Gems in a Jar - Ann Christian Farewell-2

["Pomp and Circumstance"] Please be seated. Well, Anne, it's 14 years since you arrived in Worthing from Sheffield, the second good thing to come from that city. Tell us briefly what brought you here and how you spent the first part of your time in Worthing.

I came to Worthing originally to take up a post at Beecham Pharmaceuticals after I graduated from university, heading south, not really knowing anybody or anything about the south of England. I'm afraid some of us northerners have the same view of the south as some of you southerners have of the north. It's a sort of dim, distant place.

On my first Sunday here, I came to the TAB, and I'm still here. Later on, you did a spell with O.M. on doulos. Where did you go with her? I spent my time on the doulos mostly in South America.

I joined the ship in Chile and virtually did a complete circuit of South America and also spent some time on the ship when it was in Europe as well. And then back to Worthing for teacher training and a good, solid five years at Durrington High School. Now you're off again, and where to this time? I'm going back to South America, this time to the country of Bolivia.

I have heard the term mission used in connection with your going. How does that fit in with what you're going to do? Well, I'm sure there were some people, and I'm sure I was one of them at one time, who thought missionaries were little old ladies with tweed skirts and a bun. My aim in life is to explode that myth, hence the big earrings and the bright colors.

A missionary is the sort of term you think of people going into the jungles and preaching to the heathens and this. Basically, a missionary is someone who works for the Lord overseas or in a different place, perhaps in their home church. Missionaries are now doing many, many different things.

What I'll be doing is teaching in a Christian school because there's a lot of missionaries who are out in Bolivia planting churches, training new converts, training pastors, working in universities who couldn't be there if their children were not educated, if their children had to come home to school or go to boarding school or whatever. They couldn't be there doing the job that they do. Therefore, they need people to teach their children.

So I'm going to teach in a Christian school. Half of the pupils are the children of missionaries and half are local children, Bolivian children. So that's where you're going when you leave on Tuesday from Heathrow.

Tell us a bit about the journey, as much as you know about it, that is. Well, I don't know much about the journey other than it's quite a long one. I leave Heathrow at 11.15 on Tuesday morning, fly to Miami, courtesy of British Airways.

In Miami, I've got a stopover of seven hours, and that's quite a long time when you've got to trail your luggage around with you. Then I fly from Miami to Santa Cruz, which is a big city in Bolivia, and then from there an internal flight to Cochabamba. Hopefully, when you get to Cochabamba, you'll be met.

And then what? I don't really know. They've said that they'll meet me in Cochabamba and hopefully take me. I'm anticipating staying initially in the mission guest house where I'll acclimatise.

Cochabamba's 8,500 feet above sea level, so it's quite high. So you need a time to acclimatise to the altitude because it's easy to get very breathless if you try and do too much. Will you have a language problem there? Well, I'm fortunate that I did actually learn some Spanish when I was in South America before, and I've kept that up at night school since.

It just seemed I may as well do something other than teach in a school and be involved in the tab. I wanted to do something different, so I went to night school to keep up the Spanish. Although I'm not fluent, I can certainly communicate in Spanish, so that's an advantage.

I won't be completely lost when I first arrive. You've told us a bit about the children. You didn't say what ages they were.

They start at kindergarten age, about three or four years old, and go up to the age of 17. I'll be teaching the secondary age children from the ages of about 11 to 17. So the age group will be about the same as it was here.

But the class size will be considerably smaller. What about the staff? Have you met any of them, or do you know who they are? The staff are drawn from many different countries, mostly from the United States of America, from New Zealand, and from Australia. I think there's a lady from South Africa there, I'm not sure.

I think there's one other British member of staff. There's an international staff, so the school has an international flavour to it. How different do you think it will be from Durrington High? Your headmaster's here.

I'd better be careful what I say. I think it will be very different because it's very, very much smaller. The whole school has fewer pupils than one year at Durrington.

