John 4:4-26
There’s a part of me that understands this woman at the well. At the beginning of my sophomore year of college I went through a difficult time. I was turning away from God and making some poor choices and the last thing I wanted was to be around the friends I had made through Inter-Varisty Christian Fellowship. I got up and walked out of a fellowship meeting one week, I stopped going to church and I avoided my friends as often as I could. While I was running in all kinds of directions, what I was really doing was hiding. I was hiding from my sin and from my self and the choices I was making. Some people hide from their sin and their failures by running, some hide in alcohol or drugs, some hide in reckless spending and shopping, some hide in destructive relationships, but the more we try to hide from our sin and from our self, the more we end up in deeper and darker places of despair and isolation.
That’s what we see going on with this woman at the well. She comes to draw water at the 6th hour, or at noon, because she didn’t want to be seen by the other women. Drawing water was a daily chore for women and they wouldn’t do it during the heat of the day - they would do it in the cool of the morning. Every morning women would travel to the well together, draw their water and then return to their homes together, but this Samaritan woman came at noon because she didn’t want to be seen by the others. Maybe she was tired of the stares and comments. She was hiding, hiding in her sin and hiding in her shame.
We come to find out during her encounter with Jesus that this woman has been married 5 times and the man she currently lives with is not her husband. She has made some poor choices in life and to avoid the stares and comments of the other women, she didn’t travel with them in the morning – she waited and then would come alone to get the water she needed at noon. Not only was she hiding from others, she was hiding from herself, after all if she didn’t have to face the other women she didn’t have to face the reality of her own situation. For me, as long as I kept running I not only didn’t have to face others, but on some level I didn’t have to face myself.
While our circumstances might be different, the reality is that we all spend a lot of time hiding, we hide who we really are from others, we hide from ourselves and yes, we even try to hide from God, and we hide because we don’t want to come to face to face with the reality of our sin, but living an authentic faith as a follower of Jesus Christ means we stop hiding from our sin and we confront it by coming face to face with Jesus. Look at what happens when the woman arrives at the well, notice who’s there – it’s Jesus, and while she could have laid low and kept on hiding, she didn’t. When Jesus asks her for a drink and engages her in conversation – she could have run away, but she didn’t. Authentic faith doesn’t hide and it doesn’t run from sin – it is willing to confront it and that’s what Jesus does. He helps this woman confront the reality of her sinful life. Jesus is the one who says to her, Go call your husband and come back. When the woman says I have no husband Jesus is able to help reveal to her the reality of her life – that’s right, he says, you have had 5 husbands and the man you are with now is not your husband. Jesus confronts her with the reality of who she is and he’s not there to judge and condemn her he’s there to simply help her own up to her sin - so that she can be forgiven and move beyond it.
An authentic faith is willing to confront the reality of who we are. As followers of Jesus we can’t ignore our sin and pretend like it doesn’t exist – we have to be willing to name it, confront it and confess it. It’s a painful process, but when we are alone sometime we need to sit down and honestly evaluate our life and we need to ask ourselves “how do I treat God and how I treat others?”. We need to think about our interactions with people, and the choices we make every day. And we need to ask ourselves, "How do we spend my time, my money, my energy?"
What are the things we pursue in life? Where do our hopes and dreams lie? Do our attitudes line up with the will of God? Do our actions reflect the life of Jesus? How do we answer these questions?
I don’t know about you, but there are many ways that my heart and my actions don’t line up with God’s will for my life. Just this week at the United Methodist Women meeting we saw pictures of children from Uganda who have nothing – literally they have nothing. We heard stories of how these children will wander with the cattle through the garbage dumps to see what they can find to eat or wear or use and I once again came face to face with Jesus who said to me, Andy, what you are doing with your resources? There are children who have nothing and you have so much – what are you doing?
It’s not an easy exercise but can we sit down and write out our sin, can we put it down on paper? Greed, lust, pride, self-centeredness. It’s not fun to name them, but can we be honest and own up to our sin? Gossip, anger, bitterness, jealousy. An authentic faith doesn’t hide from sin – it confronts it and names it and owns it and confesses it to God. Now once we are willing to do this - the door is opened for God to forgive. Once we confess our sin, we aren’t left holding on to it, because God pardons –God forgives. You’ll see as we keep going through this sermon series that I use “P” words: the first week was people, last week was profession and so when I wanted to talk about forgiveness I decided to use the word pardon, but one of the things I came to realize about the word pardon is that you only receive a pardon after you have been found guilty. A pardon comes only after the crime has been named, so for us to receive the pardon of God, or the forgiveness of God, we have to be willing to name our sin, but once we name it – God forgives it. Are we willing to receive God’s pardon today? Are we willing to accept and embrace God’s gift of forgiveness?
Look at John 4:10 – Jesus says, if you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water. Jesus goes on and says, 4:14 – whoever drinks the water I give will never thirst. Indeed the water I give will become a spring welling up to eternal life. This living water which is a gift from God – it’s called grace and forgiveness because it is God’s forgiveness that leads us to eternal life. It’s God’s grace that gushes forth within us to bring life, so will we accept it?
Accepting God’s grace begins with simple words, it begins in faith and trust saying, God I know I am a sinner, please forgive me. But then these words, this prayer and the desire to be forgiven, needs to bring freedom to our lives and many times that freedom doesn’t come until we are willing to forgive ourselves and allow God to take away our guilt and shame. If we don’t forgive ourselves, then like the Samaritan women we will continue to just hide. So how do we fully receive God’s grace and learn to forgive ourselves? How do we begin to experience the freedom that comes with God’s pardon?
The first thing we need to do is stop listening to Satan and start listening to God. You know the word Satan means accuser and I am convinced that Satan, as the accuser, is alive and well, and it’s his voice that constantly tells us that because of all we have done we can never be loved or forgiven by God. There are times that voice is so loud and clear that we can’t hear anything else. It’s time we stop listening to Satan and start listening to God.
Listening to God is the whole point of the 60/60 experiment. I’m excited that there are over 25 people who have told us that they are doing the 60/60 experiment and the whole point of the exercise is to help us hear more consistently the voice of God. If you haven’t been here the last few weeks the 60/60 experiment is our attempt to at least once every hour for 60 days intentionally think about God. I have set my watch alarm to go off once an hour, others have posted notes or are trying to think of God when the phone rings or when they get into their cars – whatever the prompt is, the point is to tune into the truth and the will of God. I might suggest that if you are doing the 60/60 experiment - that this week when you are prompted to think about God, instead of telling yourself that your life matters to God and God loves you – tell yourself that you are forgiven. When the alarm goes off name a sin you struggle with and then tell yourself – I am pardoned, I am forgiven.
Another way we can stop listening to Satan and start listening to God is to turn more consistently to the word of God. Daily Bible reading, weekly Bible studies and Sunday School helps us tune out the lies that surround us and help us refocus our hearts and minds on the truth of God’s grace. You can also get a prayer partner to help remind you that you are forgiven. I had a roommate for a while and we agreed to remind each other every day that we were forgiven by God – it was a powerful time where we each experienced more of the freedom and power that comes with God’s grace.
