​John 10: 22 – 39
 
The very existence of Jesus challenges the human capacity towards tolerance; invalidating any vacillation on one’s part, either one loves or hates Him. The Lord Himself was unequivocal in His judgments and instruction, and totally unambiguous on the need for His disciples’ obedience to God (Matt 7:16-23; Matt 10: 38; Matt 16: 24-27; Mark 4: 14-20; Rev 3: 14-16; c.f., Is 29:13). If He were just another teacher of good morals, His present stature would fall in with all the great philosophers of bygone eras, whose writings and pronouncements are rationally debated and passively appraised. But the claims of Christ do not elicit such personal benign detachments since Jesus Christ came to disrupt spiritual passivity within God’s space-time dimension – a continuum that bridges time, as we are familiar with in this world, with a future without end. If we are fully cognizant, our intolerance of cheap grace would alert us to our Lord’s persistent claims on our lives, in view of His own sacrifice at the cross and triumphing over Death. After all, we should only have one Master!
 
Attempts at ameliorating the truth of Jesus’ teachings, no doubt would make Him less objectionable to many, but it diminishes the compelling power of the authentic Christ and His ministry of salvation, restoration, and sanctification. In His encounter with the Jews at the Feast of the Dedication at the Temple in Jerusalem, His assertions to divinity in the context as the Good Shepherd, drew a hostile response, and they attempted to kill Him. The discerning divide was not the fact that He spoke the truth, but that they refused to listen (John 10:22-39, esp., verse 27). The second emphatic characteristic was He knew those who belonged to Him. He knows everything about us, a reflection of the complete transparency between the Father and Son! (John 10: 14-15). However, our fallen human condition motivates us to hide from each other, and at times, from God, particularly with the occurrence of certain negative proceedings that may have disrupted our lives. But a willing transparency is a requirement if we are to love without conditions and be content, for perfect love casts out fears. God has made provisions for us in that respect, to be transparently safe in Christ, and thereby, in community with each other too. There is no fence sitting with the Lord; we either belong to Him or we do not. The gospel compels us into an exclusive relationship with our Lord, where intimacy with God is only possible as we become transparent before God, and therefore, with men as well.
 
Furthermore, the message of the gospel assures us of our security in Christ. The gospel of Jesus Christ debunked the requirement for us to exercise our will and intellectual prowess to earn our place in eternity. This unique Christian gospel presents to us the certainty of God’s determination towards our salvation through the atonement of His Son, without any human obligations, except for us to repent of our sins and to trust Him implicitly, (Rom 5: 6-11; Rom 6: 8-11). There is sufficient grace for us to humbly accept who we are and thereby knowing ourselves. It has also provisioned for how God sees us, so that we may embrace what He has done for us. Hence, our security in Christ is resolute (Col 3:3-4). 
 
“And you will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart” (Jer29: 13) and “Draw near to God and He will draw close to you” (James 4:8).

​Genesis 11: 10 – 12: 20.
 
The first mention of Abraham was immediately after the Babel incident where Yahweh judged and rejected a rebellious and self-willed humanity, dispersing and confusing their language (Gen 11:7). Following Babel, Terah, Abram’s father, uprooted his family and migrated from the Chaldean city of Ur in southern Mesopotamia to Canaan. For some reason, they settled at Haran (in northwest Mesopotamia; Gen 11:31). When God spoke to Abram to depart from Haran, He inaugurated His special relationship with one individual, promising him that his descendants would be a blessing to the world (Gen 12:1-3). It would be 25 years later before Isaac was born. 
 
It is strange that Abram had no problems recognizing Yahweh’s voice (e.g., he did not even enquire who it was who was speaking to him; (c.f., Joshua 24:2) neither did he question God’s instructions. Abram simply obeyed and prepared to relocate with Lot and all the people and possessions they had acquired (Gen 12:4-5). Humanly speaking, the only basis for such familiarity was a constant human-divine communication, possibly between Terah and Yahweh, which Abram was perhaps privy (c.f., Gen 3:8-11; Gen 4:6-10; Gen 6:13-14, 22). God merely instructed Abram to complete the journey his father had undertaken. It was, in fact, after the wars of the kings that Scripture pinned down the faith of Abram in Yahweh (Gen 15: 6). This was immediately followed by the establishment of God's Covenant with him in a mystical sacrificial extravaganza that proved to Abram God's intention to keep His promises.  Subsequently, His appearances and their conversations carried on uninterrupted with a continued level of mutual awareness (Gen 12:7; Gen 13:14; Gen 13:14-17). Faith is a gift of God (Eph 2:8) and its profound growth is dependent on an ongoing relationship with Him. At that point, Abram believed God and trusted Him implicitly to fulfill His promises despite its inexplicable assertion of infertility. God was looking for obedience and He found this in Abram. When he arrived at the oak of Moreh in Shechem, God again assured him of His prior promise, with an additional gift of territory. He then moved into the mountain east of Bethel, built an altar and worshipped the Lord, before journeying on to the Negev (Gen 12:6-9).
 
