The human finger comes in very handy for a number of purposes. It is utilized constantly for all sorts of practical undertakings that are too many to enumerate. It is also a frequently employed expressive adjunct to the tongue, pointing, flexing, wagging, in accompaniment to verbal communication. It can be used for invitation, indication, accusation, and calculation. With his fingers Winston Churchill formed the “V” sign in his elation at victory. The reversal of the hand whilst displaying the same sign intends humiliation. The finger is a means of very personal and pointed communication. It is a tool of direct contact, revealing the present focus of the mind of an individual and summoning another individual (or other individuals) to attention. The finger imparts a message about the mind or mood of the messenger. It is the visible representative of a person and the part of the anatomy perhaps involved in most human action. It can signify our most intimate and immediate preoccupations, our fixation or concern at any given moment. Fingers symbolize what we are “into” and committed to at close quarters, our “hands on” engagement.

If this is inevitable from a human perspective it is obviously of massive importance when God chooses to tell us that a particular task of his is the work of his finger. We are meant to notice the personal priority and power of God in any action that he performs. We are to attribute the initiative to him, recognize his immediate involvement, and deduce what the occurrence discloses concerning him. His “fingers” are an index to his character and qualities.

As the people of God we acknowledge him as Creator and Redeemer. This is the sum of our worship of him. We marvel at all that he has made. We are inebriated with wonder. Everywhere we look his glory is displayed. We are set on a trail of unending investigation into his wisdom. We witness the exertion of his power. We know God first as Creator. The creation in its vastness and variety is acknowledged by the psalmist to be “the work of your fingers” (Psalm8:3). Such an assertion is stupendous. The scale of the cosmos is enormous and immeasurable to man and yet to God it is the small achievement of the majestic Modeller who specializes in intricate detail. He holds our globe in the palm of his hand (Isaiah 40 12 ff). The span of the universe is as nothing compared to the span of his arms that enclose everything. We are meant to capture from the words of Scripture some faint notion of his greatness but our slightest glimpse is so fleeting. We are meant to scale down our own pride and self importance and yet enlarge his compassion and care towards us. “What is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?” (8:4). Creation is his concern and he sustains and guides it. It is his decision to create that makes us of consequence to him. We and all that is has been fashioned by his own hand.

Familiarity with Holy Scripture permits us to know that creation has been damaged. The fall of angels and men has degraded and depraved their natures and the shock of the ruptured relationships with the Sovereign Lord has extended to the whole created order where everything is askew and inharmonious. Nature registers our breach with God and writhes and groans. God became incarnate to rectify and restore creation and deliver it from the forces that oppress and destroy it. God looks at human hearts enthralled by evil, at human nature disfigured by sin, at our habitation degraded by our revolt and says, “An enemy has done this” (Matthew 13:28). He sent his Son, “To destroy the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8), redeem mankind through an act of deliverance, and renew creation, this comprehensive renovation constituting the kingdom of God. The entire process of eliminating evil and expelling its source, thus freeing its captives and victims, is attributed to the Lord Jesus who has demolished the reign of darkness and manifested the reign of God bringing relief and joy to those whom he has reconciled to the Father. “But if I drive out demons by the finger of God then the kingdom of God has come to you” (Matthew 11:20). Putting creation right, Redemption, is the next greataccomplishment of the Lord for which we praise and admire him. His finger has touched the centre of our infection, healed our disease, and driven away our death. We are uplifted by his own hand which will delve into the mire to grasp us. His “manual labour” rescues us.

One of the intriguing enigmas of the New Testament is as to what Jesus wrote on the ground with his finger when he was dealing with the accusations levelled at the woman caught in adultery (John 8: 1-11). The most attractive conjecture is the one that suggests that Jesus was inscribing the words of the seventh commandment in the dust. “But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger” (v6b). When Jesus shamed the members of the censorious crowd with a sense of their own sin and they drifted away he prompted the woman to participate in that moment of inclusive self examination – for all are sinners when confronted with the law in any or all of its parts – and proclaimed freedom from condemnation and a turning away from sin. Her guilt had been erased. His finger, along with his speech, was instrumental somehow in pointing to personal salvation. It quickened the consciences of the self righteous and quietened the conscience of an offender.

