September 27, 2015
Pentecost 18 / Proper 26
The Rev. Kim Gilliland
SCRIPTURE: Genesis 1:1-5
John 1:1-5, 14-18
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 1:1 (NIV)
BELIEVE
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was
God (John 1:1 (NIV)). In the beginning there was God. In fact, in the beginning that’s all there was. There was no land. There was no sea. The was no Earth and there was no sky.
In the beginning there was God. And that’s where we are going to begin the series call
Believe .
The purpose of the Believe series is to challenge all of us to think about what we actually believe as Christians. Every week for thirty weeks between now and the end of
May we are going to be focusing on one key teaching of the Christian faith. It won’t be thirty consecutive weeks because we have other things going on as well that will necessitate the odd break but we will be looking at all thirty lessons. The series is actually broken up into three sets of ten lessons. The first ten talk about what we believe. The second ten talk about what we are called to do as Christians to live out our faith. The third ten weeks talk about the transformation that happens within each of us as become the people whom God created us to be.
I think all of these are important. It’s important to know what we are supposed to believe. It’s important to have some idea of how to live out those beliefs faithfully in the world and it’s important to understand who God wants us to become. The odd thing, however, is that one of the things that I hear most from people is that they aren’t sure about the basic teachings of the Christian faith. So I suggest that they should come to
Bible study where they can discuss these things and grow in faith. But the response is page 1.

often the very similar; they don’t want to to to a Bible study group because they’d be too embarrassed to let everyone else know how much they don’t know. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard people say things just like that. And I understand where they’re coming from. There are all kinds of people who have been around the Church for years, sometimes all of their lives, but they really don’t have a good grasp on the basic teaching of Jesus. And then there are also the newer Christians who have never had the opportunity to learn the basics. Whether people have been around the Church for years or are fairly new to the faith, this is an opportunity to sharpen your knowledge and gain a deeper understanding of your faith and how it impacts your life.
Not only are you encouraged to come to worship where you will learn some of the basics. You are also encouraged to attend one of the Bible studies where we will be discussing these things in greater detail. There is a Monday evening Bible study to which everyone is invited. There is also God’s Glory Gals who are meeting on Thursday evenings and is a good group for women who want to explore their faith on a deeper level. Wherever you are in your walk with God, this is your opportunity to learn and to grow in ways you never though possible.
BELGINNING WITH GOD
Today is the first day of the series and we are going to start at the very beginning.
We are going to start with God. That’s a reasonable place to start because everything we believe hinges on the concept of God.
There is a growing trend in North America to question the existence of God. There is a new and radical atheism out there - led by people like people like Richard Dawkins,
Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harris - who not only deny the existence of God but are quite keen to denigrate and persecute anyone who disagrees with them. They are radical and they are persuasive. They’re also pretty frustrated because after many years of campaigning against God, the belief in God continues to be strong in every corner of the globe. In fact, when you look at the actual evidence, real atheism is a very radical and fringe group in the world. When we look at the statistics, we discover that most of the world’s atheist (about 76% of them) reside in Asia - especially China - there religious people have been persecuted for more than seventy years. Interestingly, now that China has lessened the persecution, China is one of the hotbeds of Christian growth and evangelism. 12% of the world’s atheists live in Europe and only 5% live in North
America. The rest are scattered throughout other areas of the world. Percentage-wise page 2.

about 24% of North Americans identify themselves as atheists but of that 24%, 14% say they believe in the existence of God or a god-like being which leads us to wonder how many people really are atheists since to it seems somewhat counterintuitive to claim to be an atheist and also believe in God. But there you have it. The reality is that there aren’t very many real atheists out there. And those who are hold a very radical and fringe position compared with the rest of the world.
The interesting thing about the Bible is that never asks the question, “Is there a
God?” It doesn’t have to. It always presumes that God exists. There is no defense anywhere in the Bible about reality of God. God is not something that the Bible tries to prove because God simply doesn’t need to be proven and those who try to prove the existence of God almost always find themselves running amuck. The overarching truth of the Bible is the God exists. That is not someone’s opinion or an hypothesis. It’s a statement of truth and it is either true or it is not true. It’s as simple as that.
I don’t need to prove that God exists because I know that God exists. There are those who will disagree with me and I get that. They chuckle and say that God is a fable, an imaginary friend, a myth. I heard the greatest comeback to that reasoning a couple of weeks ago. It goes something like this. Is God a fable? No he’s not. Santa Claus on the other hand is a fable. And here’s the difference. If you go to any university library you will see row upon row of books that talk about God and religion. These books are all written by very intelligent people who have spent most or all of their lives studying theology. These very intelligent, well educated people all believe in God and take the existence of God very seriously. But I have never found a single book in any university that takes the existence of Santa Claus seriously. That’s reasonable because while Santa
Claus is a fable, God is not.
The other difference is this. The average person stops believing in Santa Claus before they are eight years old. That means that as people get older, they are less likely to believe in Santa Claus. Guess what research says about belief in God? It says the exact opposite, that people are more likely to believe in God as they get older. Believing in
Santa Claus is a thing of childhood. Believing in God is a thing of adulthood. Why is that? I suppose there are many reasons but one of them is that while Santa Claus is a fable, God is real.
And yet the atheist still boldly declares that there is no God. To which I say, “So what?” God doesn’t need our agreement for God to be real. Whether someone believes in page 3.

