“I Wish I Lived When …”

Posted by David on March 19, 2000 under Sermons

If you could pick any time period to live in and any geographical area on earth to live in, what would you pick? If you could live at any time in history, in any age, what age would you choose?

Since we are Christians, since we are here to remember Jesus’ death and resurrection, since we are in a worship assembly, it is likely that some of us would say, “If I could choose a time and place, I would choose Palestine in Jesus’ lifetime. I wish I could live when Jesus lived and worked.”

Why? “I would like to hear him preach. I would like to see his miracles. I would like to the watch the people. That must have been an incredible experience!”

I would not want that. I would be afraid to live at that time because I would be afraid of my reactions. If I lived in Palestine when Jesus lived, I do not know how I would have reacted to Jesus. Jesus was extremely different. When Jesus died, he was so misunderstood that nobody grasped what he was doing or what God was doing.

1. This morning I want you to consider the things that happened to Jesus in Mark 3.
   1. Mark 3 begins with Jesus teaching in a Jewish synagogue on a Sabbath day.
      1. In attendance was a man with a withered hand.
         1. That meant the hand was contorted and drawn and of no use to him.
         2. It also meant that his hand would never be of any use to him.
         3. He would live and die with a useless, withered hand.
      2. Jesus asked the man to come stand before the congregation.
      3. He asked the congregation, “Which of these actions comply with the laws concerning the Sabbath: doing good or doing harm; saving life or killing?”
      4. Nobody answered his question; everyone was silent.
      5. Jesus looked at them in anger, grieved because their hearts were hard.
      6. Jesus told the man to stretch out his hand, and immediately the man’s hand was restored to its usefulness.
      7. The Pharisees, the best read and most religious people present, left immediately and began to plan how to destroy Jesus.
   2. Jesus left the synagogue and went to the shore of the sea of Galilee.
      1. An enormous crowd of people from far and wide had gathered because they heard of Jesus’ miracles.
      2. He sent the disciples ahead to secure a boat that Jesus could use to keep the huge crowd of people from crushing him.
         1. The people knew that he had the power to heal.
         2. Everyone was trying to touch him.
         3. Even the demon possessed were bowing before him as the demons acknowledged that he was the Son of God.
   3. Later Jesus went up on a mountain with many of his disciples.
      1. From all those disciples, he selected twelve.
      2. These twelve were to be with him, to preach for him, and to cast demons out of people.
   4. After that he returned to Capernaum and entered the house where he stayed.
      1. When people heard that he was in the house, such a large crowd gathered that he and the twelve could not even eat a meal.
      2. When his relatives heard about what Jesus was doing and the great commotion he caused, they came to take him in custody because “he has lost his senses,” or “the man has gone crazy.”
      3. Some scribes from Jerusalem [a scribe became a religious expert by copying scripture by hand] came and declared that Jesus was using Satan’s power to cast out demons.
         1. Jesus said, “That is an amazing explanation! If that is what is happening, that is great news!”
         2. “If a kingdom has a civil war, the war destroys the kingdom.”
         3. “If a family fights itself, the fight destroys the family.”
         4. “If Satan is fighting against himself, he is destroying himself.”
         5. “However, no one robs a strong man’s house without first tying up the strong man.” Satan was the strong man, and Jesus was robbing Satan’s house by casting out demons.
         6. “The one sin that God will not forgive is the sin of giving Satan credit for the work of God’s Spirit.”
      4. Then Jesus’ mother and brothers arrive.
         1. With all the crowd and commotion they cannot get to him.
         2. They want to talk to him privately–wonder if the relatives sent them?
         3. He was informed that his mother and brothers are outside and wanted to talk to him.
         4. Jesus responded by saying, “The person who does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.”
2. “Wow!”
   1. I do not like to be verbally attacked and I do not like to watch as other people are verbally attacked.
      1. Watching people attack Jesus for doing good things would have distressed me.
      2. I did not need to be there.
   2. I do not like to hear people oppose God while they act as if they are serving God.
      1. Hearing the Pharisees plan to destroy Jesus by discrediting him would have distressed me.
      2. I did not need to be there.
   3. I do not like to be misunderstood, and I do not like to see other people misunderstood.
      1. Watching Jesus’ family misunderstand him would have distressed me.
      2. I did not need to be there.
   4. I do not like to be in crowds that are pushing and shoving as every person tries to get what he or she wants.
      1. Being in a huge crowd where everyone wanted the opportunity to get close enough to Jesus to touch him would have distressed me.
      2. I did not need to be there.
   5. I do not like to have people assign evil significance to good motives and godly acts, and I do not like to hear people assign evil significance to the godly motives and deeds of others.
      1. To listen to the scribes say that Jesus functioned by using Satan’s power would have distressed me.
      2. I did not need to be there.
3. To me, one of the fascinating lessons in Mark 3 is seen in the way people reacted to Jesus.
   1. Mark 3 is a chapter filled with incredible contrasts.
      1. We see the Son of God doing nothing but good as he helps physically sick people and teaches spiritually sick people.
      2. And, we see all these different reactions by different groups and persons.
   2. Look at the reactions.
      1. Religiously, the Pharisees were the most influential people in Israel.
         1. They were restorationists who wanted Israel to return to the old paths (that was their terminology).
         2. They were the best read, most knowledgeable religious people in Israel.
         3. They knew the scriptures.
         4. Their reaction to Jesus:
            1. “You cannot heal a man on the Sabbath day!”
            2. “That is a violation of the law, for the law clearly says that you must not perform an act of work on the Sabbath!”
            3. “And how dare he challenge us and embarrass us in public! That man is dangerous! His influence and popularity must be destroyed!”
      2. The demons knew Jesus’ true identity.
         1. They knew who he was, and they knew what he could do.
         2. They had no intention of serving Jesus instead of serving Satan.
         3. They just knew his power was supreme over Satan’s power.
      3. The people who knew Jesus had the power to heal the sick wanted a miracle.
         1. They saw Jesus as an immediate solution to a physical problem.
         2. Life would be fine if they could just get their physical problem fixed.
      4. In naming the twelve, Mark listed Judas Iscariot and noted that he was the one who betrayed Jesus.
      5. His extended family thought he had gone crazy.
         1. How else could they explain what he said?
         2. How else could they explain what he was doing?
         3. How else could they explain his challenges to the religious establishment?
         4. The family needed to get this man under control!
      6. The scribes, the experts in the literal wording of scripture, said that Jesus’ ability to cast out demons came from Satan.
         1. The demons knew him because he was the chief demon.
         2. The demons obeyed him because he was the leader of the demons.
         3. Jesus could be explained away because Jesus was the ultimate form of evil.
      7. Perhaps his immediate family wanted to talk to him because the extended family could not bring him under their control.
      8. Then there were the listeners who sincerely wanted to hear and understand what Jesus taught.
         1. Jesus said that they were his real family.
         2. They were his real family because they wanted to do God’s will.
         3. He came to do God’s will, and he shared a special bond with all people who wanted to understand and serve God’s will.
   3. On the deepest level of my understanding, may I share with you the reason that I would not want to live in Palestine during the time of Jesus’ ministry.
      1. I do not know which one of those people I would have been.
      2. Jesus was so radically different in how he lived, what he did, and what he taught, I do not know if:
         1. I would have been one of the Pharisees who, as a religious expert, said that Jesus was so different and radical that he was dangerous.
         2. I would have been one of the demon possessed.
         3. I would have been one of the sick that just wanted my physical problem fixed.
         4. I would have been a Judas that saw Jesus as an opportunity to satisfy my greed.
         5. I would have been one of those who thought that he was crazy and needed someone to bring him under control.
         6. I would have been a scribe who thought that Jesus was an evil man who got his power from Satan.
         7. I would have been a listener who wanted Jesus to teach me God’s will.
   4. Who do you think you would have been?

[Prayer: God, create within our hearts and minds a hunger to do your will. Open our understandings to the teachings of Jesus so that we can understand your will.]

How do you look at Jesus right now? Is he too different to be taken seriously? Do you acknowledge his identity, but you let Satan control your life? Do you just want Jesus to fix physical things? Do you think he is crazy? Do you think he is evil? Or, do you listen to Jesus with an open mind and heart because you want him to teach you God’s will?

People can tell how I look at Jesus. They can tell how you look at Jesus. The way we live and the way we use our lives tells others how we look at Jesus. What do they see when they look at our lives? What do you want them to see?

Is God Still Able?

Posted by David on March 12, 2000 under Sermons

For thirty seconds I want you to dismiss the fact that you are sitting in a church building. For thirty seconds I want you to forget that you are supposed to give “church answers.” Can you do that? Can you be honest with yourself for thirty seconds? Can you answer this question as you would while sitting at home?

Give me thirty seconds of honesty with yourself and answer this question: what do you believe in? Nothing is not an honest answer. Everybody believes in something. Do not tell me what other people believe in. Quietly, in your own mind and heart, tell me tell me honestly what you believe in.

Let me ask the question in another way. Do you believe in anything bigger than you? Do you believe in anything bigger than your feelings? Your wants? Your desires? Your priorities? Your personal convictions?

Or, what is supreme in your life? When you absolutely must make hard a choice, what consistently comes out on top? You? Your feelings? Your wants? Your desires? What is important to you? In hard decisions, what consistently is the deciding factor?

