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S1-E24 | Everyday Eurasia | Jason Nike · Eurasia Region Podcast

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  Welcome to the special Advent series of the Everyday Eurasia
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  podcast, Inspiring Fate for every day.
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  In the coming weeks, we'll be journeying together toward
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  Christmas, a season of anticipation, reflection, and
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  light in the darker days. During this special season of
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  Advent, we will journey through the Advent themes of hope,
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  peace, joy, and love. This first week of Advent, we
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  will join Pastor Jason Nike. Jason is the lead pastor at
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  Fresh Ground, a Nest Wind church, cafe and community hub
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  based in Battersea, southwest London.
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  He also serves as the Greater London assistant district
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  Superintendent. Jason will speak this week about
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  the theme Advent Hope. I Our reading today comes from
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  the book of Hebrews, chapter 4. I'm reading from verse 14
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  through to 16. Since then we have a great high
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  priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of
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  God. Let us hold fast our confession,
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  for we do not have a high Priest who is unable to sympathize with
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  our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted
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  as we are, yet without sin. Let us then, with confidence
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  draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy
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  and find grace to help in times of need.
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  Amen. So far this week we've looked at
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  hope from a few different angles, Hope when life goes
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  wrong. We've looked at the film
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  clockwise hope that takes action in The Martian.
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  And yesterday we looked at hope in dark seasons with Lord of the
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  Rings, The Two Towers. And today we look at perhaps the
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  most surprising dimension of Christian hope, hope that is
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  rooted in the character of God himself.
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  And for that, the film we're looking at today was also a
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  great book is The Life of Pi. In this film, in the Life of Pi,
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  the main character guy called Pi Patel, he explores the different
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  religions of the world with a with a genuine openness and
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  curiosity. And he he just loves the beauty,
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  the mystery and the divine transcendence.
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  And he's looking at all the different gods and all the
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  powerful things they do and how they're represented.
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  But when he encounters Christianity, he becomes really
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  baffled. And he has this question which
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  is raw and honest. He says this, if God is so
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  perfect and so powerful, why would he desire to be born as a
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  human? Why would he suffer?
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  What is there to admire in such an ordinary God?
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  For Π This idea of Jesus, tired, wounded, hungry, dying, just
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  makes no sense at all. But then comes the revelation.
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  It is precisely the suffering of Jesus that reveals the love of
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  God. God becomes ordinary, God
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  becomes vulnerable, God becomes breakable.
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  And that is why we dare to place our hope in Him.
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  Advent, for all its candles and carols and festivities which
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  often bring us comfort, it actually tells a very disruptive
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  truth. God did not save the world by
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  staying at a distance. God saved the world by entering
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  our pain. He arrived not as a warrior, not
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  as a philosopher, but as a crying, helpless baby in a
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  borrowed Manger. A God who becomes human in all
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  our frailty is actually a God who can be trusted.
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  Hebrews says there that Jesus is able to sympathize and empathize
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  with our weakness not from theory, but from experience.
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  He knows fear. He knows abandonment.
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  He knows grief. He knows exhaustion.
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  He knows what it feels like to have prayers that seem
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  unanswered. This is not a distant deity.
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  This is a God who bleeds π in the film, he eventually realizes
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  that Christianity doesn't just offer a message, it offers a
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  person. A God who suffers with us, a God
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  who suffers for us. A God whose love is shown not
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  through displays of power, but through self giving tenderness.
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  And that means that our hope isn't naive.
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  It isn't escapist, it isn't pretend.
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  Everything is fine. Our hope is grounded in the
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  truth that Jesus has carried human pain all the way to the
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  cross and then carried resurrection back to us.
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  We follow a Saviour who has walked every valley, every dark
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  place that we have walked, and therefore no valley is hopeless.
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  For anyone carrying sorrow or grief or anxiety, uncertainty
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  this Advent time, know this. Your hope isn't in a God who
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  demands that you be strong. It's in a God who knows what
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  it's like to be weak. Your hope isn't in a God who
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  tells you to cheer up. Your hope is in a God who knows
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  what it is to weep, who knows what it is to cry and to grieve.
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  Your hope isn't in a God who floats above the suffering.
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  Your hope is in a God who has suffered willingly because love
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  compelled him π asked what is there to admire in such an
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  ordinary God? And the answer is everything.
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  Everything. Let's pray.
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  Jesus, thank you that you are our God who knows our pain.
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  Thank you that you are. You entered our world, You
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  entered our weakness, You entered our wounds.
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  Give us hope, not rooted in escape, but in your presence,
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  and remind us that your love is stronger than the darkness we
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  face. Amen.
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  Thank you for listening to the Everyday Eurasia podcast,
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  Inspiring Fate for everyday. For more Everyday Stories,
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  subscribe on this podcast channel, follow our socials,
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  For our newsletter and further information about the Eurasia
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  region, visit our website, eurasiaregion.org.