So an authentic faith confronts sin and it accepts the pardon God offers, but then it must – it absolutely must go one step farther. An authentic faith also pardons others. An authentic faith forgives others. This is what we say we will do each time we pray the Lord’s prayer: forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. or Forgive us our sin as we forgive those who sin against us. Jesus drives the same point home pretty clearly in his sermon on the mount.
Matthew 6:14-15: For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.
If we aren’t willing to forgive others then God will not forgive us. It doesn’t get any clearer than that. If we aren’t willing to forgive others then God will not forgive us. One of the forces which hold us back in our faith and one of the forces which I think holds back the church from being all God calls us to be is our inability to truly forgive others. We might say the words, I forgive you, but we don’t act on it in any significant way. We say the words but then we hold on to bitterness or continue to work against those we have issues with. Our inability to forgive one another blocks God’s grace from flowing freely into our lives and into our church and this keeps the power of God from being experienced and revealed in our world.
My guess is that most of us right now could think of someone that we are struggling to forgive. It might be a spouse; it might be a parent or child, a brother or sister, a coworker or even a friend who has betrayed us. What I want us to do is picture this person in our mind and ask God to show us how we can forgive them. What will it mean for us to offer forgiveness? What will we do this week to seek reconciliation? We can’t just talk about forgiving others – we need to get specific and then get serious about doing it.
Building an authentic faith doesn’t just accept God’s pardon for our sin – it offers a pardon to those who have sinned against us and when we allow God’s grace to flow freely through our lives not only will our relationships be strengthened, but we will be changed and our faith will grow strong.
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Building an Authentic Faith - Profession
Mark 8:27-38
One of the most important questions we must answer in our lives is the one asked by Jesus in this passage from Mark: Who do you say that I am? How we identify Jesus not only gives shape to what we believe, it needs to give direction to how we live. An authentic faith not only knows that God loves us but it understands what it means to profess Jesus as our Savior and Lord. But before we look to answer Jesus’ question, let’s first look at where and when and how he asks the question.
It says Jesus and disciples were travelling into the region of Caesarea Philippi. This was an area several miles north of the Sea of Galilee and it was ruled by Philip who was the brother of the Roman governor Herod. Since it was an area with very strong Greek and Roman influences it was not a place often visited by Jews, and this is the only account we have of Jesus ever travelling in this region. What is important for us to know about Caesarea Philippi is that this was an area linked to visions and epiphanies in Jewish tradition. During the time between the end of the Old Testament and birth of Jesus, what is know at the inter-testamental period, this area was where the Jewish leaders Enoch & Levi experienced visions, and so Caesarea Philippi became known to the Jewish people as a holy place. Even though by the time of Jesus it had come under Greek and Roman dominance, the Jewish people still thought of it as holy ground where people were more closely connected to God and where people received messages from God. I think Jesus wanted his disciples to be in this holy place when they first answer this question because he wanted them to be confident that what they were seeing in Jesus and what they were saying about him wasn’t just their own opinions, who they professed Jesus to be was truth coming from God.
It’s not an accident where Jesus asks this question, he specifically takes them there for this reason, and it’s not an accident when Jesus asks. Jesus asks the disciples to profess who he is only after they have taken part in some significant activities with Jesus. In Mark 6 we see that Jesus included his disciples in the miraculous feeding of the 5,000, and again the disciples were included when Jesus fed the 4,000 in Mark 8. What’s significant about these 2 feedings is that the disciples are not just passive observers to the miracle of Jesus, they become active participants. They aren’t just listening to Jesus teach or watching him heal and perform miracles, they are involved in the actual work he is doing. In the feeding stories Jesus instructs the disciples to tell the people to sit down in groups, and then Jesus has the disciples distribute the food, and it’s as they are giving out the food that it is multiplied. The disciples are working alongside Jesus in performing the miracle, they are part of it and so they get to experience for themselves Jesus’ power. It is this kind of experience that helps the disciples understand who Jesus is and it helps them profess with confidence that Jesus is the Christ.
Now let’s look at how Jesus asks the question. Notice that he starts by asking a rather general question, Who do people say that I am? What are other people saying about me? What Jesus does with this question is give the disciples an opportunity to just talk about who he is, after all Jesus already knows what the people are saying about him. He doesn’t ask this question because he needs to know the answer, Jesus knows the answer, he knows what people are saying, he asks the question to give his disciples an opportunity to talk and to begin to wrestle with their own questions, and you have to believe they had questions. They have seen Jesus feed the multitudes twice, walk on water, calm a storm, heal the sick, and he just restored sight to a blind man and as he does all these amazing things, you know they have to be asking themselves “who is he?” In fact, in Luke’s account of Jesus calming the storm the disciples do ask themselves, who is this that even the wind & the seas obey him? They have lots of questions and now they have been given the opportunity to talk about it all with Jesus.
So they tell Jesus that the people are saying he is John the Baptist or Elijah or one of the other great prophets. While it’s all an interesting conversation, Jesus ultimately isn’t interested in an interesting conversation about what others are saying, he does all of this to provide an opportunity for his disciples to profess their faith, so Jesus then turns the question back to his disciples and this time makes it personal. What about you? Who do you say I am?
And that’s the question we all have to ask ourselves. Who do we profess Jesus to be? While it is interesting to talk about Jesus and what he has done, and while it is fascinating to have theological debates about what we know of Jesus from the Bible and other historical materials, the real question we need to come to terms with is who do we say Jesus is? Forget about what someone else says, forget about what we read in commentaries or hear in Sunday School, what is it we profess? Who do we say Jesus is? The answer to this question makes all the difference.
While the Bible is full of titles given to Jesus, and we saw again this morning the great video about who Jesus is, what I want us to do is look at just 2 titles, for me the most important 2: Savior and Lord. In many ways these 2 titles help us define Peter’s profession of Jesus as the Christ because the Christ means the Anointed One. The Christ, or Messiah, was a leader who one who was coming from God to save the people of Israel & set them free from oppression. So in many ways the Christ was coming to be a Savior & Lord. What do we mean when we call Jesus our Savior and Lord?
Let’s start with Savior – Jesus is our Savior because he is the one who saves us from sin. Sin separates us from God. God has called us to live in relationship with Him and we fail in that relationship every day. Paul says in Romans that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and then he says, the wages of our sin, or the consequence of our sin, is death. The death we are talking about is not a physical death - it is a spiritual one, our sin cuts us off from the source of all life which is God and there is nothing we can do to restore that relationship on our own. Through Jesus, however, we can be brought back into a relationship with God. The message of the cross and then the empty tomb is that through Jesus we are forgiven and we are raised with Christ to a new & eternal life.
That’s the message of John 3:16 we heard last week, for God so loved the world that he gave his only son so that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life. God sent Jesus to die on the cross for our sin and when we believe in him, when we trust in the work of Jesus on the cross, we will not die in our sin but experience forgiveness and eternal life. When we accept the work of Jesus for ourselves, when we place our faith and trust in the cross – we are professing Jesus to be our savior. Making Jesus our Savior really is as simply as saying, God I trust in the work of Jesus on the cross to forgive me of my sin &I trust Jesus to restore me into a right relationship with you. If you have never asked God for this forgiveness – you can do it today and profess Jesus as your Savior.
