We all want to be the first to know the news, especially if it is good news. Isn’t it interesting who God choose to be the first to know about the birth of the Savior? Nobody rich or famous of powerful or wise. No, God sent his angels to poor shepherds. Why do you think he did that?
LUKE 2:8-20: THE ANGELS AND THE SHEPHERDS
INTRODUCTION
We see angels and shepherds in a hundred different scenes every Christmas. They seem to be so perfect for the season. Angels are beautiful and shepherds are picturesque.
But have you ever thought about how odd it was that shepherds would have been the first to know about the birth of the Savior.
Nobody rich or famous, no great rulers, no wise scholars, no admired religious leaders found out until later.
But God chose some of the lowliest people on earth to know the secret.
Shepherds seem to us picturesque, but to people in that day shepherds were looked down upon.
Shepherds had the reputation for being dirty and smelly and not very religious.
Their work tied them down and made it impossible for them to attend religious observances.
They had the reputation for sometimes confusing other people’s property with their own.
Sometimes they were accused of pasturing their flocks on other people’s land.
I think the shepherds in our Christmas story were good and useful people, but they weren’t people who got much respect.
But isn’t it appropriate that the first people to know about Jesus—besides Mary and Joseph—were the kind of people that would be most attracted to Jesus during his time on earth?
Remember, that few of the high-class people cared much for Jesus. The people who loved him best were sinners, tax collectors, Samaritans, prostitutes, and poor people.
Text: Luke 2:8-20
I. Imagine the scene: “An angel of the Lord appeared to them and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear.”
A. It was night time.
The shepherds, we read, were in the fields watching over their sheep. They would have taken turns staying awake to raise the alarm if thieves or wild animals threatened their flock.
But when the angel showed up, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them, they were awake in an instant…and they were filled with fear. We all remember the words we learned in our Christmas plays: “They were sore afraid.”
Every time in the Bible when an angel appeared to anyone, we read that they were terrified.
And the angels always say, “Fear not!”
And that is what the angel said to these shepherds.
B. So the angel said, “Be not afraid; for behold I bring you good news of a great joy which will come to all the people; for unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.
C. Let’s look at the word “Savior.” In the Bible, Savior almost always refers to God himself.
In Luke 1:46-47 Mary says,
“My soul magnified the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.”
Luke begins this chapter with a reference to Caesar Augustus, Emperor of the greatest empire that the world had ever known: Caesar Augustus, the Emperor of Rome.
Did you know that Caesar had stamped on his coins: “Augustus, Savior, Son of God”? People really worshiped him.
Luke is trying to show us that what Caesar thought he was, Jesus really was: the Savior, the Son of God.
D. Jesus is Savior because he sets us free from the guilt and power of sin.
Jesus is Savior because he grants forgiveness for all our failures.
Jesus is Savior because he heals our sin-sick hearts.
Jesus is Savior because he is our constant companion all the way to the end of the road.
Jesus is Savior because he sets us free from our dread of death and promises eternal life.
II. And then suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those on whom his favor rests.”
A. “Host” means army.
The ancient people called the stars the “heavenly host.” They thought of the stars as spiritual beings.
They also called the angels of God the “heavenly host.”
Sometimes they combined the two ideas and thought of the stars as angels.
I picture the stars being gathered together and sweeping down to earth to sing their song to the shepherds. It must have been quite a sight!
B. The angel chorus anticipates the joyful peace that Jesus, the Prince of Peace was to bring to all who would put their faith in him as their Lord and Savior.
People complain about this song of the angels. They say, “That was almost 2000 years ago, and look at all the wars that have afflicted the world and still go on today.”
The “peace” the angels promised doesn’t mean that suddenly all the people of the world would be transformed to goodness and would love one another.
The “peace” the angels promised doesn’t even mean that the lives of faith believers will be free from heartache and struggle and pain.
The “peace” the angels promised means all the blessings of salvation.
It means peace with God. Like in the Christmas hymn:
“Peace on earth and mercy mild,
God and sinners reconciled.”
C. Let’s go back to verse 12: “And this will be a sign for you: you will find a babe wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.”
The first part of the sign was the swaddling cloths. That would show that he was a newborn.
In some countries, even today, mothers wrap their newborn babies in swaddling bands because they believe that that will make their bones grow straight.
The second part of the sign is that the baby would be lying in a manger. A “manger” is a feeding box for animals. There would be only one baby lying in a manger. The other babies would be in beds.
With those clues, the shepherds would be sure to find the right baby.
III. We need to remember that the nativity wasn’t as pretty in real life as it is on the Christmas cards.
A. That stable was dirty and dark and cold.
There wasn’t any clean linen to wrap the baby in.
There wasn’t any warm water to bathe the baby with.
There wasn’t any soft bed to lay the baby in.
Mary was very young. She was weary from the journey, and this was her first baby.
Joseph did what he could. There must have been a midwife there to help, but it was a difficult time for the new mother.
B. What a surprise, when the shepherds came bumbling in with their amazing story about the angels!
We read that all who heard the shepherds’ story wondered what to make of what they had heard. We don’t even know whether anyone believed the shepherds’ story.
Little Jesus must have looked pretty ordinary. Forget the halo over his head and the angels hovering overhead.
I think the visit of the shepherds was especially for Mary and Joseph.
Mary and Joseph must have wondered if those angels they had seen 9 months before were real, or if they had just imagined things.
But the shepherds’ story of their encounter with the angels gave Mary and Joseph assurance that this new baby really was the Promised One, the Savior of the world.
APPLICATION
In verse 19 we read: “But Mary kept all these things, pondering them in her heart.”
Mary had a lot to think about. She has to put together all the pieces of the amazing thing that has occurred to her.
She would spend the rest of her life thinking about the meaning of this great thing that she had been part of.
And in verse 20 we read, “And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.”
Life was never the same for the shepherds either. Whether anyone believed their story or not, they knew that what they had seen that night was real.
They knew that they had been in on the greatest event that had happened yet in the world.
I will leave you with two lessons from this story.
Let’s be like Mary. Let’s ponder the story in our hearts until it becomes real to us and we understand and feel what it means that Jesus is our Savior.
And let’s be like the shepherds. Let’s glorify and praise God that we have been privileged to know the story of God’s great love in sending us his Son, our Savior.
Thursday, December 2, 2010
The Christmas Story: Matthew 2:13-18: What Happened after Christmas
What was the next thing that happened in the lives of Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus after the wise men packed up and went home? This sad event helps us to understand what the Christmas story really means to us.
MATTHEW 2:13-18: WHAT HAPPENED AFTER CHRISTMAS
Christmas is over and past. But what comes next?
Today I’m going to read to you what happened to Mary and Joseph and the baby Jesus after the wise men said good bye and began their long journey home.
MATTHEW 2:13-18
This is not a story you see illustrated on Christmas cards or acted out in Christmas pageants.
It isn’t a cute story and it doesn’t make us feel all warm and fuzzy inside.
Isn’t it strange that this little baby called “Immanuel,” “God with Us,” is now fleeing for his life? “Immanuel” is on the run.
Isn’t it strange that after the angels sing “Peace on earth” the Prince of Peace is now a homeless refugee?
Scholars tell us that there were probably 20 or 30 little boys under two-years-old in Bethlehem at that time.
Isn’t it terrible that the birth of the Savior of the world was the direct cause of so many little children being torn from their mothers’ arms and cruelly murdered by Herod’s soldiers?
But this story is important to us because it helps us understand the sorrow that surrounded God’s sending his son into the world.
I. Although astrology—telling fortunes by the stars—was forbidden to the Israelites, God spoke to heathen astrologers in a language they knew. These were the “wise men” we read about in the Christmas story.
A. It is interesting that when God wanted to give Jewish shepherds the message of his Son’s birth, he sent a company of angels to them. And when he wanted to call pagan astrologers, he sent a sign in the sky. God speaks to people of different backgrounds in ways that each can understand.
B. These men, dwelling in heathen darkness as they were, were also open to God’s message and took the trouble and expense of the long journey to come and worship the Savior.
C. The story shows these men as not only “wise” but also as men of great faith.
Though Jesus was only a baby and they saw no angels or miracles and heard no teaching, they fell down before the Baby and worshiped him, presenting him, out of their treasures, precious gifts.
II. We read that when the wise men told Herod what they had learned—that a new king had been born in Israel—he became frightened. He determined to kill Jesus.
A. But God warned Joseph in a dream and Joseph obeyed.
B. It was a hard journey.
Joseph and Mary had no time to pack.
It was 200 miles to Egypt. Mary and Joseph were poor people. I doubt they could have afforded the donkey you see on the Christmas cards. They probably walked the whole way.
They would be refugees in a strange land.
So how did they survive? I think they sold the gold, frankincense, and myrrh the wise men had brought to the baby Jesus.
III. But back in Bethlehem Herod sent his soldiers to kill every boy child in Bethlehem under two-years-old. That way he thought he would be sure to get rid of this “new king” that had been born there.
A. King Herod was a brave, cruel ruler. He was paranoid, always imagining that someone was plotting against him. He had one of his wives and three of his sons executed unjustly.
This story troubles many Christians. Why didn’t God save the lives of those poor children who died that day? We don’t know.
We don’t know why awful things happen in the world. But we believe in the resurrection. We believe that God can make up for the injustices that occur in our world.
The story reminds us that suffering is never far from the joy of Christmas.
B. Catholic Christians honor the murdered children as the first Christian martyrs. Their feast day—“Holy Innocents’ Day”—is celebrated on December 28. The Orthodox Churches celebrate Holy Innocents’ Day on December 27.
