God and had been from the very beginning. He knew He had to die on the cross to pay for our sins and set us free to be God’s sons and daughters. One thing that had hurt Jesus very much was when He heard Peter denying Him and disowning Him. He was able to catch Peter’s eye as He was led out of the High Priest’s house; one look from Jesus made Peter ever so sorry and he broke down and wept. It is wonderful to know that after he was forgiven by Jesus Peter remained absolutely loyal to Him and was himself crucified upside down.

PRAYER: Father thank you for letting your Son, the sinless one, become sin to set us free from sin. We appreciate the costly price He paid for us. Forgive us for all the times we’ve denied you or hidden the fact that we belong to you. Enable us to be faithful to you for the rest of our lives, through Jesus our Fantastic Saviour. Amen.

SATURDAY 7 MARCH
John 2:13-25
Jesus Cleanses the Temple

The Jews were very exclusive in their religion and they kept everyone not of Hebrew origin out of the Temple. They did remember that God had said to them they had to be a light to the Gentiles (Isaiah 42:6), so they built an outer court in the Temple which they named The Court of the Gentiles. There Gentiles interested in the Jewish religion could come and worship God.

It was in this area that the tables of the money changers were set up and the animals sold for sacrifices. There was nowhere the Gentiles could come and pray! They were completely excluded. This is what really upset Jesus. He whipped the animals out and overturned the money changers’ tables and He quickly cleared out the Temple so Gentiles could come in. When Jesus said, “Destroy this Temple and I will raise it in three days” He was talking about the temple of His body which would be raised 3 days after His crucifixion. Soon all His followers would be incorporated into His body when the Christian Church was formed. We say during the Eucharist service, “We are the body of Christ, His Spirit is with us”. The Jewish Temple was totally destroyed in 70A.D. and the dwelling place of God came to be with men as He lived with them (see Revelation 21:3). We are His temple and we need to keep asking Jesus to cleanse us. We need to be particularly cleansed of the sins of exclusiveness and be a very welcoming temple so all non Christians can come with us to acknowledge God, put their faith in Jesus and be saved. Worldliness must be driven out of the church so all will come in and find Jesus ever ready to set them free!

PRAYER: Father God, we are your temple; your dwelling is now with us. Cleanse us in the blood of Jesus and by the power of your Holy Spirit make us a living temple of your love. Free us from all exclusiveness to become a welcoming Church drawing people out of the world into your fellowship, through Jesus our Temple Cleanser, Saviour and Lord. Amen.

SUNDAY 8 MARCH
This Week’s Message
WE are living temples in which God dwells.

In Old Testament times it was believed that God dwelt in His temple in Jerusalem. The Jews had made a special sanctuary in the middle of the Temple. It was called the Holy of Holies. No one was allowed to enter it. It was believed that no one was holy enough. The High Priest went into it only once a year after a long process of ceremonial cleansing. People thought that if they went into the presence of God they would die.

They even tied a rope around the High Priest’s ankle so that if he died they could drag him out.

The Gospel writers tell us that when Jesus died on the cross the curtain of the Temple was torn in two from top to bottom. This was the barrier that separated the Holy of Holies from the rest of the temple. The barrier that separated God from His people was broken down. Jesus made it possible for all of us to dwell with God and for God to come and live in our hearts.

When Jesus died on the cross and shed his precious blood for us he cleansed the temples of our hearts. He drove out our selfishness and sin. Now He stands at the door of our hearts and knocks. All we have to do is open the door and let Him come in. The door is the door of faith. Having faith is believing that Jesus’ death HAS cleansed us.

O what a joy it is to be a Christian. We have such a wonderful relationship with our God through Jesus. His words describe this relationship so beautifully when He says:
“If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will come to him and we will make Our home with him” (John 14:3)

PRAYER: Lord our God, by Your Holy Spirit write your commandments upon our hearts and grant us the wisdom and power of your cross, so that, cleansed from greed and selfishness, we may become a living temple of your love; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (The prayer of the day)