1. May I share with you what I personally believe?
   1. These factors lie at the foundation of my hard decisions.
      1. I believe that God is the origin of life.
         1. I do not know how He made the world.
         2. I do not know why He made the world.
         3. I do not understanding why He made humans the unique life form that they are.
         4. But I accept as fact that life came from God; God is the origin of the person.
         5. My existence is not the product of accident, chance, and time; I exist by the design and power of God.
      2. I believe that God talked to, guided, and made the world’s key promise to Abraham.
         1. I believe that God was able to work through Abraham because Abraham trusted God’s promises.
         2. I believe that Abraham lived as a nomad in the land of Canaan because he followed the specific direction of God.
         3. I believe that Isaac was born to Abraham and Sarah by an act of God to fulfill God’s promise.
      3. I believe that God made the nation of Israel from the descendants of Abraham.
         1. I believe that God began with one couple, one child, and two grandchildren and produced a nation.
         2. I believe that God intended that nation to live by the same faith that produced the same dependence on God that Abraham had.
         3. I believe that God gave that nation specific reasons to trust His promises.
      4. I believe that God brought Jesus into our world through the nation of Israel.
         1. I believe that was God’s specific intent and purpose before Abraham lived.
         2. I believe Jesus came to reveal the purpose and intent of God for people.
         3. I do not believe that Jesus was an accident or a convenient opportunity.
      5. I believe that Jesus is the Christ.
         1. I believe that he was executed by people and was resurrected by God.
         2. I believe that he gave his life and his blood for our atonement and was raised from the dead to become the Savior of all people.
      6. I believe that Jesus Christ is Lord.
         1. As Lord, I believe that he has the power to destroy the sin of any individual through his forgiveness.
         2. As Lord, I believe that he has the power to sustain the forgiven through his the grace and mercy by continuing forgiveness.
         3. As Lord, I believe that he can and will enable forgiven people to stand before God unafraid in the judgment.
   2. Now, permit me to share with you what I know: I know I am going to die.
      1. “Oh, David, how morbid can you get!”
         1. Accepting a fact that I cannot alter is not morbid.
         2. I cannot appreciate what God did for me, does for me, and will do for me in Christ if I do not accept the fact that I will die.
      2. Death is a fact.
         1. Everyone born dies.
         2. Have you personally ever known an exception?
         3. Do you actually think that you will be that exception?
   3. Americans are a strange people.
      1. We do everything we can to remove ourselves from the reality of death.
         1. For example, I grew up on a farm and like many, many Americans we grew, killed, and preserved our meat.
         2. Today meat comes from the grocery store and does not involve death.
         3. Another example, our hospitals, as much as possible, separate the living from the dying.
         4. There was a time when death was a family experience.
      2. At the same time, Americans are enthralled by violence.
         1. Violence is a major part of American entertainment.
         2. We enjoy violent sports.
         3. One formula for making a movie financially successful is to include graphic violence in the plot.
         4. Many successful television series must include at least occasional violence.
         5. Many of the most successful video games are based on violence.
      3. We want to remove ourselves from the reality of death, and yet we want to be entertained by simulated death.
         1. We do not wish to deal with the fact that we will die.
         2. Yet, we want to be entertained by simulated violence and death.
2. What I believe and what I know makes me confront a necessary choice, and I must make a decision, in fact I will make a decision–and so will you. The choice:
   1. I will decide that this life is it and indulge myself.
      1. I will make me supreme.
         1. I will make my feeling supreme.
         2. I will make my desires supreme.
         3. I will make my preferences supreme.
         4. I will make my priorities supreme.
      2. I will not allow anything to get in the way of the importance of “me.”
         1. I will not let my marriage get in the way.
         2. I will not let my children get in the way.
         3. I will not let people get in the way.
         4. I will structure everything in my life around the importance of “me.”
      3. And the older I get:
         1. The more selfish I become.
         2. The lonelier I become.
         3. The emptier my life becomes.
         4. The more afraid I become.
      4. And I will die.
   2. Or, I will decide that this life is not it, and the One I meet after this life is bigger than I am.
      1. I will understand that the purpose of life is to allow God to live in me, to change me, and to teach me how to treat people.
      2. There is a tremendous emphasis in the New Testament on the fact that belonging to Christ changes the way I treat people.
         1. Jesus placed enormous emphasis on:
            1. Forgiveness
            2. Mercy
            3. Kindness
            4. Compassion
            5. Humility
         2. We are told that love is a part of God’s nature, and that the Christian who does not love cannot know God (1 John 4:8).
         3. We are told that the Christian who loves, lives in God and God lives in him or her ( 1 John 4:16).
      3. When I live in God, God lives in me.
         1. My marriage gets better because the person I married is important.
         2. I become a better parent because the people I brought into this world are important.
         3. I become a better person because people are important.
         4. I structure my life around my concern for people because my God teaches me how to love people.
      4. And the older I get:
         1. The more unselfish I become.
         2. The more purpose life has.
         3. The fuller life becomes.
         4. The less afraid I become.
3. There are about 700 of us sitting together right now. If I asked you, “What is the purpose of the West-Ark Church of Christ?” what would you say?
   1. I am sure that we would give many different kinds of answers.
      1. There are many appropriate answers.
      2. There are also some highly questionable answers.
      3. I have no doubt that many of you would disagree with some of my answers and that I would disagree with some of your answers.
      4. And I understand that agreeing or disagreeing would not make any of our answers God’s answers.
   2. Let me anticipate one answer that I disagree with: “The mission of the church is to preserve the Church of Christ.”
      1. If we are truly a part of the church that God built on Jesus Christ, none of us individually nor all of us collectively could destroy it if we wanted to.
      2. God is still able.
      3. God who is the origin of life, who made a nation from Abraham, who sent his son through Israel to be Savior of the world, who resurrected Jesus to be Lord and Christ and head of the church is still able.
      4. God will preserve the church; we just need to be the church.
      5. Our decision is not how to preserve the church; our decision is how to serve God’s purposes as the church.
      6. The Christian assists God by doing this: (1) we belong to God only, and (2) we allow God to teach us how to treat people as God wants us to treat people.
         1. If we do less than that, we oppose God.
         2. If we do more than that, we try to be God instead of serve God.

[Prayer: God, increase our faith in Your ability.]

In Luke 12 Jesus told a parable about a wealthy farmer who had an enormous harvest. His harvest was so big he did not know what to do with it. He made two decisions. He decided to build bigger barns. He decided that he would have enough to take care of him for many years, so he would live the good life and take it easy.

God called him a fool. He said, “Tonight you will die, then who will all this belong to?” Jesus said so it is with every person who uses wealth for himself and is not rich toward God.

What do you believe in? Is anything bigger than you? Is God still able?

Male and Female: A Fundamental Difference

Posted by David on March 5, 2000 under Sermons

I have already shared with you three lessons in this series. On January 2nd, I shared with you the lesson, “Culture and the Church: Sexual Perceptions.” On January 9th, I shared with you the lesson, “Sexual Perceptions: Passing Them On.” On January 16th, I shared with you the lesson, “Boiling Over: Acceptance of Sexual Ungodliness.” All three of those lessons are available to you on audio tape, on our Web site, or in hard copy. The three of them form a background for tonight’s thoughts.

May I state clearly why I am sharing these lessons with you. Pornography is a major problem among Christians. Sexual intercourse among the unmarried is a major problem among Christians. Adulterous affairs are a major problem among Christians. Indulging sexual passions in sexual fantasies is a major problem among Christians.

Commonly, these problems are either ignored or denied in the church. We commonly choose to do one of three things: (1) we deny the prevalence of these problems. (2) Or, we declare that helping people with such problems is not the work of the church. (3) Or, we make sexual sin a Christian taboo and condemn it. Our condemnation sends this message: “if you are struggling against a sexual problem, stop the problem. But, whatever you do, don’t come to us for help.”

Jesus forgave people who wanted forgiveness for sexual immorality. The churches in the New Testament educated people who struggled with sexual immorality. The objective of education was to free them from their slavery. We need to allow Jesus and the churches in the New Testament to encourage us to help people who want help. If we do not, Satan will continue to use sexual evil to slaughter Christians.