They remember these children and pray for innocent people everywhere who suffer from the injustices in the world.
On Holy Innocents Day in Bethlehem, children still gather in the church of the Nativity to sing a hymn in memory of the children who died so long ago.
IV. This story reminds us that trouble followed Jesus from start to finish.
A. Even when he was a baby, someone wanted to kill him.
Jesus came into a world that mostly rejected him. And most of the world still does.
B. The prophet Isaiah wrote hundreds of years before Jesus was born. He foretold that God’s Servant would be “a Man of Sorrows and acquainted with grief.”
“He was despised and rejected of men,
a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.
And we hid as it were our faces from him;
he was despised and we esteemed him not.
But he was wounded for our transgression;
he was bruised for our iniquities,
and upon him was the chastisement that made us whole,
and with his stripes we are healed.”
There was tragedy in Jesus’ life—from the murder of these little boys and to rejection and trouble all his life—even until his death on a cross.
C. One Christmas season, when I was teaching 6th grade, I assigned my students to write a holiday poem. One of my students, a girl named Laura Ralston, turned in this original poem:
“Christmas giving goes back quite a way;
When Christ was born it was Christmas day.
But the greatest gift the world ever received
Was also the one that cost the most grief.”
CONCLUSION
Let us remember that God became Man so that he could suffer
The story of Jesus involves rejection and suffering—suffering for Mary and Joseph. Later Jesus would be rejected and be killed.
Still later, Jesus’ disciples who followed in his footsteps would also suffer.
And the killing of faithful believers goes on today in several nations.
This story encourages us to move from the sentimentality of Christmas to the life of Jesus and remind us how much our salvation cost God.
These three must always be kept together in our minds: Christmas—Good Friday—Easter
At Christmas we remember that God sent his Son to be the Savior of the world
On Good Friday we remember that Jesus died to bring us to God.
And at Easter we remember that Jesus was victor over sin and death.
Because Jesus came, died, and rose again, we also will rise again to eternal life.
We walk with Jesus by the way of the cross, but there is also resurrection and glory at the end.
MATTHEW 2:13-18: WHAT HAPPENED AFTER CHRISTMAS
Christmas is over and past. But what comes next?
Today I’m going to read to you what happened to Mary and Joseph and the baby Jesus after the wise men said good bye and began their long journey home.
MATTHEW 2:13-18
This is not a story you see illustrated on Christmas cards or acted out in Christmas pageants.
It isn’t a cute story and it doesn’t make us feel all warm and fuzzy inside.
Isn’t it strange that this little baby called “Immanuel,” “God with Us,” is now fleeing for his life? “Immanuel” is on the run.
Isn’t it strange that after the angels sing “Peace on earth” the Prince of Peace is now a homeless refugee?
Scholars tell us that there were probably 20 or 30 little boys under two-years-old in Bethlehem at that time.
Isn’t it terrible that the birth of the Savior of the world was the direct cause of so many little children being torn from their mothers’ arms and cruelly murdered by Herod’s soldiers?
But this story is important to us because it helps us understand the sorrow that surrounded God’s sending his son into the world.
I. Although astrology—telling fortunes by the stars—was forbidden to the Israelites, God spoke to heathen astrologers in a language they knew. These were the “wise men” we read about in the Christmas story.
A. It is interesting that when God wanted to give Jewish shepherds the message of his Son’s birth, he sent a company of angels to them. And when he wanted to call pagan astrologers, he sent a sign in the sky. God speaks to people of different backgrounds in ways that each can understand.
B. These men, dwelling in heathen darkness as they were, were also open to God’s message and took the trouble and expense of the long journey to come and worship the Savior.
C. The story shows these men as not only “wise” but also as men of great faith.
Though Jesus was only a baby and they saw no angels or miracles and heard no teaching, they fell down before the Baby and worshiped him, presenting him, out of their treasures, precious gifts.
II. We read that when the wise men told Herod what they had learned—that a new king had been born in Israel—he became frightened. He determined to kill Jesus.
A. But God warned Joseph in a dream and Joseph obeyed.
B. It was a hard journey.
Joseph and Mary had no time to pack.
It was 200 miles to Egypt. Mary and Joseph were poor people. I doubt they could have afforded the donkey you see on the Christmas cards. They probably walked the whole way.
They would be refugees in a strange land.
So how did they survive? I think they sold the gold, frankincense, and myrrh the wise men had brought to the baby Jesus.
III. But back in Bethlehem Herod sent his soldiers to kill every boy child in Bethlehem under two-years-old. That way he thought he would be sure to get rid of this “new king” that had been born there.
A. King Herod was a brave, cruel ruler. He was paranoid, always imagining that someone was plotting against him. He had one of his wives and three of his sons executed unjustly.
This story troubles many Christians. Why didn’t God save the lives of those poor children who died that day? We don’t know.
We don’t know why awful things happen in the world. But we believe in the resurrection. We believe that God can make up for the injustices that occur in our world.
The story reminds us that suffering is never far from the joy of Christmas.
B. Catholic Christians honor the murdered children as the first Christian martyrs. Their feast day—“Holy Innocents’ Day”—is celebrated on December 28. The Orthodox Churches celebrate Holy Innocents’ Day on December 27.
They remember these children and pray for innocent people everywhere who suffer from the injustices in the world.
On Holy Innocents Day in Bethlehem, children still gather in the church of the Nativity to sing a hymn in memory of the children who died so long ago.
IV. This story reminds us that trouble followed Jesus from start to finish.
A. Even when he was a baby, someone wanted to kill him.
Jesus came into a world that mostly rejected him. And most of the world still does.
B. The prophet Isaiah wrote hundreds of years before Jesus was born. He foretold that God’s Servant would be “a Man of Sorrows and acquainted with grief.”
“He was despised and rejected of men,
a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.
And we hid as it were our faces from him;
he was despised and we esteemed him not.
But he was wounded for our transgression;
he was bruised for our iniquities,
and upon him was the chastisement that made us whole,
and with his stripes we are healed.”
There was tragedy in Jesus’ life—from the murder of these little boys and to rejection and trouble all his life—even until his death on a cross.
C. One Christmas season, when I was teaching 6th grade, I assigned my students to write a holiday poem. One of my students, a girl named Laura Ralston, turned in this original poem:
“Christmas giving goes back quite a way;
When Christ was born it was Christmas day.
But the greatest gift the world ever received
Was also the one that cost the most grief.”
CONCLUSION
Let us remember that God became Man so that he could suffer
The story of Jesus involves rejection and suffering—suffering for Mary and Joseph. Later Jesus would be rejected and be killed.
Still later, Jesus’ disciples who followed in his footsteps would also suffer.
And the killing of faithful believers goes on today in several nations.
This story encourages us to move from the sentimentality of Christmas to the life of Jesus and remind us how much our salvation cost God.
These three must always be kept together in our minds: Christmas—Good Friday—Easter
At Christmas we remember that God sent his Son to be the Savior of the world
On Good Friday we remember that Jesus died to bring us to God.
And at Easter we remember that Jesus was victor over sin and death.
Because Jesus came, died, and rose again, we also will rise again to eternal life.
We walk with Jesus by the way of the cross, but there is also resurrection and glory at the end.
Saturday, November 6, 2010
Living Thankfully: Luke 17:11-19: How to Make Jesus Happy
One reason why it is more blessed to give than to receive is that we get more pleasure from gratitude than from gifts we might receive. In this story we see that in that way Jesus was just like us.
Luke 17:11-19: HOW TO MAKE JESUS HAPPY: A THANKSGIVING SERMON
I. Introduction
Have you ever given a gift to someone and received not a word of thanks? How disappointing!. We wonder whether our friend received the gift or maybe they didn’t like the gift we had so carefully chosen.
For three years I was responsible for the deacon fund for my church. I got all the calls for help with rent, groceries, and utility payments. We helped as many as we thought were truly needy. But only once did I receive a thank you note from anyone.
I used to be a school teacher. Sometimes a parent would write me a letter to thank me for teaching his or her child. Sometimes a child would write me a letter of gratitude. That really made me happy. I saved those letters.
In the same way it makes God happy when we thank him for what he has done for us.
Thanksgiving Day is tomorrow. We’re fortunate in the United States to have a day set aside to remind us to be thankful for the good things in our lives--to express our thankfulness for the people who have helped us and especially to God our Father, who is the giver of all good gifts.
II. Text: Luke 17:11-19
A. Ten men afflicted with the terrible disease of leprosy came to Jesus begging to be healed.
The stood at a distance and lifted up their voices saying, “Master, have mercy on us!”
Do you know what “mercy” is? Mercy is pity combined with help.
Mercy is what we need but know we don’t deserve. “Goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.”
B. For a good reason they stood far off. Leprosy was the name given to any of several serious skin diseases that causes ugly, itching rashes or running sores or boils or swelling and stinking flesh.
Whether or not these diseases were contagious, the people thought they were and such people were to stay away from everyone else.
In the Old Testament we read that they were to live outside the town or village. They were commanded to wear torn clothes and let the hair of their heads hang loose.
They were to cry, “Unclean! Unclean!” whenever someone came close. Temple and synagogue were off limits.
C. Jesus performed this healing in an unusual way. He didn’t lay his hand on them as he did other times for other lepers. He just told them to go to the priests.
This was a necessary step for them in order to return to society.
The priest would examine them and certify that they were free of the disease and then they could go back to their homes and families and jobs and friends.
