Chardon church of Christ

Overview of the Bible - Part 2

Overview of The Bible

INTRO: Good evening. It’s good to see you back this evening.

This morning we started a lesson giving an overview of the Bible. We thought it might be a good lesson to encourage us to look deeper into things in God's word, and to excite us about this wonderful book. We mentioned that although the story of the Bible is a fascinating story it is also a very simple story and that in reading it once over some people perceive it as being so simple they think that they really don't have to spend much time in it.

Indeed the principles of the Bible are very simple. But the supporting structure of those principles, the nature of God, His desires for us, and the requirements we need to meet are more complex. It is in the studying of God’s word that we find the answers to our questions and the complexity quickly dissolves with our understanding. But it takes some time and effort to do that.

Knowledge abounds in this world. People have more and more things to know about than ever before. Technology. Art. Health. Business. Music. Ecology. Accounting. Fitness. Relationships. Architecture. History. Math. Physics. Botany. Computers. Engineering. Films. Medicine. Economics. Genetics. To name a few. Yet it has been said people know less about the Bible than their great grandparents who followed a plow around a field for twelve hours a day.

Let us review what we studied this morning.

I. Before the Beginning: In Proverbs Chapter 8 we found that the story of the Bible actually starts far before creation. The eternal wisdom of God’s word existed;

• “Before His works of old.
• From everlasting, from the beginning,
• Before the earth was.
• When there were no depths, it was brought forth,
• When there were no fountains abounding with water.
• Before the mountains were settled,
• Before the hills;
• While as yet God had not made the earth, nor the fields,
• Nor the beginning of the dust of the world.
• When God established the heavens, it was there:
• When He set a circle upon the face of the deep,
• When He made firm the skies above,
• When the fountains of the deep became strong,
• When He gave to the sea its bound,
• That the waters should not transgress his commandment,
• When he marked out the foundations of the earth;
• Wisdom was by Him as a master workman;” [para]

A. The word of God tells us that before the world was even created, God had determined to save an elect people, a chosen people as Paul tells us in Ephesians 1:4 - “just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love,”

B. Before anything was even formed in this world, before the foundation of the earth, that doctrine, that precept was in place. God knew that there would be people who would serve Him, who would be considered His elect, His chosen people.

C. David explains that there were going to be a class of people who do not permit their opinions to stand in the way, to stand between them and the word of God. These are people that will not let their personal convictions stand between them and the word of God and their hope of heaven. They will not form preconceived religious ideas about truth. These people would let God's word conform them.

II. The Beginning: We read in Genesis of the creation and there we see the authoritative power, the omnipotence of God as He spoke words and things formed, the elements obeyed Him, and the world came to be as we now know it.

A. We find that God created man in His own image, and because He created them in His own image He knows—we can conform to His image! We were made that way.

B. We also learned that we were given a free-will. We are not programmed robots but are free to make choices, even bad ones as we saw in the story of Adam and Eve. Satan comes on to the scene and we see how easily we can change our understanding of God’s word if it suits our desires. Free-will allows us to disobey and bring about disaster.

III. God’s Plan: God knew all this and He has a plan to save man which we saw start to be revealed in Genesis 3:15. “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.''” As we continue to read through our Bible we find statements of hope, statements that reveal a plan to redeem these sinners, these sinful people that have violated God's command.

A. If we had read on in Genesis 6:5-7 we would have seen this ability to choose almost ended our existence. “Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the Lord was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. So the Lord said, "I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth” Fortunately were was one who did not make the wrong choices, his name was Noah and “Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord.” Here we learn of salvation through God’s grace.

B. In Genesis 12:1-4 we find God making a promise to Abraham and God says in that promise that “in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

1. We read from the Apostle Paul in Galatians 3:5-9 – “just as Abraham "believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.'' Therefore know that only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham. And the Scripture, foreseeing (foreseeing is significant here) foreseeing that God would justify the nations by faith, preached the gospel to Abraham beforehand, saying, "In you all the nations shall be blessed.'' So then those who are of faith are blessed with believing Abraham.”
2. It is revealed to us that these promises that God made early on in the pages of Genesis, had to do with Christ.
3. The Law: We learned that we are to strive for perfection, to be holy 1st Peter 1:15-16 – “but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, "Be holy, for I am holy.''”
4. To get mankind to the point where they understood God's expectation of holiness and moral perfection, and to help them to feel the remorse, the guilt, to have this mournful spirit that Jesus would talk about in the Beatitudes, to get them to that point He brought law to them, the eternal existing law.

C. God revealed this in what is known as the Mosaic Law. Exodus 20:1 Moses is at Mount Sinai and he receives the Ten Commandments. In Hebrews 8:4-6 the author of Hebrews tells us that these laws that God had given through Moses were a “shadow of the heavenly things”. Hebrews 10:1 the author tells us “For the law, having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things...”

1. The laws didn't represent the end where God wanted to bring men, but was a step. They were a tutor to get man to where he needed to be.
2. Furthermore, we are told in Hebrews 7:18-19 “For on the one hand there is an annulling of the former commandment because of its weakness and unprofitableness, for the law made nothing perfect; on the other hand, there is the bringing in of a better hope, through which we draw near to God.”
3. The law lacked something. The Law of Moses was lacking in that he says it could not make a man perfect and that's what God was after. Perfection, absolute moral perfection and the Mosaic Law could not do this. This was its unprofitableness.

IV. The Savior: In God’s word we find that God had always planned before the foundation of the world to bring Christ into the world. We can read about the Christ all throughout the Old Testament scriptures.

A. We read from Isaiah 9:6 where the Prophet of God said to us; “For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given; and the government will be upon His shoulder.” And you know the rest.

1. The Christ would come into the world and He would preach the gospel of peace with God. He would also be crucified by the very ones He was trying to guide to righteousness so that they could attain eternal life.
2. Three days later, Christ rose from the grave. He was resurrected and He ascended into the heavens. All of this was foretold, it was written. All this was in the mind of God before one particle of dust came together on the Earth, before we were created.

B. Christ ascended into the heavens and He brought a new law. We read from Galatians Chapter 3 that it was the object of the Mosaic Law to serve as a tutor, to bring us to Christ and to understand the need to be forgiven of sin so we might not be separated from God.

C. In Jeremiah 31:31ff we read; “"Behold, the days are coming,'' says the Lord, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah ”

1. Scripture foretold of this new law that would come. This new law would be different than the old law Moses delivered.
2. Jeremiah tells us that through the law of Christ, the new covenant, men would be forgiven. Verse 34 says; “No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, 'Know the Lord,' for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,'' says the Lord. "For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.”

V. The Kingdom: Now let is continue in our Overview. We find Jesus at Matthew 4:23 preaching this Gospel of the Kingdom, this new covenant, this new law. It is referred to in Galatians 6:2 as the law of Jesus Christ. Not only is there a new law that was given, there is also a kingdom that was established. No longer would there be a man on earth as king over this kingdom that was ruled by the Mosaic Law. There would be a new kingdom, as God had promised all throughout the Old Testament scriptures. Daniel 2:44-45 is probably one of the more memorable ones where Daniel tells Nebuchadnezzar the interpretation of his dream. “And in the days of these kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed; and the kingdom shall not be left to other people; it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever. Inasmuch as you saw that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it broke in pieces the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold the great God has made known to the king what will come to pass after this. The dream is certain, and its interpretation is sure.” During the days of the Roman kings, God will establish a kingdom that will never, ever be destroyed.