1. The book of Genesis was written by Moses to the Israelites who had been released from Egyptian slavery.
   1. Genesis had a specific message with a specific purpose for these people.
      1. The word Genesis means “beginning.”
         1. The Hebrews or Israelites named their books by using the first word that appeared in the book.
         2. The first Hebrew word in this book means “in the beginning.”
         3. Genesis is its English name, and it originated with the Greek translation of the Hebrew.
      2. “Beginning” is a very appropriate name for this book.
         1. Its basic purpose was simple: it explained to these freed slaves (1) their origin and (2) why they lived in Egypt.
         2. The material begins with God’s creation and ends with Joseph’s death in Egypt.
            1. Only two chapters of fifty are devoted to the creation, a total of 56 verses.
            2. One chapter of fifty, or twenty-four verses, is devoted to the origin of evil.
            3. Thirty-nine chapters of fifty are devoted to Abraham and his descendants.
      3. The book told the Israelites basically two things:
         1. It told them that every physical thing that exists, including them, has its origin in the living God who delivered them from Egypt.
            1. No Egyptian god delivered them from slavery.
            2. The living, Creator God delivered them from slavery.
         2. It explained to them that they were the descendants of Abraham.
            1. Abraham had a special relationship with the Creator God.
            2. They were delivered from Egypt so the Creator God could keep His promise that He made to Abraham.
      4. The book was not written to be a science book, a philosophy book, or a book on ethics.
         1. The book was written to explain to Israel their origin and their history.
         2. The book was written to help hundreds of thousands of freed slaves understand and claim their identity.
         3. It was not written to address 20th and 2lst century issues that did not exist when Israel was delivered from Egypt.
   2. Genesis contains two creation accounts; one is general and one is specific.
      1. The general account, Genesis one, briefly discusses how the Creator God brought the physical world, all physical things, and human life into existence.
      2. The specific account, Genesis two, discusses in more detail the creation of the man and woman, the human male and female.
      3. This is the information I want you to consider.
         1. The creation of the human was unique; the human was a unique life form.
         2. God made a special environment for the human and placed the male human in that environment.
         3. In that environment the man had only one need: the need for companionship because loneliness was not good.
      4. Genesis 2:18-25 deserves your special attention. Notice the progression of its information.
         1. First, notice the statement that the state of loneliness is not a good state of existence for the man.
            1. That was not a discovery God made after creating Adam; God knew that before creating Adam.
            2. But Adam did not know that, and Israel needed a better understanding of that.
            3. Adam needed a helper suitable for him; literal translation, Adam needed a helper “corresponding” to him.
            4. Make a mental footnote of that thought.
         2. Second, God had Adam name all the land creatures.
            1. In that process, Adam discovered that no creature was like him, was suitable for him, could be companion to him, had an existence that corresponded to his existence.
            2. God knew that. Adam did not know that. Adam had to discover that truth before he could appreciate the uniqueness of Eve.
         3. Third, God created Eve from Adam to be his equal, not his superior, not his servant, but his equal.
            1. When God presented Eve to Adam, Adam immediately understood.
            2. “She is unique! There is no creature like her! She “corresponds” in existence to me! She is a part of me!”
      5. We correctly understand that this is the origin of family.
         1. Humans were made to (1) be in relationship with God and (2) exist as families by establishing a relationship between a man and a woman.
         2. The individual was created to bond with another individual and bring into existence family life; we were created to be social beings.
      6. It was very important for Israel to understand those facts.
         1. Israel was family.
         2. Israel was family who belonged to the living Creator God.
         3. Because they as family were descendants of the Abraham who had a special relationship with the Creator God who just released Israel from slavery, they needed to understand that God was working through Abraham’s family to bring a blessing to every family on earth.
         4. As family, they needed to commit to and cooperate with the Creator God.
   3. I now want you to think about a statement you have used all your life.
      1. Those of you who grew up in the church always have heard and taught that Eve was created to be a suitable helper for Adam.
      2. Question: help Adam do what?
         1. When Eve was presented to Adam, there was no evil in the world.
         2. There was no toil and labor.
         3. They lived in an environment designed by God to met every physical life need they had.
         4. He did not go to the office, and she did not iron clothes.
         5. He and she did not make money at different jobs to make ends meet.
      3. Marriage exists so that we can help each other. But:
         1. If that help is limited to cleaning house and paying the bills, we miss the core concept of helping each other.
         2. If that help is limited to making money and acquiring possessions, we miss the core concept of helping.
         3. Help each other do what?
   4. The marriage exists by God’s design to destroy loneliness.
      1. We miserably fail to bring into existence what God intended marriage to do.
      2. There are more married Christians who are lonely than there are married Christians who live in a relationship that destroys loneliness.
      3. Too many Christians experience two common failures in marriage.
         1. Too many Christians, too many people do not understand how to destroy loneliness through marriage.
         2. Too many Christians, too many people do not understand how to create a healthy sexual relationship that nurtures marriage.
2. I do not wish to offend anyone, but we cannot address one of the fundamental reasons for marriage distress without speaking frankly.
   1. There are two fundamental reasons for so many marriages experiencing deep distress.
      1. The first is that the two people in the marriage are not in a healthy relationship with God.
         1. In a January 8 article in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette entitled, “Christians more likely to divorce than non-Christians, Survey finds,” the results of a Barna Research Group of almost 4,000 adults reveals that the divorce rate is higher among born-again Christians than among those who declare themselves to be atheist and agnostics.
         2. The results also seem to indicate that there is some relationship between conservative beliefs and divorce: it seems that the more conservative the beliefs of the group, the more likely people in that group are to divorce.
         3. You may interpret those results as you wish, but, whatever your interpretation, the evidence indicates that people professing to be born again Christians do not create the kind of relationship with God that nurtures marriage.
      2. The second fundamental reason many marriages experience deep distress is this: many married Christian men and women do not understand each other well enough to destroy loneliness.
   2. Men and women are fundamentally different as persons.
      1. The magnitude of that difference is seen in the monthly cycle of a woman and the sex drive of a man.
      2. No man understands the power the monthly cycle has in a woman’s life.
         1. That is totally outside a man’s life experience.
         2. He does not even observe that reality until he is married.
         3. It takes a while for him to grasp that the effects of that cycle are real.
         4. Because he never experienced those experiences, many men decide, “It is all in your mind; get tough, forget about it, and don’t think about it.”
         5. He does not understand, and his wife experiences the loneliness that comes from realizing, “He does not understand me as a person.”
      3. No woman understands the power of a man’s sex drive in a man’ life.
         1. That is totally outside a woman’s life experience.
         2. She does not even observe that reality until she is married.
         3. It takes a while for her to grasp that the effects of the sex drive are real.
         4. Because she never experienced those experiences, many women decide, “It is all in your mind; get tough; forget about it, and don’t think about it.”
         5. She does not understand, and her husband experiences the loneliness that comes from realizing, “She does not understand me as a person.”
3. A fundamental purpose of marriage is to destroy loneliness.
   1. The objective of the unique companionship shared by a man and woman in marriage is to destroy loneliness.
      1. A key component of that companionship is a mutually healthy, nurturing sexual relationship.
      2. That relationship cannot exist if the husband and wife are not committed to understanding each other.
      3. Without that commitment, marriage cannot accomplish one of the primary objectives of God’s design–the destruction of loneliness.
   2. Having good sex does not create marriage.
      1. Good sex alone cannot create successful marriage.
      2. The understandings that destroy loneliness create a successful marriage.
      3. Those understandings will build a good sexual relationship.
      4. A healthy, nurturing sexual companionship is critical to a healthy, nurturing marriage that destroys loneliness for both the husband and the wife.

The church will not be successful in helping people leave pornography, unmarried intercourse, and adulterous affairs until we help people understand that God designed marriage relationships to destroy loneliness.

Religious Band-Aids or Spiritual Healing?

Posted by David on under Sermons

We all have our likes and dislikes. I certainly have mine. For example, somewhere in my process of growing up I was taught that you fix a problem the first time you work on it. The saying I was taught: “If it is worth doing, it is worth doing right.” So when I fix something, I want to fix it right.

That formed an important part of my work ethic. I will work hard to do something right the first time, but I hate to fix the very same problem a second time. Focus on what you need to do, do the job right, and truly fix the problem when you work on it.

1. When God sent Jesus to this world, God was fixing a problem.
   1. The problem was created by Satan the first time Satan deceived people into rebelling against God.
      1. That first human rebellion invited evil to become a part of our world and a part of our lives.
      2. God set in motion His plan to fix, to fix perfectly, what Satan broke by deceiving people.
   2. Stated in a simple way, this was God’s plan to fix the problem evil created.
      1. Step one: find a man who would trust God enough to put his confidence in God’s promises even when the man did not understand those promises.
         1. That man was Abraham.
         2. Abraham trusted God’s promises even when he did not understand them.
      2. Step two: from descendants of that trusting man, produce a nation.
         1. That nation was the nation of Israel.
         2. Israel was and is the descendants of Abraham.
      3. Step three: through that nation create the conditions that would allow God to send His son to destroy the sins of all people.
         1. God worked for centuries in Israel creating the conditions that would allow Him to send Jesus.
         2. God worked through Israel to produce a Savior who would offer salvation to the world.
      4. Step four: when God made Jesus the Savior through his atoning blood and his resurrection from the dead, God would do two things.
         1. The first thing He would do was offer this salvation to Israel.
         2. The second thing He would do was offer this salvation to all people regardless of who they were.
   3. When God sent Jesus on his human ministry, God sent Jesus exclusively to Israel.
      1. When Jesus sent the twelve on what we call the limited commission, he specially instructed them to teach only the people of Israel, only the Jews (Matthew 10:5,6).
      2. He once declared that his ministry was for the lost sheep of the house of Israel (Matthew 15:24).
      3. Acts verifies that God intended the people of Israel to hear the gospel first.
         1. In Acts 3:26, Peter declared in Jerusalem to an audience at the temple, “For you first, God raised up His servant and sent him to bless you by turning every one of you from your wicked ways.”
         2. When Paul preached Jesus to the Jews in the synagogue of Antioch of Pisidia, he said that it was necessary to preach to the Jews first (Acts 13:46).
         3. Years later Paul wrote to the Christians in Rome, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek” (Romans 1:16).
         4. In the missionary journeys of Paul, if there was a Jewish population in the place he visited, he always began preaching first in the Jewish synagogue.
2. Matthew 15:21-28 records a very interesting incident that occurred in Jesus’ ministry.
   1. The scribes and Pharisees from Jerusalem began to shadow Jesus’ movements and to attack him as he taught.
      1. Once as they increased their confrontations with Jesus, he traveled outside the traditional territory of Israel, outside the area we call Palestine.
         1. This is the only time that the gospels verify that Jesus went outside the Jewish homeland.
         2. He went into the district of the cities of Tyre and Sidon.
         3. This was the area just north of Galilee.
      2. While he was in that area, a Canaanite woman came to him begging him to show mercy and heal her demon possessed daughter.
         1. The first thing I want you to notice is that this was a Canaanite woman, not an Israelite woman.
            1. God commanded the first Israelites who entered the land of Canaan to kill this woman’s ancestors because of their great wickedness (Deuteronomy 9:5).
            2. God did not want these wicked people to influence Israel with their evil ways (Deuteronomy 7:1-5).
            3. He did not want the Canaanites to teach Israel to worship their gods.
      3. The second thing I want you to notice is the way this lady approached Jesus.
         1. She called him Lord.
         2. She acknowledged that Jesus was a descendant of King David, and that was one of the important qualifications of the Messiah.
         3. She asked for mercy.
         4. She said the demon was cruel to her daughter.
      4. The third thing I want you to notice is Jesus’ initial disregard for this Canaanite woman.
         1. He did not even acknowledge her presence.
         2. He did not respond to her pleading.
         3. He did not say one word to her.
         4. God sent Jesus to the Jews; he was fulfilling God’s mission; he was following God’s master plan; so he totally ignored her.
      5. The fourth thing I want you to notice is that the woman would not give up.
         1. She continued to follow Jesus.
         2. She continued to beg for mercy.
         3. She would not give up.
      6. The fifth thing I want you to notice is the disciples’ reaction.
         1. The disciples became tired of her and her begging.
         2. They asked Jesus to send her away because she was bothering them.
         3. Perhaps that was a request to give her what she wanted so that she would go away.
      7. The sixth thing I want you to notice is what actually happened.
         1. Jesus spoke to the disciples, not to the woman, and said, “I was sent only to Israel, and she is not a part of Israel.”
         2. But, when Jesus spoke to the disciples about her, she took that opportunity to bow down in front of Jesus and ask him to help her.
         3. Then Jesus spoke to her for the first time, and, oh, what he said: “It is not proper to take bread away from the children and throw it to the dogs.”
            1. Suppose that you begged Jesus for mercy, and he said that to you?
            2. What would you do?
      8. The seventh thing I want you to notice is that the woman agreed that it was not proper to take bread from the children and throw it to the dogs.
         1. “Lord, you are right; I am not one of the children; I am one of the dogs; and it is not right to take anything away from the children and give it to me.”
         2. “But, even the dogs get to eat the crumbs.”
      9. The eighth thing want you to notice is Jesus’ statement.
         1. “Woman, you have a lot of faith.”
         2. “May what you wish happen.”
         3. What she wished was the healing of her daughter, and it happened.
3. What do you want from Jesus? What do you want Jesus to do for you?
   1. “I want Jesus to fix this physical problem. I want Jesus to fix this physical situation. I want Jesus to change this physical circumstance.”
      1. Is that it? Is that all you want from Jesus?
      2. All you want from Jesus is a miracle to fix something physical?
   2. Miracles that fix the physical are what we are about; miracles that fix the physical are not what Jesus is about.
      1. Miracles that fixed the physical were not permanent.
         1. Every sick person Jesus healed got sick again.
         2. Every hungry person Jesus fed got hungry again.
         3. Every dead person Jesus resurrected died again.
      2. Did Jesus fix all the physical problems in Israel? No.
         1. Did he heal every sick person in Israel? No.
         2. Did he feed every hungry person in Israel? No.
         3. Did he raise every dead person in Israel who died during his ministry? No.
      3. Jesus’ physical miracles verified that God sent him to heal spiritual sickness.
         1. Jesus’ concern for physical needs proved his love for people.
         2. By compassionately ministering to the physical, Jesus focused people’s attention on their greatest sickness, their spiritual sickness.
4. If Jesus said to you, “Let your wishes become your reality,” what would happen?
   1. If Jesus gave you what you wanted him to give you, what would you have?
      1. Would it all be physical?
      2. Would it all deal with this life?
      3. Would it all be spiritual?
   2. If Jesus gave you what you wanted, would it honor God?
      1. Becoming a Christian totally changed Paul’s understanding of life and death.
      2. Of himself, Paul wrote, “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me…” (Galatians 2:20).
      3. As Paul began his letter to the Ephesians, three times he declared that the purpose of Christian existence is “to praise God’s glory” (Ephesians 1:6, 12, 14).
      4. As he looked death in the face, Paul said, “I shall not be put to shame in anything, but that with all boldness, Christ shall even now, as always, be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death” (Philippians 1:20).
   3. I have an ambition, a goal for the rest of my life.
      1. Like all who live on this earth, I am physical.
         1. That means I experience aging.
         2. That means I experience trials.
         3. That means I experience sickness.
         4. That means I experience suffering.
         5. That means I will die.
      2. My ambition and goal:
         1. May my aging process honor God.
         2. May my trials honor God.
         3. May my sickness honor God.
         4. May my suffering honor God.
         5. May my death honor God.
      3. May people not say of me, “Wasn’t he a great person!” May people say of me, “Didn’t he belong to a great God and a great Savior!”
   4. It has taken a very long time to learn this truth, but I have begun to learn it.
      1. Christian living is about honoring God.
      2. Christian obedience is about honoring God.
      3. Christian service is about honoring God.
      4. Christian worship is about honoring God.
      5. For the Christian, dying is about honoring God.