So, obviously, the size is different. Also, the facilities will not be as good. I'm told that the laboratory is reasonably adequately equipped, but not nearly so well equipped as the labs at Durrington.

And also, things are more difficult to get. I met the headmaster of the school, and he was telling me things like hydrochloric acid, which we sort of use gallons of in schools here, very difficult to get because they use it in the processing of cocaine, which is the main export of Bolivia. So you can't get hold of it unless you fill in forms in triplicate and all the rest of it.

So it's very difficult to get hold of some of the chemicals. It's not a boarding school, I gather, and presumably you'll go home each night. So what sort of a place will home be? I don't know that either.

I'm told that they will find me a small flat or a little apartment somewhere. Again, I don't know all the details of that until I actually arrive. Will you have things like TV, washing machine, fridge, plumbing? Well, I'll certainly have a fridge, I hope.

I don't think I'll have a TV or a washing machine. The plumbing in Bolivia is, well, not quite up to the standard of Britain. You can't be guaranteed you'll get water 24 hours a day.

You can't be guaranteed you'll get electricity 24 hours a day. So it's likely to be the times that you want both at the same time, like for a hot shower or something, that the two go off. So obviously things are not quite as civilized in one sense as here in Britain.

Well, maybe that's a good thing for us to remember. When we have a hot shower, we might think of Anne and think, well, this isn't just a fortnight's holiday she's gone on. This is something that's going on and on, and these things could be greater after a time.

What about church on Sunday, Anne? Well, this time next week I'll be in a Spanish-speaking church in Bolivia. The church in Bolivia is growing rapidly amongst the poor people. There is no church in the upper class in Bolivia.

So mostly are poor people, often people who work, labourers, miners, things like that. But the people really love the Lord and the churches are very small, very, very simple. They won't be nearly so grand as the Tab.

But the worship is always very lively, very exuberant, and I fit in quite well there. You'll need to relax as well as to work. So what opportunities are there in this area, sports, reading material, shopping, Marks and Spencers, McDonald's? There may be a McDonald's in the capital, La Paz, but I don't think there will be in Cochabamba where I'm going.

No, the main shopping will be at the local market, which is very colourful because all the local Indians are there with all their very brightly coloured shawls and that. So that will be different, but I think it will be quite fun as well. I hope to do some walking because the town I'm living in is surrounded by beautiful hills and quite nice scenery from what I've seen of it.

So I hope to do walking and I hope to do, in school holidays, do some travelling around, visiting some of the sites in Bolivia. Talking of shopping, will you get a paycheck each month as you do now and will it come from the equivalent of the Bolivian education department or somewhere like that? Well, not quite, no. I get an allowance from the mission, which in turn comes from people who give money to support me, from home friends, family, people at the church who give money to keep me there basically.

Well, the mission, in case anyone doesn't know, is SIM and we'll be hearing a bit about that from John Pickett in a little while, so we won't say any more at the moment. At the moment, with your family and friends around you, there's a feeling of excitement, I'm sure, but next Tuesday, as you step out on your own, is there any special support you would like to have then? I really would appreciate prayer for the journey. Twenty-four hours is a long time on your own, especially for the arrival in Bolivia because I arrive not at my final destination and the customs in Bolivia are known for their awkwardness.

It has been known for customs officials to plant drugs on unsuspecting people, to charge colossal sums that they don't need to charge and all sorts of difficult things like that, so I would appreciate prayer for a really smooth passage through the customs because after travelling for some 20-odd hours, my Spanish will not be at the tip of my tongue. I'll be a bit exhausted and to actually have to try and communicate could be a problem. Before we go on to prayer needs, tell us about the family you're leaving behind.

We're so glad that some of them are here with us this evening. Yes, my mum and dad are here tonight and I'm very pleased to have them here. I've got three sisters, none of whom can be here tonight.

Two of them live near Manchester and one is up in Cumbria near where my parents live. I wish they could be here tonight, but because of work and family, they can't. Andrea and Graham Phillips are going to be Anne's prayer secretaries.