A. Jesus said in Mark 9:1 that “I say to you that there are some standing here who will not taste death till they see the kingdom of God present with power” Therefore they knew that during their lifetime, the kingdom of God would be established.

B. In Acts Chapter 2 we find the prophecy regarding the coming of the Kingdom of God fulfilled. Peter quotes from Joel in Acts 2:16-21. God speaking through Joel “And it shall come to pass in the last days, says God, That I will pour out of My Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your young men shall see visions, your old men shall dream dreams and on My menservants and on My maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days; and they shall prophesy.”

1. Then in verse 21 still quoting from Joel; “And it shall come to pass that whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.” Then in Acts 2:33 Peter proclaims concerning Jesus; “Therefore being exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He poured out this which you now see and hear.”
2. All those who would call upon God, now have the opportunity be saved. Now people can be forgiven. This is the perfect law of liberty. People can be saved from the consequences of their sins.

C. When we read the book of Acts, we find statements that help us to realize that after Acts chapter 2 the Kingdom of God had been established. At 1st Thessalonians 2:12 the apostle Paul speaks of people being called into His own kingdom. At 2nd Thessalonians 2:14 Paul tells us that it is the Gospel that calls people into His kingdom, the Church of our Lord and Savior.

1. He tells us at 2nd Thessalonians 2:13 that “...God from the beginning chose you for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth,” Again, we see the eternal wisdom of God, the eternal word of God.
2. Before the world was even created, before any of us even placed a foot on the earth, before you faced your first temptation, before you found yourself in the midst of great sin, before you had determined to justify things that you were doing as right, when in all reality, according to the eternal word of God, it was wrong. Before any of that took place in your life, this word stood firm where it always has been and always will be.

D. And as the kingdom was established, God gave the instructions as to how people could enter into that kingdom. The instructions are not, as some people may think. How are we to think about what the entrance to the kingdom of God is? Should I come up with some method on my own? Should I listen to some preacher out there tell me “just say the sinner's prayer” and you will have entrance into the kingdom of God? Nowhere do I find either of those in the Scriptures.

1. In Luke 3:8 we have a statement made by John the Baptist that helps us understand some things about this eternal word, about entrance into the kingdom of God. John said; “Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance, and do not begin to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.' For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones.”
2. The people thought in their minds that their relationship, their blood kinship to Abraham gave them an automatic ticket into the kingdom of God. John says; do not begin to say to yourselves. In other words, let's see what the Lord has to say about this.
3. Nicodemus in John Chapter 3 is a great example for us. Here is a man who is not only a Pharisee but is known as a "ruler of the Jews," a title reserved in Rabbinic literature “for a great man”. This is not a man who was deficient in understanding the Mosaic Law. Jesus tells Nicodemus in John 3:3 “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”
4. Jesus says “unless” or in some translations “except”. That means if and only if, it is a conditional statement. There are conditions.
5. Jesus tells this Pharisee who is of the seed of Abraham, there's something that you are lacking. You're not in the kingdom of God. The Pharisee, the ruler among the Jews, the person of God who knows the Mosaic Law like the back of his hand, has not met the requirements of entering into the kingdom of heaven.
6. Remember as we started this sermon John 1:12-13 “But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.”

E. These are the elect of God; the one's God had foreknowledge of before the foundation of the world. These will have a transformation of their thinking. They are people who will be born again, not literally from their mother's womb, but they will be transformed in their thinking into a new person. No longer will they cling to fleshly desires and all the things that come with this wicked world.

1. They will have a transformation of thinking that comes through an understanding of studying God's word. These are the ones that will be the elect generation, the righteous class, the breed of God's people, they are eternal people.
2. In Acts 2:38 when the church is established, the kingdom of God established, we see the people asking; “what shall we do?” That is, what must we do to be saved?
3. Peter gives them the answer, repent of your sins. Just as Adam and Eve broke the commandment of God, you also have broken God's commandments, in your living by your own convictions, by your own opinions, by your own pre-conceived religious ideas, repent of those things and turn to the riches of God's true word. “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” Peter goes on; “For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call.”

VI. The Gospel Call: The gospel call, the plan of God before there were even people. In that gospel call on that day there would be some, 3000 people that would answer. But there were many more there that day. Now, as we look at the pages of the Book of Acts, we find the church growing. People heard that gospel, and they conformed their lives to it. They were born again. They were transformed and they stopped living the way that they had been living, and began to live a new life. They would be like the Apostle Paul, as he said in Galatians 2:20 – “it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me”.

A. In Acts 4 the Sadducees put the apostles in custody then it says in Acts 4:4 – “However, many of those who heard the word believed; and the number of the men came to be about five thousand.”

B. There are many things to see in the book of Acts. Let’s look at Acts chapter 8 where we find Phillip preaching to the Samaritans. There was a man called Simon who practiced sorcery in the city and in Acts 8:11 it says “And they heeded him because he had astonished them with his sorceries for a long time.” Then in Acts 8:12-13 – “But when they believed Philip as he preached the things concerning the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, both men and women were baptized. Then Simon himself also believed; and when he was baptized he continued with Philip, and was amazed, seeing the miracles and signs which were done.” These people, these Samaritans, did exactly what the people did on the day of Pentecost in order to be added to the kingdom of God.

VII. The Lessons: As you go through the pages of God's eternal word, you find not only instructions, not only laws, but the lives of individuals are revealed. Lives like those of Noah, Abraham, and Jacob. We find of the patriarchs, the prophets and the apostles, men like Barnabas, like Philip the Evangelist who we just read about in Acts 8. We read about these people, and these men and women who made a conscientious decision. They heard the words of God and they decided to put aside their “I think”, they decided to put away things that they had learned through the years from previous generations, traditions.

A. We read in God’s word about traditions don’t we? As you read through the early pages of the New Testament, we see many traditions. For example “Why don't your disciples wash their hands before they eat?” People had convictions within themselves about certain things like that. The righteous heard the gospel of Jesus Christ. They believe that message. They confessed that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God. They were willing to be baptized for the forgiveness of their sins.

B. They wanted to live faithfully all the days of their lives, because this is what the word of God taught and teaches today. The righteous. But as we go through the word of God, we read about other people. We read about people like Cain who killed his own brother. We read about men like Korah from Numbers 16 and how he wanted to have the authority and power that Moses and Aaron had. As we read through the early pages of the Bible and we see people like Korah who said things like he said to Moses and Aaron “Why then do you exalt yourselves above the congregation of the Lord” We wonder at their arrogance, and their thinking.

C. In the Old Testament, we find something going wrong and we find God coming down out of the heavens and filling His tabernacle. Moses would go into the tabernacle and commune with God about what went on. If I’m one of those stirring up trouble, I would be terrified, because when God is angry, His wrath is fierce. Even though God had done all of these things, all of these great blessings, all these wonderful miracles, Korah steps out of line and says, What makes you so special?