[Prayer: “God, help us learn to honor You. Help us stop blinding the world to Your greatness by showing the world us instead of You.”]

Satan has deceived us. He says honoring God has nothing to do with the way we use our lives. Do not allow Satan to deceive you. Whatever happens in your life, use it to bring God honor. Never use religious Band-Aids. Instead, heal your soul in Jesus Christ. Live in Christ and let God fix your heart and mind.

Does Your “Ideal” Fill The Void?

Posted by David on February 27, 2000 under Sermons

People want the “ideal.” We all want the “ideal.” We want the ideal husband, the ideal wife, the ideal family, the ideal house, the ideal job, and the ideal congregation as we live in the ideal community.

Why? Why all our fascination with the ideal? Simple: we believe that if we experience the ideal, the ideal will eliminate our problems. We are deceived into believing that problems disappear when the ideal exists. We are deceived into believing that the answer to every type of problem is producing the ideal: the ideal person, the ideal situation, or the ideal circumstance.

Teens, are you an ideal child? Would you be the ideal child if you had ideal parents? Married ladies, are you the ideal wife? Would you be the ideal wife if you had the ideal husband? Married men, are you the ideal husband? Would you be the ideal husband if you had the ideal wife? All of you who work for paid, are you the ideal employee or the ideal boss? Would you be the ideal employee or the ideal boss if you had the ideal job?

Consider an irony. “I” never expect to be an ideal person, but “I” expect “you” to be an ideal person. The solution to my problems will exist when you are the ideal person. The fact that I am not the ideal person is irrelevant.

Are you the ideal Christian? Does God look at you and say, “You are just exactly what I want in a Christian man or woman!” No? Would any of us say that the reason we are not an ideal Christian is because God is not the ideal God or Jesus is not the ideal Savior?

1. What type of person would be the ideal convert, become the ideal Christian?
   1. Let’s describe the ideal convert, the ideal Christian.
      1. The ideal convert, the ideal Christian, is a person who has the right attitude toward Jesus.
         1. This person knows that Jesus is the source of eternal life.
         2. He or she is not ashamed to come to Jesus for eternal life.
         3. He or she humbles himself or herself before Jesus Christ.
         4. He or she wants to obey Jesus Christ.
      2. The ideal convert, the ideal Christian, has been a good moral person.
         1. He or she never killed anyone.
         2. He or she was never involved in sexual sin.
         3. He or she was never a thief.
         4. He or she was always an honest person.
         5. He or she always treated his or her family with respect.
      3. Does that sound like the ideal person to convert? Does it sound as if this man or woman has the potential for becoming the ideal Christian?
   2. Once, when Jesus was on a journey, a man ran to him, knelt before him, and asked, “Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life” (Mark 10:17-22)?
      1. Jesus said, “You know the commandments. ‘Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not defraud, honor your father and mother.'”
      2. The man answered, “I have always kept these commandments, even when I was a teenager.”
      3. When Jesus looked at him, Jesus felt love for him.
      4. Jesus said, “You lack one thing: go sell all your possessions and give to the poor, and then you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.”
      5. When the man heard Jesus’ instruction, gloom settled over him–you could see the gloom in his face.
         1. Jesus’ instruction genuinely grieved him because he sincerely wanted eternal life.
         2. And he left; he did not follow Jesus.
         3. He owned a lot of property, and he valued his property more than he valued eternal life.
   3. If this person presented himself or herself to us, we would be elated that this committed, believing, upstanding person wanted to be a Christian.
      1. What a great attitude toward Jesus!
      2. What a person–he or she has great moral integrity!
      3. What a person–he or she wants to obey, who wants to be active!
      4. What a person–he or she has knowledge of and commitment to the will of God!
      5. What a person–he or she is genuine and sincere!
      6. And he or she has money–that is a powerful asset!
   4. Have you considered all the responses that Jesus could have given to this rich young man? From our perspective, Jesus could have handled the situation differently.
      1. He could have said, “You have so many right values–with time everything will work itself out.”
      2. He could have said, “There are thirteen of us working full time in this ministry, and we surely could use your financial help.”
      3. He could have said, “You have the basic attitudes that you need, and the mature attitudes will come later.”
      4. He could have said, “It would be a real asset to my ministry if you were my disciple. You would bring a lot of credibility to my work.”
      5. But Jesus didn’t; he said, “You have a problem that you need to address.”
   5. This man could not have eternal life unless he addressed the central issue in his life.
      1. He could not be Jesus’ disciple if he did not address a basic heart problem.
      2. What problem? Jesus specifically addressed this heart problem in the sermon on the mount.
         Matthew 6:24 No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.
         1. The principle is simple: two powerful forces cannot control the same life.
         2. Does that mean a person must perfectly obey God every minute of every hour of every day? No, that is impossible. Perfect obedience is never an option.
         3. It means that we must settle the issue of who or what controls our lives.
         4. We decide who or what is in control of our life before we are locked into major conflict with evil or a major struggle with temptation.
         5. When we face a crisis, we decide before the crisis that God is in control.
      3. Jesus understood this simple truth: the person who truly follows him decides who is in control before he or she is in the middle of a struggle or crisis.
         1. The man genuinely wanted eternal life.
         2. The man honestly accepted the fact that Jesus could tell him how to obtain it.
         3. But the man was not willing to change masters.
            1. His life was controlled by his possessions.
            2. He was not willing to change from the controlling influence of his possessions to the controlling influence of Jesus.
      4. Jesus made him confront the real issue in his life: if you want eternal life, you must do what is necessary to change the master who controls you.
2. Is your life empty? Do you feel like you have a great big hole right in the middle of you?
   1. Listen to me carefully.
      1. I did not ask you:
         1. If you feel too busy.
         2. If you feel stressed.
         3. If you feel over-committed.
         4. If you feel underappreciated.
         5. If you feel like you are chained to a treadmill.
      2. I asked you if your life feels empty?
         1. Regardless of what others see in you or say about you, do you feel empty?
         2. Regardless of the awards hanging on your wall, do you feel empty?
         3. Regardless of what your high school or college transcript says, do you feel empty?
         4. Regardless of the amount of money or possessions you have, do you feel empty?
      3. What does your emptiness do to you?
         1. When no one is watching you, does your emptiness break your heart?
         2. When you are alone, is your emptiness heavier than life?
         3. Does your emptiness depress you?
         4. Does your emptiness make you feel all alone?
         5. Does your emptiness make you feel like no one really cares?
         6. Does your emptiness cause you pain and suffering?
   2. If you struggle with emptiness, who or what controls your life?
      1. Money?
      2. Fear?
      3. Work?
      4. Ambition?
      5. Other people’s expectations?
      6. The past?
3. When God controls your life, God destroys your emptiness.
   1. Someone says, “Wait a minute, David! Not true, not true, not true! I have been a Christian for years, and I feel empty!”
      1. What do you mean when you say, “I have been a Christian for years?”
      2. Are you like the young man who ran to Jesus?
         1. You say Jesus is the source of eternal life.
         2. You keep all the commands.
         3. You live by the system and do all the right things according to the system.
      3. BUT, you have never put God in control of your life.
         1. God is not THE controlling force in your life.
         2. And, if right now, Jesus demanded that you make a decision about what you allow to control your life, God would lose.
         3. BUT, you are a Christian, an empty Christian, a Christian dissatisfied with the church, a Christian dissatisfied with other Christians. Why? Because you expect everything but you to be ideal.
   2. How do I know when God controls my life?
      1. I treat other people like I want to be treated (Matthew 7:12).
      2. I refuse to stop loving other people (Romans 13:8).
      3. My words are a source of strength, encouragement, and grace to others–they joyfully listen to me because I build them up (Ephesians 4:29).
      4. I am committed to kindness, and I express kindness by forgiving others as Christ has forgiven me (Ephesians 4:32).
      5. I strengthen weak hands and feeble knees and make straight paths for the lame so the weak find healing (Hebrews 12:12,13).
      6. And by serving God through helping others, my emptiness is destroyed.

Question: do you have a religion that you follow through all the “right motions,” or does God control your life?

[Prayer: God, help us destroy the emptiness by placing You in control.]