The three references to the finger(s) of God point to the personal, intimate, and intense involvement of the Lord in the great work of creation, the gracious work of redemption, and his gentle work of restoration. Creation, salvation, and the comfort of the individual heart are all spheres of the Lord’s concern where he works his sovereign and gracious will through his near presence.
RJS

On God:
Whatever we think, and whatever we say of him, should savour of his excellence, correspond to the sacred sublimity of his name, and tend to the exaltation of his magnificence.

No figures of speech can describe God’s extraordinary affection toward us, for it is infinite and various.

On Christ:
Christ is the ladder by which we ascend to God the Father.

Nothing can raise us up to God, until Christ shall have instructed us in his school.  Yet this cannot be done, unless we, having emerged out of the lowest depths, are borne up above all heavens, in the chariot of his cross.

The kingdom of God is nothing else than the inward and spiritual renewal of the soul.

On the Spirit:
When God shines into us by his Spirit, he at the same time causes that sacred truth which endures for ever to shine forth in the mirror of his word.

We are partakers of the Holy Spirit, in proportion to the intercourse we maintain with Christ; the Spirit will be found nowhere but in Christ.
John Calvin – died 27th May 1564

The labour of the biographer is neither as easy nor as exact as many may suppose. To record a life as objectively and as accurately as possible is an enormous and responsible undertaking. It is not uncommon, and very commendable, that diligent biographers produce revisions of their literary work. It is also obvious that various biographers occupied with the same subject cover different areas in a notable life, consider different facts, and arrive at differing conclusions. Personalities possess and display too many facets to be neatly pinned down. Relevant material is limited, folk are often different characters in different company; we may reveal or withhold aspects of our nature and expressions of our views depending on the various societies in which we circulate. Each of us has a private side that is carefully guarded and perhaps only partially shared with a select few. Biographers operate from different perspectives and are governed both by known and unsuspected biases, deliberate and undetected motives, various measures of approval or disapproval. In fact they may select and interpret their subjects very subjectively. A sense of close identification with an admired figure may become the means of excessive familiarity where an author begins to live though the subject and discern and impose personal views and values that apply more to the narrator than the one whose life they record. On the other hand prejudice can portray character and conduct in a very cruel and negative manner. It should be the case that biography ought to be enterprised only with a high sense of moral duty, diligent research, and self-effacement. A person’s life is to be handled with as much care posthumously as when they are present. We cannot hijack any historical individual as a vehicle for own message. We must endeavour to correctly convey theirs without poaching their name or engaging in excessive conjecture. The biographer must be governed by observation and restrained with opinion. Iconography and calumny are equal hazards in the practice of biography and the temptations are great. It is good, even, necessary, to weigh a number of perspectives on persons of importance and influence if we wish to assess them fairly and profitably. Calvin, Cromwell, Lincoln, Churchill are only a few of histories heroes who come in for applause or antipathy depending on their biographer’s basic premise or principle of evaluation. Taken as a whole political or religious biography can be recognized as a mass of contradiction difficult for the mind to navigate. The same character can be vigorously presented as righteous or roguish.

A multiplicity of angles helps to supply the key to character. Truth and tone have a ring about them that certifies authenticity. Evidence mounts that usually settles safe opinion, and ongoing reference to sources can either confirm or disabuse our mind on any vital matter. The judicious combination of investigation, intelligence, and instinct, can usually amount to an impartial appraisal of any entity of interest to biographers. Integrity commends itself in a worthy text. Writer and reader must resolve to be honest in the search for what is credible.

Whatever Biblical scholarship may aver in its certainty or guesswork concerning New Testament origins, the sources and priority of the gospels, authorship and provenance of documents, it is clear that the evangelists and the rest of apostolic testimony give us a multifaceted presentation of the Lord Jesus Christ. Four gospels give us an insight into his person from different vantage points and an all-round survey of his ministry. From them we learn the essentials about him from succinct memoirs that pursue carefully nuanced theological aims from commonly agreed facts. The compilation of these materials does not suggest any contradiction or any inconsistency. Rather, we have a coherent account of the Lord and his earthly mission which is supplemented and explained in the epistles by some who walked with the Lord and one, Paul, who received understanding from both eyewitness tradition and special revelation. Christ’s ascended life and roles are communicated through the Revelation of St. John, his most intimate companion, who plumbed the nature, assignment, accomplishment, and aftermath of Jesus’ attitudes and acts more deeply than his fellow gospellers.  John moves from the internal features of Jesus’ story to his ongoing eternal functions. Matthew, Mark, and Luke are no less profound, but work at the message of Christ’s deity, power, and purpose of rescue from external demonstrations of his authority which they relate cogently and reliably.

