Recently I read the testimony of A.N.Wilson, English novelist and biographer, published in the April issue of the journal New Statesman. Here was a man who had a sudden conversion experience 20 years ago. A conversion not to Christianity, but from Christianity to atheism. He had found it an exciting and liberating experience – like the character in one of Dostoevsky’s novels who says, If God is dead, everything is allowed.

But Wilson continued to have doubts. Many of those he most admired, were in fact believers. He was reminded that if human beings are no more than collections of meat, the random product of a universe empty of meaning or purpose – as materialistic atheism asserts them to be – then human abilities, like language or music or love, must be denied any true significance. Watching friends die convinced him that human existence is too mysterious for atheistic explanation. The turning point was the realisation that the evil ethics of Nazism had sprung from the atheistic teaching about man, by such as Nietzsche, while the only opposition to it, even at the cost of their lives, had come from Christians like Bonhoeffer.

The dilemma of modern man.

This testimony, it seems to me, sums up the dilemma of modern man. He wants to be free of God, yet cannot live happily without him. He wants to choose himself how to live, yet everywhere his actions lead to chaos, alienation, meaningless and despair.

What hope can atheism give to mankind? Its advocates speak with many voices – but Stephen Hawking, the scientist so afflicted by Lou Gehring’s disease, is typical. At the conclusion of an address given at Cambridge University, he said, If we can keep from destroying each other for the next one hundred years, sufficient technology will have developed to distribute humanity to various planets, and then no one tragedy or atrocity will eradicate us all at the same time. His only hope lay in more technology to rescue us from our innate tendency to violence and the aggression through which he says we’ve evolved!

The teaching of Scripture about our origin.

It is time to remind ourselves of the teaching of Jesus, and of the Bible, about our origin, our nature, and the only good hope that God offers us.

The psalmist cries, Know that the LORD is God. It is he who has made us, and not we ourselves.. (Psa 100:3mg) In popular thought life began by chance, and we’ve evolved in an unplanned way ever since. But the believer knows that God created man – moreover that God created man in his own image.. male and female he created them. (Gen 1:27)

Whatever else may be meant by our being created in God’s image – this surely tells us that we are created to reflect the character of God himself in our lives, in our thinking, our doing and our loving... You made him a little lower than the angels, and crowned him with glory and honour. You made him ruler over the works of your hands, and put everything under his feet.. O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. (Psa 8:5,6,9) To know God as our Creator, whom we are to enjoy and serve – ought to lead us into profound worship, and an awareness of our dignity and great value in God’s sight. Moreover our fellow human beings, because they possess the same dignity and worth, should command our love and respect.

How we are now.

But we know that that is not how it is! Pick up any newspaper and find out! God made mankind upright – but men have gone in search of many schemes. (Eccl 7:29) We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way. (Isa 53:6a) There is no-one righteous, not even one; there is no-one who seeks God. All have turned away. (Rom 3:10-12, quoting Psa 14:1-3; 53:1-3) Or in Jesus’ words: From within, out of men’s hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evils come from inside and make a man ‘unclean’.(Mark 7:21-23)

A graphic picture of the human heart was drawn by Malcolm Muggeridge. While working as a journalist in India, he left his residence one evening to go to a nearby river for a swim. As he entered the water, across the river he saw an Indian woman from the nearby village who had come to have her bath. Muggeridge impulsively felt the allurement of the moment, and temptation stormed into his mind. He had lived with this kind of struggle for years, but had somehow fought it off in honour of his commitment to his wife, Kitty. On this occasion, however, he wondered if he could cross the line of marital fidelity.

He struggled just for a moment and then swam furiously towards the woman, trying to outdistance his conscience. His mind fed him the fantasy that stolen waters would be sweet, and he swam the harder for it. Now he was just two or three feet away from her, and as he emerged from the water, he was devastated as he looked at her.

She was old and hideous.. her skin was wrinkled and, worst of all, she was a leper.. This creature grinned at me, showing a toothless mask. The experience left him trembling and muttering under his breath, What a dirty lecherous woman! But then the rude shock of it dawned upon him – it was not the woman who was lecherous; it was his own heart.

Two possible destinies.

This is what Jesus taught. And it’s not just sexual immorality. When we look into the human heart we see also greed, hate , pride, anger and jealousy. All these are so destructive of human relationships. Here lies our predicament, which the Scriptures call sin. And it arises because we’ve departed from God’s will and purpose, and cut ourselves off from his life. (Gen 2:17)

If this is the diagnosis, that our heart is deceitful.. and beyond cure (Jer 17:9) as the Bible asserts – what is the prognosis – the inevitable consequence for mankind? Why shouldn’t God wash his hands of us – and start over again?