Many good things happen every week in this congregation, and I am grateful for each one of them. But there are members who have been in this congregation for years that feel like they are locked out and cannot get on the inside. I have heard their cry. There are members whose pain is bigger than life, people who grieve in silence because they are lonely and think no one cares. I have heard their cry. There are members who are crushed under their burdens and are convinced no one wants to help. I have heard their cry. May not one good thing die! But, may we touch the life of every person who feels locked out, abandoned, or insignificant. May we all hear each other’s cry, and may we help each other.

May we let God destroy the emptiness. May we put God in control.

Life Without Struggle: A Blessing?

Posted by David on February 20, 2000 under Sermons

If you could live your vision of the ideal life right now, how would you live? Let me guess. Remember, I am asking you about your concept of the ideal life. I am talking about your dreams becoming your reality.

If our dreams came true, for most of us, it would involve these things. (1) It would involve a house. (2) It would involve how that house was furnished. (3) It would involve the location of that house. (4) It would involve a car. (5) It would involve money. (6) It would involve a job. (7) It would involve how much time that you had to do what you wanted to do. (8) It would involve eliminating the things and people who create stress in your life. (9) It would involve your concept of peace and happiness.

Bottom line: if we lived the ideal life, if our dreams became reality, our lives would be free from struggle. We could not have our dream life if there was struggle. The key to having the best possible life is eliminating difficulty. That would be a blessing.

1. The gospels of Matthew (4:1-11), Mark (Mark 1:12,13), and Luke (4:1-13) inform us that Jesus’ earthly ministry began with a wilderness experience.
   1. The first thing that happened after Jesus’ baptism was this: the Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.
      1. God through the Holy Spirit guided Jesus into the wilderness.
      2. The purpose of sending Jesus to the wilderness was to face Satan.
      3. Jesus’ ministry began with a major confrontation between Jesus and Satan.
   2. Jesus was in the wilderness fasting for forty days before Satan confronted him.
      1. During the forty days his focus was exclusively on God and his mission.
      2. He fasted.
         1. For forty days he did not eat anything.
         2. For forty days he focused on who he was, why God sent him, and what the purpose of his life was.
         3. For forty day he focused his mind and his heart as he committed himself to God’s objective.
         4. For forty days he gave 100% of his thinking to spiritual understanding, and 0% of his thinking to the physical.
   3. At the end of his forty day fast, the tempter [Satan, the devil] came to him.
      1. Who had the advantage?
      2. Did Jesus have the advantage because he spent forty days considering nothing but his spiritual reason for existing?
      3. Did Satan have the advantage because Jesus had been alone for over a month and was in severe physical need?
      4. The advantage was not determined by Jesus’ state of mind or physical needs.
      5. The determining factor was Jesus’ ability to trust God.
   4. If you want to gain a powerful insight into the way that Satan tempts Christians, look at the way Satan treated Jesus.
      1. Satan did not use power in an attempt to overwhelm a physically weak man.
      2. Satan used deceit in the attempt to get Jesus to place himself in opposition to God.
      3. The first two temptations are ingenious attempts to deceive.
         1. “If you are the son of God…” which can also be translated “Since you are the son of God.”
            1. “Jesus, you have spent a month concentrating on who you are and why God sent you.”
            2. “You think that you have a unique relationship with God, a relationship that no human has ever had with God.”
            3. “You say to yourself that you are God’s son…not God’s prophet, but God’s son.”
            4. “Prove your faith in your unique identity and relationship with God.”
         2. This was the ingenious approach of the first two temptations.
            1. “If you are God’s son, turn these stones to bread.”
               1. “You are hungry.”
               2. “You are in the wilderness to preparing to begin God’s work.”
               3. “If you are too weak to get back to civilization and food, you will starve to death.”
               4. “If that happens you will do nothing for God.”
               5. “If you really believe you are who you think you are, make some bread and eat” (not a banquet; just some bread).
            2. “If you are God’s son, jump from this temple high place.”
               1. Satan surrounded Jesus with God’s presence: he took him to Jerusalem, the holy city, and to the temple, where God’s presence existed as no where else on earth.”
               2. He quoted scripture to Jesus: Psalms 91 says that God will protect the son of God with His angels.
               3. “You say to yourself that you are God’s son; let God confirm that you are right; jump.”
      4. The third temptation is a simple, straightforward attempt to bargain with Jesus on a high mountain.
         1. “You are right. You are God’s Son. You have nothing to prove.”
         2. “But you are going about your mission the wrong way.”
            1. “You came to be king.”
            2. “You came to rule the world.”
            3. “You came to change the world because you would be king of a world wide kingdom.”
            4. “All this struggle you now face is unnecessary.”
            5. Satan enabled Jesus to see the kingdoms of the world.
            6. “I control them–all of them. I will make you king of the world right now and you can change anything you want to change.”
            7. “Just fall down before me and worship me, and it will happen.”
   5. If you want a powerful insight into the way a Christian defeats temptation, understand Jesus’ responses.
      1. Jesus did not quote a proof text to give Satan a pat religious answer.
      2. If you see Jesus just quoting a verse from memory, you miss the point.
         1. All my life I have listened to people quote random Bible verses to prove what they want to prove or to defend what they want to defend.
            1. Every false teaching that exists quotes Bible and uses proof texts.
            2. People justify adultery, abortion, murder, division, evil attacks on Christians, and all kinds of unbiblical restrictions by using “proof texts.”
            3. A person can use “proof texts” to justify anything he or she wants to justify.
         2. Jesus did not succeed in rejecting Satan’s temptations by quoting random verses from the Bible.
            1. The scriptures Jesus quoted dealt with the temptation and the situation.
            2. Jesus understood what God wanted.
            3. The context of each of those scriptures powerfully addressed the deceit.
            4. Jesus was not deceived because Jesus saw the deceit.
            5. Jesus saw the deceit because he understood God.
      3. Satan deceives Christians right and left today because they do not understand God.
         1. They worship when they were told they were supposed to worship.
         2. They do the things in worship they were told they were supposed to do.
         3. They take the doctrinal stands they were told they were supposed to take.
         4. But everything they do has little to do with God.
         5. They do not do these things because they understand God.
         6. They do them because that is what the church has told them that they should do.
         7. It is a matter of accepting instruction, not a matter of understanding God.
2. I call your attention to an essential question: why did God send Jesus to the wilderness?
   1. First, I want you to see that God has always used the wilderness experience to prepare and mature His servants.
      1. Abraham had a wilderness experience; he wandered as a nomad in a land that never belonged to him, and that experience matured his faith in God.
      2. Moses had a wilderness experience; he spent forty years in Sinai wilderness before he became God’s leader of Israel.
      3. David had a wilderness experience; he spent years in the wilderness before he became Israel’s great king.
      4. Elijah, Israel’s greatest prophet, had a wilderness experience; God used that experience to teach Elijah a lesson that he needed to learn.
      5. Jesus had a wilderness experience; that experience inaugurated his ministry.
      6. Evidence suggests that even the apostle Paul had a wilderness experience; he said in Galatians 1:17 that he spend time in Arabia before his work recorded in Acts began.
   2. Second, I want you to understand the answer to the question, “Why?”
      1. Look at these facts:
         1. Abraham was in the wilderness because he was following God’s instruction.
         2. Moses was in the wilderness because he failed and ran for his life.
         3. David was in the wilderness because Saul was trying to kill him.
         4. Elijah was in the wilderness because he wanted to die; he wanted to die because he failed to accomplish his expectations.
         5. Jesus was in the wilderness to prepare for his ministry.
         6. We are not told why Paul was in Arabia.
         7. That list is the Bible’s elite list: Abraham, Moses, David, Elijah, Jesus, and Paul.
      2. Why did all of them have wilderness experiences?
         1. Certainly, different experiences placed them in the wilderness.
         2. But they all were in the wilderness for the same basic reasons.
            1. Reason one: so that they would decide in their deepest being to place God in exclusive control of their lives.
            2. Reason two: so that they would decide on the deepest level of life to trust God, no matter what they faced.
            3. Reason three: so they would understand the reason for their lives.
            4. Reason four: so that God could equip them for greater service and usefulness.
   3. One of the great problems in the lives of American Christians is that they want to do wonderful things for God without any struggle.
      1. Satan has powerfully, successfully deceived the American Christian about God.
         1. He has made us believe that God promises us a life without struggle.
         2. He has made us believe that God protects the true Christian from struggle.
         3. He has made us believe that Christian peace produces no struggle.
         4. He has made us believe that the Christian hope is fulfilled by a struggle free physical existence on this earth.
         5. And, he has made us believe if these things do not happen, God is the one who has deceived us.
      2. Satan has powerfully, successfully deceived the American Christian about the purpose of life. According to Satan,
         1. The purpose of life is found in the physical.
         2. The fulfillment of life is found in pleasure.
         3. The meaning of life is found in selfishness.
         4. The security of life is found in money.

Satan does not care how religious you are as long as you do not place your faith in God. Satan does not want you to go the wilderness with God. It is in the wilderness that you decide what life is really about. It is in the wilderness that you learn to listen to God. It is in the wilderness that you find faith. God can powerfully use the man or woman who leaves the wilderness with a deeper faith in God.

[Prayer: God, help us learn that wilderness experiences equip us to serve Your purposes.]

The truth: you and I live in the wilderness. Just like Israel, we will reach the place God has built for us by surviving the wilderness. God cannot help you survive the wilderness if you don’t trust Him. But, God can bless and use you beyond imagination if you place God in control of your life.

What Did You Expect?

Posted by David on February 13, 2000 under Sermons

When I was five years old, my brother, Jack, was born. My mother prepared me for his birth by talking to me. I had been an only child for five years. She knew that I needed to be prepared for a baby in the family. She clearly understood that it would not be good for the new baby to come as a surprise to me. So long before his birth, she talked to me about how nice it would be to have a playmate.

It does not require an imagination to understand what a five year old expected. We were living in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. World War II was raging. Dad was moved to a brand new city to work at a brand new, enormous facility. Everything existed to assist the development of the atomic bomb.

I did not have a playmate. We moved into the first completed house in our subdivision. The thought of having a playmate was absolutely thrilling.

Though I was only five years old, this picture is still clear in my mind. I knew when my brother was born. I knew when Mom was bringing him home. I can see our car, our side walk, and our front yard. I can see me running down the side walk to the car to met my new playmate. And I can remember Mom lifting the blanket off of newborn Jack’s face, and telling me that this was my brother.