Is Andrea here? Yes, that's Andrea. If you can't see her, make sure you know who she is and they will keep us in touch and keep your news flowing to us. Is there anything else you're burning to say, Anne? What I really want to say is a huge thank you for everybody here at the TAB.

I love you all as a family. You've meant so much to me over the last 14 years. I start to cry.

I'm really going to miss you all so much and I really will appreciate all the letters and all the prayers I know you will send in my direction. It's been great being a member of the TAB. I'm still a member of the TAB, I know, when I go, but I won't be here every Sunday.

I'm looking forward to seeing you in 1994, God willing. Please write to Anne from time to time as you're able. Tell her what God's doing in your life and what he's doing in the church, but also tell her about your work, school, college, what's happening here in Worthing, about what the new colours are at Marks and Spencers, whether the hemlines are going up or down, who's going out with who.

Write about football, snow cup, who's ahead of the Moray Polls, the latest teaching trends, all that Anne would be interested in if she were here. We'll miss you, Anne. We really will.

We'll miss your spontaneous prayers from the gallery and your hacking cough which comes with each winter. We'll miss your dangly earrings. We'll miss just having you around.

Thanks for sharing with us. We can stand with you now, knowing as much as you know, and you can be sure that we'll stand with you on Tuesday when you step out with God into unknown territory. Thank you.

Please join on what is true. Fill your life with what is just, what is right, and let the beauty of the Father shine in you. Fill your thoughts with what is good, long to do what God requires.

Let your life be a work of peace and of love, and let your eyes linger only on what inspires. Listen to the one who goes before you. Feed upon the bread and wine, and the peace that passes understanding.

We'll fill your heart, fill your mind, all the time. Set up a pure in heart, where I shall rest upon His face. Hunger for the good that loves on and on, and discover the meaning of His grace.

Listen to the one who goes before you. Feed upon the bread and wine, and the peace that passes understanding. We'll fill your heart, fill your mind, all the time.

Feast your mind on what is pure. Feast your mind on what is true. Fill your life with what is just, what is right, and let the beauty of the Father shine in you.

Oh, let the beauty of the Father shine in you. It's a great pleasure to be here tonight to honor Anne Christian as she sets off for pastures very new and very different from ours. It's also a great pleasure for me personally and for my wife, if I may say so, to be present in your very vibrant community.

The reading I have is from the fourth chapter of St. Paul's second epistle to the Corinthians. It is subtitled in the New International Version of the Bible, Treasures in Jars of Clay. Therefore, since through God's mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart.

Rather, we have renounced secret and shameful ways. We do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly, we commend ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God.

And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, the God of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For we do not preach ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake. For God, who said, let light shine out of darkness, made his light shine in our hearts, to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.

But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard-pressed on every side, but not crushed, perplexed, but not in despair, persecuted, but not abandoned, struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body.

For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you. It is written, I believed, therefore I have spoken.

With that same spirit of faith, we also believe and therefore speak, because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you in his presence. All this is for your benefit, so that the grace that is reaching more and more people may cause thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God. Therefore, we do not lose heart, though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.

For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So, we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

Thanks be to God. Let's keep our Bibles open at that passage which Mr. Smith directed our attention to. And I'd like you to all join in reading that seventh verse.

We have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. I remember once sharing some meetings in Westminster Central Hall. David Kossoff was part of the team that had joined with the London Emanuel Choir.

For those of you who don't know, Kossoff is a brilliant Jewish storyteller. One of the best I have ever come across. And in a fascinating way, he held spellbound a congregation of 3,000 people as he narrated his own understanding of the story of Jonah.

And as he got towards the end, he gave us the picture of Jonah somewhat peeved, sitting or standing under a withered plant which no longer gave him shade from the eastern sun. And Kossoff said, of God, he chuckled. And I rather like the idea because I think, perhaps not from that context, but from other passages of Scripture, there is warrant to suggest that God has a sense of humor.