We don’t know how far they got before they realized they were healed--maybe a mile or two or more than that. No doubt they were all grateful for what Jesus had done for them, and they were doing just what he had told them to do.
They were on their way to the priest. But one of the 10 realized that he couldn’t just go on. He returned to Jesus.
D. But then one of the men did a surprising thing. This man turned back, praising God with a loud voice and fell at Jesus’ feet, giving thanks.
It is interesting that, not only did he thank Jesus, but first of all he praised God.
Thanksgiving and praise are pretty near to the same thing because when we thank God we are praising him too.
This man was hearty in his praise. He praised God with a loud voice. Just like the psalm, he “made a joyful noise to the Lord.”
And Jesus was pleased. He noted that the one who was grateful was a foreigner--a member of the despised race of the Samaritans, considered by good Jews to be heretics. Jews, we read, had nothing to do with Samaritans.
Probably the only reason this man was with the others who were Jews was because misery loves company.
E. Jesus said, “Rise and go. Your faith has made you well.”
Salvation and healing are the same word in Greek. Some translations read, “Your faith has saved you.”
Jesus wanted to give this grateful man something more than a well body. He wanted to give him a healed soul.
Jesus told the Samaritan ex-leper that his faith had connected him to God. Because of his faith, as expressed in his gratitude, he had found in Jesus eternal life.
In the same way our thankfulness to God is an expression of our faith and love for Jesus.
III. On Thanksgiving Day we call upon each other to be grateful for our blessings.
A. Gratitude is the surest measure of my spiritual condition.
I met a man a few weeks ago who told me that he didn’t owe anything to anyone. He had worked for everything he had.
The attitude of self-centeredness says, “I deserve everything I have, so why should I thank anyone.”
The attitude of bitterness says, “I deserve far more than I ever got. I’m mad at the world and I’m mad at God.”
The attitude of gratefulness says, “Thank you, Lord Jesus, for your kindness that I didn’t deserve.”
B. Our blessings are doubled when we not only receive them at the hand of God but also return God praise.
Forward-looking prayer is when we ask God for something.
Forward-looking prayer can be self-centered because we are often asking for something for ourselves.
Backward-looking prayer is prayer that thanks God for blessings received.
Backward-looking prayer is especially pleasing to God because by thankful prayer we show we appreciate God’s goodness and that we love him.
It is good to look back over our lives and thank God for the good things: grandparents, parents, good friends, church, good people to work with, for knowing God, the companionship of Jesus through all the hard times, the hope of eternal life.
CONCLUSION
In a moment we are going to sing a familiar Thanksgiving hymn: “Now thank we all our God, with heart and hands and voices.” Its author, Martin Rinkart, was a German pastor in Germany during the terrible 30-Years War.
The enemy army had surrounded his city, and famine and plague were rampant.
800 homes were destroyed and the people began to die. The town’s pastors conducted dozens of funerals every day.
Finally the pastors too, died and only Rinkart was left. He conducted as many as 40 funerals every day.
When the enemy army demanded a huge ransom to lift the siege, Pastor Rinkart left the safety of the walls to plead for mercy.
The enemy commander, impressed with his faith and courage lowered his demands.
Soon afterward the war ended and Martin Rinkart wrote this hymn for a grand celebration service.
Some books say that he wrote the hymn as a table grace for his children. It is an impressive witness of thankfulness to God in a terrible time. Maybe he wrote it for a table grace and then used it at the grand celebration.
“Prayer is a glad and reverent lifting up of the heart to God in honor and praise for his goodness.”
Luke 17:11-19: HOW TO MAKE JESUS HAPPY: A THANKSGIVING SERMON
I. Introduction
Have you ever given a gift to someone and received not a word of thanks? How disappointing!. We wonder whether our friend received the gift or maybe they didn’t like the gift we had so carefully chosen.
For three years I was responsible for the deacon fund for my church. I got all the calls for help with rent, groceries, and utility payments. We helped as many as we thought were truly needy. But only once did I receive a thank you note from anyone.
I used to be a school teacher. Sometimes a parent would write me a letter to thank me for teaching his or her child. Sometimes a child would write me a letter of gratitude. That really made me happy. I saved those letters.
In the same way it makes God happy when we thank him for what he has done for us.
Thanksgiving Day is tomorrow. We’re fortunate in the United States to have a day set aside to remind us to be thankful for the good things in our lives--to express our thankfulness for the people who have helped us and especially to God our Father, who is the giver of all good gifts.
II. Text: Luke 17:11-19
A. Ten men afflicted with the terrible disease of leprosy came to Jesus begging to be healed.
The stood at a distance and lifted up their voices saying, “Master, have mercy on us!”
Do you know what “mercy” is? Mercy is pity combined with help.
Mercy is what we need but know we don’t deserve. “Goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.”
B. For a good reason they stood far off. Leprosy was the name given to any of several serious skin diseases that causes ugly, itching rashes or running sores or boils or swelling and stinking flesh.
Whether or not these diseases were contagious, the people thought they were and such people were to stay away from everyone else.
In the Old Testament we read that they were to live outside the town or village. They were commanded to wear torn clothes and let the hair of their heads hang loose.
They were to cry, “Unclean! Unclean!” whenever someone came close. Temple and synagogue were off limits.
C. Jesus performed this healing in an unusual way. He didn’t lay his hand on them as he did other times for other lepers. He just told them to go to the priests.
This was a necessary step for them in order to return to society.
The priest would examine them and certify that they were free of the disease and then they could go back to their homes and families and jobs and friends.
We don’t know how far they got before they realized they were healed--maybe a mile or two or more than that. No doubt they were all grateful for what Jesus had done for them, and they were doing just what he had told them to do.
They were on their way to the priest. But one of the 10 realized that he couldn’t just go on. He returned to Jesus.
D. But then one of the men did a surprising thing. This man turned back, praising God with a loud voice and fell at Jesus’ feet, giving thanks.
It is interesting that, not only did he thank Jesus, but first of all he praised God.
Thanksgiving and praise are pretty near to the same thing because when we thank God we are praising him too.
This man was hearty in his praise. He praised God with a loud voice. Just like the psalm, he “made a joyful noise to the Lord.”
And Jesus was pleased. He noted that the one who was grateful was a foreigner--a member of the despised race of the Samaritans, considered by good Jews to be heretics. Jews, we read, had nothing to do with Samaritans.
Probably the only reason this man was with the others who were Jews was because misery loves company.
E. Jesus said, “Rise and go. Your faith has made you well.”
Salvation and healing are the same word in Greek. Some translations read, “Your faith has saved you.”
Jesus wanted to give this grateful man something more than a well body. He wanted to give him a healed soul.
Jesus told the Samaritan ex-leper that his faith had connected him to God. Because of his faith, as expressed in his gratitude, he had found in Jesus eternal life.
In the same way our thankfulness to God is an expression of our faith and love for Jesus.
III. On Thanksgiving Day we call upon each other to be grateful for our blessings.
A. Gratitude is the surest measure of my spiritual condition.
I met a man a few weeks ago who told me that he didn’t owe anything to anyone. He had worked for everything he had.
The attitude of self-centeredness says, “I deserve everything I have, so why should I thank anyone.”
The attitude of bitterness says, “I deserve far more than I ever got. I’m mad at the world and I’m mad at God.”
The attitude of gratefulness says, “Thank you, Lord Jesus, for your kindness that I didn’t deserve.”
B. Our blessings are doubled when we not only receive them at the hand of God but also return God praise.
Forward-looking prayer is when we ask God for something.
Forward-looking prayer can be self-centered because we are often asking for something for ourselves.
Backward-looking prayer is prayer that thanks God for blessings received.
Backward-looking prayer is especially pleasing to God because by thankful prayer we show we appreciate God’s goodness and that we love him.
It is good to look back over our lives and thank God for the good things: grandparents, parents, good friends, church, good people to work with, for knowing God, the companionship of Jesus through all the hard times, the hope of eternal life.
CONCLUSION
In a moment we are going to sing a familiar Thanksgiving hymn: “Now thank we all our God, with heart and hands and voices.” Its author, Martin Rinkart, was a German pastor in Germany during the terrible 30-Years War.
The enemy army had surrounded his city, and famine and plague were rampant.
800 homes were destroyed and the people began to die. The town’s pastors conducted dozens of funerals every day.
Finally the pastors too, died and only Rinkart was left. He conducted as many as 40 funerals every day.
When the enemy army demanded a huge ransom to lift the siege, Pastor Rinkart left the safety of the walls to plead for mercy.
The enemy commander, impressed with his faith and courage lowered his demands.
Soon afterward the war ended and Martin Rinkart wrote this hymn for a grand celebration service.
Some books say that he wrote the hymn as a table grace for his children. It is an impressive witness of thankfulness to God in a terrible time. Maybe he wrote it for a table grace and then used it at the grand celebration.
“Prayer is a glad and reverent lifting up of the heart to God in honor and praise for his goodness.”
Friday, September 3, 2010
Connecting with God in Prayer: Matthew 15:21-28: The Silence of God
Have you ever felt that God was ignoring you? Matthew includes a little story in his gospel that shows us how we can get through to God.
MATTHEW 15:21-28: THE SILENCE OF GOD
INTRODUCTION
A pastor told me once about a woman he visited who was 104 years old. All her friends had gone to heaven, and she was left alone. She was tired of weakness and sickness; she was lonely. She wanted to be with Jesus, too. She said, “I feel like God has forgotten me.”
Have you ever felt that God has forgotten you?
You pray and nothing happens.