Venturing literally into an unknown occupied territory was a test of Abram’s faith in overcoming his trepidations and submitting his family’s vulnerability to God. Were these fears the very ones that prompted Terah to remain in Haran? Perhaps his growing obedience laid the groundwork for the seed of faith that was sown by God. For in the generations to come, Abram’s obedience became an exemplary rallying point on countless occasions: for example, encouraging the remnant Babylonian exiles, in Stephen’s defense, in Paul’s justification by faith, and the Hebrew writer’s heroes of faith (c.f., Isaiah 51:2-3; Micah 7:20; Acts 7:2-8; Rom 4; Gal 3:6-14; Heb 11:8-10). 
 
Abram’s fears reflected his humanity, and his choices in subsequent events indicated this initial fragile faith in God. Why did he not trust God to care for his family during the famine in the Negev, since God did not direct him to move his family to Egypt? Further, by positioning his wife, Sarai, as his sister to Pharaoh, and later to King Abimelech in Gerar (Gen Gen 12:10-20; Gen 20), he sought to compromise Sarai in the interest of his own survival. Earlier, he was not afraid of the Canaanites, why would he suddenly be fearful of the Egyptians and the Philistines? Was he attempting to help God in His promised inheritance by preserving his own life? Yet, God was faithful. Yahweh did not chide Abram but redeemed him from his disgraceful cowardice and protected his family (c.f., Psalm 105:42-45). Often, the choices we take signify our motivations, and invariably leaving telltale signs of our faith or lack of it in our God. I surmised that God was surfacing to Abram his own selfish motivations when it came to any exposures of dangers to himself! However, when it came to Yahweh's instruction to him to sacrifice his only son, Isaac, on Mount Moriah, Abraham, according to the narrative in Genesis did not flinch (Gen 22). Isaac was 8 years old and he was 108. I am not so sure Isaac felt the same way! This incident indicated the level of trust that had already developed between Yahweh and Abraham. Despite our changing circumstances, God’s promises will always hold, as He is the I AM! Our nascent faith ought to be based on our conviction in God’s character, which ought to be founded on a consistent personal relationship with Him (Heb 10:23; 1 Thess 5:24). It would be pertinent for us to attempt to emulate Abraham, the father of our faith, in some small aspect (Rom 4: 9 - 11; Gal 3: 6 - 9).

​Matthew 4:18 – 22; Mark 1: 16 -20; Luke 5: 1 – 11; John 1: 35 – 51
 
What is expected of a disciple of Christ is a perennially intriguing and challenging question. At the commencement of Jesus’ public ministry, we can tease out a couple of the important elements of what it means to follow our Lord as He presciently selected His disciples - His first converts. God was looking for those He foreknew, whom He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son… and these… He also called… and justified (Rom 8:29-30), to follow Him closely in the formation of their new identity (Jn 1:39, 43). This invitation was not generally extended to everyone who may desire to follow Him, for the Gospel narratives recorded that Jesus did turn certain people away, who had chosen perhaps from their own selfish motivations to stick by Him but clinging to their own individualism (cf., Luke 9: 57-62). One can believe in someone or his message, and yet not be personally committed to that person.
 
A disciple (distinctly different from the Twelve) is a chosen follower of the Lord, who is expected to have relinquished his own prior choice of direction in life to be able to fully comply with this new course: as the saying goes, he would be one who had burnt all his bridges behind him. Perhaps, that is what being lukewarm is all about - an unwillingness to be wholeheartedly committed to the One who is the creative Alpha and the Omega! This is a daunting pledge on this side of heaven that confronts every believer. It is inevitably taxing to trust someone with a recognizable physical human form though fallible, but to trust Someone Who is invisible, despite His standing as Creator, is even more intractably complex. But learning to trust God, we must, for this progressive journey that charts and stretches our faith were to continue, if we are to intimately know Him. This is the crux of discipleship. For in the absence of a maturing personal relationship with our Lord, to declare oneself to be a follower of Jesus is a misnomer. 
 