D. In the New Testament we see Diotrephes, another one. In 3rd John we find Diotrephes wanted to have the pre-eminence of men. He wanted the pre-eminence that belonged to Christ, putting himself between man and God as it were, repudiating the word of the apostles, making a man to be the head on earth of the church! There are examples all throughout history in the Bible where we see righteous people and unrighteous people.

CONCLUSION: Each of us should consider, where do I stand in this? Where do we see our self in the pages of this Word which existed before we even came into the world? I believe we all have some ideas, don't we? Ask yourself, are the religious things about you in line with God's word or are you doing this because it's what you think?

People get confused about love, the love of Jesus. People get confused about the grace of Jesus. People get confused about how peace works. People get confused about how faith works. People are confused about this book that's very plain, very clear. In all reality it's simple but it takes some time digging into it to understand it.

People are confused because they won't open God’s word and study it. They just keep saying, this is what I think, and I'm good! In the end, as Jesus said in Matthew 7, depart from me, you worker of iniquity. And they said, oh, wait a minute. But we did all these things in your name, Jesus, we loved you, and we did all of these things. He says depart from me I never even knew you. [para]

“You who practice lawlessness”. Why did He say that? Was Jesus an ugly guy who was just mean and nasty? No, He says this word existed before you even came into the world and you did not conform your life to it. I gave you opportunity, I loved you, I gave everything for you. But you wouldn't conform your life to My Word.

So the question is this evening for each of us, where are we? Have we deceived ourselves? In what way do we approach this word? If I approach this word, trying to prove some conviction I have, forget it. It's not going to work. This word is pre-existent and it transforms the way I think. That's the way I should approach it.

I learned how to read so I start reading it. I start learning from it. I start to conform my convictions around it. I don't try conform the Bible to my convictions, I conform my convictions to the Bible and I will be blessed eternally and my hope will be realized one day.

The Bible overview today was very short, very simple. I hope each of us is encouraged to look deeper into the things of God's word, to understand its principles. We have one life to live and that's it. We have the one chance of this life to get it right. He's given us the right way, right here in His word. I'm not going to die and be able to come back and say, can I have a mulligan? No. Too late. You had your chance.

If there somebody here who is not a member of the body of Christ and you have come to believe in your heart that Jesus is indeed the Christ, the son of the living God, and you're willing to confess that faith and repent of your sins we'd be glad to assist you as you are baptized into the body of Christ. You will then as a Christian take up your cross daily and follow by faith, studying His word and growing in understanding.
If you’re a child of God already and your faith has been weak to where you have gone astray, if there is sin between you and God, I would like to encourage you to deal with it.
God is gracious; God is willing to forgive you. We as your brothers and sisters in Christ will pray for you, pray with you and do the very best we can to encourage you.

If you are subject to the Gospel call in any way, you are invited to come forward and make your need known while we stand and sing the song of invitation.

Invitation song: # ???
Reference Sermon by: John Robertson

Overview of the Bible - Part 1

Overview of the Bible

INTRO: Good morning to everyone, it's good to see you this beautiful, sunshiny morning. It is a blessed day to be here in the house of God with the saints of the Lord and look forward to another study of God's word with you.

I was listening to some old songs by the Chuck Wagon Gang the other day and one caught my attention. Now there are some here way to young to recall the Chuck Wagon Gang and likely not many recall the old song “Dust on the Bible”. Let me read a few verses.

I went into a home one day just to see some friends of mine
Of all their books and magazines, not a Bible could I find
I asked them for the Bible, when they brought it what a shame
For the dust was covered o'er it, not a fingerprint was plain

Dust on the Bible, dust on the Holy Word
The words of all the prophets and the sayings of our Lord
Of all the other books you'll find, there's none salvation holds
Get the dust off the Bible and redeem your poor soul

I thought it would be good to have for a lesson an overview of the Bible. It might be a good lesson to encourage us to look deeper into things in God's word, and to excite us about this wonderful book that directs us in the paths of righteousness so that our hope of heaven may one day be fulfilled. Mark had a wonderful sermon recently on the “The Prayer of Jabez” taken from something recorded in the middle of 9 chapters of genealogy in 1 Chronicles. It was a pearl in the middle of endless names that God saw fit to put there yet how many of us discovered it? As we have said many times, lessons often come from the desire to learn and so I hope this will encourage that desire. The title, Overview of the Bible, may sound as though we'll be here for the next couple of days, non-stop. But this is just going to be a very broad overview that hopefully will give us a taste for wanting to look deeper into the things of God's word.

The story of the Bible is a fascinating story and it is really a very simple story. In fact, sometimes it is perceived as being so simple that someone may think that they really don't have to spend much time in it because of the elementary principles. Such as having faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God, confessing that faith, repenting of our sins, being baptized for the remission of sins and being saved by God's grace.

All of these things are found in the word of God, but in their own way they are more complex than we may believe at first. Once we dig in and read however, then the complexities of these issues quickly dissolve, but it takes some time and effort to do that. It sometimes seems to me that people lack an interest in the Bible itself.

People are fascinated with movies and with books to the point they'll watch a favorite movie over and over again. They’ll read novels over and over and they can tell you everything about those novels. Yet when it comes to the book that can guide us to an eternal heavenly home, it seems that there's a lack of understanding, a lack of knowledge. That’s a neglect that needs to be repaired.

Though it is a book that directs us to righteousness man neglects it, though its pages explain our existence, man rejects it, though the words reveal an act of love and compassion unparalleled in human history, when Christ, the son of God, gave his life on the cross so that we might have eternal life, man rejects the words of God. In John 1:10-13 John writes speaking of Jesus; “He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.”

John writes that even though Christ was their creator, many people rejected him. I do not believe that this defines anyone present this morning, but rather we would be a people that are very interested in the word of God.

I. Before the Beginning: In our overview of the Bible this morning you might well think, we will start with creation, but the story of the Bible actually starts far before creation. In fact, it considers eternity.

A. When we think about God, we see One who is eternal, eternal in the heavens, a God that has always existed. In fact, we read in this Bible that His word always existed. I want to read to you from Proverbs Chapter 8. This is a fascinating reading and if you haven't read this or it's been a while since you've read it, follow along with me and think about the importance of these words in relationship to the story of the Bible. At the beginning of the chapter we read “ Does not wisdom cry out, and understanding lift up her voice? She takes her stand on the top of the high hill, beside the way, where the paths meet. She cries out by the gates, at the entry of the city, at the entrance of the doors: "To you, O men, I call, and my voice is to the sons of men.” Proverbs 8:1-4 tells us that the wisdom and understanding of God’s word is under consideration here.