Jesus has come to be our Savior, but he also comes to be our Lord & this is where what we profess needs to give shape to what we do and how we live - because we can’t call Jesus Lord and then keep on living our lives as we did before. Professing Jesus as Lord means being willing to allow Jesus to give direction to our lives. A lord is someone who has authority over other people and when a lord gives direction – people follow. So calling Jesus Lord means we need to give him authority in our lives to guide us & direct us & then be willing to follow wherever he leads, but let’s be honest, this is not easy. Look back at Peter. He called Jesus the Christ, but then he wasn’t willing to follow Jesus when he explained what it meant for him to be the Christ. For Jesus, being the Christ was going to mean suffering & death, to which Peter says, no way, this will never happen to you. Peter didn’t want to go where Jesus was going, he didn’t want to do what Jesus was going to have to do.
Notice that Jesus doesn’t just rebuke Peter, he shows him, and he shows all of us that if we are going to call Jesus our Lord then we must be willing to deny ourselves, take up our cross and follow him. Calling Jesus Lord means being willing to sacrifice what we may want in order to do what God wants, and this refocusing of our lives on the will and the way of God needs to penetrate every aspect of our life. From our relationships with family and friends, to our need to forgive, to the service we offer to those in need, to the use of our resources and money, our time and talents – everything we do needs to be shaped by what it means for us to call Jesus our Lord. Calling Jesus Lord means going where Jesus goes and doing what Jesus does.
If you still have doubts about who Jesus is, or if you are struggling to be able to call him Savior or Lord, then think about putting yourself into a position where you can make that call. Remember, the disciples weren’t able to profess Jesus as the Christ until after they had worked with Jesus. It was because they had spent time with Jesus and had even been part of his miracles and experienced his power that they were able to make the profession they did. If you are still struggling with what to call Jesus, don’t turn away from him, turn towards him & walk along side him and do the things that Jesus is doing. Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, nurture the children, care of the sick, join a Bible Study, commit yourself to the 60/60 experiment where you reorient yourself on the will and the way of God, like the disciples, step out in faith in some way and allow yourself to experience the power of God. Knowing Jesus as our Savior and Lord doesn’t come by being a passive observer and no amount of knowledge will give us the assurance we need. Authentic faith that proclaims with confidence that Jesus is Savior and Lord comes by being an active participant with Jesus.
Who do you say that I am? An authentic faith says Jesus is Savior not because we read it in a book or heard it in a sermon; we profess it because we have experienced the saving power of Jesus for ourselves – we know we are forgiven. An authentic faith professes Jesus is Lord and then works hard to go where Jesus goes and do what Jesus does – even when it means that we deny ourselves and take up a cross.
One of the most important questions we must answer in our lives is the one asked by Jesus in this passage from Mark: Who do you say that I am? How we identify Jesus not only gives shape to what we believe, it needs to give direction to how we live. An authentic faith not only knows that God loves us but it understands what it means to profess Jesus as our Savior and Lord. But before we look to answer Jesus’ question, let’s first look at where and when and how he asks the question.
It says Jesus and disciples were travelling into the region of Caesarea Philippi. This was an area several miles north of the Sea of Galilee and it was ruled by Philip who was the brother of the Roman governor Herod. Since it was an area with very strong Greek and Roman influences it was not a place often visited by Jews, and this is the only account we have of Jesus ever travelling in this region. What is important for us to know about Caesarea Philippi is that this was an area linked to visions and epiphanies in Jewish tradition. During the time between the end of the Old Testament and birth of Jesus, what is know at the inter-testamental period, this area was where the Jewish leaders Enoch & Levi experienced visions, and so Caesarea Philippi became known to the Jewish people as a holy place. Even though by the time of Jesus it had come under Greek and Roman dominance, the Jewish people still thought of it as holy ground where people were more closely connected to God and where people received messages from God. I think Jesus wanted his disciples to be in this holy place when they first answer this question because he wanted them to be confident that what they were seeing in Jesus and what they were saying about him wasn’t just their own opinions, who they professed Jesus to be was truth coming from God.
It’s not an accident where Jesus asks this question, he specifically takes them there for this reason, and it’s not an accident when Jesus asks. Jesus asks the disciples to profess who he is only after they have taken part in some significant activities with Jesus. In Mark 6 we see that Jesus included his disciples in the miraculous feeding of the 5,000, and again the disciples were included when Jesus fed the 4,000 in Mark 8. What’s significant about these 2 feedings is that the disciples are not just passive observers to the miracle of Jesus, they become active participants. They aren’t just listening to Jesus teach or watching him heal and perform miracles, they are involved in the actual work he is doing. In the feeding stories Jesus instructs the disciples to tell the people to sit down in groups, and then Jesus has the disciples distribute the food, and it’s as they are giving out the food that it is multiplied. The disciples are working alongside Jesus in performing the miracle, they are part of it and so they get to experience for themselves Jesus’ power. It is this kind of experience that helps the disciples understand who Jesus is and it helps them profess with confidence that Jesus is the Christ.
Now let’s look at how Jesus asks the question. Notice that he starts by asking a rather general question, Who do people say that I am? What are other people saying about me? What Jesus does with this question is give the disciples an opportunity to just talk about who he is, after all Jesus already knows what the people are saying about him. He doesn’t ask this question because he needs to know the answer, Jesus knows the answer, he knows what people are saying, he asks the question to give his disciples an opportunity to talk and to begin to wrestle with their own questions, and you have to believe they had questions. They have seen Jesus feed the multitudes twice, walk on water, calm a storm, heal the sick, and he just restored sight to a blind man and as he does all these amazing things, you know they have to be asking themselves “who is he?” In fact, in Luke’s account of Jesus calming the storm the disciples do ask themselves, who is this that even the wind & the seas obey him? They have lots of questions and now they have been given the opportunity to talk about it all with Jesus.
So they tell Jesus that the people are saying he is John the Baptist or Elijah or one of the other great prophets. While it’s all an interesting conversation, Jesus ultimately isn’t interested in an interesting conversation about what others are saying, he does all of this to provide an opportunity for his disciples to profess their faith, so Jesus then turns the question back to his disciples and this time makes it personal. What about you? Who do you say I am?
And that’s the question we all have to ask ourselves. Who do we profess Jesus to be? While it is interesting to talk about Jesus and what he has done, and while it is fascinating to have theological debates about what we know of Jesus from the Bible and other historical materials, the real question we need to come to terms with is who do we say Jesus is? Forget about what someone else says, forget about what we read in commentaries or hear in Sunday School, what is it we profess? Who do we say Jesus is? The answer to this question makes all the difference.
While the Bible is full of titles given to Jesus, and we saw again this morning the great video about who Jesus is, what I want us to do is look at just 2 titles, for me the most important 2: Savior and Lord. In many ways these 2 titles help us define Peter’s profession of Jesus as the Christ because the Christ means the Anointed One. The Christ, or Messiah, was a leader who one who was coming from God to save the people of Israel & set them free from oppression. So in many ways the Christ was coming to be a Savior & Lord. What do we mean when we call Jesus our Savior and Lord?
