He whom God has sent [Jesus] speaks the words of God, for he gives the Spirit without measure. The Father loves the Son and has placed all things in his hands. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever disobeys the Son will not see life, but must endure God’s wrath.

—John 3:34-36 (NRSV)

Here we have the reason why we call the Good News “good news.” Without Jesus we remain alienated from God and if we remain alienated from him we ultimately die. God knows this. Our sin is terribly grievous to him, but he created us to have a relationship with him rather than to destroy us and so he gave us himself in the person of Jesus to rectify our terrible plight. We do not earn this gift of life; it is God’s gracious gift to us. It is our by faith.

So how can John say in one clause that those who believe in Jesus will have eternal life but those who disobey Jesus will not? Is this not contradictory? Which is it? Faith or works? The answer, of course, is both because real faith always manifests itself in works. As we saw yesterday, we desire to do the things that we know please our beloved.

You never stop hoping for temporal things and yet are frequently disappointed in your hopes. You are excited by them before they come, corrupted by them when they do come, tormented by them when they inevitably leave. Are not all temporal things the sort that glow brightly when coveted, grow dull when acquired, and fade away when lost? It is better by far to use the good things of this earth as we need them on our pilgrimage but avoid making them the center of our heart’s joy so that we not be buried in their ruins when they collapse. It is better by far to make use of this world as though we were not using it in order to reach the God who made it and remain in him for all eternity.

—Augustine, Sermon 157.5

I do need you, Lord. I need you now. I know that I can do without many of the things that I once thought were necessities, but without you I cannot live, and I dare not die.

I needed you when sorrow came, when shadows were thrown across the threshold of my life, and you did not fail me then. I needed you when sickness laid a clammy hand upon my family, and I cried to you, and you did hear me. I needed you when perplexity brought me to a parting of the ways, and I knew not how to turn. You did not fail me then, but in many ways, big and little, you indicated the better way. And though the sun is shining around me today, I know I need you even in the sunshine, and will need you tomorrow.

I give you my gratitude for that constant sense of need that keeps me close to your side. Help me to keep my hand in yours and my ears open to the wisdom of your voice. Speak to me, that I may hear you giving me courage for hard times and strength for difficult places; giving me determination for challenging tasks. I ask you for no easy way; but just grace that is sufficient for every need, so that no matter how hard the way, how challenging the hour, how dark the sky, I may be enabled to overcome. In your strength, who has overcome the world, I make this prayer. Amen.

—The Prayers of Peter Marshall

If you ever want to know what Christian humility, faith, and trust look like, read this prayer and make it your own. Marshall knows who is God and who is not, and desires God’s will over his own. You cannot pray like this without being humble and having a faith that allows you to see the manifold ways in which God answers your prayers. This, in turn, allows you to build experience of God’s gracious love for you, which in turn helps build your faith. Cool.

Give God praise for any well spent day.

—Susanna Wesley, mother of John and Charles Wesley

It is true we have departed from [Roman Catholicism], and for so doing we both give thanks to Almighty God, and greatly rejoice on our own behalf. But yet for all this, from the primitive church, from the apostles, and from Christ, we have not departed. Let them compare our churches and theirs together, and they shall see that themselves have most shamefully gone from the apostles, and we most justly have gone from them [Roman Catholicism].

—John Jewel, An Apology of the Church of England 1562

Again, do not focus on the anti-Roman rhetoric. If you do, you miss Jewel’s point. He is not against the church per se but only those practices that he considers to have no basis in the primitive church, in the apostolic teaching, or in the teachings of Christ.

O that our [Roman] adversaries, and all they that stand in defense of the mass this day, would content themselves to be judged by this rule! O that, in all the controversies that lie between us and them, they would remit the judgment unto God’s word! So should we soon agree and join together: so should we deliver nothing unto the people but what we have received at God’s hand.

—John Jewel, Challenge Sermon 1558

Here we see an important basis for the Anglican reformers—that worship be based on Scripture first and foremost. Jewel was commenting on some of the practices of his day that were part of the Roman mass, practices he considered to be based on superstition rather than on Scripture and the tradition of the primitive church. Read with the excerpt below, you can begin to see that Jewel and his fellow reformers had no interest in starting a brand new church, but rather to reform the existing one.

[Some people] stand this day against so many old fathers, so many doctors, so many examples of the primitive church, so manifest and so plain words of the holy scriptures; and yet have they herein not one father, not one doctor, not one allowed example of the primitive church, to make for them. Of all the words of holy scriptures, of all the examples of the primitive church, of all the old fathers, of all the ancient doctors, in these causes they have not one.

—John Jewel, Challenge Sermon 1558

John Jewel was one of the earliest and most effective apologists for the church of England. Jewel and the early Anglican reformers wanted to reform Christ’s one holy, catholic, and apostolic church, and return it to its historical and scriptural roots. They had no interest in throwing the baby out with the bath water. Hence, we must be very careful not to read too much into some of his anti-Catholic rhetoric. Jewel and the early Anglican apologists were not against Catholicism per se. Rather, they were against much of the practices that had developed within the church, practices they considered to have no basis in Scripture and that were antithetical to the primitive church.

In this excerpt above, Jewel is arguing against those who wanted to completely break from all the practices of Catholicism, something Jewel found unacceptable because it had no historical or scriptural basis. Tradition was important to the early Anglicans, but tradition that had its root in the early church, not that had developed in the last few centuries. This is one reason I love Anglicanism. It seeks to be consistent and true to Scripture and the early church. I think people who fail to consider tradition rob themselves of the richness of Christian worship and theology.

Pass Me Not, O Gentle Savior

Pass me not, O gentle Savior,
hear my humble cry;
while on others thou art calling,
do not pass me by.

Refrain:
Savior, Savior, hear my humble cry;
while on others thou art calling,
do not pass me by.

Let me at thy throne of mercy
find a sweet relief,
kneeling there in deep contrition;
help my unbelief.
(Refrain)

Trusting only in thy merit,
would I seek thy face;
heal my wounded, broken spirit,
save me by thy grace.
(Refrain)

Thou the spring of all my comfort,
more than life to me,
whom have I on earth beside thee?
Whom in heaven but thee?
(Refrain)

—Fannie Crosby, 351