You read your Bible, but God seems to be far away.
You go to worship but you don’t feel anything.
You think, “Maybe God doesn’t care.”
You wonder, “Maybe I’ve believed a lie; maybe there isn’t a God after all.”
It is hard to deal with the silence of God.
A famous Christian author said, “I think there is no suffering greater than what is caused by the doubts of those who want to believe.”
In Matthew’s gospel we have a story in the gospel about a woman who came to Jesus with a great need—and Jesus ignored her. When she persisted, he insulted her. But the story has a happy ending.
We find the story of this remarkable lady in Matthew 15:21-28.
I. The woman was a Canaanite, from a nation that was a traditional enemy of Israel. Israel had conquered their land some 1500 years before. The Old Testament says a lot of harsh things about the Canaanites.
A. She lived in what is now Lebanon—north, beyond the borders of the Holy Land.
How did she learn of Jesus? How did she get the idea that he was the Messiah, the “Son of David”?
We don’t know. We only know that one day when Jesus had left his own country to get away from the demanding crowds and the arguing and disputing of his enemies and to have a quiet time with his disciples, this pagan woman came with her urgent plea.
She cried out with her urgent plea: “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David; my daughter is severely possessed by a demon.”
B. And Jesus ignored her.
How out of character this seems!
Elsewhere in the gospels we read that Jesus was the friend of sinners and outcasts, of the sick and needy, and all who needed healing.
“But Jesus did not answer her not a word” (v23).
The disciples knew how much Jesus needed rest and refreshment. They suggested he send her away.
Apparently her pestering of Jesus had gone on for some time.
Let us remember, when we read the gospels that we are reading only a sketch of what went on.
I once saw a movie about the life of Jesus. It used only the actual words of Jesus as recorded in the Gospel of Matthew.
It didn’t seem realistic at all. Everything happened too fast.
Surely Jesus didn’t go around having three-sentence conversations with people and then walking away.
What we have in our story is just the gist of the conversation.
This woman evidently had just kept calling out to Jesus for some time, and Jesus had kept ignoring her.
And finally, the disciples, sizing up the situation, decided it had gone too far.
So they suggested Jesus tell her to move on.
II. This story troubles us. Why didn’t Jesus help her? What would we think of a doctor who refused to treat a patient of a different race? So let’s look at the story a little closer.
A. First of all, Jesus wanted her—and his disciples—to understand something very important about his mission.
Jesus said to the woman, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”
Jesus would have only three years to get the “Jesus Movement” underway.
He didn’t have time to spend wandering through various countries as a medical missionary.
God’s plan was that through Israel he would bless the world.
That plan started with Abraham, back in the book of Genesis.
Then, after the resurrection, Jesus would send his disciples out to make disciples of every nation.
B. But the woman wasn’t discouraged by this information—nor did Jesus expect her to be.
She came and knelt before him—in the attitude of worship—and simply said, “Lord, help me!” (v25).
That’s one of the best prayers anyone can ever make.
A prayer we need to make over and over—maybe every day: “Lord, help me.”
C. And Jesus seemed to rebuff her: “It is not fair to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs” (v26).
The Jews had a lot of racial pride, and they used to call the Gentiles, “dogs.”
And the Gentiles returned the compliment by calling the Jews things just as bad.
But it surprises us to hear Jesus say such a harsh thing to the poor, desperate woman.
That’s because haven’t used our imaginations properly.
We need to imagine that we are there.
We need to see the look of Jesus’ face.
We need to hear the tone of his voice.
There was a tenderness in his voice, and maybe a bit of a smile on his face.
Jesus was teasing her to see how she would take these words.
Jesus was inviting her to argue her case with him.
D. She could have retorted:
“That’s not fair!” Or, “I’m just as good as they are!” Or, “Would it really be such a big problem for you to help me?”
No, she used her wits. When Jesus seemed to reach out his hand to push her away, she took hold of it to draw him close.
She picked up on the word “dog”: “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table” (v27).
She was content to be a “dog” if she could be a dog at Jesus’ table.
III. Jesus was very pleased with her answer.
A. Her humility, her wisdom, and her faith overcame any reluctance Jesus may have had in the beginning.
Humility, wisdom, and faith delight the heart of Jesus.
He said to her, “O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.” And her daughter was healed instantly” (v28).
Peter and Andrew and James and John had left all to follow Jesus.
But Jesus never said to them: “Great is your faith!”
The only other person of whom it is recorded in the gospels to receive this compliment was the heathen centurion who came asking Jesus to heal his sick son.
In these two stories we have a preview of the gospel mission that would begin at Pentecost and spread out to all the world.
B. This woman’s experience with Jesus was much richer because Jesus forced her persevere, and so to express her great faith.
I know a woman who, after she had taken care of her aging mother for many years, said, “Well, now God owes me one.”
The woman in our story knew that God didn’t owe her anything.
When God helps us—when God saves us—when God hears our prayers—it is pure grace.
We have no claim on him. He doesn’t owe us anything.
APPLICATION
Have you ever been ignored? It hurts, doesn’t it?
It’s even worse when God seems to ignore us.
I have known people who became so discouraged by unanswered prayer that they gave up on God.
They couldn’t bear the silence of God.
This story can be a parable to us of what to do when we feel ignored by God.
This woman could have gone home after she was rebuffed and said, “I tried. I went to him and begged him. And he refused me. I did what I could and it didn’t work.”
The Canaanite woman teaches us that it is earnest prayer, not casual prayer, that moves the heart of God.
Do you remember the story of Jacob—how he wrestled with the angel?
They wrestled all night, and the angel was winning.
But Jacob held on to the angel and said, “I will not let you go, unless you bless me” (Genesis 32:26).
And he won the blessing.
This woman was like Jacob. She held on and she won the blessing.
CONCLUSION
The preacher and theologian Fred Craddock tells of a time when he went to a hospital to visit a friend.
He was walking down the hall when he came upon a woman with her head against a door; she was banging on the door with both fists.
“Let me in! Let me in!” she shouted.
When Craddock got to the door, he saw that it was the chapel.
He said, “Here, let me help you.” And he tried the door, but it was locked.
He finally found someone with a key and they went in.
She had evidently come to the hospital without any planning. Her clothes were not nice. Her hair hadn’t been combed. She was wearing flip-flops.
The woman had the look of desperation. She had the voice of desperation.
“I know he’s going to die, I know he’s going to die, I know he’s going to die,” she screamed.
“Who?” Craddock asked.
“My husband.”
“What’s the matter?”
“He’s had a heart attack.”
Craddock told her that he was a minister and asked, “Can I pray with you?”
And she said, “Yes, please.”
And Craddock began to pray. But the woman interrupted him.
She started praying herself. She just took over.
She said, “Lord, this is not the time to take my husband. You know that better than I do. He’s not ready. Never prays. Never goes to church. He’s not ready. And what about me? I don’t have any skills. I can’t find work. I dropped out of school to marry him.”
She was really talking to God.
“And what about the kids?” she said. “They don’t mind me now with him around. If he’s gone, they’ll be wild as bucks. What about the kids? This is not the time to take my husband.”
The next day Craddock went back to the hospital.
He saw the same woman. She had a nice dress on. She had combed her hair. She was wearing shoes. She looked fine.
Before he could ask, she said, “He’s better.” She smiled and said, “I’m sorry about that crazy woman yesterday.”
Craddock said, “You weren’t crazy.”
She said, “I guess the Lord heard one of us.”
Craddock said, “He heard you.”
Craddock comments: “She was desperate. She had God by the lapels, both hands, and was screaming in God’s face: ‘I don’t think you’re listening!’ That’s desperation.”
God likes it when we pray like we really mean business.
MATTHEW 15:21-28: THE SILENCE OF GOD
INTRODUCTION
A pastor told me once about a woman he visited who was 104 years old. All her friends had gone to heaven, and she was left alone. She was tired of weakness and sickness; she was lonely. She wanted to be with Jesus, too. She said, “I feel like God has forgotten me.”
Have you ever felt that God has forgotten you?
You pray and nothing happens.
You read your Bible, but God seems to be far away.
You go to worship but you don’t feel anything.
You think, “Maybe God doesn’t care.”
You wonder, “Maybe I’ve believed a lie; maybe there isn’t a God after all.”
It is hard to deal with the silence of God.
A famous Christian author said, “I think there is no suffering greater than what is caused by the doubts of those who want to believe.”
In Matthew’s gospel we have a story in the gospel about a woman who came to Jesus with a great need—and Jesus ignored her. When she persisted, he insulted her. But the story has a happy ending.
We find the story of this remarkable lady in Matthew 15:21-28.
I. The woman was a Canaanite, from a nation that was a traditional enemy of Israel. Israel had conquered their land some 1500 years before. The Old Testament says a lot of harsh things about the Canaanites.
A. She lived in what is now Lebanon—north, beyond the borders of the Holy Land.
How did she learn of Jesus? How did she get the idea that he was the Messiah, the “Son of David”?
We don’t know. We only know that one day when Jesus had left his own country to get away from the demanding crowds and the arguing and disputing of his enemies and to have a quiet time with his disciples, this pagan woman came with her urgent plea.
She cried out with her urgent plea: “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David; my daughter is severely possessed by a demon.”
B. And Jesus ignored her.
How out of character this seems!
Elsewhere in the gospels we read that Jesus was the friend of sinners and outcasts, of the sick and needy, and all who needed healing.
“But Jesus did not answer her not a word” (v23).
The disciples knew how much Jesus needed rest and refreshment. They suggested he send her away.