B. Now Proverbs 8:22-31 – “"The Lord possessed me at the beginning of His way, before His works of old. I have been established from everlasting, from the beginning, before there was ever an earth. When there were no depths I was brought forth, when there were no fountains abounding with water. Before the mountains were settled, before the hills, I was brought forth; while as yet He had not made the earth or the fields, or the primeval dust of the world. When He prepared the heavens, I was there, when He drew a circle on the face of the deep, when He established the clouds above, when He strengthened the fountains of the deep, When He assigned to the sea its limit, so that the waters would not transgress His command, when He marked out the foundations of the earth, Then I was beside Him, as a master craftsman; and I was daily His delight, rejoicing always before Him, rejoicing in His inhabited world, and my delight was with the sons of men.”[NKJV]

1.The word of God has always been around. Even before one particle of dust or rock or drop of water was put upon this earth, there was the eternal word of God, complete in every way. The mind of God was there. We think about things eternal and that even before the world started, we see the word of God was.
2. Think about what it actually had to say even before each of us were put upon the face of this earth. The word of God tells us that before the world was even created, God had determined to save and elect people, a chosen people as Paul tells us in Ephesians 1:4 - “just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love,”
3. At Romans 8:29-30 the apostle Paul writes; “For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.”
4. Before anything was even formed in this world, before the foundation of the earth, that doctrine, that precept was in place. God knew that there would be people who would serve Him, who would be considered His elect, His chosen people. God knew that there would be people to do that before He even formed the earth that we live on. Before one man, before the man Adam and the woman Eve were even created this was known by God.

C. David helps us to understand the concept or the doctrine of fore-destination or predestination. The King James Version uses the word predestination. It's a good word, it says what it says. David helps us to understand the idea of God's foreknowledge of people who would serve him and people who would not serve him. In Psalms 14:5 when David wrote; “... For God is with the generation of the righteous.” that word generation comes from a Hebrew word translated into the Greek not as a period of time but as characterized by “quality”, “condition” or “class” of men. Liddell and Scott said that it means a person in a family, race, or stock, of horses a breed or kind, a race.

1. What David is saying, what the Apostle Paul is saying, what God is saying, is that before the foundation of the world, God knew that there would be a class of people, there would be a breed of people, there would be a family of people, who would conform their lives to the image of Jesus Christ. They will serve the Lord come what may in this life, no matter what hardship, no matter what difficulty, no matter what they face, they're going to serve the Lord with all their heart, mind and soul.
2. These are going to be people who do not permit their opinions to stand in the way, to stand between them and the word of God. These are people that will not let their personal convictions stand between them and the word of God and their hope of heaven. They will not form preconceived religious ideas about truth.
3. They'll let the truths of God's word conform their thinking and their minds. They will be as one, not only with other people of that class or family or generation—they will be one with God. Conform to an image of God, and God has always known about these special people. Before any dust particle or any water was on the Earth, God knew that there would be those who submit to His authoritative, eternal word.

D. As we continue this morning, let’s keep that idea in our minds so that we can understand the Bible; understand its objectives, where it's headed and where it wants to take us. If I understand that before I was created, before I came into this world, before you came to this world, that the word of God already existed, then I will understand that it's up to me to catch up to it, it doesn't catch up to me.

II. The Beginning: Now let’s read Genesis 1:1 – “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” In Psalms 33:6-9 tells us; “By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, And all the host of them by the breath of His mouth. He gathers the waters of the sea together as a heap; He lays up the deep in storehouses. Let all the earth fear the Lord; Let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of Him. For He spoke, and it was done; He commanded, and it stood fast.”

A. Here we see the authoritative power, the omnipotence of God as He spoke words and things formed, the elements obeyed Him, and the world came to be as we now know it.
B. In Genesis 1:26 we find that God created man in His own image, He created male and female and because He created them in His own image He knows—we can conform to His image! We were made that way.
C. As we continue to read through the early pages of the word of God, we find that it was not long before man disobeyed these precepts, these eternal existing laws, that were in place before Adam and Eve even came upon the face of the earth. In Genesis 2:16-17, God said that; “16. ... "Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; 17. "but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.''”

1. In Genesis 3:1 Satan comes on to the scene. I know that you've heard this, most people have read through this so many times, but read through it with me and follow the line of thought. Genesis 3:1- “Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, "Has God indeed said, 'You shall not eat of every tree of the garden'?''” When I read that I wondered, why did he say that? At Genesis 2:16-17 God says; “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat”. This is given in the form of a command, a law. We recognize this.
2. Satan asks, “Has God indeed said, 'You shall not eat of every tree of the garden'?” His approach is that of a question. The purpose of this query was to focus upon the restriction and prohibition which God had made regarding a certain tree. “And the woman said to the serpent, "We may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden; "but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, 'You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.'”
3. The glaring error on Eve's part is her mishandling of God's Word. She added to it saying; "nor shall you touch it". Thus, the groundwork for the fall was laid through adding to and altering the Word of God. “the serpent said to the woman, "You will not surely die” and you know the rest of the story.

D. The woman saw the fruit that it was good, and she ate it because she was tempted of Satan to do so. Then Adam followed suit and he also ate. Mankind fell from the very start, the very first two human beings to ever exist upon the face of the earth God created, sinned. They violated the commandment of God.

III. God’s Plan: God's plan at that point “kicks in” as we might say. Remember now, these words were in existence from all eternity.

A. Here we find God starts to reveal His plan to save man. In Genesis 3:15 we see the first ray of hope for Adam and Eve as they are cast out of the garden. “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.''” As we continue to read through our Bible we find statements of hope, statements that reveal a plan to redeem these sinners, these sinful people that had violated God's command.
B. In Genesis 12:1-4 we find God making a promise to Abraham and God says in that promise that “in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
C. In Second Samuel 7:12-15 we find the prophet Nathan telling David that it would be through his seed, that God would establish an eternal kingdom that would never, ever end.
D. When we turn to the pages of the New Testament, we find the meaning of these promises that were made of Genesis Chapter Twelve and Second Samuel Chapter 7.

1. We read the Apostle Paul’s writing in Galatians 3:5-9 – “Therefore He who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you, does He do it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? just as Abraham "believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.'' Therefore know that only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham. And the Scripture, foreseeing (foreseeing is significant here) foreseeing that God would justify the nations by faith, preached the gospel to Abraham beforehand, saying, "In you all the nations shall be blessed.'' So then those who are of faith are blessed with believing Abraham.”
2. We turn over to verse sixteen, the same chapter. “Now to Abraham and his Seed were the promises made. He does not say, "And to seeds,'' as of many, but as of one, "And to your Seed,'' who is Christ.” At that point, it is revealed to us that these promises that God made early on in the pages of Genesis, had to do with Christ. With Jesus Christ coming into the world and serving as a living sacrifice, so that man could have hope, because man sinned.

IV. The Law: Because of the revealed Word of God there would be generations upon generations upon generations of individuals who would come to see the need to be forgiven of trespasses. God is omnipotent, God is omniscient, God is the all knowing, all seeing God. He is creator of all things. He is all powerful, and man must come to see Him for what He is and meet His demands of absolute moral perfection.

A. “Therefore you shall be perfect”, Jesus said in Matthew 5:48, “just as your Father in heaven is perfect”. In Leviticus 11:44 God says “...you shall be holy; for I am holy...”

1. The Apostle Peter quotes this in 1st Peter 1:15-16 – “but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, "Be holy, for I am holy.''”
2. To get man to the point where they understood God's expectation of holiness and moral perfection, and to help them to feel the remorse, the guilt, to have this mournful spirit that Jesus would talk about in the Beatitudes, to get them to that point He brought law to them, the eternal existing law.