The evidence, endorsement, and entreaty presented to the reader of the New Testament mounts to such a degree that acceptance of the Saviour on his terms seems inevitable, yet the human heart is so perverse and resisitant that effective grace must be added to the written testimony.

But there is another powerful factor, often neglected, that conveys a sound knowledge of the person of the Lord Jesus to us, and that is the mass of cameos, hints, and descriptions of him in the Old Testament. The more it is read the more the ancient Scripture of Israel portrays Christ, until we perceive that it is a continuous witness to him who was to come.  The prophecies and insights recorded from Genesis to Malachi proffer the character and credentials of the promised Redeemer. What may, on a cursory inspection, seem to be limited reference to him gradually looms so large that we begin to perceive that the Old Testament is advance and abundant information about the One sent from the Lord in due time.  It is a manual on the Messiah alerting us as to what to expect and whom to look for. It is the manual of the Messiah outlining what he must do in obedience to the Father. It is the manual of salvation by the Messiah alluring us to recognize and trust him. When at last the Messiah arrives he fits the profile and purpose of the prophetic books so perfectly in a way that is astounding and thrilling to us.  The term “Old” attached to the previous “Testament” does not signify redundancy, vagueness, and the fact that the writings of Israel have been superseded by those that are more recent.  It is a misleading designation referring to the Former Testament that happens to be the first instalment of the revelation of Jesus Christ, and now it comes into its own, and is even more essential for its detailed description, and our identification, of the Saviour. The diversified portrayal of Jesus over so many generations and through such diverse personalities fits together as a divine masterpiece, a mosaic as it were. We see him approaching as if in a reflection, and when his advent occurs we shout in welcome, “Here he is!” 

Jesus is attested to so completely and convincingly by a cloud of credible witnesses who took such careful note of him because they pinned their eternal hopes upon him. They could not afford to be deluded or wrong. Prophets and apostles staked their lives upon him and gave their lives to him. The hopes of the prophets were so high that they could not suffer to be let down. They were impelled by the word of the Lord. Apostles and eye witnesses saw their hopes fulfilled in Jesus and were not disappointed after cautious and careful observation. Jesus comes to us with the authority of God and the assurance of men. Both are bound up in the Bible the entirety of which speaks of him and can be trusted.

Everyone’s perspective on any issue is governed by limitations imposed by personal conviction and expectation. Evaluation is highly subjective but we must do the best we can by the evidence we see and the observations we can make, and at least draw provisional conclusions with as much accuracy as we can. These conclusions help us to exercise some degree of foresight that assists in the prevention of dangerous trends before they become irreversible. Any sense of crisis can exaggerate the situation, for we judge by sight and sense and cannot tell from these the nature and direction of divine oversight, and the intervention that may occur. Elijah’s sense of alarm and isolation in his circumstances was quickly alleviated by the intimation that the Lord had reserved seven thousand in Israel who remained faithful to him (1 Kings 19:18). Election ensures the continuity of true tradition among the people of God no matter the volume of defectors.

In all the appearances of a resurgence of Anglicanism in our time the cause of classic Anglicanism does not appear to fare too well. The much publicized Anglicanism of the 21st century scarcely resembles the essential Anglicanism of the Reformation: the contemporary Anglican way fails to converge with, and is hardly even parallel to, the Anglican Way of our Founders. The Articles of Religion are rarely cited and adhered to in their original sense, and revised or imported liturgies lack the strength to convert sinners to the faith or confirm them in the rigours of the Christian warfare. What we are witnessing is the rise of a weak pseudo-Anglicanism that has forsaken the realism, bold theology, and biblically based, God centred worship of the framers of the authentic Anglican Way.