Let’s start with Savior – Jesus is our Savior because he is the one who saves us from sin. Sin separates us from God. God has called us to live in relationship with Him and we fail in that relationship every day. Paul says in Romans that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and then he says, the wages of our sin, or the consequence of our sin, is death. The death we are talking about is not a physical death - it is a spiritual one, our sin cuts us off from the source of all life which is God and there is nothing we can do to restore that relationship on our own. Through Jesus, however, we can be brought back into a relationship with God. The message of the cross and then the empty tomb is that through Jesus we are forgiven and we are raised with Christ to a new & eternal life.
That’s the message of John 3:16 we heard last week, for God so loved the world that he gave his only son so that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life. God sent Jesus to die on the cross for our sin and when we believe in him, when we trust in the work of Jesus on the cross, we will not die in our sin but experience forgiveness and eternal life. When we accept the work of Jesus for ourselves, when we place our faith and trust in the cross – we are professing Jesus to be our savior. Making Jesus our Savior really is as simply as saying, God I trust in the work of Jesus on the cross to forgive me of my sin &I trust Jesus to restore me into a right relationship with you. If you have never asked God for this forgiveness – you can do it today and profess Jesus as your Savior.
Jesus has come to be our Savior, but he also comes to be our Lord & this is where what we profess needs to give shape to what we do and how we live - because we can’t call Jesus Lord and then keep on living our lives as we did before. Professing Jesus as Lord means being willing to allow Jesus to give direction to our lives. A lord is someone who has authority over other people and when a lord gives direction – people follow. So calling Jesus Lord means we need to give him authority in our lives to guide us & direct us & then be willing to follow wherever he leads, but let’s be honest, this is not easy. Look back at Peter. He called Jesus the Christ, but then he wasn’t willing to follow Jesus when he explained what it meant for him to be the Christ. For Jesus, being the Christ was going to mean suffering & death, to which Peter says, no way, this will never happen to you. Peter didn’t want to go where Jesus was going, he didn’t want to do what Jesus was going to have to do.
Notice that Jesus doesn’t just rebuke Peter, he shows him, and he shows all of us that if we are going to call Jesus our Lord then we must be willing to deny ourselves, take up our cross and follow him. Calling Jesus Lord means being willing to sacrifice what we may want in order to do what God wants, and this refocusing of our lives on the will and the way of God needs to penetrate every aspect of our life. From our relationships with family and friends, to our need to forgive, to the service we offer to those in need, to the use of our resources and money, our time and talents – everything we do needs to be shaped by what it means for us to call Jesus our Lord. Calling Jesus Lord means going where Jesus goes and doing what Jesus does.
If you still have doubts about who Jesus is, or if you are struggling to be able to call him Savior or Lord, then think about putting yourself into a position where you can make that call. Remember, the disciples weren’t able to profess Jesus as the Christ until after they had worked with Jesus. It was because they had spent time with Jesus and had even been part of his miracles and experienced his power that they were able to make the profession they did. If you are still struggling with what to call Jesus, don’t turn away from him, turn towards him & walk along side him and do the things that Jesus is doing. Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, nurture the children, care of the sick, join a Bible Study, commit yourself to the 60/60 experiment where you reorient yourself on the will and the way of God, like the disciples, step out in faith in some way and allow yourself to experience the power of God. Knowing Jesus as our Savior and Lord doesn’t come by being a passive observer and no amount of knowledge will give us the assurance we need. Authentic faith that proclaims with confidence that Jesus is Savior and Lord comes by being an active participant with Jesus.
Who do you say that I am? An authentic faith says Jesus is Savior not because we read it in a book or heard it in a sermon; we profess it because we have experienced the saving power of Jesus for ourselves – we know we are forgiven. An authentic faith professes Jesus is Lord and then works hard to go where Jesus goes and do what Jesus does – even when it means that we deny ourselves and take up a cross.
Monday, September 8, 2008
The 60/60 Experiment
I first heard of the 60/60 experiment at the Willow Creek Leadership Summit last month. John Burke, lead pastor and founder of Gateway Church in Austin, Texas, and author of the book Soul Revolution (Zondervan Publishing, 2008), mentioned it during his talk and the program is outlined in his book. Here's a brief summary taken from the book Soul Revolution, this was handed out to the people of Faith Church on Sunday.
The 60-60 Experiment
For the next 60 days, try to stay in a continuous, honest conversation with God.
Set a watch or alarm to beep every 60 minutes, and/or put up sticky notes & reminders around your home, car & office, as a reminder to stay connected.
Try to turn your thoughts back to God all throughout the day, as often as you can. This simple conscious contact with God isn't easy, but it's all you have to do - everything else will begin to fall into place over time.
Even if you're not yet convinced this is true (that God is real or that God loves you), try it. Every 60 minutes, stop and remember "God is with me right now and God loves me!" Remind yourself that your life matters to God and let that thought propel you to ask God, "Show me your will in this next moment.”
Begin the experiment today and see if this isn't the path to a far more satisfying life and a more authentic faith.
For more information on the 60/60 experiment I would encourage you to get a copy of Soul Revolution, or find more information at the Gateway Church website www.gatewaychurch.com link to Soul Revolution.
I'm excited to see what this does for the people of Faith Church, I'm already enjoying and learning from the experiment myself.
~Andy
The 60-60 Experiment
For the next 60 days, try to stay in a continuous, honest conversation with God.
Set a watch or alarm to beep every 60 minutes, and/or put up sticky notes & reminders around your home, car & office, as a reminder to stay connected.
Try to turn your thoughts back to God all throughout the day, as often as you can. This simple conscious contact with God isn't easy, but it's all you have to do - everything else will begin to fall into place over time.
Even if you're not yet convinced this is true (that God is real or that God loves you), try it. Every 60 minutes, stop and remember "God is with me right now and God loves me!" Remind yourself that your life matters to God and let that thought propel you to ask God, "Show me your will in this next moment.”
Begin the experiment today and see if this isn't the path to a far more satisfying life and a more authentic faith.
For more information on the 60/60 experiment I would encourage you to get a copy of Soul Revolution, or find more information at the Gateway Church website www.gatewaychurch.com link to Soul Revolution.
I'm excited to see what this does for the people of Faith Church, I'm already enjoying and learning from the experiment myself.
~Andy
Building an Authentic Faith - People Matter to God
Today we are going to begin a journey of looking at what it means for us to build an authentic faith. When I looked up authentic in the dictionary it gave this definition, not false or copied, I liked that, not copied. How we live out our faith can not be copied from others. While we can learn from the example of others, if we try to follow Jesus exactly like someone else– we will end up disillusioned & disappointed. The Christian faith is not a religion of rules – it is a personal relationship with the living God & each one of us needs to figure out for ourselves what it means to faithfully follow Jesus. Over the next 2 months, what I want us to do is look at several encounters that people had with Jesus not so we can copy them, but so we can learn from them how to develop, strengthen & live out our own faith.
As we begin our journey today we need to start where all faith needs to start – not with an understanding of ourselves, but with an understanding of God. In his book Soul Revolution, John Burke says, unless we believe God is above all, loving & good & for us, we won’t be willing to seek him. This makes perfect sense. Why would we want to develop a relationship with God if we didn’t believe that ultimately God is loving, good & for us? So the foundation on which we need to build our faith is this underlying truth, people matter to God. Our lives matter to God. You & I, we matter, God is for us & yes, God loves us. The entire bible is simply the story of God’s patient & faithful love for his children. It’s a story that time & again shows us that God is for us & that God does loves us. We heard of God’s love for us a few weeks ago from Isaiah 43:1-5.