The chuckle of God. When our Lord Jesus was leaving the temple area and taking a nocturnal trip down the Kidron Valley into the Garden of Gethsemane, He spoke to His entourage, His disciples. In the distance was the bronze gates of the temple.

And emblazoned on those gates was the national emblem of the Hebrew nation at that time. The emblem was the vine. Probably, if you use a little bit of imagination, you can see that in the Kidron Valley there would be lots of little bonfires.

It was a time of the harvest and the old vines were being burnt. And our Lord Jesus is moving towards this climax in His own ministry when in just hours He'll be arrested and a day or so later pinned to a cross. And He talks to His disciples and He backtracks on the temple and the gate and the vine.

And He says, All that that vine stood for, the purposes of God in Israel, I have fulfilled. And He went on to say, and there was a preacher in London in the forties who made this comment. It might need a little bit of qualification.

He went on to say, By way of excommunication of Judaism at that point, I am the vine, you. And He's talking to His disciples, other branches. In other words, all the purposes of God, all the promises of God in the Old Testament, all His concerns for the Jewish nation and for the world now rest on you.

And I just wonder if, and here I use speculation, Some lofty angel didn't move over to the right hand of the Majesty on high and said, O God, aren't you taking a bit of a risk? I mean, there's Peter. Don't put too much faith on him. He could deny your Son.

There's Judas, and he's about to betray Him. And as for Thomas, well, he's skepticism personified. And I think I hear a little chuckle.

The chuckle of the Almighty. Because He knows what He's about. And His Son is infallible.

And when His Son says, I am the vine, And speaks to the disciples, you are the branches, And the future of God's purposes are invested in you, And not in the temple, the Old Testament dispensation. The Son was speaking deliberately. He was speaking predictively.

And He was speaking accurately. God entrusted the future of the gospel into the hands of a disparate group of people. We have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.

The verse on even third reading, for some of you, will seem like one of those annoying clues in the Daily Telegraph crossword puzzle that and us so brilliantly fairly regularly. Let me bring a little clue, a further clue, to the text on top of the gospel narrative to which I've just referred. Here is the Apostle Paul, and he's got lined up the membership of a Christian church in a place called Corinth.

And he says this. I'm speaking from his first letter to the Corinthians. The 27th verse in the first chapter.

God chose the foolish things of this world to shame the wise. God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things and the things that are not to nullify the things that are so that no one may boast before Him.

Now, if you've got the little cogs of your brain moving quickly, if you're really concentrating, you now have enough scriptural evidence to make sense out of our seed text. We have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. God entrusts the greatest thing in this world to ordinary human people, and He asks them to execute a mission in His name.

So, let's crack open this text in three ways. Here is the contents, or here are the contents. This treasure, references made to the container in jars of clay, and then there is some comment on the consequence to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.

The contents. It might surprise you to hear that when the Bible refers to the gospel, it does so in such extravagant or seemingly extravagant language as treasure. But let's face it, if what is most important in your estimation as you go through life is what lies beyond, then the secret to what lies beyond is of such consequence that it will cause you to ask many a question as to how you can prepare for the eternity that is yet to be.

In terms of value, it must be more important to get that right than to get anything else right this side of eternity, or to express it in a different fashion. Our Lord Jesus, when He came on this earth, why did He come? Well, He tells a parable on one occasion, I don't have time to go into it, in which He refers to a group of people who are rich unto God. And then by consequence, by deduction, He refers to those who are poverty stricken.

What is the opposite to a rich man, a poor man? Why did Jesus come into this world? Well, says the Apostle Paul, you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. How though He was rich, He became poor in order to make people rich who didn't deserve the treasure that He has come to bring. Our Lord Jesus Christ has come to show you the secret of a right relationship with God.