And I know my immediate reaction. I took one look at newborn Jack, said inside myself, “I can’t play with that!” and walked away. My expectations were completely destroyed. I expected a five year old playmate. I did not expect a newborn. I was totally disappointed because I did not get what I expected. What I expected was based on what I wanted. What I wanted had nothing to do with reality.

1. One huge source of spiritual failure in the individual and in the church occurs through failed expectations.
   1. We can see the power of failed expectations in Israel’s deliverance from Egyptian slavery.
      1. God promised Abraham that he would make a nation from Abraham’s descendants when Abraham did not even have one child.
      2. God gave Abraham twelve great grandsons through his grandson, Jacob.
      3. From those twelve great grandsons God produced the twelve tribes of Israel.
      4. During a severe famine, God placed the families of those twelve sons in Egypt.
      5. Those families became an enormous people whom the Egyptians enslaved.
   2. God convinced a reluctant Moses to return to Egypt, become the leader of these slaves, request their release, and lead them to the country God promised them.
      1. Moses tried to help his people earlier, failed, and fled to the wilderness to save his life.
      2. He never intended to see Egypt again.
      3. God appeared to Moses, declared that the suffering of Israel must end, and said,
         Exodus 3:8 “So I have come down to deliver them from the power of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey…”
         Exodus 3:10 “Therefore, come now, and I will send you to Pharaoh, so that you may bring My people, the sons of Israel, out of Egypt.”
      4. Moses expected to go Egypt, to win the instant acceptance of Israel as their leader, to ask Pharaoh to let Israel go, and lead the people out of slavery to their country.
      5. It did not happen.
         1. Moses went to Pharaoh, made his request, and Pharaoh rejected his request.
         2. In fact, Pharaoh decided there was only one reason that Moses made such a stupid request: the Israelite slaves had too much time on their hands.
         3. So Pharaoh issued a work order that greatly increased the burdens of the slaves to the point that he made their lives impossible.
         4. And this is what the Jewish leaders said to Moses:
            Exodus 5:21 “May the Lord look upon you and judge you, for you have made us odious in Pharaoh’s sight and in the sight of his servants, to put a sword in their hand to kill us.”
         5. And this is what Moses said to God:
            Exodus 5:22,23 “O Lord, why have You brought harm to this people? Why did You ever send me? Ever since I came to Pharaoh to speak in Your name, he has done harm to this people, and You have not delivered Your people at all.”
         6. Failed expectations.
   3. For the next forty years every failure in Israel included failed expectations.
      1. When they left Egypt after God performed the tenth powerful miracle against Egypt, everything was wonderful!
         1. God could do anything!
         2. Soon they would be in their new land!
         3. But as soon as the Egyptian army trapped them at the Red Sea, they turned on Moses and asked him why he brought them out there to die (Exodus 14:11,12).
      2. When God delivered Israel by providing an escape across the Red Sea on dry land, everything was wonderful!
         1. God could do anything!
         2. Soon they would be in their new land!
         3. But as soon as they got thirsty and hungry in the wilderness. they turned on Moses saying, “I wish God had killed us in Egypt!” (Exodus 16:2,3)
      3. The reason God took them through the wilderness instead of on the highway by the sea was to keep them from getting discouraged.
         Exodus 13:17,18 Now when Pharaoh had let the people go, God did not lead them by the way of the land of the Philistines, even though it was near; for God said, “The people might change their minds when they see war, and return to Egypt.” Hence God led the people around by the way of the wilderness to the Red Sea; and the sons of Israel went up in martial array from the land of Egypt.
         1. I want you to see something very important to us today.
         2. God used miraculous power to help Israel every step of the way.
         3. And we say, “Oh, if God would just use miracles to help us we would believe and we would serve.”
         4. What makes us think that we are so different?
         5. We, just like Israel, are blind to much of God’s activity.
         6. We, just like Israel, trust God with the past but do not believe God can do anything about now or tomorrow.
         7. Miracles never produced faith in people who did not trust God.
      4. You need to read the book of Exodus and note how Israel failed again and again because they placed faithless expectations on God.
      5. You need to read the book and note how many times they turned on Moses or on God because their faithless expectations were not met.
2. Just as surely as failed expectations brought pain and failure in the Old Testament, failed expectations brought pain and failure in the New Testament.
   1. Jesus was working in the wilderness area where John baptized in the Jordan River.
      1. The political and religious leaders of Israel wanted to kill Jesus, and his twelve disciples knew it.
      2. They knew it was dangerous for Jesus to return to the Jerusalem area (John 11:8).
      3. But he did return to resurrect Lazarus from the dead (John 11).
      4. Jesus immediately became wildly popular.
         1. They welcomed Jesus to Jerusalem as Israel welcomed its king shouting the words and phrases that Israel used when they welcomed a new king.
         2. For a week Jesus was the most popular man in Jerusalem, and no one could slow or stop his “band wagon.”
         3. When the Pharisees confronted him, they lost ground.
         4. When the Saduccees confronted him, they lost ground.
         5. When the Herodians confronted him, they lost ground.
         6. They not only could not kill him; they could not stop him.
      5. The expectations of the twelve disciples skyrocketed.
         1. They had been afraid that Jesus might be killed, and now it was obvious that he was going to be king.
         2. He would become king, they would become the king’s administration.
         3. So Peter told him that he would be loyal to him to death (Matthew 26:31-35).
         4. All the disciples were filled with such a sense of self-importance that none of them would wash the others’ feet (John 13:1-20).
      6. Then everything fell apart, and their expectations were killed.
         1. Jesus was arrested, and they fled into the darkness of the night.
         2. Jesus was tried and condemned, and they could not understand it.
         3. They watched him die hanging from a cross in total rejection and disgrace as though he were an evil man and a terrible criminal.
         4. And nothing made sense. None of their expectations came true.
      7. When their wrong expectations died, they hid in fear in an upper room in Jerusalem behind closed doors.
      8. Nothing changed until they understood what God did: God made Jesus Lord and Christ (Acts 2:36).
3. Failed expectations still bring pain and failure in individual lives and in the church.
   1. Failed expectations are a major source of the kind of disappointment that produces failure.
      1. “You are not what I expected in a wife.”
      2. “You are not what I expected in a husband.”
      3. “You are not what I expected in a child.”
      4. “You are not what I expected in a boss.”
      5. “You are not what I expected in an employee.”
      6. “Your are not what I expected in Christian friend.”
      7. What did you expect? Where did you get your expectations?
   2. One of the greatest sources of pain in our families and in our congregations come from frustrated expectations.
      1. Too many adult sons struggle with the pain of feeling like a worthless failure.
         1. They are certain that they never met their father’s expectations, so they are filled with a sense of failure.
         2. This pain spills over into their role as a husband.
         3. This pain spills over into their role as a parent.
         4. This pain spills over into their relationship with their Christian family.
      2. Many adult daughters struggle with the pain of feeling like a worthless failure.
         1. They are certain that they never met their mother’s expectations, so they are filled with a sense of failure.
         2. This pain spills over into their role as a wife.
         3. This pain spills over into their role as a parent.
         4. This pain spills over into their relationship with their Christian family.
      3. Many adult Christians struggle with what they have been told are God, or Christ, or the church’s expectations.
         1. God goes into a rage when you do not meet His expectations.
         2. Christ will not forgive you when you do not meet His expectations.
         3. The church exists to punish you for your mistakes, not to help you with your struggles.
         4. This pain makes war against the person being spiritual.

May I ask you a question? Do your expectations crush people? Or do they challenge and encourage people? God’s expectations nurture people by building relationships. The relationship between God and Jesus show the blessings of God’s expectations.

[Prayer: God, help us turn to you as our greatest Helper. Help us understand that You did not send Jesus to devastate us. Help us discover the love in Your expectations.]

Is it easier for the people who associate with you and live with you to walk with God because of you? Do you use expectation like God does: to challenge, encourage, and nurture. Or do you use expectation like Satan does: to discourage and crush?

Opportunity Versus Response

Posted by David on February 6, 2000 under Sermons

Success in the business world depends on a number of variables. One of those variables is the ability to determine your market. To be successful in business, you must honestly, correctly identify your real market.

It is very easy to get psyched up, hyped up, and heart-and-soul excited about what appears to be an excellent business opportunity. It is very easy to tell yourself these four things. (1) “I have a wonderful product.” (2) “There is a real need for my product.” (3) “Eighty per cent of the people in Fort Smith have an actual, existing need for my product.” (4) “Therefore if I go in business and sell my product, the business cannot fail!”

It is real easy to believe that situation is a “sure thing.” On the basis of my enthusiasm and confidence created by the situation, I begin my “cannot miss” business. However, in the face of all my enthusiasm, three sobering facts still stand. (1) Not everyone understands that he or she needs my product. (2) An undetermined number of people understand that they need my product, but they do not want my product. (3) An undetermined number of people understand that they need my product, and they want my product, but will never consider buying my product from me.

Many businesses with an excellent product fail. They do not fail because the product is bad. They do not fail because there is not sufficient need for the product. They fail because people refuse to buy the product.