Apparently her pestering of Jesus had gone on for some time.
Let us remember, when we read the gospels that we are reading only a sketch of what went on.
I once saw a movie about the life of Jesus. It used only the actual words of Jesus as recorded in the Gospel of Matthew.
It didn’t seem realistic at all. Everything happened too fast.
Surely Jesus didn’t go around having three-sentence conversations with people and then walking away.
What we have in our story is just the gist of the conversation.
This woman evidently had just kept calling out to Jesus for some time, and Jesus had kept ignoring her.
And finally, the disciples, sizing up the situation, decided it had gone too far.
So they suggested Jesus tell her to move on.
II. This story troubles us. Why didn’t Jesus help her? What would we think of a doctor who refused to treat a patient of a different race? So let’s look at the story a little closer.
A. First of all, Jesus wanted her—and his disciples—to understand something very important about his mission.
Jesus said to the woman, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”
Jesus would have only three years to get the “Jesus Movement” underway.
He didn’t have time to spend wandering through various countries as a medical missionary.
God’s plan was that through Israel he would bless the world.
That plan started with Abraham, back in the book of Genesis.
Then, after the resurrection, Jesus would send his disciples out to make disciples of every nation.
B. But the woman wasn’t discouraged by this information—nor did Jesus expect her to be.
She came and knelt before him—in the attitude of worship—and simply said, “Lord, help me!” (v25).
That’s one of the best prayers anyone can ever make.
A prayer we need to make over and over—maybe every day: “Lord, help me.”
C. And Jesus seemed to rebuff her: “It is not fair to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs” (v26).
The Jews had a lot of racial pride, and they used to call the Gentiles, “dogs.”
And the Gentiles returned the compliment by calling the Jews things just as bad.
But it surprises us to hear Jesus say such a harsh thing to the poor, desperate woman.
That’s because haven’t used our imaginations properly.
We need to imagine that we are there.
We need to see the look of Jesus’ face.
We need to hear the tone of his voice.
There was a tenderness in his voice, and maybe a bit of a smile on his face.
Jesus was teasing her to see how she would take these words.
Jesus was inviting her to argue her case with him.
D. She could have retorted:
“That’s not fair!” Or, “I’m just as good as they are!” Or, “Would it really be such a big problem for you to help me?”
No, she used her wits. When Jesus seemed to reach out his hand to push her away, she took hold of it to draw him close.
She picked up on the word “dog”: “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table” (v27).
She was content to be a “dog” if she could be a dog at Jesus’ table.
III. Jesus was very pleased with her answer.
A. Her humility, her wisdom, and her faith overcame any reluctance Jesus may have had in the beginning.
Humility, wisdom, and faith delight the heart of Jesus.
He said to her, “O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.” And her daughter was healed instantly” (v28).
Peter and Andrew and James and John had left all to follow Jesus.
But Jesus never said to them: “Great is your faith!”
The only other person of whom it is recorded in the gospels to receive this compliment was the heathen centurion who came asking Jesus to heal his sick son.
In these two stories we have a preview of the gospel mission that would begin at Pentecost and spread out to all the world.
B. This woman’s experience with Jesus was much richer because Jesus forced her persevere, and so to express her great faith.
I know a woman who, after she had taken care of her aging mother for many years, said, “Well, now God owes me one.”
The woman in our story knew that God didn’t owe her anything.
When God helps us—when God saves us—when God hears our prayers—it is pure grace.
We have no claim on him. He doesn’t owe us anything.
APPLICATION
Have you ever been ignored? It hurts, doesn’t it?
It’s even worse when God seems to ignore us.
I have known people who became so discouraged by unanswered prayer that they gave up on God.
They couldn’t bear the silence of God.
This story can be a parable to us of what to do when we feel ignored by God.
This woman could have gone home after she was rebuffed and said, “I tried. I went to him and begged him. And he refused me. I did what I could and it didn’t work.”
The Canaanite woman teaches us that it is earnest prayer, not casual prayer, that moves the heart of God.
Do you remember the story of Jacob—how he wrestled with the angel?
They wrestled all night, and the angel was winning.
But Jacob held on to the angel and said, “I will not let you go, unless you bless me” (Genesis 32:26).
And he won the blessing.
This woman was like Jacob. She held on and she won the blessing.
CONCLUSION
The preacher and theologian Fred Craddock tells of a time when he went to a hospital to visit a friend.
He was walking down the hall when he came upon a woman with her head against a door; she was banging on the door with both fists.
“Let me in! Let me in!” she shouted.
When Craddock got to the door, he saw that it was the chapel.
He said, “Here, let me help you.” And he tried the door, but it was locked.
He finally found someone with a key and they went in.
She had evidently come to the hospital without any planning. Her clothes were not nice. Her hair hadn’t been combed. She was wearing flip-flops.
The woman had the look of desperation. She had the voice of desperation.
“I know he’s going to die, I know he’s going to die, I know he’s going to die,” she screamed.
“Who?” Craddock asked.
“My husband.”
“What’s the matter?”
“He’s had a heart attack.”
Craddock told her that he was a minister and asked, “Can I pray with you?”
And she said, “Yes, please.”
And Craddock began to pray. But the woman interrupted him.
She started praying herself. She just took over.
She said, “Lord, this is not the time to take my husband. You know that better than I do. He’s not ready. Never prays. Never goes to church. He’s not ready. And what about me? I don’t have any skills. I can’t find work. I dropped out of school to marry him.”
She was really talking to God.
“And what about the kids?” she said. “They don’t mind me now with him around. If he’s gone, they’ll be wild as bucks. What about the kids? This is not the time to take my husband.”
The next day Craddock went back to the hospital.
He saw the same woman. She had a nice dress on. She had combed her hair. She was wearing shoes. She looked fine.
Before he could ask, she said, “He’s better.” She smiled and said, “I’m sorry about that crazy woman yesterday.”
Craddock said, “You weren’t crazy.”
She said, “I guess the Lord heard one of us.”
Craddock said, “He heard you.”
Craddock comments: “She was desperate. She had God by the lapels, both hands, and was screaming in God’s face: ‘I don’t think you’re listening!’ That’s desperation.”
God likes it when we pray like we really mean business.
Finding Jesus (or Letting Jesus Find Us): Matthew 13:44: Buried Treasure
What could be more exciting than finding buried treasure? Jesus told a story about that.
MATTHEW 13:44: BURIED TREASURE
INTRODUCTION
I remember how, as a child, I enjoyed stories of buried treasure.
Do you remember how in Tom Sawyer, Tom and Huck discover Injun Joe’s iron box full of gold coins in the cave?
And I remember a story by Howard Pyle—I think it was “Tom Crist and the Treasure Chest”—in that story a boy solves a mystery and finds Captain Kidd’s buried treasure.
Probably when you were in junior high school you read Edgar Allen Poe’s story “The Gold Bug.” It was in a literature textbook called Prose and Poetry. Do you remember that they solved a coded message and then climbed up into a tree and dropped a little beetle made of gold through the eye-socket of a skull fastened up there. They dug in the spot where the bug struck the ground, and there they found the treasure.
Jesus told us a story about buried treasure to teach us a lesson about what is important in life. The story is told in just one verse.
Text: Matthew 13:44:
“The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up; then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.”
Did you know that in Iowa we have a law that if you find a treasure—even if it’s on someone else’s land—and if the one who buried it has died and no heirs can be found, you can keep the treasure?
Different states and different countries and different times have different laws. Evidently in Jesus’ country, the man had to own the land to keep the treasure. But that was no problem: the treasure was so valuable.
I. The surprise
A. Sometimes God seems to be hidden.
Sometimes he surprises people who aren’t looking for him but who stumble onto him.
Even some of us who were seeking God were surprised when we found him.
He wasn’t like what we expected. It was like coming upon a treasure in a field.
B. I can imagine what when the man’s plow (or shovel) hit the box of treasure, he was irritated. “Oh, those confounded rocks!” he probably said.
Just so, sometimes we find God when our life hits a snag.
A disappointment, a sickness, a busted romance, the death of a loved one…makes us turn to God, and we find out that he was there all the time—waiting for us to find him.
II. The “field” Jesus is telling about is the drab little corner of the world where we spend our life.
And in that unimportant farm or little town—in a Sunday school class, or youth group, or among family who love us, or maybe at an evangelistic meeting—we found the treasure, the Savior who was waiting for us to discover him.
I have found God hidden in a book…in the kind, generous action of a friend (or stranger)…in a moving sermon…in conversation with a friend...or maybe in the quiet of prayer or Bible reading.
I met a lady once who found God in a hymn. This lady came from Scotland. She told me that when she was a young woman working in a factory in Scotland, a Christian lady came to sing for the workers. And she sang this song:
“When my life work is ended and I cross the swelling tide,
When the bright and glorious morning I shall see,
I shall know my Redeemer when I reach the other side
And His smile will be the first to welcome me.
I shall know Him, I shall know Him,
And redeemed by His side I shall stand,
I shall know Him, I shall know Him
By the print of the nails in his hand.”
And through that song my friend found the treasure that was Jesus.
III. The man had to sell everything he had to possess the treasure.
A. God always costs something. Salvation is free; Jesus paid the price when he died for us
But to take hold of Christ we have to let go of the things that have taken his place in our lives.
Someone said, “God wants to give us something; but our hands are too full.” And that applies to salvation and all the blessings of salvation that God has for us.
B. The things the world thinks are so important—riches, reputation, pleasure, power—are only for this world. These are things that won’t last.