B. He would reveal it to man first by the way of Moses in what is known as the Mosaic Law. Galatians 3:23 the apostle Paul writes; “But before faith came, we were kept under guard by the law, kept for the faith which would afterward be revealed. Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor. For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.” This law was to bring people to faith and help them to see the magnitude of their sins, the horrendous state of their soul, the desperate need they had for the forgiveness of their sins. It was to prepare us to understand the need, and without the laws of God we would not see the state of desperation we are in.

C. Exodus 20:1 Moses is at Mount Sinai and he receives the Ten Commandments. In Hebrews 8:4-6 the author of Hebrews tells us that these laws that God had given through Moses were a “shadow of the heavenly things”. In Hebrews 10:1 the author tells us “For the law, having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things...”

1. They didn't represent the end where God wanted to bring men, but they were a step. They were a tutor to get man to where he needed to be.
2. Furthermore, he tells us at Hebrews 7:18-19 “For on the one hand there is an annulling of the former commandment because of its weakness and unprofitableness, for the law made nothing perfect; on the other hand, there is the bringing in of a better hope, through which we draw near to God.”
3. The law lacked something. The Law of Moses was lacking in that he says it could not make a man perfect and that's what God was after. Perfection, absolute moral perfection and the Mosaic Law could not do this. This was its unprofitableness.

V. The Savior: God had always planned before the foundation of the world to bring Christ into the world. We can read about the Christ all throughout the Old Testament scriptures. There are many, many prophecies, words that speak about the coming of Jesus and what He would represent.

A. Maybe the most memorable statements which people recall are in Isaiah 9:6 where the Prophet of God said to us; “For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given; and the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end, upon the throne of David and over His kingdom, to order it and establish it with judgment and justice from that time forward, even forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.”

1. The Christ would come into the world and He would preach the gospel of the kingdom, the gospel of peace with God. He would also be crucified by the very ones that He created, by the very ones that He taught, by the very ones that He loved, those He was trying to guide on the paths of righteousness so that they could attain eternal life. They would slay Him on a cross.
2. Three days later, Christ rose from the grave. He was resurrected and He ascended into the heavens. All of this was foretold, it was written. All this was in the mind of God before one particle of dust came together on the Earth, before we were created.
3. Think about this, before you stepped a foot onto this earth, before you took a breath of life, this was all in place. You grew from being a one moment old child to where you are right now, and you learn things from this book about God the Father and His eternal word which has been in existence before you ever were.

B. Christ ascended into the heavens and He brought a new law. We read from Galatians Chapter 3 that it was the object of the Mosaic Law to serve as a tutor, to bring us to Christ, to bring us to faith and help us to see our need to be forgiven of sin, to paint a picture of the horrendous nature of sin and the state that it puts one in to be separated from God, Isaiah 59:1-2.
C. Starting in Jeremiah 31:31ff we read; “"Behold, the days are coming,'' says the Lord, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah ”

1. Scripture foretold of this new law that would come. This new law would be different than the old law Moses delivered. The law that Moses delivered was unprofitable in that it could not prefect anyone, that is, forgiving people of their sins. But that would not be the case with the law of Christ.
2. Jeremiah tells us that through the law of Christ, the new covenant, men would be forgiven. Verse 34 says; “No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, 'Know the Lord,' for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,'' says the Lord. "For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.”

CONCLUSION: As we bring this mornings portion of our overview to a close let me go back to what led me to present this and that is “Dust on the Bible”. Why are people ignorant of the Bible? Some do not study it. Some do not want to understand it. Some have minds that are cluttered with other things. Some have not learned to rightly divide it. And unfortunately some are prejudiced against it.
It is impossible to have a saving scripture knowledge without regular study (Acts 17:11; 2 Timothy 2:15). We do not expect to learn math, English, science, history or literature without cracking a book. The Bible is no different.

There are religious people that do not study Scripture. Instead they rely on the traditions of their parents and the views of their preachers. Many could not point to the Bible as authority for what they believe (cf. Colossians 3:17). Christ’s words are hauntingly real in our generation, “You are mistaken, not knowing the Scriptures” (Matthew 22:29). Some spend more time with Swindoll or Lucado than they do Peter and Paul. As strange as it sounds, we need to put the Bible back into our religious curriculum.

Scripture speaks of those who are willfully ignorant (2 Peter 3:5). The Bible condemns sins; therefore, sinners do not enjoy reading it. Deeds of darkness do not enjoy exposure to light. Woodrow Wilson said, “A man has deprived himself of the best there is in the world, who has deprived himself of a knowledge of the Bible . . . I have a very simple thing to ask of you. I ask every man and woman in this audience that from this day on they will realize that part of the destiny of America lies in their daily perusal of this great Book.”

Jesus spoke of thorny-ground where the seed of the Word was choked. One of those thorn bushes was the “cares of this world” (Matthew 13:22). Good, moral people sometimes get too busy with family, food, finances, and fun to give the Word space to grow. Even among Bible readers, ignorance can remain if they fail to meditate on the Bible’s precepts (Psalm 1:2). No knowledge on this earth, not now or ever, is as important as Bible knowledge.

We use sunglasses to dim the intensity of the sun. There are those that put shades on their mind’s eye to dim the Gospel light. They come to the Bible with their minds already made up as to what it says. Like the ancient Jews (Matthew 13:15), they make it fit their beliefs rather than fitting their life to it. This makes proper interpretation impossible.

If there somebody here who is not a member of the body of Christ and you have come to believe in your heart that Jesus is indeed the Christ, the son of the living God, and you're willing to confess that faith and repent of your sins we'd be glad to assist you as you are baptized into the body of Christ. You will then as a Christian take up your cross daily and follow by faith, studying His word and growing in understanding.
If you’re a child of God already and your faith has been weak to where you have gone astray, if there is sin between you and God, I would like to encourage you to deal with it.
God is gracious; God is willing to forgive you. We as your brothers and sisters in Christ will pray for you, pray with you and do the very best we can to encourage you.

If you are subject to the Gospel call in any way, you are invited to come forward and make your need known while we stand and sing the song of invitation.

Invitation song: # ??? Reference Sermon by: John Robertson

How Does It Look to You Now?

How Does It Look to You Now?  

Haggai 2:3-7 , Philippians 2:13

Our scripture text this evening is from Haggai, the third book from the end of the OT. And in chapter 2, vs's 3-7 the prophet Haggai is delivering a message from God to the people of Israel. He says:

"`Who of you is left who saw this house in its former glory? How does it look to you now? Does it not seem to you like nothing? But now be strong, O Zerubbabel,' declares the Lord.

‘Be strong, O Joshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest. Be strong, all you people of the land,' declares the Lord, ‘& work. For I am with you,' declares the Lord Almighty.

‘This is what I covenanted with you when you came out of Egypt. And my Spirit remains among you. Do not fear.' This is what the Lord Almighty says:

‘In a little while I will once more shake the heavens & the earth, the sea & the dry land. I will shake all nations, & the desired of all nations will come, & I will fill this house with glory,' says the Lord Almighty."