God or not has absolutely no bearing on whether or not God actually exists. Either God exists or God doesn’t exist. And the way anyone feels about that simply doesn’t matter.
So the proper question is never, “Is there a God?” The only real question is, “Who is God?” And that’s what we’re going to take a stab at right now.
WHO IS GOD?
Who is God? That’s the key idea of chapter one of Believe , it is that the only true
God is the God of the Bible - Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
The Shema is found in the Old Testament in Deuteronomy 6:4 (NIV). It is a concise summary of everything that Hebrew people needed to know about God and this is what it says, “Hear O Israel: the LORD our God, the LORD is one.” That may not seem like such an important statement but it is because it propelled the Hebrew people into a new understanding of God. Today we call it monotheism. Monotheism means one God.
There aren’t many gods. There is only one.
This was a radical departure from the understanding of God when the Shema was written 5,000 years ago. Back then most cultures were polytheistic. They believed in many gods. They believed that various gods did different things and that different gods were there for different people. When one country defeated another country in battle it was because the god of the winning country was a stronger god. When one nation had better crops than another nation it was because that nation’s god has smiled on it and not the others. Even the Greeks and the Romans, as smart and advanced as they were, did not have this figured out. But the Hebrews did and they were way ahead of their time.
The Shema says, “No more will we believe in many gods. There is only one God and his name is Yahweh. All other gods are false gods and idols.” Hear O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one.
This also says something else. It says that no matter how we see God, no matter how many ways God presents himself to us, there is still only one God. That’s important because we cannot talk about God without talking about the trinity. The trinity is a
Christian concept that is developed in the New Testament. It says that the one God comes to us in three persons - Father, Son and Holy Spirit. And yes I know that the word
“trinity” never appears in the Bible but the concept does. In fact, the concept of the trinity is prevalent throughout the New Testament. What it means is that the Father, the Son and page 4.

the Holy Spirit are all God. They are equally God. None is subordinate to the others. All are co-equal. The Father is God. The Son is God and the Holy Spirit is God.
But that sound like three God? No it doesn’t. It’s three persons in one God and each of those person shares the essence and fundamental nature of God. People have tried to create different analogies to illustrate the trinity. Try this one. Here’s an apple that I picked off of our apple tree yesterday. That apple consists of three things: the skin, the flesh and the core. Each of those parts of the apple is distinct. I can peal off the skin and I can separate the flesh from the core but they are still apple. The skin is apple. The flesh is apple and the core is apple. Each is apple and each is equally apple. They may look different and have different functions. They may each be unique but all are apple and none of them is any more apple than the other two.
There are a lot of Christians who haven’t figured that out because no one has ever been clear about it with them but it is foundational to what we believe. The most common misunderstanding that I hear from Christians - even those who have been around the
Church all their lives - is that they believe that Jesus is somehow subordinate to the
Father. In fact, when they think about God they often think only about the Father. To them, Jesus is the Son of God which makes him somehow lower than God the Father.
That might be a commonly held belief but it’s also bad theology. In John 1:1 (NIV) we read these words: “In the beginning there was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God.” And then in John 1:14 (NIV) says this: “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only
Son, who came from the Father full of grace and truth.” The Word was God. The Word is
God. The Word because flesh in Jesus Christ which means that Jesus is also God. Get that straight. Don’t forget it. It is key to what we believe as Christians.
God is not three separate gods. God is not one God who manifests himself in three different roles. And none of the persons of the trinity is subordinate to the others. All are co-equal and all are equally God. That’s will be a great discussion point for Bible study tomorrow night so if you want to talk more about this than that is your chance. Hear O
Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one.
WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE?
But now you might be asking the very reasonable question: How does belief in page 5.