1 But now, this is what the LORD says— he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: "Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine.
2 When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze.
3 For I am the LORD, your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior; I give Egypt for your ransom, Cush and Seba in your stead.
4 Since you are precious and honored in my sight, and because I love you, I will give men in exchange for you, and people in exchange for your life.
5 Do not be afraid, for I am with you; I will bring your children from the east and gather you from the west.
The Bible is full of passages that speak of God’s love and probably the most familiar one is John 3:16. For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
Notice how it all begins - For God so loved the world. It’s because God is for us & because our lives matter to God that God was willing to send Jesus to save us. That our lives matter to God is also the message of John 3:17. I always feel a little sorry for John 3:17 because it doesn’t get the same recognition, and yet the truth is it is equally as powerful a verse and it also shows us how much God loves us. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world but to save the world through him. God didn’t send Jesus to condemn us & judge us – God didn’t send Jesus to give us a bunch of rules to follow, God sent Jesus to save us & to show us the way to experience all the fullness & abundance of life, & God did this because God is for us. God did this because our lives matter to Him, he loves us. I was sharing with the new member class this past week that I continue to be humbled & amazed by the thought that the God of the universe, the God who created the mountains, set the waters into the seas & placed the planets into the sky cares about me. God cares about what happens to me, he cares about what I’m going through, he cares about our lives & if you don’t believe this, if you don’t believe that God loves us, if you don’t believe that our lives matters to Him, then look with me again at Mark 1:40-42.
40A man with leprosy came to him and begged him on his knees, "If you are willing, you can make me clean."
41Filled with compassion, Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. "I am willing," he said. "Be clean!"
42Immediately the leprosy left him and he was cured.
A man with leprosy came to Jesus… now let’s just stop here & remember that people who had leprosy didn’t matter to anyone. Because leprosy was such a contagious disease anyone who suffered with it was literally cast out of their homes, churches, schools & all of society & they were forced to live in communities with other lepers away from everyone. They could not see their family & friends, they were not allowed to worship in the temple with others & anytime a person even came close to a leper it was the responsibility of the leper to shout out “unclean, unclean” so that the healthy person would avoid them. So while lepers not only suffered with the pain of a physically debilitating disease, they also had to suffer the humiliation of social isolation. Lepers had no value, their lives simply didn’t matter - to anyone.
So it’s a man who has been told that his life is worthless who comes to Jesus & says, if you are willing, you can make me clean. If you want to, Jesus, if you are willing, if you care anything at all about me, you can make me clean. The man is taking a huge risk here because what he is asking Jesus is this, in a world where my life doesn’t matter to anyone, Jesus, does it matter to you? And Jesus answers with a resounding, Yes, your life matters!! I love what Jesus says here, I am willing. Jesus doesn’t reach out & heal the man because he feels obligated or compelled to do it. He doesn’t heal the man because he pities him or because it’s the right response in order to be faithful to God – Jesus heals the man because he wants to. Jesus heals the man because when he looked at him he didn’t see a leper, he didn’t see a man whose life had no value, he saw a child of God whose life mattered. By choosing to heal a leper, Jesus is making a statement about the value & worth of all people. All people matter to God, not just those who are clean & healthy, not just those on the inside of society, not just those who have standing, or who live the right way, all people matter. All people are loved by God & God chooses to reach out to us all.
Do you know that your life matters to God? Can you say with 100% certainty that God loves you & that even if you were the only person to ever life, God would have still sent Jesus to die for you? Do we understand deep within our heart & soul that there is simply nothing we can do to change God’s love for us? In a world where we are so often judged by our performance & where love is so often conditional, the unconditional love of God is often hard for us to accept, but until we do, I’m not sure we can build any kind of solid & enduring faith because the foundation of all faith is the understanding that our lives really do matter to God. When we grab hold of this truth, then, as John Burke says, we will be willing to seek God. Once we know that God loves us we can move forward to build an authentic & powerful faith that will change our lives & change our world, but nothing happens until we set this truth in our hearts & minds, so I want to invite you to join me in something called the 60/60 experiment so that we can set this truth as the foundation of our lives.
For the next 60 days I want to challenge us all to try & stay in a continuous & honest conversation with God where moment by moment, day by day we open ourselves to hearing God say, your life matter to me. Since this kind of relationship & conversation with God for most us does not come naturally, we will need some gentle reminders that God loves us. Again, John Burke, who helped developed this experiment has said, we need something to interrupt our habit of not giving God a second thought most of the day, so we can turn & allow God to break in and lead & guide us.
The 60/60 experiment challenges us to at least once every hour think about God & remember that God is with us & that God loves us. One suggestion on how to do this would be to get a watch that you can set to beep every hour & when the alarm interrupts your day remind yourself that God loves you, tell yourself once again that your life really does matters to God & that He is there to help you through whatever circumstance you find yourself in at that moment. I have been doing this for over a week now & I have to tell you that it has been an interesting experience. Many times I have heard the alarm go off at just the moment I needed some reassurance that God was with me. Once the alarm went off as I was reading an email from a friend of mine who was making a big change in her life. I immediately responded to her & told her I knew God was in her decision & reminded her that God that God loved her. What I have begun to see is that the times the alarm has gone off have not been random moments during the day, but God directed moments. They have reminded me that my life matters to God & that God is with me.
Alarms are just one way to go through the experiment, you could also try using post-it notes as reminders & you could place them in on your computer, mirrors, in your car, at work, place a small dot on your watch. Train yourself to think about God when you hear a clock chime, the phone ring, whatever might interrupt your routine use as a moment to remind yourself that God is with you & more importantly that God is for you. If doing this once every hour seems to be too much for where you are in your walk with God right now, then try thinking about God 3 times a day, or even twice, once when you get up in the morning & when you go bed at night, but keep doing it for 60 days so that by the end of October you will know with certainty that God is with you & God is for you & loves you. Knowing that our lives matter to God will begin to change us & it is that first necessary step to a more authentic & powerful faith.
As we begin our journey today we need to start where all faith needs to start – not with an understanding of ourselves, but with an understanding of God. In his book Soul Revolution, John Burke says, unless we believe God is above all, loving & good & for us, we won’t be willing to seek him. This makes perfect sense. Why would we want to develop a relationship with God if we didn’t believe that ultimately God is loving, good & for us? So the foundation on which we need to build our faith is this underlying truth, people matter to God. Our lives matter to God. You & I, we matter, God is for us & yes, God loves us. The entire bible is simply the story of God’s patient & faithful love for his children. It’s a story that time & again shows us that God is for us & that God does loves us. We heard of God’s love for us a few weeks ago from Isaiah 43:1-5.
1 But now, this is what the LORD says— he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: "Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine.
2 When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze.
3 For I am the LORD, your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior; I give Egypt for your ransom, Cush and Seba in your stead.
4 Since you are precious and honored in my sight, and because I love you, I will give men in exchange for you, and people in exchange for your life.
