MCS 135 ¢ Photo courtesy of the MCS Communications Team
Loving God and Serving Together This is an abridged version of the sermon that Bishop Dr Chong Chin Chung preached at Wesley Methodist Church’s 135th anniversary on 16 Feb 2020, which also marked the launch of the MCS 135 celebrations.
Bishop Dr Chong greets worshippers at the MCS 135 launch service at Wesley MC on 16 Feb 2020
L
uke 10:25–29 is John Wesley’s favourite passage to show why a Christian would relentlessly pursue perfection or holiness, both scriptural and social.
As we launch our MCS 135 celebrations, let this Scripture remind us of this important confession of every Methodist: to love God with all our heart, soul, strength and mind, and to love our neighbour in the same way. These statements were in the response given by a lawyer to a question he himself had put to Jesus: “Which is the greatest commandment of all?” While the encounter is also recorded in Matt 22:36–40 and Mark 12:30–31, it is only in Luke’s account where we learn that Jesus turned the question back to the lawyer by asking: “What is written in the law? How do you read it?”
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METHODIST MESSAGE March 2020
How the lawyer answered his own question (v25–26) Every devout Jew would have memorised these scriptures: Shema—listen, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength” (Deut 6:5) and “Love your neighbour as yourself” (Lev 19:18). The lawyer had come ready with an answer and recited these verses confidently. When Jesus said, “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live,” the lawyer must have been very pleased and proud of himself. In fact, this episode revealed his rather literal and clichéd understanding of the Law. As far as he was concerned, inheriting eternal life depended on one’s actions and behaviour.