Now the subject God is talking about here is an important one, & we'll get to it a little bit later in this sermon.

But right now I particularly want us to notice the question in the middle of the third verse, "How does it look to you now?" That is a good question to ask periodically in our lives: "How does it look to you now?"

Look back over 2019, how does it look to you now? Now we can look back & see all the hopes & dreams, disappointments & sorrows of 2019.

We can also ask this question about 2020. As we look forward, some prophets of doom tell us that this year is going to be a bad year. But others say that 2020 will be a great year!

So what do you see?

ILL. Behavioral scientists have discovered that we usually see things that we prepare ourselves to see, & that this is all centered in a network of nerve cells called the "Reticular Activating System." And everybody here today has a "Reticular Activating System." Did you know that?

The Reticular Activating System works like this. Once something has been brought to our attention & we have been prepared to see it, we'll see it virtually everywhere we go.

For example, if you decide to buy a new car & you make up your mind that you are going to buy a certain brand, a certain body style, & a certain color, all of a sudden you'll see those cars everywhere.

You'll see them on the roads, in TV advertisements, in newspapers & magazines. They're everywhere.

Now what has happened? They were always there, but the moment you focused your attention to see them, your Reticular Activating System kicked in, & suddenly you saw them everywhere.

It happens in other areas of life, too. We see what we are prepared to see. If we're prepared to see doom & gloom, that's what we'll see. If, on the other hand, we have prepared ourselves to see sunshine & opportunities, then that is what we are going to see.

So let's ask the question, "How does it look to you now?" & consider it in 3 different areas.

I.  HOW DO YOU LOOK TO YOURSELF?

First of all, how do you look to yourself? When you look in the mirror, what kind of person looks back - someone who is weak, who isn't worth very much?

Or do you see an eager, optimistic person who can hardly wait for each day to begin because there are so many things to do? What do you see when you look at yourself?

I hear people say things like, "Why, I can't do that." Or, "That's just too hard." Others say, "I know I'm hard to get along with, but that's just the way I am. Lord knows, I've tried, but I can't seem to change."

But the Bible says that when God's Holy Spirit comes to live in our lives He can bring about dramatic & drastic changes, if we will let Him.

When He came into the life of Saul of Tarsus, who was persecuting the church, He changed Saul into the gentle & yet strong Apostle Paul. And He can make the same kind of changes in our lives, too.

But a lot depends upon what we see. How do you look to yourself? Let me challenge you from Scripture to see yourself the way God sees you.

In Philippians 2:13 God says something that ought to influence how we see ourselves. " ¹³ for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure.

Paul is saying that we are a part of God's investment - bundles of unlimited opportunity & potential. God wants to change us, & then through us He wants to influence & change the world.

So don't go around saying, "Well, that's just the way I am. God can change you, if you'll let Him have His way in your life.

ILL. Someone said, "Life can be hard if lived by the yard. But it is a cinch by the inch." So place your life in God's hand & live it one inch at a time.

ILL. Some years ago two young brothers decided to pour kerosene in the pot bellied stove in their school room because it was cold & they wanted to warm things up.

They poured what they thought was kerosene on the fire, but it was gasoline, & the stove exploded. It killed one boy & left the other with badly burned legs. Doctors told his parents that they must amputate his legs right away or his whole body could become infected.

The parents said, "Let's wait a day." The next day the doctors said, "His legs must be amputated." The parents said, "No, let's wait another day."

This went on for several weeks, until finally the doctors discovered that the legs were healing, but that the left leg would be 2 1/2 inches shorter than the right leg. The doctors said, "He will keep his legs, but he'll never be able to walk."

Within a few weeks the boy was standing up & hobbling around on crutches. The doctors changed their prediction. "Well, he may be able to walk, but he'll never be able to walk without crutches."

But within a few more weeks he was walking without crutches. So they said, "Well, he may be able to walk without crutches, but he'll never be able to run." But then he broke into a wobbly jog & soon he was running.

That boy was Glenn Cunningham, who, in the 1930's, won gold medals & set world records in track, & in his day was called, "The fastest human being on two feet."

You see, with God everybody has potential. God can even take crippled bodies & shattered lives,

& with them change the world. So how does it look to you when you look in the mirror? What do you see?

II.  HOW DOES THE WORLD LOOK TO YOU?

The second question is, "How does the world look to you?" The Bible teaches us that God so loves the world that He gave His only begotten Son so that whoever believes in Him, might have everlasting life.

God loves the world, & sees each of us as channels through whom His message of love might travel. So what do you feel when you look at the world? Are you concerned at all?

ILL. Tim Hansen in his book "Holy Sweat" tells about trying to teach a group of boys in High School who were totally uninterested in what he was teaching. So he decided that he was going to get their attention one way or another.

He tried every way he could think of to get them to listen. But day after day they just defied him to get them interested in anything. Finally, he went to the chalkboard & in desperation wrote the word, "APATHY" in great big 3-foot letters across the blackboard. Then he turned around & looked at his class.

He said that there was one big senior boy, sitting at his desk, squinting at those letters - reading them out aloud, "A P A T H Y." The boy scratched his head for a moment, & then read it out loud again, & tried to pronounce it - "A-pa-thy."

Pretty soon the boy turned to his buddy & said, "A-pa-thy. What's that mean?" His buddy shrugged his shoulders & answered, "Who cares?"

I wonder if we exhibit that attitude sometimes when we look at our world today? Do you see it as an opportunity to share the love of God, or do you care? What do you see when you look at the world around you today?

III. HOW DOES THE CHURCH LOOK TO YOU?

Finally, how does the church look to you today? Let's look again at the passage in the Book of Haggai that I read to begin this sermon. In it God instructs Haggai to speak to Gov. Zerubbabel, to the high priest, & to all the people.

The occasion is this. After years of exile in Babylonia, their new Persian rulers had set the Jews free - free to return to their homeland, to rebuild Jerusalem & Solomon's temple that the Babylonians had destroyed.

So after they return, God says to the prophet Haggai, "Speak to them & ask them, 'How many of you remember what the Temple was like before it was destroyed?'"

There were some who could remember when the temple stood in all of its glory, when people came & worshiped, sacrifices were offered, when prayers rose up to God. Those had been exciting times of worship & fellowship as people came together in God's house.

Then God asks, "How does it look to you now?" And what they saw was just a pile of rubble, because the temple lay in ruins.

But then three times God says, "Be strong." "Be strong," to Zerubbabel. "Be strong," to the High Priest. "Be strong," to all the people.

He said, "Here is the reason you can be strong, I'm with you. I’ve made a covenant with you. My spirit remains among you. Do not fear, for I'm going to shake the heavens & the earth. I'm going to shake the sea & the dry land. I'm going to shake all the nations."

Then He said, ⁷ I will shake all nations, and what is desired by all nations will come, and I will fill this house with glory,’ says the Lord Almighty. (Haggai 2:7)

Now, what about the church? As you look around, what do you see? Do you see just a beautiful building, or do you see a room full of people with the potential to make a difference in the lives of men & women, boys & girls, for the glory of God?