5 Do not be afraid, for I am with you; I will bring your children from the east and gather you from the west.
The Bible is full of passages that speak of God’s love and probably the most familiar one is John 3:16. For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
Notice how it all begins - For God so loved the world. It’s because God is for us & because our lives matter to God that God was willing to send Jesus to save us. That our lives matter to God is also the message of John 3:17. I always feel a little sorry for John 3:17 because it doesn’t get the same recognition, and yet the truth is it is equally as powerful a verse and it also shows us how much God loves us. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world but to save the world through him. God didn’t send Jesus to condemn us & judge us – God didn’t send Jesus to give us a bunch of rules to follow, God sent Jesus to save us & to show us the way to experience all the fullness & abundance of life, & God did this because God is for us. God did this because our lives matter to Him, he loves us. I was sharing with the new member class this past week that I continue to be humbled & amazed by the thought that the God of the universe, the God who created the mountains, set the waters into the seas & placed the planets into the sky cares about me. God cares about what happens to me, he cares about what I’m going through, he cares about our lives & if you don’t believe this, if you don’t believe that God loves us, if you don’t believe that our lives matters to Him, then look with me again at Mark 1:40-42.
40A man with leprosy came to him and begged him on his knees, "If you are willing, you can make me clean."
41Filled with compassion, Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. "I am willing," he said. "Be clean!"
42Immediately the leprosy left him and he was cured.
A man with leprosy came to Jesus… now let’s just stop here & remember that people who had leprosy didn’t matter to anyone. Because leprosy was such a contagious disease anyone who suffered with it was literally cast out of their homes, churches, schools & all of society & they were forced to live in communities with other lepers away from everyone. They could not see their family & friends, they were not allowed to worship in the temple with others & anytime a person even came close to a leper it was the responsibility of the leper to shout out “unclean, unclean” so that the healthy person would avoid them. So while lepers not only suffered with the pain of a physically debilitating disease, they also had to suffer the humiliation of social isolation. Lepers had no value, their lives simply didn’t matter - to anyone.
So it’s a man who has been told that his life is worthless who comes to Jesus & says, if you are willing, you can make me clean. If you want to, Jesus, if you are willing, if you care anything at all about me, you can make me clean. The man is taking a huge risk here because what he is asking Jesus is this, in a world where my life doesn’t matter to anyone, Jesus, does it matter to you? And Jesus answers with a resounding, Yes, your life matters!! I love what Jesus says here, I am willing. Jesus doesn’t reach out & heal the man because he feels obligated or compelled to do it. He doesn’t heal the man because he pities him or because it’s the right response in order to be faithful to God – Jesus heals the man because he wants to. Jesus heals the man because when he looked at him he didn’t see a leper, he didn’t see a man whose life had no value, he saw a child of God whose life mattered. By choosing to heal a leper, Jesus is making a statement about the value & worth of all people. All people matter to God, not just those who are clean & healthy, not just those on the inside of society, not just those who have standing, or who live the right way, all people matter. All people are loved by God & God chooses to reach out to us all.
Do you know that your life matters to God? Can you say with 100% certainty that God loves you & that even if you were the only person to ever life, God would have still sent Jesus to die for you? Do we understand deep within our heart & soul that there is simply nothing we can do to change God’s love for us? In a world where we are so often judged by our performance & where love is so often conditional, the unconditional love of God is often hard for us to accept, but until we do, I’m not sure we can build any kind of solid & enduring faith because the foundation of all faith is the understanding that our lives really do matter to God. When we grab hold of this truth, then, as John Burke says, we will be willing to seek God. Once we know that God loves us we can move forward to build an authentic & powerful faith that will change our lives & change our world, but nothing happens until we set this truth in our hearts & minds, so I want to invite you to join me in something called the 60/60 experiment so that we can set this truth as the foundation of our lives.
For the next 60 days I want to challenge us all to try & stay in a continuous & honest conversation with God where moment by moment, day by day we open ourselves to hearing God say, your life matter to me. Since this kind of relationship & conversation with God for most us does not come naturally, we will need some gentle reminders that God loves us. Again, John Burke, who helped developed this experiment has said, we need something to interrupt our habit of not giving God a second thought most of the day, so we can turn & allow God to break in and lead & guide us.
The 60/60 experiment challenges us to at least once every hour think about God & remember that God is with us & that God loves us. One suggestion on how to do this would be to get a watch that you can set to beep every hour & when the alarm interrupts your day remind yourself that God loves you, tell yourself once again that your life really does matters to God & that He is there to help you through whatever circumstance you find yourself in at that moment. I have been doing this for over a week now & I have to tell you that it has been an interesting experience. Many times I have heard the alarm go off at just the moment I needed some reassurance that God was with me. Once the alarm went off as I was reading an email from a friend of mine who was making a big change in her life. I immediately responded to her & told her I knew God was in her decision & reminded her that God that God loved her. What I have begun to see is that the times the alarm has gone off have not been random moments during the day, but God directed moments. They have reminded me that my life matters to God & that God is with me.
Alarms are just one way to go through the experiment, you could also try using post-it notes as reminders & you could place them in on your computer, mirrors, in your car, at work, place a small dot on your watch. Train yourself to think about God when you hear a clock chime, the phone ring, whatever might interrupt your routine use as a moment to remind yourself that God is with you & more importantly that God is for you. If doing this once every hour seems to be too much for where you are in your walk with God right now, then try thinking about God 3 times a day, or even twice, once when you get up in the morning & when you go bed at night, but keep doing it for 60 days so that by the end of October you will know with certainty that God is with you & God is for you & loves you. Knowing that our lives matter to God will begin to change us & it is that first necessary step to a more authentic & powerful faith.
Saturday, September 6, 2008
Psalm 89 ~ Reassurance
I heard someone define assurance this week as "a sure thing", it’s being certain of something. But other than death & taxes, is there any thing that is a sure thing. Unfortunately not even our faith is a sure thing at times. It’s not that God’s grace toward us ever fails, it’s not that God stops loving us, but sometimes we struggle to believe God really does loves us. I don’t know about you, but there are so many times I struggle to feel loved by God & there are times I wonder if God is with me & if God really can or does forgive me, & it’s in those times of doubt that we all need some reassurance. We all to be need to be reminded that God’s grace & love is a sure thing.
If we look at Psalm 89 we see here the story of David. While the psalm is written by Ethan the Ezrahite, it reveals to us the heart & life of David, & it begins with words of assurance. David is certain that God was with him - look at 89:1-2.
1 I will sing of the LORD's great love forever; with my mouth I will make your faithfulness known through all generations.
2 I will declare that your love stands firm forever, that you established your faithfulness in heaven itself.
Look at the words here, stands firm, established, & faithfulness. These are words of assurance. David is certain that God is with him. He is certain of God’s love & protection, & then look at 89:19-24.
Once you spoke in a vision, to your faithful people you said: "I have bestowed strength on a warrior; I have exalted a young man from among the people.
I have found David my servant; with my sacred oil I have anointed him.
My hand will sustain him; surely my arm will strengthen him.
No enemy will subject him to tribute; no wicked man will oppress him.
I will crush his foes before him and strike down his adversaries.
My faithful love will be with him, and through my name his horn will be exalted.
David is certain of the promise & covenant God made with him. David knows that God is with him. David knows God is fighting for him & he is certain that God will bless his family. For David God’s love & faithfulness is a sure thing. But then something happens, look at 89:38-42 & 46.