1. One of Jesus’ best known parables is a kingdom parable we commonly call the parable of the soils (Matthew 13:3-23; Luke 8:4-15).
   1. The parable was based on a real life occurrence that happened every year.
      1. It was the time of the year to plant your wheat or barley crop.
         1. Bread was their basic, daily food that sustained their lives.
         2. They made much of the bread they ate from the grain that they grew.
         3. As an agricultural society, planting wheat or barley was critical to survival.
      2. They did not have horses, mules, or tractors to cultivate the ground or to plant the crop.
         1. They planted their wheat or barley in a way that we would call primitive today–they sowed it by hand.
         2. When I grew up on the farm, we referred to this kind of planting as broadcasting (has that word every changed meanings!).
         3. They carried their seed in a bag.
         4. They sowed the seed by taking a handful of it and scattering it as they walked through the field.
         5. When you sow seed, If you want a crop, two things are true:
            1. You have to be very generous in scattering seed.
            2. You have little control over where the seed lands.
      3. This sower was scattering his seed.
         1. Some of the seed landed on the pathway that separated the fields.
         2. Some of the seed landed on ground that was so full of rock that there was too little soil for the plants to mature–in days ahead when the sun was hot and the rain stopped, the hot rocks would cook the roots.
         3. Some of the seed fell on ground that had thorns growing on it, and the young plants that came up could not compete with the thorns.
         4. Some of the seed fell on fertile ground, came up, and produced a harvest.
   2. This is one of the few parables that Jesus explained to the disciples.
      1. The seed is the word of God.
      2. The four kinds of soil are the hearts of men and women.
      3. The hard pathway represents the person who hears God’s word, the message about God’s kingdom, and does not understand.
         1. The seed that fell on the hard path was exposed.
         2. The birds saw it and ate it.
         3. Because this person’s heart is hard, Satan snatches away the seed.
      4. The rocky soil is the person who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy.
         1. But he does not let an understanding of the message take root in his heart.
         2. When what he learned caused suffering and pain in his life, he fell away.
      5. The thorn patch is the person who hears the word, but he allows the worries of the age and the deceitfulness of riches to choke the word so it does not produce any fruit.
      6. The good soil represented the person who heard, understood, and produced grain.
   3. This parable contains three extremely important, powerful lessons.
      1. The first lesson is that you and I have one of those hearts.
         1. Everyone of us has a hard heart, a rocky heart, a thorny heart, or good a heart.
         2. The basic challenge of the parable is not for you to determine what kind of heart everyone else has.
         3. The basic challenge of the parable is to challenge you to look at your own heart and see what kind of heart you have.
         4. How does your heart react to the word of God?
      2. The second lesson: the seed was sown everywhere–hard hearts, rocky hearts, thorny hearts, good hearts.
         1. Though the seed was scattered over the entire field, the entire field did not contribute to the harvest.
         2. Not everyone will receive and understand God’s word.
         3. Not everyone wants to be a citizen of God’s kingdom.
         4. The problem is not in the sower; the problem is not in the seed; the problem is in the fact that many people do not want God.
      3. The third lesson: three of the four kinds of hearts produced no harvest for God’s word, bore no fruit for God.
         1. Before we start discussing how sad that it is that so many in the world reject Christ, look very carefully at the parable.
         2. The hard hearts never received the word of God, never were a part of God’s kingdom.
         3. But two of the hearts did receive the word, did begin life in God’s kingdom, but did not accomplish God’s purpose.
            1. The rocky heart looked wonderful as the seed sprang to life–the rocky heart felt real joy
               1. But there was not root system to sustain this heart when life got difficult.
               2. The seed came to life temporarily.
               3. When living for God became difficult, they quit.
            2. The thorny heart gave life to the seed.
               1. The problem was not that the seed did not come to life.
               2. The problem was that the new plant could not compete with worry and materialism.
               3. Jesus did not say that the plant was choked to death, but the plant was choked to the point that it produced no harvest.
      4. One of the bad soils never responded to God, but two of the bad soils did respond to God.
         1. Let’s put it another way.
         2. One of the bad soils was never in the kingdom of God.
         3. Two of the bad soils were in the kingdom of God.
2. When I was a college student and a young preacher, evangelizing the world was stressed in many ways.
   1. A lot of emphasis was placed on bringing the lost of the world to Christ.
      1. The need for missionaries was stressed.
      2. The importance of evangelizing our nation was stressed.
   2. One of the models used to promote the power and the success of evangelism was a specific one-on-one model.
      1. The model: if every Christian converted one person to Christ every year, then every person in the world would become a Christian in “X” number of years.
         1. This model has a basic flaw seen in its basic assumption.
         2. That assumption was that every person could be converted to Christ.
         3. According to Jesus, that assumption is not correct.
      2. Not even Jesus could convert everyone in the nation of Israel, a nation that believed in the living God.
         1. Multitudes wanted the benefit of Jesus’ power.
         2. Few wanted the benefit of Jesus’ teachings.
         3. The majority of people in first century Israel did not respond positively to Jesus’ resurrection.
         4. The majority of the first century world did not respond positively to the gospel.
      3. In those days there were hard hearts, rocky hearts, and thorny hearts.
      4. Today there continue to be hard hearts, rocky hearts, and thorny hearts.
      5. When Jesus spoke to Nicodemus, he explained reality in this way:
         John 3:19-21 “This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God.”
         1. There always has been and there always will be evil people who love the darkness of evil and hate the light that Jesus brings.
         2. People who practice evil hate Jesus’ light.
         3. People who practice evil refuse to come to the light because they are afraid that their deeds will be exposed.
         4. Only those who practice the truth come closer and closer to the light.
         5. They want to see and understand who they are and what they do.
         6. They know that they cannot fight the evil in their lives if they love the evil or if they are blind to the evil.
         7. A person can be blind to the evil by living in the darkness and refusing to come close to the light.
3. Let’s ask some essential questions.
   1. Does God love all people, the entire world?
      1. Jesus said God did in John 3:16. “For God so loved the world…”
      2. Paul said so in Titus 2:11, “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men,”
      3. Peter said so in 2 Peter 3:9, God does not want any to perish, but for all to come to repentance.
   2. Did Jesus die for sins of all people?
      1. Jesus said so in John 12:32, “If I be lifted up, I will draw all men to me.”
      2. Paul said so in 1 Timothy 1:15, “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.”
      3. Peter said so in Acts 10:43, “Through his name everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins.”
   3. Will all repent as God wishes or accept the forgiveness that Jesus wishes to give them? No.
      1. The opportunity exists.
      2. Not everyone sees it as an opportunity.
      3. Not everyone will accept the opportunity.

Do you remember Jesus’ statement to the disciples, “Look at the fields! They are ripe and ready for harvest” (John 4:35). Do you know who Jesus was watching when he said that? Samaritans. The Jews regarded Samaritans as outcasts, as non-people. Jews would not have looked at any Samaritans as a harvest for God. Jesus did. He saw their hearts, and their hearts were good soil.

[Prayer: Help us sow and trust You for the increase.]

Someone says, “What we need to do is convince people that they need to be baptized.” I disagree. What we need to do is to convert people to Christ. People who are baptized, but are not converted are rocky soil or thorny soil. People who are baptized because they are converted to Christ are good soil. What kind of soil would Jesus call you? Look at your heart. Are you converted to Christ? Or, have you just been baptized?

Is It Up To Us … Or God?

Posted by David on January 30, 2000 under Sermons

Suppose we were eating together in a small group. Suppose someone began a discussion about what needed to happen in this congregation for it to reach its potential. Everyone in the group shares his or her thoughts on that subject. You also share your thoughts. What would you say?

What do you think would be the focus of that discussion? Would the focus be on how we need to respond to our culture? On how we should address problems in our society? On what we need to do to strengthen marriage? On what families and homes need to do to stabilize? On what ministries we need to develop? On the ways that we need to use our facilities?

What place would we give God in that discussion? Would any of the discussion focus on ways that we could depend more on God? Would we discuss the leadership role that we should give God? Would anyone dare suggest that we need to let God lead?

1. “Get real, David! God doesn’t…”
   1. God doesn’t what?
      1. Finish your thought. God doesn’t what?
         1. God does not act today?
         2. God cannot do anything today?
         3. So if we depend on God’s leadership, nothing happens?
      2. Is the only way that God accomplishes anything is for us to do it?
         1. Do we really think that without us God is helpless?
         2. “If a job is to be done, we will have to do it.”
         3. “If a problem is to be fixed, we will have to fix it.”
         4. “If our lives are to have strength, we must be the source of the strength.”
         5. “If we need answers, we will have to discover them within our own minds.”
   2. What kind of God do you think exists?
      1. What kind of God do you believe in?
      2. Or do you believe in God?
         1. “Oh, yes, yes, I believe in God.”
         2. Then tell me about the God you believe in.
   3. Let me talk to two groups, and both groups are sitting here.
      1. Group one, what kind of God do you believe in?
         1. “I believe in the God who created!”
         2. “I believe in the God who gave Isaac to the 100 year old Abraham!”
         3. “I believe in the God who delivered Israel from Egyptian slavery!”
         4. “I believe in the God who took Israel across the Red Sea on dry land, who sustained them in the wilderness, who gave them Canaan!”
         5. “I believe in the God who sent His son to be a human!”
         6. “I believe in the God who resurrected Jesus from the dead!”
         7. “I believe in the God who created the church in an extremely wicked world!”
      2. And what can that God do in our world, in our culture, and in our lives today?
         1. “Well, what ever we get done for him.”
         2. How many people was God dependent on when He created?
         3. How many people was He dependent on when He gave Abraham Isaac?
         4. How many people was He dependent on when He rescued Israel?
         5. How many people was He dependent on when He raised Jesus from the dead?
         6. How many people was He dependent on when He established the church?
      3. We have great faith in the fact that God was powerful and active up through the first century AD, but we have little faith in the power and activity of God today.
      4. In fact we have swapped places with God: we have the power, and God serves us, so we think.
   4. Group two, what kind of God do you believe in?
      1. “I couldn’t tell you anything about God because I don’t know anything about God.”
      2. “Now I can tell you all about the church.”
         1. “I can tell you about proper doctrine.”
         2. “I can tell you about proper practice.”
         3. “I can tell you about true and false positions on doctrinal issues.”
         4. “I can tell you who we should and who we should not fellowship.”
         5. “I can tell you the work the church should not do and the work the church should do.”
         6. “I can talk to you about anything you want to discuss if we talk about the church, but I cannot talk to you much about God.”
      3. “But let’s be real honest; it is not important to know that much about God.”
         1. “The heart of true religion today is not about God.”
         2. “The heart of true religion today is about the church.”
         3. “Salvation is not about God; salvation is about the church.”
         4. “Salvation involves Christ more than it does God, but it only involves what Christ did, not what Christ does.”
2. In either case we create a very human church and a very human Christianity.
   1. The end result in both groups is the same.
      1. God does not do anything today.
      2. It is all up to us.
      3. So let’s not waste a lot of time in prayer.
         1. Pray the acceptable, standard prayer at the acceptable, standard times in acceptable, standard worship.
         2. Now we should really get upset if we do not pray.
         3. But we should also get upset if we pray too much.
         4. Give God a little prayer and He is content; just throw Him a spiritual bone.
   2. What if we placed God and Jesus Christ front and center?
      1. What if we had a group who believed in God’s power and the power of prayer who spent time together every Sunday morning praying for the Bible classes and the sermon? Think anything would happen? Or would that be a waster of time?
      2. What if on Wednesday nights we had the elders stand at each side of the auditorium with the invitation that anyone could pray with them about anything on his or her heart. The elders would find a private place to pray with them. Think anything would happen? Or would that be a waste of time?
      3. What if, instead of reading names off a list and giving a generic prayer to ask God to help the sick and comfort the grieved, we had a group to pray for those people by name and by situation? Think anything would happen? Or would that be a waste of time?
   3. “Whoa! Now wait a minute, David! We DO NOT believe …”
      1. We do not believe what?
      2. We do not believe that the God who created heaven and earth and raised Jesus from the death is capable of independent action?
3. Brothers and sisters, maybe the reason that we have not reached our potential is because we have no faith in God.
   1. Maybe we think that God depends on us instead of us depending on Him.
   2. Maybe we don’t pray as we should because we don’t think God can do anything.
   3. Maybe we place our faith in an institution we call the church instead of the God who sent the Savior and created the church.
   4. Maybe we have built a religion that does not require faith.
      1. Faith in God is secondary; faith in us is primary.
      2. Faith in Jesus is restricted to facts.
      3. Faith in the church as an institution is critical.
      4. Success in the church depends on us, not on God.
      5. It is human wisdom, and human leadership, and human energy, and human logic, and human effort that get the job done. Humans, not God, get the job done.

