Last week, on Monday 27 February, the American author Dan Brown was in the
news. He was instructed to turn up at court in London. You’ll perhaps remember
him – he is the author of the Da Vinci Code, a book that has sold some 36
million copies world wide, and has led to the floors and carpets wearing out at
Rosslyn Chapel which features in the book. Why is he in court ? He is there
because two other authors, Richard Leigh and Michael Baigent are suing him for
lifting their ideas from a book they wrote about the Holy Grail in 1982. In the meantime, a film of The Da Vinci Code,
starring Tom Hanks and Audrey Tautou looks as if it will be put on hold. The
court case continues this Tuesday, and will last three weeks. There is a lot at
stake here. Dan Brown has made around 200 million dollars from the Da Vinci
Code.
Now, while for us, the Bible is the Book of Life, containing a living Word,
the Word of the Lord for us, the Good News - “The DaVinci Code”, written by Dan Brown is a
book of fiction. And the fiction that
Dan Brown writes portrays Jesus in quite a a different way from the Gospels.
Wherever Dan Brown got his fictional story line, his book says some outrageous things about the
family of Jesus, and says some outlandish things about the kind of person Jesus
was. Of course, it is a work of fiction, but many, obviously have read it, with
sales of 36 million worldwide - and have read the untrue claims about Jesus
made in the book.
So what is the truth, what are the truths, at the heart of all this ?
An attack on Jesus
Well, the first is this. And we see it in the reading this morning from Luke’s Gospel. And its this: that attacks on Jesus, slanders about Jesus, opposition – are not new at all. Quite the opposite. Jesus experienced all these Himself. In Luke 11 we read of a characteristic act of kindness and love on Jesus’ part, where He healed a man who could not speak. When the man who was unable to speak, spoke the crowd was was amazed. But, and this is important - 15 But some of them said, "Is is by the prince of demons, that Jesus is driving out demons.".
When you think about this for a
moment or two you will realise that these are shocking words. There are worse
accusations here than Dan Brown or the writers he lifted his ideas from make,
because here people are saying that Jesus healing, love, mercy are demonic. Still today Christian faith is
involved in controversy – about every three or four months there are attacks
and claims, in newspapers, or on the TV from Dan Brown, to Richard Dawkins and
others. This is nothing new,
John Calvin once wrote – the gospel condition, the normal
situation of the gospel is that it is
always under attack by Satan !
What, does Jesus do ? He brings the whole situation to a point of decision.
That can be a rare thing these
days. Very often we are used to saying – “on the one hand – there is something
true in this,
and on the other something true in that”
But because of all that is at
stake, because of the urgency of the moment, because here the power of God is
at work – Jesus brings the whole situation to a decisive point.
He says - 19 if I drive out demons by the prince of demons, by whom do your
followers drive them out? And now,
here is the decisive point, the heart of the matter But if, if, if I do this, if I drive out demons by the power of God, then the
Jesus does not here invite the
crowd to weigh up the options, make sure everything is balanced and reasonable.
This is not that kind of situation.
This is a dynamic situation,
where God is moving, in healing power, in redeeming power. Jesus is putting
before the men and women there a vital choice, a life giving, life winning
choice - to hear the Father’s invitation, to come into His kingdom to find life
in Him – and He declares “He who is not
with me is against me, and he who does
not gather with me, scatters.
The great claim of the New
Testament is that to accept Jesus Christ, to know Him to follow Him, to trust
Him – is not simply one interesting option among a whole lot of others – to accept Jesus Christ is to find life, the
heart of life, in a unique way. It is a very clear thing. Jesus Christ puts before us a vital choice, continually, a life
giving, life-winning choice - to hear the Father’s invitation, to come into His
kingdom to find life in Him. To walk with Him on a narrow
path of life.
Spiritual things
But to do so, to walk with Him on that narrow path of life, is like that
experience we have all had, where either driving or walking along a road, we
turn the corner and the landscape before us makes us gasp. To take a few steps
along a path – and suddenly to see snow capped mountains before us, glens,
forests and hills for mile after mile makes us stop and wonder and draw it all
in. To walk with Jesus on the narrow path of life is like that.
For as life draws on, as each day passes, we find that the narrow path He
invites us to walk with Him opens up on to the breathtaking, majestic landscape
of the New Testament. Where we see all the wonder, and beauty and majesty and
power of what God has done for us in His love, all the wonder, and beauty and
majesty and power in Jesus Christ.
It is very clearly set out in 1
John. There, John tells us,
as life unfolds, the Spirit of God leads us into the all the wonder, and beauty and majesty and
power in Jesus Christ, such is the Father’s love and goodness to us, that He
gives us the gift of the Spirit who guides our life. And this is not absorbing fiction, or interesting theory,
or a nice idea. John tells us – that as our knowledge of Jesus Christ
is deepened, as our love for each other grows then we know for ourselves that
the Spirit is indeed working in our own lives.
And this is just as Jesus
promised. In John’s gospel, Jesus says the breathtaking words: The Spirit will
guide you into all the truth – He will bring glory to me by taking from what is
mine and making it known to you.
So you see where we have come to ? We have come to the heart of the matter. The very
centre – we are speaking here again of the
unsurpassed wonder of Jesus Christ – the sheer wonder of all that is ours
in Him. So that like Peter, we say to
ourselves – in view of all this, in the light and glory and majesty of Jesus
Christ – where else would we go ? Where else would we
want to go, or to be ? Jesus, Jesus Christ is our north and south,
and east and west, He is the living centre too, He is our
life in the past, in the present and our life to come. And so - the
claims, the fictions of the passing world fade into fleeting shadows in His
light.
AMEN