38 But you have rejected, you have spurned, you have been very angry with your anointed one.
39 You have renounced the covenant with your servant and have defiled his crown in the dust.
40 You have broken through all his walls and reduced his strongholds to ruins.
41 All who pass by have plundered him; he has become the scorn of his neighbors.
42 You have exalted the right hand of his foes; you have made all his enemies rejoice.
46 How long, O LORD ? Will you hide yourself forever? How long will your wrath burn like fire?
David is no longer certain of God’s love. He now questions whether or not the promise God made to him & his family is valid. Suddenly David is filled with doubt & fear. His faith is gone & so is the certainty he once had that God had anointed him & blessed him. Have you ever been in a place where you faced these same kinds of questions? Maybe we question God’s love for us? Maybe we wonder whether or not God can forgive us, maybe we begin to ask ourselves if God is even there. These doubts & struggles are real & they are all too common & it’s during these times that we need some reassurance, but what causes us to lose our assurance in the first place?
What are those things that take away our certainty in God’s promises? Why is it that we can go from having a strong & abiding faith in God one day to incredible doubts & fears the next? Well, if we look at David we find that one reason might be our own sin. A few weeks ago as we looked at the life of David we heard the story of his moral collapse. When David committed adultery with Bathsheba it began a series of choices by David that did not honor or glorify God. All David did was try to cover up his own sin in order to keep his public image in tact & in the process David made one bad choice after another. David’s failure & sin robbed him of the assurance of God’s love because it broke his relationship with God.
Our sin robs us of the assurance of God’s love because sin always breaks our relationship with God. While forgiveness can & does restore that relationship, the reality is that each time we sin, each time we fail in our walk with God we will wrestle with doubts & fears because sin separates us from God. It’s not that God turns away - we do & each time we do we will question whether or not God loves us & we will ask ourselves, can God forgive me again.
It’s not just sin that can rob us of assurance – it can also be our poor self image or low self esteem. Maybe deep down we have always questioned whether or not God does loves us. If we have a hard time seeing the value & worth God has placed in us, it can be easy to question whether or not God really is with us or working for us. What’s amazing to me is how a low self esteem or a poor self image can follow us all through life. How many of us can remember every word that a bully said to us on the bus or during recess? While the old saying goes sticks & stones may break my bones but names can never hurt me, the truth is that names & words do hurt & while bones might heal, sometimes our self image does not & if we don’t see value & worth in ourselves, then it will be hard for us to be certain that God loves us & cares for.
Circumstances can also cause us to question God’s love for us. When everything starts to go wrong, when we find ourselves in a string of one crisis after another that are not of our own doing & beyond our ability to fix, we might begin to ask ourselves where is God? Has God turned away? Has he hid his face from us? Like David in 89:49 we might start crying out, Lord, where is your steadfast love of old?
Our own sin & failure, our poor self image & low self esteem, & the circumstances of life can rob us of the assurance that God is with us & God loves us, but did you notice something about all of those things - they all focus on ourselves. When we are caught up in our sin & our failures - we are looking at ourselves. When we struggle with a poor self image or low self esteem we are looking at ourselves & when the circumstance of life become overwhelming & we feel defeated, again we are only focused on ourselves. So the assurance of God’s love & the certainty of God’s promises begin to fade because we are not looking at God, we are only looking at ourselves. If we need some reassurance, if we need to be reminded of God’s great faithfulness & steadfast love, then we need to look to God.
Let me offer 3 ways we can turn & look to God to find this kind of reassurance. The first way we can look to God is to look back. We can look back into our own lives not to look at ourselves but to look at how God has been faithful to us in the past. Can we find those moments when God was there to help us & can we use those moments to remind us that God will help us again? Throughout the Old Testament God called the people of Israel to look back at their lives & remember how God had been faithful. Israel was always looking back to the story of how God delivered them from the Red Sea & the hand of Pharaoh. When the people of Israel had the Red Sea in front of them & Pharaoh & his army behind them everything looked hopeless. They were trapped & thought they would die, but then God parted the Red Sea & Israel was able to cross over on dry ground. God often told the people of Israel to look back to that moment to reassure them that God would continue to help them.
David could also have looked back into his own life to see all the ways God had provided for him & cared for him. God had rescued David many times & proven himself trustworthy over & over again, so he could have found reassurance from his own life’s story if he had turned back & remembered how God had helped him. So can we look back into our own lives, or maybe into the lives of our families & remember a time when God was faithful? Can we look back & see how God was there during a crisis, or how God provided for us in some clear way? And then can we hold on to those moments as a reminder that just as God was with us in the past, so is God with us today & we can be assured that God will be with us into the future.
The second place we can look for reassurance is to those around us because many times it will be our family & friends who will helps us see & hear God more clearly. When we begin to doubt & question our faith & trust in God we need people who will speak to us words of truth. This is why small groups & Bible Studies & Sunday School classes are so important because it’s in these places where our friends can share with us God’s words. We heard some of those words today from Isaiah 43:1-5.
1 I will sing of the LORD's great love forever; with my mouth I will make your faithfulness known through all generations.
2 I will declare that your love stands firm forever, that you established your faithfulness in heaven itself.
3 You said, "I have made a covenant with my chosen one, I have sworn to David my servant,
4 'I will establish your line forever and make your throne firm through all generations.' "
5 The heavens praise your wonders, O LORD, your faithfulness too, in the assembly of the holy ones.
These are the kinds of words we might need to hear when we question our own value. When we doubt God is with us during a difficult time or when we wonder if God can ever forgive us, we need people who will speak to us these kinds of words & give us the reassurance we need.
Then the third place where we can find reassurance is right here in worship. Look again at Psalm 89:1-2. It’s in singing of God’s love, it’s in proclaiming God’s faithfulness & declaring God’s goodness that we find reassurance. The reason that worship brings reassurance is because worship helps shift our focus from us to God. Worship reminds us that we are not to be the center of our lives – God is, so we need to stop looking at ourselves & start trusting in God. That’s why we pray, that’s why we look to God’s word, that’s why we sing & praise God, that’s why we tithe & give to God, because it all helps us keep our eyes & hearts fixed on God & sometimes just saying it & singing it & praying it over & over again helps us trust & believe it.
That reassurance comes from our times together in worship is also the message of the old Fanny Crosby hymn, Blessed Assurance. We are going to sing that hymn in just a minute but if you know the chorus it goes, this is my story this is my song, praising my savior all the day long, this is my story, this is my song, praising my savior all the day long. The song reminds us that the blessed assurance we need to strength our faith comes from praising God, it comes from reflecting on the story of our lives & looking back to those times & places where we have seen God at work, & it comes from hearing the story & the song of others.
If we look at Psalm 89 we see here the story of David. While the psalm is written by Ethan the Ezrahite, it reveals to us the heart & life of David, & it begins with words of assurance. David is certain that God was with him - look at 89:1-2.
1 I will sing of the LORD's great love forever; with my mouth I will make your faithfulness known through all generations.
2 I will declare that your love stands firm forever, that you established your faithfulness in heaven itself.
Look at the words here, stands firm, established, & faithfulness. These are words of assurance. David is certain that God is with him. He is certain of God’s love & protection, & then look at 89:19-24.