There has never been a man or woman who decided to follow Christ who didn’t have to give up something.
Paul said that he had once had everything he thought was important—learning, reputation, position—but when he found Jesus he was happy to count all those things as refuse so that he could gain Christ.
C. I wonder what this farm worker had to sell in order to buy the field. Maybe he owned a bit of land with a little house on it. Maybe had a few animals…and farm implements…and household goods.
But he sold everything that was dearest to him.
But that was no problem to him. Jesus says, “In his joy he goes and sells all that he has…”
IV. But the emphasis of the parable isn’t on what we give up but what we receive when we find God because the treasure of the Kingdom of Heaven is incomparably more valuable than anything it costs us.
Here is what the treasure is…
Peace that passes understanding…
Joy that the world can’t give and the world can’t take away…
Companionship of the Savior every step of the way…
“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me…”
Assurance that all things work together for good for those who love God.
Everlasting life, the promise of resurrection and life with God and his people in a far Better Country.
But especially, the treasure is Jesus himself, because when we have him we have all the rest.
CONCLUSION
Jesus is the treasure, and we have to have all of him…You can’t have just a part of Jesus.
Some people want just enough of what they call religion to get into heaven by the skin of their teeth.
But Jesus says, “That won’t ever do.”
The Bible says, “If anyone is in Christ he is a new creation. Old things have passed away. Everything has become new.”
My purpose today is to remind you of our treasure in Jesus.
The more we think about what we have in Jesus, the more real that he becomes to us.
And the more real Jesus is the more exciting life is.
MATTHEW 13:44: BURIED TREASURE
INTRODUCTION
I remember how, as a child, I enjoyed stories of buried treasure.
Do you remember how in Tom Sawyer, Tom and Huck discover Injun Joe’s iron box full of gold coins in the cave?
And I remember a story by Howard Pyle—I think it was “Tom Crist and the Treasure Chest”—in that story a boy solves a mystery and finds Captain Kidd’s buried treasure.
Probably when you were in junior high school you read Edgar Allen Poe’s story “The Gold Bug.” It was in a literature textbook called Prose and Poetry. Do you remember that they solved a coded message and then climbed up into a tree and dropped a little beetle made of gold through the eye-socket of a skull fastened up there. They dug in the spot where the bug struck the ground, and there they found the treasure.
Jesus told us a story about buried treasure to teach us a lesson about what is important in life. The story is told in just one verse.
Text: Matthew 13:44:
“The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up; then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.”
Did you know that in Iowa we have a law that if you find a treasure—even if it’s on someone else’s land—and if the one who buried it has died and no heirs can be found, you can keep the treasure?
Different states and different countries and different times have different laws. Evidently in Jesus’ country, the man had to own the land to keep the treasure. But that was no problem: the treasure was so valuable.
I. The surprise
A. Sometimes God seems to be hidden.
Sometimes he surprises people who aren’t looking for him but who stumble onto him.
Even some of us who were seeking God were surprised when we found him.
He wasn’t like what we expected. It was like coming upon a treasure in a field.
B. I can imagine what when the man’s plow (or shovel) hit the box of treasure, he was irritated. “Oh, those confounded rocks!” he probably said.
Just so, sometimes we find God when our life hits a snag.
A disappointment, a sickness, a busted romance, the death of a loved one…makes us turn to God, and we find out that he was there all the time—waiting for us to find him.
II. The “field” Jesus is telling about is the drab little corner of the world where we spend our life.
And in that unimportant farm or little town—in a Sunday school class, or youth group, or among family who love us, or maybe at an evangelistic meeting—we found the treasure, the Savior who was waiting for us to discover him.
I have found God hidden in a book…in the kind, generous action of a friend (or stranger)…in a moving sermon…in conversation with a friend...or maybe in the quiet of prayer or Bible reading.
I met a lady once who found God in a hymn. This lady came from Scotland. She told me that when she was a young woman working in a factory in Scotland, a Christian lady came to sing for the workers. And she sang this song:
“When my life work is ended and I cross the swelling tide,
When the bright and glorious morning I shall see,
I shall know my Redeemer when I reach the other side
And His smile will be the first to welcome me.
I shall know Him, I shall know Him,
And redeemed by His side I shall stand,
I shall know Him, I shall know Him
By the print of the nails in his hand.”
And through that song my friend found the treasure that was Jesus.
III. The man had to sell everything he had to possess the treasure.
A. God always costs something. Salvation is free; Jesus paid the price when he died for us
But to take hold of Christ we have to let go of the things that have taken his place in our lives.
Someone said, “God wants to give us something; but our hands are too full.” And that applies to salvation and all the blessings of salvation that God has for us.
B. The things the world thinks are so important—riches, reputation, pleasure, power—are only for this world. These are things that won’t last.
There has never been a man or woman who decided to follow Christ who didn’t have to give up something.
Paul said that he had once had everything he thought was important—learning, reputation, position—but when he found Jesus he was happy to count all those things as refuse so that he could gain Christ.
C. I wonder what this farm worker had to sell in order to buy the field. Maybe he owned a bit of land with a little house on it. Maybe had a few animals…and farm implements…and household goods.
But he sold everything that was dearest to him.
But that was no problem to him. Jesus says, “In his joy he goes and sells all that he has…”
IV. But the emphasis of the parable isn’t on what we give up but what we receive when we find God because the treasure of the Kingdom of Heaven is incomparably more valuable than anything it costs us.
Here is what the treasure is…
Peace that passes understanding…
Joy that the world can’t give and the world can’t take away…
Companionship of the Savior every step of the way…
“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me…”
Assurance that all things work together for good for those who love God.
Everlasting life, the promise of resurrection and life with God and his people in a far Better Country.
But especially, the treasure is Jesus himself, because when we have him we have all the rest.
CONCLUSION
Jesus is the treasure, and we have to have all of him…You can’t have just a part of Jesus.
Some people want just enough of what they call religion to get into heaven by the skin of their teeth.
But Jesus says, “That won’t ever do.”
The Bible says, “If anyone is in Christ he is a new creation. Old things have passed away. Everything has become new.”
My purpose today is to remind you of our treasure in Jesus.
The more we think about what we have in Jesus, the more real that he becomes to us.
And the more real Jesus is the more exciting life is.
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
A Life Well Spent: Genesis 12:1-4, etc.: What Will Be Your Legacy?
What difference will it make a hundred years from now that you ever lived? Maybe more than you can imagine.
GENESIS 12:1-4, PSALM 90:17, REVELATION 14:13: WHAT WILL BE YOUR LEGACY?
INTRODUCTION
A little girl in a church junior choir was chosen to lead a procession for a Christmas candlelight service.
She felt it to be an awesome responsibility to carry her candle and lead that long procession down the aisle of he church.
After the service she said to her mother, “I looked back and saw all those people coming behind me, and I was scared!”
Do you ever think of all the people who follow behind you—and will follow behind you to the end of time?
Some are members of our family; some are not yet born.
Yet how we have lived influences the lives and decisions of all who follow us.
It is a great responsibility to be leading such a procession.
Long before the people of God understood the truth of the resurrection to eternal life, they had a firm conviction that their legacy lived on in the lives of people who came after them.
We see this in God’s promise to Abraham in Genesis 12:1-4:
Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. …and by you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
We see this hope also at the end of Psalm 90:17:
"Let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us,
and establish thou the work of our hands upon us,
yea, the work of our hands establish thou it."
The psalmist hopes, as we all do, that the good he did has some kind of permanence. He hopes that his work will live after him.
In the New Testament, in the light of the truth of the Resurrection, we read this:
Revelation 14:13:
And I heard a voice from heaven saying,
“Write this: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord henceforth.”
“Blessed indeed,” says the Spirit, “that they may rest from their labors, for their deeds follow them.”
Did you ever think about your deeds following you?
Did you ever think that part of you will live on here on earth in the lives of those you have loved?--and maybe even in the lives of strangers?
I. Sometimes we are not even aware of something we do that others remember as an important milestone in their life.
A. Can you remember how a seemingly chance remark by someone you respected helped you make a decision that has made a big difference in your life?
Or maybe it was a kind action—or a good example that encouraged you or inspired you…
B. It is said that James Boswell, the famous writer often in conversation referred to a special day in his childhood when his father took him fishing. That day stood out in his memory and he often thought about the things his father had taught him in the course of heir fishing together.
It occurred to someone to check the journal that Boswell’s father had kept to see what the father had said about that fishing trip from his perspective.
Here is what he found when he turned to that date: “Gone fishing today with my son. A day wasted.”
II. Christian believers are constantly aware that this life is not all there is, and we seek intentionally to pass on to others something that has enriched our lives.
A. The story is told that the great theologian Karl Barth was once asked by a colleague how he, with all his immense learning, could possibly believe the assertions of the Christian creed, he gave this reply: “Because my mother told me.”
This doesn’t mean that in the course of time Dr. Barth didn’t find out that some things his mother told him turned out not to be true—or that he found no evidence to support his faith beyond that his mother told him. But he surely meant that his mother planted the seed and that there was no other factor in his coming to faith more important than his mother’s influence.
By her faithful teaching Karl Barth’s mother passed her legacy on to her son.
B. The preacher and theologian Fred Craddock tells this story:
A young woman said to me, that during her freshman year at college she was failing in her classes, she wasn’t having any dates, and didn’t have as much money as the other students.
“One Sunday afternoon,” she said, “I was feeling so lonely and depressed that I went to the river near the campus. I climbed upon the rail and was looking into the dark water below…
“Then, for some reason or another I thought of the line, ‘Cast all your cares upon him, for he cares for you.’”