The realism of authentic Anglicanism is suited to the tragedy and suffering of this degraded world. The seriousness and scale of human misery is down-played in much contemporary religion. It is an attitude that can only exist in our affluent western world where we can, for much of the time, ignore the hardships and heartaches of the majority of human kind. There is also a massive concealment of the injury and pain actually endured by folk in our own society that the shallow Christianity of our own generation cannot address in any profound way or honestly attempt to explain in terms of our breach with God. The emphasis is on being upbeat because even spectators recoil at the reality of human anguish and prefer its avoidance. Pretence as to wellbeing and superficial solace is resorted to, whereas an honest appraisal of the human condition should permit the disturbing outpouring of the troubled heart without censorship (note the attempt to muffle the voice of the imprecatory psalms in modern worship). The liturgy and pastoral services of original Anglicanism do not shy away from the brutalities and bruisings of life and usher the sufferer into the presence of the God who heals and restores. Our hope lies only in a radical and repentant return to God where we recognize that we are not only victims of misfortune but miscreants before him. Rowan Williams has referred to the melancholy of Anglicanism which is its refusal not to acknowledge the fallen-ness of man in a groaning environment. The thrill seekers in religion will inveigh against this awareness as undue pessimism but that is to turn a blind eye to the long historical catalogue of disasters, wars, injustices and hurts that have afflicted mankind and which still assail him in enormous volume. Religion in our time is designed to pamper rather than prepare for hardship.

The bold theology of original Anglicanism has been replaced by the quest for pleasurable emotion and the cultivation, and subjective guidance, of gratifying, congenial, “mountain-top” experience. Valleys are often not accounted for in contemporary Christian topography. Feelings, sentiment, self-serving reason, overrule the objective revelation of God in Holy Scripture, e.g. I must like what I see in Scripture before I receive it. Biblical and human diagnostics concerning the human condition, its sin, guilt, stubbornness, and helplessness, sharply differ. Our estimate of ourselves is not honest or grave enough. Again, gainsayers would say that we are too grim, but pessimism concerning man actually promotes an optimistic reliance upon God who allows our sins and afflictions to drive us wholly to him. Until we despair of our selves we deny our selves of his salvation, clinging to other vain hopes for rescue and relief. The Biblical doctrine of sin and depravity leaves us no other option than to cry to God and depend on him, our only safe and effective Refuge. Our liturgy emphatically articulates the Scriptural themes of sin, grace, faith, with a view to our being sure of conversion and our being enabled by God to persevere in holy obedience to him all our lives. Our death in sin, our doom in guilt, and our deliverance by Christ our Saviour have to be stressed with force sufficient enough to cause us sincerely to seek him in honesty and hopefulness. We cannot trifle with God through outward observances, rites, and ceremonies. For many, Anglicanism is simply indulgence in these things, i.e. vestments, colour, movement, and gesture within the framework of watered down liturgy (1979?). At the centre of our hearts we must turn to him. Our wills must resolve to incline towards him and only grace can redirect them. We must search ourselves for the signs of the inner renovation that is necessary. Who of us in these times of fostering self-esteem reckons our self as truly wretched? An impotent, pitiful, sinner can only offer this petition, “Lord, take my heart from me, for I cannot give it to thee. Keep it for thyself, for I cannot keep it for thee; and save me in spite of myself (Augustine).

The Scriptural doctrine of Anglicanism is outlined in the Articles of Religion. They must be assented to and confessed by every person authorized to preach and teach in our communion, or solemn declarations and vows are meaningless. Knowing the beliefs of our Reformers the Articles are not capable of variation or private manipulation. There is no exemption from the soteriology of Cranmer and his colleagues, and most expressly this is the case with their views on original sin, the bound will, and sovereign election (Articles 9, 10, 17). This requirement is not an infringement of Christian charity. It does not discourage fellowship with Christians of other persuasion, but calls for confessional integrity and unity within a certain organization of believers. Conscientious dissenters may always find other options for the exercise of valid ministry without jeopardising unanimity, or diluting testimony, in a communion with whose fundamentalsthey disagree. Offence and disputation do not arise from the Articles and their adherents but from those who seek to modify them according to personal preference.

God centred worship is the work of mind and heart in honour and adoration of him. It is an offering derived from his truth and self disclosure in his Word. It is not geared to self gratification. Worship is not theatre attracting attention to its performers or providing amusement for its audience. It is acknowledgement of and amazement at the glory of the Triune God. It is based on the facts of revelation accepted by heartfelt faith and presented to him affectionately in the fear of the Lord. Reverence and delight combine in our corporate gaze upon Christ in word and sacrament. Our Cranmerian manual is the touchstone for such worship.