From the beginning, God had said to man, You must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die. And because man did disobey, Dust you are, and to dust you will return (Gen 2:17; 3:19), or in other words, The wages of sin is death. (Rom 6:23a) And this involves more than physical death, for the disobedient will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord. (2 Thes 1:9)

But – praise God! – this is not God’s last word to us! For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16) And this Son is Jesus, who tells us, I have come that [you] may have life and have it to the full. (John 10:10) Completing the text given above, The wages of sin is death – but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Rom 6:23)

Jesus defined eternal life as knowing you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. (John 17:3) It is knowing we are loved with an everlasting love. (Jer 31:3) It is being welcomed home like the errant son in Jesus’ parable, whose father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; who ran to his son and threw his arms around him and kissed him – and who restored him to the dignity and honour of being a son in his father’s home. (Lk 15:20-23) It is being forever in the presence of Jesus, our Lord. (John 17:24)

The way of Jesus.

Only Jesus, the Son of God, can bring us into this eternal life. He said, I am the way and the truth and the life. No-one comes to the Father except through me. (John 14:6) Only Jesus shows us real compassion, gives us real dignity, and can restore our life. Men and women without Jesus in their lives, however charming, ultimately fail to exhibit true, unselfish love towards others.

A generation ago there was a great American tennis player, whose name was Arthur Ashe. It became public knowledge that he had contracted AIDS from a blood transfusion during heart surgery. This greatly admired gentleman looked into the eyes of the small army of reporters interviewing him and said, As painful as it is to know that I have this dread disease, nothing could be as painful as the rejection I have endured all my life by virtue of my colour.

Now think about Jesus’ interview with the woman at Jacob’s well. She was a Samaritan, who were treated with contempt by the Jews as ethnically mongrel, and religiously defective. Moreover she had been married, betrayed and abandoned by five husbands. Every-thing about her spoke of personal rejection, of being an outcast. That is why she was so shocked and dumbfounded that this man, a rabbi, should engage her in a gracious conversation. That alone gave her dignity and respect. But that conversation brought about a much greater transformation. God did a work in her life that undoubtedly brought lasting blessing to her, and through her to others.

And this is typical of what God longs to do in each of us. I’ve just been reading the biography of a Muslim woman, who was badly crippled for the first 19 years of her life. But Jesus revealed himself to her and, at her earnest entreaty, completely healed her. So she became a believer, despite persecution and threats of death. Now she is a faithful witness to Jesus throughout the world.

How we can receive the gift.

Which brings us to ask, How can we receive this gift of eternal life, that Jesus offers? How can we drink the living water that he gives, that quenches our spiritual thirst for ever, and becomes in us a spring that issues in eternal life?

Let me take you back to that earlier reading about Jacob’s encounter at night with the man who wrestled with him till daybreak. Jacob is returning home after an absence of twenty years. At that time he had fled from home because he had stolen the blessing his father had intended for Esau, his older twin brother. While Esau was out hunting game for a special meal to give his father, Jacob had impersonated him, and kneeling before their blind father, asked Isaac to bless him. Isaac asks, Who are you? and Jacob replies, I am your son, your firstborn Esau.

Isaac hesitates because he hears the voice of Jacob, although the rest of the disguise speaks of Esau. Nevertheless Isaac does bless Jacob. In that culture a paternal blessing given in the Lord’s presence was a prophetic oracle. Like a vow, once made, there was no way back – it could not be withdrawn. As a result, because of his brother’s murderous anger, Jacob had to flee.

Now the moment of confrontation between the brothers had arrived. Jacob would be meeting Esau the following morning. Jacob feared for his life. Only one thing was left to do – to receive, not a father’s blessing, but the real blessing of God. He received Isaac’s blessing by duplicity, but he can only receive this blessing by helpless clinging. The divine wrestler asks, What is your name? And this time he answers truthfully, Jacob – which, by a play on the word, could mean deceiver. Only then does God bless him and give him a new name, Israel [possibly = God shall reign or Let God reign].

Before we can receive God’s blessing of forgiveness, of fellowship with him, of eternal life – there has to be a surrender on our part too, to One who is far greater and stronger than we are. We too must answer him truthfully about our own nature, confess our unworthiness to receive blessing because of our own sinfulness, and be willing to change. We may struggle to do that – but without a change of attitude, without self-abandoning trust in Jesus, we cannot receive the new life, the new relationship with him, that God longs to give us. May we do that – like the errant son in the parable, who returns to his father, saying, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son. And may each of us know the Father’s welcome! Amen.