When Paul spoke to a group in Athens who literally knew nothing about God or Jesus, Paul began his lesson with God. This is what he said:
Acts 17:24-28 The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands; nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all people life and breath and all things; and He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation, that they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we also are His children.’

James, in speaking to Christians who were more like us than we wish to admit, said this,
James 4:1-4 What is the source of quarrels and conflicts among you? Is not the source your pleasures that wage war in your members? You lust and do not have; so you commit murder. You are envious and cannot obtain; so you fight and quarrel. You do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures. You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.

The God who created the world, who sent the Savior, who resurrected him from the dead, who created the church is active today. He will still be at work long after everyone of us is dead. His existence is not dependent on us. Our existence is very much dependent on Him. When your faith is in God, Christ becomes the center of your life.

“That’s the Way It Works!”

Posted by David on January 23, 2000 under Sermons

This is our year of national elections. This is the year we celebrate the reality of democracy. This is the year that we practice the democratic ideal in ways that are uniquely American. This year we will elect a President.

How do we do that? First, we have a two party system. There are more political parties than two, but the two are the powerful parties that have a realistic chance of electing a President. Second, we have a primary system. Every person who hopes to be a national presidential candidate for one of those two parties must campaign in the primaries. There it is decided, state primary by state primary, who will be the presidential candidates in the two major parties. Third, we have major party conventions. At these conventions the presidential candidates of the two major parties are officially declared to be “the party candidates.” Fourth, these two candidates campaign for the national vote for about four months. Fifth, we have a nation election, and, ideally, the person who gets the most votes is our President for four years.

Why do we do it that way? Do you want the constitutional answer, the historical answer, or the “person-on-the-street” answer? Perhaps one oversimplified answer will do for all three: “That is the way it works.” Is “that the way it works” in every democracy? No. “That is the way it works” in America. Can you imagine living in a country where it did not work that way? Can you imagine it working in any other way in America?

That is the system. The system works. Protect the system. Be loyal to the system. Do not mess up the system. Do not change the system. From the perspective of the American people, the essential key to democracy working is the system.

From the perspective of the American people, the key to anything working is the system. Always stick with the system. In the system you will always find the life and the essence of success.

1. It is does not surprise me that in our culture and our nation, the key to religious success is declared to be in the system.
   1. That is one reason that many in the Church of Christ often find the needs and the spiritual conditions that surround us so confusing.
   2. If our religious system is right, why are we not more successful?
   3. If our religious system worked well in the past, why is it too often ineffective today?
2. Placing faith in our religious system does not make us unique.
   1. The nation of Israel in which Jesus was born placed their faith in their religious system.
      1. First, their system began with a fact: the nation of Israel was the chosen people of God.
         1. The Old Testament emphasized that fact many times.
         2. Their problem did not come from that fact.
         3. Their problem came from their interpretation of that fact.
         4. To them that meant God loved them to the exclusion of other people.
         5. A person who was not an Israelite could convert to Judaism and become an Israelite, but to convert the person had to be indoctrinated in the system and live by the system.
      2. Second, the heart and soul of their system was the Law that God gave them through Moses.
         1. The heart and soul of the Law were the ten commandments.
         2. Their religious system was based on their understanding and application of the Law.
   2. In their religious system, the ten commandments (first given in Exodus 20:1-17,) were the foundation of everything.
      1. You worship the Lord God who delivered you from Egypt, and no other god.
      2. You do not make any object that represents God; you make no idols.
      3. You do not use God’s name in a way that enables you to deceive others.
      4. You will keep Saturday holy by making it a day of rest.
3. Then in first century Israel was born a Jewish man named Jesus, God’s son, who through God’s resurrection became the Christ.
   1. Jesus did not teach or work within their religious system.
      1. Jesus worshipped God, but Jesus did not emphasize the things their system emphasized.
      2. Jesus honored God’s name, but Jesus did not honor God in the Ways their system emphasized.
      3. Jesus honored God by observing Saturday as the day of rest, but Jesus did things on Saturday that their system did not permit.
      4. The devoutly religious and the religious leaders were the greatest adversaries Jesus had.
      5. Why would Israel’s devoutly religious people oppose Jesus? Because Jesus’ teachings did not emphasize the same things that their system emphasized. He declared truth and revealed God outside the system.
         1. The law said, “Do not commit adultery,” but Jesus forgave people who committed adultery.
         2. The law said, “Do not steal,” but Jesus forgave thieves (tax collectors).
         3. The law said not to work on Saturday, and Jesus did good on Saturday.
         4. Jesus did not restrict his work to function within the religious system.
   2. Jesus died to be Savior to all people, not just Israel.
      1. The good news of God’s accomplishments in Jesus’ death and resurrection were shared with the world.
      2. Jesus’ teachings were shared with the world.
      3. Within a few years people who were non-Israelite Christians outnumbered Israelites who were Christians.
      4. Jewish Christians had a problem accepting these people as Christians.
      5. Why?
         1. They did not fit the system.
         2. In the past, many of these people worshipped other gods, and the law said do not do that. How could God save people who had worshipped other gods?
         3. In the past, many of these people honored and encouraged the making of idols, and the law said not to do that. How could God save people who had encouraged the making of idols?
         4. In the past, these people had not honored God, and the law said you must honor God. How could God save people who had not honored Him in the past?
         5. These people had never kept Saturday as a holy day of rest, and the law said to do that. How could God save such people?
         6. Many of these people were completely ignorant of the Law!
      6. Because these people did not fit the religious system of Judaism, many Israelite Christians refused to consider them to be God’s people.
4. In a concise, direct statement, Paul dealt with the reality of God’s salvation in Christ as he wrote Romans 3:21-26.
   But now apart from the Law the righteousness of God has been manifested, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe; for there is no distinction; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed; for the demonstration, I say, of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. (The New American Standard Bible, 1995 Update, La Habra, California: The Lockman Foundation, 1996.)
   1. This is my understanding of Paul’s declaration.
      1. God found a way to be righteous and to reveal righteousness that is not based on the Law.
         1. God can independently of the Law be righteous in His actions.
         2. That allows God to extend to people the opportunity to be righteous before Him that in a way that does not depend on the law.
         3. Instead of the Law being the way to become righteous, the Law is a witness to what God has done.
         4. God’s word, the Law and the Prophets, are the witness to this new way to be righteous.
      2. In this is the new way to be righteous:
         1. God Himself is righteous through what He did in Jesus Christ.
         2. God can make people righteous through what He did in Jesus Christ.
         3. Jesus made this new way to be righteous possible by trusting God.
         4. This new way makes us righteous when we trust Jesus.
         5. This new way to be righteous is available to everyone who trusts Jesus.
         6. Everyone, Israelite and non-Israelite, needs this new way to be righteous because every person is guilty of evil and falls short of God’s glory.
      3. Any person who trusts what God did in Jesus can be justified.
         1. By being justified, Paul means God looks at that person as if he or she was not guilty of sin.
         2. This justification does not come through obeying the law; it is given by God as a gift; it comes through God’s grace.
         3. God’s justification has to be a gift; no human deserves justification.
      4. God can justify us, can look at us as if we are not guilty of any evil, because God redeemed us with Jesus Christ.
         1. He used Jesus’ death to buy us back from evil; He paid the full penalty for our evil by giving Jesus’ life and the blood for our mistakes.
         2. God publicly substituted Jesus’ life for the consequences of our evil.
         3. Jesus’ blood paid for our evil.
         4. Jesus’ blood benefits us when we trust what God did in that blood.
      5. Why was it necessary for God to substitute Jesus’ life for our evil?
         1. It was necessary because God endured all the human evil committed prior to the death of Jesus.
         2. It was necessary because God’s justice had not destroyed humanity for wickedness.
         3. It was necessary because God had shown grace and practiced forgiveness in all those generations before Jesus died.
         4. It was necessary because righteousness is a part of God’s nature, and, because His nature is righteous, God could not be unrighteous.
         5. To refuse to make all people pay the full consequences of evil before Christ was an unrighteous act if God had not paid for those passed over sins with the blood of Jesus.
      6. By allowing Jesus to die for human evil, God was just.
         1. In Jesus’ purity God paid the full price of every sin that ever has been or ever will be committed by humans.
         2. Because God paid for those sins, God is just.
         3. Because God paid for all sins, God can forgive any person.
   2. Paul’s point is simple.
      1. God’s innocent Son died to pay for every evil ever committed by people.
      2. Jesus was innocent of any evil, therefore Jesus could be our substitute sacrifice.
      3. Jesus lived and died in absolute surrender to and trust in God.
      4. God fulfilled justice by letting the innocent Jesus die for our sins.
      5. Because God fulfilled justice, God is free to justify every person who trusts what He did in the death of Jesus.
5. If we want to, we can make rules, regulations, and laws out of everything God did in Jesus.
   1. We can tell ourselves and the world, “That is the way it works.”
   2. We can make a system out of what God did in Jesus.
   3. But if we do that, faith in that system cannot save us.
   4. Faith in Jesus, faith in what God did in Jesus’ death will save us.
      1. Only in Jesus’ death could God be righteous.
      2. Only if we trust what God did in Jesus’ death can we be righteous before God.

[Prayer: God, help us trust the only truth that can free us from sin. Help us trust Jesus. Help us trust his death. Help us trust his blood. Help us trust his resurrection.]

In what do you trust? God knows if your faith is in a system or in His son. Do you know? When you trust a system, you believe in your self. When you trust Jesus, you believe in God.