2020 is unfolding before us. The way we see it, with God's help, is the way it can be. God is alive & on His throne. Nothing is impossible with Him. He waits for a willing church to answer His call, to respond to His challenge, to reach out to a world that desperately needs to hear His message.

ILL. A nurse who used to work with young children in the pediatric ward of a hospital said, "When I worked in the pediatric ward, before I listened to the little ones' chests, I would plug the stethoscope into their ears & let them listen to their own hearts. Their eyes would always light up with awe.

"But I never got a response to equal 4year old David's. I gently tucked the stethoscope in his ears & placed the disk over his heart. 'Listen,' I said. 'What do you suppose that is?'

"He drew his eyebrows together in a puzzled line & looked up as if lost in the mystery of the strange tap tap tapping deep in his chest. Then his face broke out in a wondrous grin. 'Is that Jesus knocking?' he asked."

Somewhere, maybe in Sunday School, David had heard that scripture where Jesus is standing at the door of our hearts, knocking & asking for admission.

INVITATION: If you are here this evening and haven’t opened your heart and life to Jesus and his pattern of life

Repenting of your sins

Confessing he is the Son of the Living God

Being baptized for the remission of your sins

And then walking a new life

It is my privilege to extend His invitation, with the assurance that He can take whatever you are right now & change you in ways that you never thought possible. We extend His invitation & pray you will respond…

as we stand and sing the song of invitation

Contributing Sermon Given

By Melvin Newland

The Prayer of Jabez

The Prayer of Jabez

1 Chronicles 4:9-10, Ephesians 1:3

 

ILL. During some of the darkest days of the American Revolution, after the Continental Army had experienced several defeats, a farmer who lived near Gen. George Washington’s camp decided to pay the soldiers a visit.

 

As he approached the camp he overheard a voice raised in agonizing prayer. On closer inspection he saw Gen. Washington down on his knees in the snow, tears streaming down his cheeks, asking God for assistance & guidance. The farmer crept away & returned home.

 

Once there he said to his family, "Its going to be all right. We're going to win!" "What makes you think that?" his wife asked. "Well," said the farmer, "I heard Gen. Washington pray out in the woods today - such fervent prayer I have never heard. And God will surely hear & answer that kind of praying."

 

Such was the prayer of a man we're going to look at this morning. And he’s known for a very short prayer that he prayed.

 

If you were to turn to the first 9 chapters of the book of 1 Chronicles, you would find a list of genealogies containing more than 500 names! These names make up the official family tree of the Hebrew tribes, beginning with Adam & continuing up to Israel’s return from captivity.

 

Most names are mentioned with no comment, but there is someone mentioned in chapter 4 who stands out above the crowd. His name is Jabez. And he's not particularly remembered for what he did, but for what he prayed.

 

Listen to 1 Chronicles 4:9 (NKJV). “Now Jabez was more honorable than his brothers, and his mother called his name Jabez, saying, ‘Because I bore him in pain.’”

Do you understand what it is saying about his name? His mother named him "Jabez" because that name in Hebrew means “sorrow " or "misery" or "pain."

His mother experienced great pain when he was delivered, & she named him "Pain" so that he would never forget the pain he had caused her.

 

Children are given names for all kinds of reasons. Did you happen to read this story in the Reader’s Digest? 

Following the 1960s, San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury district changed from being a "hippie" community to a high rent area. Many of the hippies moved down the coast to Santa Cruz. So,

Santa Cruz natives soon found their children going to school with other children bearing names such as "Time Warp", "Spring Fever", "Moonbeam", "Earth", & "Precious Promise".

That’s when the kindergarten teachers met "Fruit Stand." Every fall, for the first few days of school, parents were told to pin name tags to their children's clothes, kiss them good-bye & send them off to school on the bus.

 

So it was for "Fruit Stand". The teachers thought the name on his nametag was rather odd, but they tried to make the best of it.

"Would you like to play with the blocks, Fruit Stand?" they asked. And later, "Fruit Stand, how about a snack?" He accepted hesitantly. But by the end of the day, his name didn’t seem much stranger than some of the others.

 

Well, at dismissal time, the teachers led the children out to the buses. "Fruit Stand, do you know which one is your bus?" He didn’t answer. That wasn’t strange. He hadn’t answered them all day long. Lots of children are shy on the first day of school. It didn’t matter.

 

The teachers had instructed the parents to write the names of their children’s bus stops on the reverse side of their name tags. So the teacher simply turned over Fruit Stand's tag. There, neatly printed, was the word "Anthony."

 

Jabez' name is buried in the middle of 9 chapters of genealogies.

But Jabez is like a shining star in a long list of anonymous characters. And what Jabez is remembered for is not some outstanding achievement, but for a prayer that he prayed.

 

Let’s look at it & see. Let’s see why God was pleased enough with his prayer to have it forever recorded in scripture. Listen to it.

 

(1 Chronicles 4:10, NKJV). "And Jabez called on the God of Israel saying, ‘Oh, that You would bless me indeed, & enlarge my territory, that Your hand would be with me, & that You would keep me from evil, that I may not cause pain!’”

 

His prayer had 4 parts: #1, He prayed that God would bless him. #2, He prayed that God would enlarge his territory. #3, He prayed that God’s hand would be with him. #4, He prayed that God would keep him from evil.

And in response to his prayer, the last part of vs. 10 says, "So God granted him what he requested” (NKJV).

If we want God to answer our prayers, then maybe we ought to take a careful look at this prayer & see why God granted Jabez what he requested.

 

I.  JABEZ PRAYED FOR GOD TO BLESS HIM

1. The first thing we notice is that Jabez prayed for God to bless him. He wanted God’s blessing on his life.

 One man wrote: "I used to think it was selfish to ask God to bless me. Then I realized that the word 'blessed' means to have God’s favor upon your life. It isn’t selfish to ask for that; in fact, all Christians should be asking God to have favor upon their lives."

 

There is nothing wrong with praying for God to bless you if it is for the purpose of being a blessing. If you want to have more so that you can give more, then that is an acceptable prayer.

If you want wisdom so that you can help other people, then pray for wisdom, for the Bible says, in James 1:5

“If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, & it will be given to him.”

 

In (Ephesians 1:3) we find these words: “³ Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ:”

 

God wants to bless His people – so it is not wrong for Jabez to ask to be blessed, & it is not wrong for you or for me to ask God to bless us either.

 

If you want success, or want to be a leader because you want to serve others with more talents & resources, then pray for those things in order that your life may be a blessing.

 

Jabez knew that God had told his ancestor Abraham in

(Genesis 12:2), “I will make you into a great nation & I will bless you; I will make your name great, & you will be a blessing.”)

And Jabez wanted to share in that blessing, too.

God wants to bless us, but we must want the blessing for the right reasons.

 

If you're not closer to God now than you were last year, then somehow you have missed a blessing. You need to pray for God to bless you & bring a new fire into your soul; a new passion for God; a new zeal for serving Him; a new desire to have your life be a blessing to others.

 

II.  JABEZ PRAYED THAT GOD WOULD ENLARGE HIS TERRITORY

You see, so many people never have a purpose larger than themselves. This is why Jabez prayed the second part of his prayer: that God would enlarge his territory.