She said, “I stepped back, and her I am.”
Craddock asked, “Where did you learn that line?”
She said, “I don’t know.”
Craddock said, “Do you go to church?”
“No…well, when I visited my grandmother in the summers we went to Sunday school and church.”
Craddock said, “Ah…”
C. D. L. Moody was the most successful evangelist of our grandparents’ time.
When Moody was still a small child his father died and his mother and ten children were left destitute.
When he was 10 his brother found him a job in a neighboring town where he would work through the winter months. The child’s heart broke as he left his family to live so far away.
At last he and his brother arrived at the town where he was to work. His brother saw his tears and pointed to a feeble, old, white-haired man and said, “There’s a man that’ll give you a cent; he gives one to every new boy that comes to town.”
Moody says that he planted himself directly in the old man’s path. As the man came up to them, his brother spoke to him, and he stopped and looked at the child. He said, “Why, I have never seen you before. You must be a new boy” He asked him about his home, and then, laying his trembling hand upon the child’s head, he told him that though he had no earthly father, his Heavenly Father loved him, and he gave the little boy a bight new cent.
Near the end of his life Moody said, “I do not remember what became of that cent, but that old man’s blessing has followed me for over fifty years, and to my dying day I shall feel the kindly pressure of that hand upon my head. A loving deed costs very little, but done in the name of Christ it will be eternal.”
CONCLUSION
Perhaps when you were a sophomore in high school you read Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar as I did.
Our teacher gave us our choice to memorize either Brutus’ speech at Caesar’s funeral or Mark Antony’s.
I learned Mark Antony’s speech—you know—the one that begins:
“Friends, Romans, countrymen,
lend me your ears.
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
the good is oft interred with their bones.”
Antony is right that the evil people do lives after them.
But he is wrong that “the good is oft interred with their bones.”
The good that we do also lives on.
A famous saint named Bernard said this:
“Our deeds do not pass away as they seem to. On the contrary, every deed done in this life is the seed of a harvest to be reaped in eternity.”
My purpose in speaking to you in this way is to remind you that you also leave a legacy to those who come after.
You who have lived for God leave a legacy of good that enriches the lives of those who come after—family, friends, strangers—and will go on enriching lives until the end of time—and for eternity.
GENESIS 12:1-4, PSALM 90:17, REVELATION 14:13: WHAT WILL BE YOUR LEGACY?
INTRODUCTION
A little girl in a church junior choir was chosen to lead a procession for a Christmas candlelight service.
She felt it to be an awesome responsibility to carry her candle and lead that long procession down the aisle of he church.
After the service she said to her mother, “I looked back and saw all those people coming behind me, and I was scared!”
Do you ever think of all the people who follow behind you—and will follow behind you to the end of time?
Some are members of our family; some are not yet born.
Yet how we have lived influences the lives and decisions of all who follow us.
It is a great responsibility to be leading such a procession.
Long before the people of God understood the truth of the resurrection to eternal life, they had a firm conviction that their legacy lived on in the lives of people who came after them.
We see this in God’s promise to Abraham in Genesis 12:1-4:
Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. …and by you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
We see this hope also at the end of Psalm 90:17:
"Let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us,
and establish thou the work of our hands upon us,
yea, the work of our hands establish thou it."
The psalmist hopes, as we all do, that the good he did has some kind of permanence. He hopes that his work will live after him.
In the New Testament, in the light of the truth of the Resurrection, we read this:
Revelation 14:13:
And I heard a voice from heaven saying,
“Write this: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord henceforth.”
“Blessed indeed,” says the Spirit, “that they may rest from their labors, for their deeds follow them.”
Did you ever think about your deeds following you?
Did you ever think that part of you will live on here on earth in the lives of those you have loved?--and maybe even in the lives of strangers?
I. Sometimes we are not even aware of something we do that others remember as an important milestone in their life.
A. Can you remember how a seemingly chance remark by someone you respected helped you make a decision that has made a big difference in your life?
Or maybe it was a kind action—or a good example that encouraged you or inspired you…
B. It is said that James Boswell, the famous writer often in conversation referred to a special day in his childhood when his father took him fishing. That day stood out in his memory and he often thought about the things his father had taught him in the course of heir fishing together.
It occurred to someone to check the journal that Boswell’s father had kept to see what the father had said about that fishing trip from his perspective.
Here is what he found when he turned to that date: “Gone fishing today with my son. A day wasted.”
II. Christian believers are constantly aware that this life is not all there is, and we seek intentionally to pass on to others something that has enriched our lives.
A. The story is told that the great theologian Karl Barth was once asked by a colleague how he, with all his immense learning, could possibly believe the assertions of the Christian creed, he gave this reply: “Because my mother told me.”
This doesn’t mean that in the course of time Dr. Barth didn’t find out that some things his mother told him turned out not to be true—or that he found no evidence to support his faith beyond that his mother told him. But he surely meant that his mother planted the seed and that there was no other factor in his coming to faith more important than his mother’s influence.
By her faithful teaching Karl Barth’s mother passed her legacy on to her son.
B. The preacher and theologian Fred Craddock tells this story:
A young woman said to me, that during her freshman year at college she was failing in her classes, she wasn’t having any dates, and didn’t have as much money as the other students.
“One Sunday afternoon,” she said, “I was feeling so lonely and depressed that I went to the river near the campus. I climbed upon the rail and was looking into the dark water below…
“Then, for some reason or another I thought of the line, ‘Cast all your cares upon him, for he cares for you.’”
She said, “I stepped back, and her I am.”
Craddock asked, “Where did you learn that line?”
She said, “I don’t know.”
Craddock said, “Do you go to church?”
“No…well, when I visited my grandmother in the summers we went to Sunday school and church.”
Craddock said, “Ah…”
C. D. L. Moody was the most successful evangelist of our grandparents’ time.
When Moody was still a small child his father died and his mother and ten children were left destitute.
When he was 10 his brother found him a job in a neighboring town where he would work through the winter months. The child’s heart broke as he left his family to live so far away.
At last he and his brother arrived at the town where he was to work. His brother saw his tears and pointed to a feeble, old, white-haired man and said, “There’s a man that’ll give you a cent; he gives one to every new boy that comes to town.”
Moody says that he planted himself directly in the old man’s path. As the man came up to them, his brother spoke to him, and he stopped and looked at the child. He said, “Why, I have never seen you before. You must be a new boy” He asked him about his home, and then, laying his trembling hand upon the child’s head, he told him that though he had no earthly father, his Heavenly Father loved him, and he gave the little boy a bight new cent.
Near the end of his life Moody said, “I do not remember what became of that cent, but that old man’s blessing has followed me for over fifty years, and to my dying day I shall feel the kindly pressure of that hand upon my head. A loving deed costs very little, but done in the name of Christ it will be eternal.”
CONCLUSION
Perhaps when you were a sophomore in high school you read Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar as I did.
Our teacher gave us our choice to memorize either Brutus’ speech at Caesar’s funeral or Mark Antony’s.
I learned Mark Antony’s speech—you know—the one that begins:
“Friends, Romans, countrymen,
lend me your ears.
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
the good is oft interred with their bones.”
Antony is right that the evil people do lives after them.
But he is wrong that “the good is oft interred with their bones.”
The good that we do also lives on.
A famous saint named Bernard said this:
“Our deeds do not pass away as they seem to. On the contrary, every deed done in this life is the seed of a harvest to be reaped in eternity.”
My purpose in speaking to you in this way is to remind you that you also leave a legacy to those who come after.
You who have lived for God leave a legacy of good that enriches the lives of those who come after—family, friends, strangers—and will go on enriching lives until the end of time—and for eternity.
Friday, July 2, 2010
Strength for the Journey: 1 Corinthians 15:58, etc.: True Happiness
Everyone wants to be happy, but most people are looking for it in all the wrong places. Here are the three things you need in order to be happy.
1 CORINTHIANS 15:58, 1 JOHN 4:7-12, & JOHN 14:3: TRUE HAPPINESS
INTRODUCTION
When I taught seventh grade I used to ask my students to write for me an essay: “My Goal in Life.”
As their compositions showed, my students weren’t very ambitious to make a great mark in the world—to find the cure for cancer or to explore the Amazon or to write great books or symphonies.
Most of the children wrote that all they really hoped for in life was to “be happy.”
They weren’t especially interested in fame or fortune or accomplishing great things. They just wanted “happiness.”
They didn’t realize—what all of us older people know—that happiness isn’t something you can find by seeking it.
You’ve probably heard the saying:
“Happiness is like a butterfly; the more you chase it the more it will elude you. But if you turn your attention to other things, it comes and softly sits on your shoulder.”
Not so many mornings ago I woke up—as I often do—long before time to get up and was thinking about life. I was considering what I had done with my life up to now and that soon my life on earth would be ending, and what would I have to show for it?
I was thinking about the pains and limitations of old age, and I was becoming sort of melancholy as I thought about how little time I have left.
I wondered: what do I really need to be happy?
Then something came to me that I had read many years ago. It was this saying,
”Happiness consists of three things:
something to do,
someone to love,
and something to look forward to.”
I thought about the wisdom of that saying, and it occurred to me that with Christ in my life I have all these things.
I. The first thing we need to be happy: Something to do: 1 Corinthians 15:58:
“Therefore my beloved brothers and sisters, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.”
