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"Then said they unto him, What shall we do, that
we might work the works of God. Jesus answered and said
unto them, This is the work of God that you believe on
Him whom He hath sent". John 6:28.
Jesus encouraged people to realise the presence and power
of God in the world. Whatever the situation or circumstance
in which they met with Him He spoke of God and their relationship
with Him.
His stories, sayings, quotations and advice were to persuade
people to trust in God so that all they think, say and do,
will be governed by their faith and reliance on Him.
To the question, "How shall we please God?" "What
must I do to satisfy God?" He illustrated what he described
in the way He lived in the service of God and people. He talked
to them about God in their own vocabulary, and their own ideas,
to enable them to see and understand what He said to them
and did for them.
He spoke to people who believed in God, but to many of them
their faith was unsatisfactory and ineffectual. They needed
something more and better than what they had. Jesus described
to them that proper way in which God and people could be together
in the essential relationship between Creator and created.
He added a new metaphor to the Psalmnist's description of
God as the Shepherd when He called Him Father. The thought
was of a father close to his children, deeply concerned for
their welfare just as the best of fathers would be to their
children.
Using the metaphor He spoke of the relationship of father
and children when they were disloyal and disobedient to him.
He insisted that people never out-lived their need of God
and their losses from their misconduct in their treatment
of Him caused unnecessary problems for them.
They need the God-given, Christ-like virtues of faith, selflessness,
honesty and generosity which mark them as children of God.
God as Jesus described Him is committed to people and their
individual needs, aspirations, responsibilities and potentialities.
St Augustine said: "God loves each one of us as if there
was only one of us to love." Jesus insisted that people
needed God and God needs people by which to express himself
in human terms. He instilled in His disciples faith in God
that was true to God. When we compare the description Jesus
gave us of God with how so often He has been presented, and
misrepresented, by religious people, the difference is chasmic,
wide and very wide.
He is not the God of fearful judgment, short on mercy and
lacking in charity, favouring dogma and the demands of a blind
acceptance of it. Because this is Christianity, as many see
it, it is essential in the face of any unChrist-like misrepresentation
of God, that we see him as Jesus did, the loving Father to
whom we are so much indebted for all that is good in our lives.
And to remember His prayer:
"Father of goodness and truth, the world has
not known you, but I have known you and these men now
know that you have sent me, I have made yourself known
to them and I will continue to do so, so that the love
you have had for me may be in their hearts - and that
I may be there also." John 17:25,26.
We shall be very much better teachers of Christianity, far
better witnesses for Christ, when we learn to deal with people
as Jesus did, using His methods of treating them as they are
and where they are, and with the respect He showed in the
treatment of everyone.
Canon Dr. S.E. Long
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