God and the oneness of God make a difference to the way that I live my life? That’s a good question because the only way something is important is because it makes a difference. Believing in God makes a huge difference.
If we embrace the God of the Bible as the one true God, three principles will direct us. Here they are:
Principle #1. Because God is God I am not. That’s important because it means that while Jesus is not subordinate to the Father, we are. There is a higher being in this world and we ultimately are accountable to that being. That being is God and it is God who sets the standards of our behaviour, not ourselves. People have often mistakenly said that religious wars have killed more people that all other wars combined. I want you to know that is false. While people have certainly been killed in religiously motivated conflicts it is a drop on the bucket compared to those who have been slaughtered in the name of atheism. When we look at the most bloodied dictators of the 20 th century, we get a very ominous list: Joseph Stalin, Mao Tse Tung, Adolph Hitler and Pol Pot. All of these people had one thing in common. They were atheists and secular humanists who ignored
God’s will and substituted their own. Tens of millions of people suffered and died in the
20 th century because people forgot that God is God and I am not.
Principle #2: Because God is God, I can be sure that God is in charge. Those of you who are going to read the book will note that I’ve varied that principle a bit. The book says that, “I can be sure that God is in charge and in control.” I’ve told you before that I don’t believe that God is in control based on my understand of how most people understand that. They think that God being in control means that everything happens at
God’s direction and that nothing happens apart from God’s will. I don’t believe that because if that were true, then the concept of free will would be null and void. God could be in control but has chosen not to be so that we can have free will. But I do believe that
God is in charge because ultimately God wins. Ultimately God’s purpose will will be known and God purpose will be fulfilled. I get that and I agree with it. And that’s another great topic for discussion tomorrow night.
Because God is God, I am not. Because God is God, I can be sure that he is in charge. Here’s principle #3: Because God is God, I want to know and follow his will for my life. That is so true. There are a lot of people out there who are confused about life.
They are dissatisfied, disenchanted and distracted. And the primary reason for that is because they don’t know that God has a purpose for their lives. God has a purpose for all page 6.

of our lives. None of us is here by accident but until you figure out that purpose and follow God’s will, life will never make sense. Because God is God, I want to know and follow his will for my life.
But what does this mean in our relationships with other people? Here also believing in God has a profound effect on who we are and how we behave. That’s because, as we read in Genesis 1, each of us is created in God’s image. Because that is true, it means that each of us needs to treat others as God treats us. Here are three principles that guide our relationships:
Principle #1: Because I was created in God’s image, I recognize the full personhood of others and respect boundaries. That means all people are created equal. It does not matter whether you are black or white, young or old, male or female, able bodied or disabled. All people are worthy of the same respect and dignity and for us to deny that respect and dignity to anyone for any reason is simply wrong because to do so is to deny God who created us in his image.
Principle #2: Because I was created in God’s image, I look out for the rights, preferences and comfort of others. That can be a challenge especially when people come to this country from other cultures who have different norms and expectations.
Sometimes they make choices that we don’t understand or they do things that we would never choose to do. But unless they are doing something is illegal or unethical, we are still called to look out for their rights, preferences and comforts because they too are created in God’s image. Just because we don’t like it or we would not choose it is not grounds to protest against it.
Principle #3: Because I was created in the image of God, I value and enjoy others.
God gave us life so that we could spend time with him. He also gave us life so that we could spend time with each other. We were never intended to live on our own. Rather, we were created to live in community. No one is an island. That’s not to say that all people should be flaming extroverts because half the world’s population are introverts but even introverts need community. They just need less of it. It’s really a matter of degree. The ways that we enjoy each other may vary depending on our relationships. Clearly husbands and wives enjoy each other in different ways than do friends. People of faith who pray together enjoy each other differently than people at work who each lunch together. But however we do that, it is important to understand and appreciate that you were created to enjoy life in community. page 7.

Jesus is the centre of our faith because Jesus is God. God exists. Of that, we can be certain. Next week we are going to talk about the character of God. What kind of God is
God and how does he interact with us? page 8.

PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE
We come to you, O God, with the confidence of your constant presence. We thank you that we are never alone and that your Spirit lives in our hearts and works in our lives.
We thank you for all of the wonders of Creation: for the feeling of autumn in cool morning mists; for bike rides in the warm afternoon sunshine; for geese flying south and plants storing energy for the winter ahead.
Thank you for sowing good things into our lives. Thank you for honouring our times when we share with others by providing for our every need. Help us to so appreciate your generousity that we will never withhold any good thing from anyone else.
Your grace has no limits and your love knows no boundaries.
Help us, O God, to increase in our sense of mission in our community and in the world. Help us to understand that when we do it together, we can get so much more done than trying to do things alone. Encourage us to discover the missions that you would have us do and give us the courage, the strength and the tenacity to fulfill your great calling.
Be with us as a nation as we approach the Federal election next month. Give us wisdom in our voting and encouragement to actually cast our votes. We pray that our elected officials will be willing to represent their constituents for the betterment of all people, Canadians and immigrants, who live in this great nation.
We lift up in prayer those who are sick, especially Mary Taylor, Gary Rawlins,
Ruby Archer and Doug Montgomery. Be with all people who are sick in body, mind or spirit. Be with them in their illness. Sometimes we are confused and disillusioned by sickness but help us to see your hand in our lives in any and every situation.
Heavenly Father, when circumstances and situations would seem to be more than we can bear, you are our refuge. Remind us that you are greater than any problem in our lives. In the tough times, we can call upon you and you are always there to provide strength and hope. Grant us the assurance that you will always be there for us as we are there for one another. We thank you for your great unfailing love which never ends, in
Jesus’ name. Amen. page 9.

WORSHIP RESOURCE PAGE
September 27, 2012 / Pentecost 18 / Proper 26
SCRIPTURE
Esther 7:1-6, 9-10, 9:20-22; Psalm 124; Mark 9:38-50; James 5:13-20
CALL TO WORSHIP
There is joy in the Lord;
There is joy in knowing that God is with us.
Praise be to God who lifts us above our troubles and sets our feet upon solid ground;
Come, let us worship the our God, the Maker of Heaven and Earth.
PRAYER OF APPROACH
God of Love, your Spirit flows to us like a refreshing stream of cool water. We ask for your presence among us for you have promised to be with your people when we call upon your name. We thank you that you are faithful in all that you have promised. You have called us to be your Church and set us aside for the ministry of Christ. Enable us to be faithful to that which you have called us as a community of faith. May our worship intensify and nourish the deep need that we have for you in our lives. Amen.
PRAYER OF CONFESSION
God of Mercy, despite your amazing love, we have fallen short of your glory. We have hurt and wounded others, intentionally or otherwise. Help us to realize that our relationships with our sisters and brothers affect our relationship with you. If we have offended anyone or they have anything against us give us the courage to be reconciled as the opportunity arises. Keep us sensitive to the needs of our neighbours that we may encourage them to walk the road of faith that leads to your arms. Amen.
ASSURANCE OF PARDON
The power of God is the power to forgive and redeem us for our place in Heaven. Hear the Good News and believe that, in Jesus’ death and resurrection, the chains of sin have been broken and we are freed to walk in the light of God’s grace.
DEDICATION OF OFFERING
Father God, help us to recognize every opportunity to give to others, whether in time, money, compassion, mercy, or any other means. May we reach out not for motives of reward or recognition but because of love knowing that as we give it will be given to us according to the promises that you have made through Jesus Christ our Saviour. Amen.
COMMISSIONING
As children of the Living God, we are called to embrace our neighbours and to share with them the
Gospel of Life which is Jesus Christ. Let us always remember that it is by our words and actions that people often have their first encounter with the carpenter from Galilee. Go from this place and walk the path of faith as followers of him who gave all that he had for us.
MESSAGE OUTLINE page 10.

The Rev. Kim Gilliland
September 27, 2015
BELIEVE - GOD
WHO IS GOD?
Everything begins with God.
Hear O Israel: the LORD our God, the LORD is one.
Deuteronomy 6:4 (NIV)
There is only one God - monotheism.
This was a radical view of the Hebrew people 5,000 years ago.
God comes to us in three different person - trinity.
The Father, Son and Holy Spirit are all God.
They are co-equal.
Each shares the essence and nature of God.
Even some Christians question the divinity of Jesus.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God... The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and only Son who came from the Father full of grace and truth.
John 1:1, 14 (NIV)
HOW DOES BELIEVING IN GOD EFFECT ME?
Believing in God is only important if it makes a difference to me and way I live my life.
What difference does it make?
There are three principles we need to understand regarding who I am:
Principle #1: Because God is God, I am not
Principle #2: Because God is God, I can be sure that God is in charge.
Principle #3: Because God is God, I want to know and follow his will for my life.
There are also three principles about how we treat others:
Principle #1: Because I am created in the image of God, I recognize the full personhood of others and respect boundaries.
Principle #2: Because I am created in the image of God, I look out for the rights, preferences and comforts of others.
Principle #3: Because I am created in the image of God, I value and enjoy others. page 11.