A. Many of you have been active in times past, serving God and serving other people. You have cared for your families, visited sick neighbors, taught SS, sung in choirs, given to those in need, served your churches and neighborhoods in 100 different ways.
B. But now it is different. The old opportunities are gone and maybe you have become discouraged because now you are no longer serving others but others are serving you. But now I want to remind you that there are still things to do for others and for God.
We can all pray—for our families, our friends, our enemies, the people of the world. When we watch our TVs and see the troubles of the world, we can pray for these people. We can pray for our churches, for our children and grandchildren and relatives out in the world that need help from our God. Someday we may learn that the greatest good we did in the world was by our prayers.
We can encourage others. Think of how often your day has been brightened by a friendly smile or a word of encouragement. You can be that person who encourages others by an expression of gratitude, a compliment, a listening ear.
We can still give. Maybe we can’t give as we used to, but we can still give something back to God. We can still give gifts to other people.
I had an aunt who lived to be 101. She lived in a nursing home for several years. She ordered several copies of a monthly devotional booklet. When the nurse aides came into her room, she gave each aide of her booklets.
They came to expect them and ask for them.
And most important—we can bear witness that God is real.
I think of a last visit to a friend as she lay in bed at the end of life.
She was not old but she had a disease that she knew couldn’t be cured.
She was not grieving. She was planning her funeral.
She wanted her service to be a witness to her faith in God.
At one point she began to laugh. She said, “I seem to always want to be in control. Here I am planning my own funeral!”
Even in her weakness she was keeping her faith alive.
That strengthened my faith. I thought: “If she is able to say that God is real, then he must be real!
II. The second thing we need to be happy: Someone to love. I John 4:7-12:
“Dear friends, let us love one another;
for love is of God,
and he who loves is born of God and knows God.
He who does not love does not know God;
for God is love.
In this the love of God was made manifest among us,
that God sent his only Son into the world,
so that we might live through him.”
A. The great incentive to love is God’s love for us: John 3:16. Let’s repeat it together.
And if we truly love God his love will fill our lives and we will love others because they are dear to him.
B. Yesterday we had been married 50 years. Our children asked our friends and relatives to send us cards. We have been getting these expressions of love from people we love and it has been very humbling. We have a lot of people to love and so do you.
C. But let me remind you that love in the Bible isn’t just a feeling.
Love in the Bible is mostly a way of behaving—love is respect, kindness, courtesy, service, sacrifice, giving of what is dear to ourselves to others.
Love is for those who love us, and love is even for our enemies—Jesus said so. So when you pray for those who love you, also pray for your enemies.
That is what Jesus said. There is always someone to love. And there is always some way to show that love.
III. The third thing we need to be happy: Something to look forward to: John 14:3:
“Let not your hearts be troubled;
believe in God, believe also in me.
In my Father’s house are many rooms;
if it were not so,
would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?
And when I go and prepare a place for you.
I will come again and will take you to myself,
that where I am you may be also.
A. Sometimes you hear the saying: “The best is yet to be.” That’s especially true for Christians. Psalm 16 tells us that “in God’s presence is fullness of joy, and at his right hand are pleasures for evermore.”
B. Some of us have walked with God so long that we’ve forgotten how terrible it would be to grow old without God. Think of what it would be like to have nothing to look forward to but ever-increasing weakness, pain, and forgetfulness.
C. Sometimes as I lie in bed and can’t sleep I think about what it will be like in glory—in the Paradise of God, the Father’s House, New Jerusalem.
No more tears, no more crying or pain or sickness or death.
We will sing and dance and sit down together to feast with the Lord.
Every pleasure we enjoy on earth will be translated to perfection in glory.
We will be re-united with loved ones and make countless new friends. We will share stories together.
We will have work and leisure and never grow weary or be bored.
It will be better than we can imagine now.
And, best of all, we will see Jesus face to face. We will walk and talk with him.
CONCLUSION:
People think they need many things to be happy. But we know that we need only three things, and they are things that we can all have if we are friends of the Lord Jesus:
Something to do, someone to love, and something to look forward to.
We are so blessed, we who are God’s children. Let us give thanks.
1 CORINTHIANS 15:58, 1 JOHN 4:7-12, & JOHN 14:3: TRUE HAPPINESS
INTRODUCTION
When I taught seventh grade I used to ask my students to write for me an essay: “My Goal in Life.”
As their compositions showed, my students weren’t very ambitious to make a great mark in the world—to find the cure for cancer or to explore the Amazon or to write great books or symphonies.
Most of the children wrote that all they really hoped for in life was to “be happy.”
They weren’t especially interested in fame or fortune or accomplishing great things. They just wanted “happiness.”
They didn’t realize—what all of us older people know—that happiness isn’t something you can find by seeking it.
You’ve probably heard the saying:
“Happiness is like a butterfly; the more you chase it the more it will elude you. But if you turn your attention to other things, it comes and softly sits on your shoulder.”
Not so many mornings ago I woke up—as I often do—long before time to get up and was thinking about life. I was considering what I had done with my life up to now and that soon my life on earth would be ending, and what would I have to show for it?
I was thinking about the pains and limitations of old age, and I was becoming sort of melancholy as I thought about how little time I have left.
I wondered: what do I really need to be happy?
Then something came to me that I had read many years ago. It was this saying,
”Happiness consists of three things:
something to do,
someone to love,
and something to look forward to.”
I thought about the wisdom of that saying, and it occurred to me that with Christ in my life I have all these things.
I. The first thing we need to be happy: Something to do: 1 Corinthians 15:58:
“Therefore my beloved brothers and sisters, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.”
A. Many of you have been active in times past, serving God and serving other people. You have cared for your families, visited sick neighbors, taught SS, sung in choirs, given to those in need, served your churches and neighborhoods in 100 different ways.
B. But now it is different. The old opportunities are gone and maybe you have become discouraged because now you are no longer serving others but others are serving you. But now I want to remind you that there are still things to do for others and for God.
We can all pray—for our families, our friends, our enemies, the people of the world. When we watch our TVs and see the troubles of the world, we can pray for these people. We can pray for our churches, for our children and grandchildren and relatives out in the world that need help from our God. Someday we may learn that the greatest good we did in the world was by our prayers.
We can encourage others. Think of how often your day has been brightened by a friendly smile or a word of encouragement. You can be that person who encourages others by an expression of gratitude, a compliment, a listening ear.
We can still give. Maybe we can’t give as we used to, but we can still give something back to God. We can still give gifts to other people.
I had an aunt who lived to be 101. She lived in a nursing home for several years. She ordered several copies of a monthly devotional booklet. When the nurse aides came into her room, she gave each aide of her booklets.
They came to expect them and ask for them.
And most important—we can bear witness that God is real.
I think of a last visit to a friend as she lay in bed at the end of life.
She was not old but she had a disease that she knew couldn’t be cured.
She was not grieving. She was planning her funeral.
She wanted her service to be a witness to her faith in God.
At one point she began to laugh. She said, “I seem to always want to be in control. Here I am planning my own funeral!”
Even in her weakness she was keeping her faith alive.
That strengthened my faith. I thought: “If she is able to say that God is real, then he must be real!
II. The second thing we need to be happy: Someone to love. I John 4:7-12:
“Dear friends, let us love one another;
for love is of God,
and he who loves is born of God and knows God.
He who does not love does not know God;
for God is love.
In this the love of God was made manifest among us,
that God sent his only Son into the world,
so that we might live through him.”
A. The great incentive to love is God’s love for us: John 3:16. Let’s repeat it together.
And if we truly love God his love will fill our lives and we will love others because they are dear to him.
B. Yesterday we had been married 50 years. Our children asked our friends and relatives to send us cards. We have been getting these expressions of love from people we love and it has been very humbling. We have a lot of people to love and so do you.
C. But let me remind you that love in the Bible isn’t just a feeling.
Love in the Bible is mostly a way of behaving—love is respect, kindness, courtesy, service, sacrifice, giving of what is dear to ourselves to others.
Love is for those who love us, and love is even for our enemies—Jesus said so. So when you pray for those who love you, also pray for your enemies.
That is what Jesus said. There is always someone to love. And there is always some way to show that love.
III. The third thing we need to be happy: Something to look forward to: John 14:3:
“Let not your hearts be troubled;
believe in God, believe also in me.
In my Father’s house are many rooms;
if it were not so,
would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?
And when I go and prepare a place for you.
I will come again and will take you to myself,
that where I am you may be also.
A. Sometimes you hear the saying: “The best is yet to be.” That’s especially true for Christians. Psalm 16 tells us that “in God’s presence is fullness of joy, and at his right hand are pleasures for evermore.”
B. Some of us have walked with God so long that we’ve forgotten how terrible it would be to grow old without God. Think of what it would be like to have nothing to look forward to but ever-increasing weakness, pain, and forgetfulness.
C. Sometimes as I lie in bed and can’t sleep I think about what it will be like in glory—in the Paradise of God, the Father’s House, New Jerusalem.
No more tears, no more crying or pain or sickness or death.
We will sing and dance and sit down together to feast with the Lord.
Every pleasure we enjoy on earth will be translated to perfection in glory.
We will be re-united with loved ones and make countless new friends. We will share stories together.
We will have work and leisure and never grow weary or be bored.
It will be better than we can imagine now.
And, best of all, we will see Jesus face to face. We will walk and talk with him.
CONCLUSION:
People think they need many things to be happy. But we know that we need only three things, and they are things that we can all have if we are friends of the Lord Jesus:
Something to do, someone to love, and something to look forward to.
We are so blessed, we who are God’s children. Let us give thanks.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)