Once you spoke in a vision, to your faithful people you said: "I have bestowed strength on a warrior; I have exalted a young man from among the people.
I have found David my servant; with my sacred oil I have anointed him.
My hand will sustain him; surely my arm will strengthen him.
No enemy will subject him to tribute; no wicked man will oppress him.
I will crush his foes before him and strike down his adversaries.
My faithful love will be with him, and through my name his horn will be exalted.
David is certain of the promise & covenant God made with him. David knows that God is with him. David knows God is fighting for him & he is certain that God will bless his family. For David God’s love & faithfulness is a sure thing. But then something happens, look at 89:38-42 & 46.
38 But you have rejected, you have spurned, you have been very angry with your anointed one.
39 You have renounced the covenant with your servant and have defiled his crown in the dust.
40 You have broken through all his walls and reduced his strongholds to ruins.
41 All who pass by have plundered him; he has become the scorn of his neighbors.
42 You have exalted the right hand of his foes; you have made all his enemies rejoice.
46 How long, O LORD ? Will you hide yourself forever? How long will your wrath burn like fire?
David is no longer certain of God’s love. He now questions whether or not the promise God made to him & his family is valid. Suddenly David is filled with doubt & fear. His faith is gone & so is the certainty he once had that God had anointed him & blessed him. Have you ever been in a place where you faced these same kinds of questions? Maybe we question God’s love for us? Maybe we wonder whether or not God can forgive us, maybe we begin to ask ourselves if God is even there. These doubts & struggles are real & they are all too common & it’s during these times that we need some reassurance, but what causes us to lose our assurance in the first place?
What are those things that take away our certainty in God’s promises? Why is it that we can go from having a strong & abiding faith in God one day to incredible doubts & fears the next? Well, if we look at David we find that one reason might be our own sin. A few weeks ago as we looked at the life of David we heard the story of his moral collapse. When David committed adultery with Bathsheba it began a series of choices by David that did not honor or glorify God. All David did was try to cover up his own sin in order to keep his public image in tact & in the process David made one bad choice after another. David’s failure & sin robbed him of the assurance of God’s love because it broke his relationship with God.
Our sin robs us of the assurance of God’s love because sin always breaks our relationship with God. While forgiveness can & does restore that relationship, the reality is that each time we sin, each time we fail in our walk with God we will wrestle with doubts & fears because sin separates us from God. It’s not that God turns away - we do & each time we do we will question whether or not God loves us & we will ask ourselves, can God forgive me again.
It’s not just sin that can rob us of assurance – it can also be our poor self image or low self esteem. Maybe deep down we have always questioned whether or not God does loves us. If we have a hard time seeing the value & worth God has placed in us, it can be easy to question whether or not God really is with us or working for us. What’s amazing to me is how a low self esteem or a poor self image can follow us all through life. How many of us can remember every word that a bully said to us on the bus or during recess? While the old saying goes sticks & stones may break my bones but names can never hurt me, the truth is that names & words do hurt & while bones might heal, sometimes our self image does not & if we don’t see value & worth in ourselves, then it will be hard for us to be certain that God loves us & cares for.
Circumstances can also cause us to question God’s love for us. When everything starts to go wrong, when we find ourselves in a string of one crisis after another that are not of our own doing & beyond our ability to fix, we might begin to ask ourselves where is God? Has God turned away? Has he hid his face from us? Like David in 89:49 we might start crying out, Lord, where is your steadfast love of old?
Our own sin & failure, our poor self image & low self esteem, & the circumstances of life can rob us of the assurance that God is with us & God loves us, but did you notice something about all of those things - they all focus on ourselves. When we are caught up in our sin & our failures - we are looking at ourselves. When we struggle with a poor self image or low self esteem we are looking at ourselves & when the circumstance of life become overwhelming & we feel defeated, again we are only focused on ourselves. So the assurance of God’s love & the certainty of God’s promises begin to fade because we are not looking at God, we are only looking at ourselves. If we need some reassurance, if we need to be reminded of God’s great faithfulness & steadfast love, then we need to look to God.
Let me offer 3 ways we can turn & look to God to find this kind of reassurance. The first way we can look to God is to look back. We can look back into our own lives not to look at ourselves but to look at how God has been faithful to us in the past. Can we find those moments when God was there to help us & can we use those moments to remind us that God will help us again? Throughout the Old Testament God called the people of Israel to look back at their lives & remember how God had been faithful. Israel was always looking back to the story of how God delivered them from the Red Sea & the hand of Pharaoh. When the people of Israel had the Red Sea in front of them & Pharaoh & his army behind them everything looked hopeless. They were trapped & thought they would die, but then God parted the Red Sea & Israel was able to cross over on dry ground. God often told the people of Israel to look back to that moment to reassure them that God would continue to help them.
David could also have looked back into his own life to see all the ways God had provided for him & cared for him. God had rescued David many times & proven himself trustworthy over & over again, so he could have found reassurance from his own life’s story if he had turned back & remembered how God had helped him. So can we look back into our own lives, or maybe into the lives of our families & remember a time when God was faithful? Can we look back & see how God was there during a crisis, or how God provided for us in some clear way? And then can we hold on to those moments as a reminder that just as God was with us in the past, so is God with us today & we can be assured that God will be with us into the future.
The second place we can look for reassurance is to those around us because many times it will be our family & friends who will helps us see & hear God more clearly. When we begin to doubt & question our faith & trust in God we need people who will speak to us words of truth. This is why small groups & Bible Studies & Sunday School classes are so important because it’s in these places where our friends can share with us God’s words. We heard some of those words today from Isaiah 43:1-5.
1 I will sing of the LORD's great love forever; with my mouth I will make your faithfulness known through all generations.
2 I will declare that your love stands firm forever, that you established your faithfulness in heaven itself.
3 You said, "I have made a covenant with my chosen one, I have sworn to David my servant,
4 'I will establish your line forever and make your throne firm through all generations.' "
5 The heavens praise your wonders, O LORD, your faithfulness too, in the assembly of the holy ones.
These are the kinds of words we might need to hear when we question our own value. When we doubt God is with us during a difficult time or when we wonder if God can ever forgive us, we need people who will speak to us these kinds of words & give us the reassurance we need.
Then the third place where we can find reassurance is right here in worship. Look again at Psalm 89:1-2. It’s in singing of God’s love, it’s in proclaiming God’s faithfulness & declaring God’s goodness that we find reassurance. The reason that worship brings reassurance is because worship helps shift our focus from us to God. Worship reminds us that we are not to be the center of our lives – God is, so we need to stop looking at ourselves & start trusting in God. That’s why we pray, that’s why we look to God’s word, that’s why we sing & praise God, that’s why we tithe & give to God, because it all helps us keep our eyes & hearts fixed on God & sometimes just saying it & singing it & praying it over & over again helps us trust & believe it.
That reassurance comes from our times together in worship is also the message of the old Fanny Crosby hymn, Blessed Assurance. We are going to sing that hymn in just a minute but if you know the chorus it goes, this is my story this is my song, praising my savior all the day long, this is my story, this is my song, praising my savior all the day long. The song reminds us that the blessed assurance we need to strength our faith comes from praising God, it comes from reflecting on the story of our lives & looking back to those times & places where we have seen God at work, & it comes from hearing the story & the song of others.
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