He has come to prepare you for the eternity that is yet to be. And this gospel message, which can be summarized in terms of, God so loved the world, He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. That gospel message has a right to be declared throughout the whole world.

The United Nations talks about human rights. And the Bible agrees with quite a lot of the deductions that they reckon ought to be the normal right of the average person in our world. But it adds to it, every man has a right to hear the gospel.

And so when you read of the gospel in the Scriptures, you see it so often referred to in terms of wealth. To make the riches of His glory known, says the Apostle Paul writing to the Romans in the 9th chapter and the 23rd verse. Writing again to them, he says the depth of the riches of the wisdom of God.

He speaks to the Ephesians of the incomparable riches of Jesus Christ. And to the Colossians in similar fashion, the glorious riches. But why do we have missionaries today? We need to put up the question and find an answer.

The answer that I give you is different from the one that came over on the BBC a year or so ago. We need missionaries today because men are still in ignorance as to the basic understanding of what the gospel is. And the Bible says that this gospel is so precious that there's only one word to describe it, and it is as treasure.

If you had something precious, where would you put it? Well, in a vault. Maybe in the vaults of London. Maybe in your bank.

I used to work in the educational offices in Sheffield when I was really a grammar school failure. And I left before I even tackled A-levels or anything like that. And I spent two years as a prison sentence in the offices there.

And we had a lady by the name of Miss Smith. And the senior clerk would always joke that Miss Smith kept all her pound notes in some stocking that she had in the wardrobe. He reckoned that she was fairly old-fashioned and she loved to have her leg pulled.

You know, some of these Miss Smiths do, don't they? But where you would normally put your treasure requires more concern than that little semi-humorous illustration that I gave you. And here the Bible says that God seems to be somewhat careless of the way in which He entrusts this message which is referred to so poetically as treasure. He says He puts it in jars of clay.

Now the apostle is wanting to arrest the attention of the people who read his letters. And so he uses this next little metaphor which they will understand. Because if you went to the bazaars in Corinth you would find many clay parts that they sold for just a dime or so, just a penny or so.

And when you used your clay part, if it had got a crack or if you knocked it over, well, it was expendable and also replaceable. And says the apostle, that's just like those who have received the gospel. Just like those who are committed to sharing this truth with others.

We like clay jars. And God puts His gems in these jars. And He asks us to let others be enriched as a result of the knowledge that we have of His gospel, of His way of writing wrong.

When the Romans conquered another area of the empire, sometimes the trophies of war would be brought back to the imperial city. And they would always put the gold and the silver in earth clay vases. As though to contrast the meanness, so to speak, of the one with the value of the other.

When God made man, how did He create him? He created him from the soil, from the dust of the earth. Very often in the Old Testament and written out by Paul in the New Testament, you find the parable of God the divine potter with clay on His wheel. And God fashions men and women.

And as they respond to His deft fingers, so they become that sort of personality that He can use for the advance of His will in the world. But He does not give to us immortality. We are not here for any long span of time compared with the whole story of human history.

There is fragility that's built into us. Look in a mirror if you are over eighteen years of age and you debate my point. What are missionaries? Super spiritual people? Obviously so.

Ladies with a bun and a hat? Thick Bible? So saintly that you can send them second-hand tea bags? That they can live on the smell of an oil rag? They don't need the sort of support and sustenance that you and I need because they are a breed set apart? The Apostle Paul describes such here as being clay jars with fragility, who have the same origin as you and me, who are part of our stock, our kiss, our kin. Call to live for Jesus for forty years, fifty years, sixty years, it doesn't matter. And in that missionary call, He involves actually the whole church and not just a special group.

We have this treasure in jars of clay. To show what? Well to show the fact that we are not super human people. Well says the Apostle Paul as he is writing in this second epistle, speaking of his own problems and the criticisms that are sometimes leveled his way because of his physical position and his lack of ability with words.

He says in the tenth verses he is offsetting some criticisms. His letters, speaking of his own writings. Some people are saying his letters are weighty and forceful but in person he is unimpressive and his speaking amounts to nothing.