Jesus’ disciples’ response to “Come and you will see” and “Follow Me,” drew out from them their obedience as an observer and a learner for three years or so with their Master, thus enabling them to participate in His ministry. Essentially, Jesus was asking them to walk with Him and see for themselves what this new identity and life is all about. In hindsight, just like any professional apprenticeship, there is no easy way out of this process of intimate relational discipling, to which He had continually emphasized throughout the Gospels His non-negotiable requirements (Jn 15-17). For example, Nathanael’s touchy interjection to Jesus’ uncanny knowledge about him under the fig tree, opened a window not only into the omniscience of our Lord, but an unflinching obedience that is required as a follower. The disciples’ testimonies of Jesus were first-hand eye-witnessed accounts of what He had said and done as they watched Him closely. They not only believed Him at some point, but their whole orientation to life changed because of this journey they took with Him (Jn 1:36, 41, 43, 45, 46, 47, etc; “said” is a historical present construct, implying a testimony to a past event, i.e., to witness or testify). An evangelistic programme to orientate them to reach others was not required, as their excitement at discovering their Messiah, was sufficient impetus for them to passionately testify about Him to others. Hence, a relational intimacy with God remains the basis for our obedience to Him, where even the threat of death by their Roman persecutors later on, did not make them recant or deny their courageous faith. Jesus’ self-revelation to Nathanael caps it all, when He says that He is the One who will bring us back to God (Jn 1:51); the process of reconciliation with God had begun as He stood before sinful man as a precursor of a redemptive analogy of the ‘new man,’ but for us, we must functionally be ‘in Christ’ and He in us! 

​“Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me” (Rev 3:20). These mystical words spoken by Jesus, and quoted in the Book of Revelation by the Apostle John, possess an intriguing quality of God’s desire for a direct and intimate relationship with the human individual. It implies that our God is a Seeker and He incessantly initiates these exploratory moves in attempting to reach out to us. The metaphor used (viz., to eat), implies a human activity, which in Middle Eastern culture, speaks of a trusting and equal relationship; one that celebrates hospitality and generosity. Perhaps His premeditated insight and subsequent conversation with Nathanael (John 1: 46 – 50) provides us with some inkling of His approach with us. It invariably involves Nathanael’s guilelessness and open-hearted predisposition as a spiritual seeker, with a childlike willingness desiring to hear and discern what God had to say to him. This is always followed by a trusting responsiveness to God’s initiative which will open the ‘door of our heart’ to His transforming power. We call this orientation process the grace of faith; where grace is the power that God gives to the person to exercise his faith in self-surrender to Him (c.f., Deut 6: 4 – 5; Deut 13: 1 - 4). 
 
Although I had heard the above Scriptural verse from the Book of Revelation many times during my early teen years, my self-serving individualistic attitude precluded me from its application. While in the UK, God finally got my attention as I sought to grasp the complex reality of an indifferent academic pursuit in the midst of an awakening spiritual journey. One day when my frustrations towards an apparently apathetic God in the midst of a distressed world spilled over, I thought aloud in challenging His silence and relevance. But before I could complete my sentence, a sudden overwhelming sense of peace filled me. For a minute or two, I remained transfixed in awe, savouring this otherworldly peace ‘that passes understanding’ (Phil 4: 7). God’s astonishing signature peace launched me into my search for its Originator! 
 
Two weeks later, as I took a different route home after work, my eyes caught the setting sun's rays reflecting off a brass plaque across the street. The signage read “London Healing Mission, the Office of the Anglican’s Ministry of Healing.” My inquisitiveness piqued as I was concurrently exploring several avenues on relating to God. A mental note was made on the Mission’s weekly Friday evening service.
 
Friday arrived. The moment I stepped onto the threshold of the Mission’s basement entrance, where the service was to be held, that irrepressible peace hit me. I stood still for a moment and wondered about its significance in this place. Comfortably seated at the back of the small room, I watched the proceedings with some interest; the singing and an exposition of the above passage by the Rev. Roy Jeremiah, the vicar-in-charge. When the service ended, I immediately slipped out and disappeared into the night. 
 
The following Friday, drawn by the mysterious “abiding peace,” I returned to explore again! The service over, Rev. Jeremiah immediately stood in my way and introduced himself. We spent the next three hours traversing my belief system in his office. After considering the claims of Christ, I thought to myself, “Surely, there isn’t any real harm ‘to invite Jesus to abide in my heart!’ If there is anything of substance in that invitation, then it would be an interesting outcome to explore further. But if it was just an ‘empty commitment,’ I really have nothing to lose. I would just continue on with my search for God.” 
 
Praying after the vicar, I proceeded to figuratively ‘open the door of my heart’ to Jesus. But before I could conclude with an “Amen,” I found myself caught-up in the strangest of sensations: as if I was in the process of being ‘internally’ emptied and refilled! When I opened my eyes, it was as though I was looking through a new pair of eyes; the room I was in and Rev. Jeremiah looked different. I said to him, “ You look different from a moment ago!” He laughed, “That’s what the new birth looks like for some.” The joy (which could not have been manufactured by me) was inexpressible, accompanied by an irrepressible desire to read the Bible. It was close to midnight by the time I left the Mission’s office.
 
That was the beginning of my reciprocal journey with God. Ten days later, in Glasgow, Scotland, I encountered my first malevolent spiritual entity. (The latter’s narrative is the first of “The Unseen Life” series on 5 February 2024).