And he goes on in the sixth verse of the following chapter to say, I may not be a trained speaker but I do have knowledge. And then he goes on further in the twelfth chapter to talk about the frailty of his physical being and how he comes to God and asks that he might have an improvement in his own health and strength. The Apostle stands as an illustration of the comment that he is making.

He stands as an illustration to all missionaries, to all Christians that God has placed treasure in earthen vessels. In other words the task that God has given men and women to do is utterly impossible. I am the vine.

You are the branches. And there is a chuckle I suggest on the part of Almighty God if one of the angelic beings remonstrates with him. Nothing wrong with the deduction that it is an impossible task that is being settled upon such people.

But you have to take into consideration that this God who places this treasure in this jar of clay does not then abdicate his responsibility but continues to give to this clay jar the power to live out the message and to rise to the responsibility of the task of being an ambassador for the Lord Jesus. We have this treasure in jars of clay. Why? To show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.

Alright, some of you are skeptical about Christianity. I have two questions to put to you. Take them with you and think them through.

What is your answer to Jesus Christ if you are skeptical? You say, what do I mean? Well look, here is this man and by common consent of all the historians and philosophers and psychologists what he had to say was eminently sensible. He gave us a code of ethics which is utterly unsurpassed. But locked into those code of ethics, not apart from them, but locked into them are his insinuations that he is more than just an ordinary man.

He is God himself. And there really has been no explanation to understand the Lord Jesus Christ and His teaching and His claims apart from accepting that He was who He claimed to be, none other than the Son of God. And Christianity in one sense demands the answer from any thinking person.

Who is Jesus? What is Jesus Christ in your estimation? And I would go so far as to say that unless you came in on the bottom line with the answer, He is divine, then you are bereft of any other way of explaining Jesus. But here is my second question. How do you explain the church? You see, this church, and by a church I'm not meaning a building, I'm not meaning a denomination.

I'm meaning Christianity down the years, across the centuries, and around the globe today. How do you understand the church? How did she come about? I mean, the angel, if you'll allow my little speculation, is quite right. If he says, look at Peter, look at Judas, look at Thomas, do you dare to say, will you allow your son to say, He is divine? And they are the branches.

These men do not have the ability to cope with the responsibility that you're placing upon them. And one of the greatest proofs of the gospel of Jesus is the church, and the fact that the church continued to exist. It grew from the ranks of these men who would never probably have got through the SIM screening board had they applied to be missionaries in the 20th century, let alone become staff members of Durrington High School.

That the all-surpassing power is from God, and not from us. And what's going to keep Anne, and Gustav, and John, and Jean, and Peter, and Colleen, and Dave, and Irene, and Catherine Forsyth, and Pamela Massey, and Richard Sharp, and David Gibbs, and Martin and Heather Smith, and others that I've met and missed in my quick call of the church role. What is going to keep them as faithful ambassadors? Well, that same power that will keep Anne, that keeps me, that keeps every other mortal Christian on this earth, and it is the dynamic that comes from God Himself.

This all-surpassing power is from God, and not from us. God has placed gems in clay pots, and that's basically what a missionary is. Perhaps never so defined before, but I believe I biblical warrant.

You see Anne going, the Anne that we love, as someone as fragile as you and me. And the only reason why she dares go, and we dare place our hands upon her and send her, is because we're relying on this all-surpassing power of God to keep her. Now, as I close, what about you? You see, the questions that I've been juggling from this pulpit don't go away for the thinking person.

The problem is that thinking people are not in the majority in the Western world. I am a new creation, no more in condemnation. Here, in the grace of God, I stand.

There's a divine chuckle when anyone suggests to this God that He can't achieve His purposes through ordinary people like ourselves. He can, He does. The history of Christian missions, I narrow it down, the history of this church illustrates the point.

Respond to this warm-hearted God and the salvation He offers you. Let's pray.