With more land he could grow more crops, employ more workers, give more to the needy, & provide for an extended family & for strangers that come his way, as the Law required.

As an honorable man, He was not thinking only of himself, he was thinking about the welfare of others. Jabez was asking to be used by God.

Are you living only for yourself, or are you wanting God to use your life for His glory? Do you want to be blessed by God in order to be a blessing?

How many ways can you think of that God could enlarge your territory?

One of the things I'm praying about for my children and grandchildren is that God would bless them in order that they might be used by Him in this world. I'm praying that they will have a passion for God, & that He will give them the necessary tools to serve Him.

 

I'm also praying that prayer for you and I. I want us to be God’s people, being used by him in a world that needs Him desperately.

I want us to live for more than ourselves & our own interests. I pray that our lives will be used in serving God by serving the needs of others. I want to be a part of what God wants to do in this world.

 

In a time of great discouragement, God spoke through the prophet Isaiah in (Isaiah 54:2) saying, “Enlarge the place of your tent, stretch your tent curtains wide, do not hold back; lengthen your cords, strengthen your stakes.”

 

God wants us to see beyond our circumstances to what can be accomplished if we will join in seeking His blessing.

 

III. JABEZ PRAYED FOR GOD'S HAND TO BE WITH HIM

Thirdly, Jabez prayed for God’s hand to be with him. Jabez knew that what he was praying for was bigger than what he could accomplish by himself.

He was praying for something so big that only the hand of God on his life could accomplish it.

 

It has been said that “God answers prayer in 4 ways:

‘Yes,’

‘No,’

‘Wait a while’        &           ‘You’ve got to be kidding!’”

And I think that there are times when I pray that God answers, “You’ve got to be kidding, Mark.

You think that will work?

I can see the end result, & if we do that it would defeat everything you’re trying to do.”

So, our prayers should always include “not my will, but yours be done.”

I think we should all pray, "Lord, let your hand be with me" because when God’s hand is upon us – we do not need to be afraid. God wants to take care of us.

Shouldn't we ask for His care? Shouldn't we ask for His presence in our lives?

Psalm 37:23-25 says: ²³ The steps of a good man are ^[a]ordered by the Lord, And He delights in his way.
²⁴ Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down;
For the Lord upholds him with His hand.

²⁵ I have been young, and now am old;
Yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken,
Nor his descendants begging bread.

God wants to walk with us. Shouldn't we pray for His presence in our lives?

 

IV.  JABEZ PRAYED THAT GOD WOULD KEEP HIM FROM EVIL

But the final part of Jabez’s prayer is the most important: Jabez prayed that God would keep him from evil.

“Keep me from evil that I might not cause pain."

I understand that! His birth had caused pain, & his name meant pain. But he didn't want to cause any more pain to others.

He wanted his life to be a blessing.

 

Jabez wanted to be protected from evil, because he knew that sin causes pain in the life of the one who commits it, & it brings pain into the lives of those who are victims. But most of all, sin brings pain to the heart of God.

Do you remember what the Bible says the world was like just prior to the flood in Noah’s day? 

Genesis 6:5-6 says that, “The Lord saw how great man’s wickedness on the earth had become, & that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time."

Then it says, “The Lord was grieved that He had made man on the earth, & His heart was filled with pain.” Sin brings pain to the heart of God.

 

I think that perhaps the greatest evidence of the pain that sin brings is the cry of Jesus as He hung upon the cross for us,

“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46)

Can you imagine not only the suffering of Jesus, but also the suffering of the Father as He turned away from Jesus because of our sins?

 

During the depression years a Texan by the name of Yates owned a sheep ranch. But he just wasn’t making enough to pay the principal & interest on the mortgage, so he was in danger of losing his ranch.

With little money for clothes or food, his family (like many others at that time) had to live on a government subsidy.

 

Then one day a seismographic crew from an oil company came into the area & told him there might be oil on his land. They asked permission to drill a wildcat well, & he signed a lease with them. That well came in at 80,000 barrels a day.

 

Many subsequent wells were more than twice as large. And Mr. Yates owned them all. The day he bought the land he had received the oil & mineral rights too. Yet for years he’d been barely surviving on welfare.

 

A multimillionaire living in poverty! His problem? Even though he owned all the mineral rights on his land, he just didn’t know the oil was there.

 

 

Many today are living in spiritual poverty because they just don't realize

how much God loves them;

that through Jesus He is ready to forgive their sins,

and that he desires to bless their lives with a peace that the Bible says "passes all understanding."

 

Today, we have the opportunity to be obedient to God’s plan of salvation:

Repenting of our sins and being baptized for the remission of our sins to walk in newness of life.

 

INVITATION: Will you come, seek His blessing, & feel the hand of God working in your life?

As we stand and Sing the song of Invitation.

  

  

Contributing Sermon Given

By Melvin Newland

Lesson of the Garbage Truck

Lesson Of The Garbage Truck!
Philippians 4:8, Philippians 1:12-23

ILL. Someone wrote, "One day I got into a taxi & we took off for the airport. We were driving in the right lane when a car suddenly sped out of an alley right in front of us. My taxi driver slammed on his brakes, skidded, & missed crashing into the other car by inches!
The driver of that car stuck his head out of the window & yelled at us. My taxi driver just smiled & waved at him. So I asked, “Why did you just smile at him? That guy almost caused a wreck & then began cursing you!”
That was when my taxi driver taught me what I now call the “Lesson of the Garbage Truck.” He explained that many people are like garbage trucks. They run around full of garbage, full of frustration, full of anger & disappointment.
As their garbage piles up, they need a place to dump it, & sometimes they’ll dump it on you. Don’t take it personally. Don’t take their garbage & dump it on other people at home, or at work, or on the streets. Just smile, wish them well, & move on.
You see, what you pay attention to, what you dwell upon in life will generally determine the kind of decisions you make.
Ella Wilcox wrote:
"One ship sails east & another west with the self-same winds that blow.
'Tis the set of the sail & not the gale which determines the way they go."
The apostle Paul gives us great advice in Philippians 4:8. "Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable if anything is excellent or praiseworthy think about such things."
Now we ought to memorize that verse, realizing that what so many are doing today is the exact opposite. Look at the TV programs, popular magazines, even newspapers & you will often see glorification of things that are impure & untrue.

INTRO: People focus so much on the negative that the media seldom features positive news because they’re afraid they’ll lose their audience. But let's break that pattern this evening, & look at the Apostle Paul as he focuses on the positive.
A family who had twin boys wanted to teach them a lesson about attitude. They took each boy and placed him in a room by himself. The room was full of horse manure. They told the boys they had to stay in their rooms for an hour, then they would come get them. When the family returned to the first boy’s room, he was sitting in the corner of the room just watching the clock, but when they returned to the second boy’s room, he was shoveling the manure out the window. “why are you doing that?” they asked. He replied, “With all this manure in here, there has to be a pony at the bottom of the pile.” The boys were in similar situations, but took completely different approaches.
In Philippians 1:12-23, Paul mentions some negative things that are going on in his life unpleasant circumstances, unreasonable people, & his uncertain future.
But Paul goes on to show that God was able to use those negative things in a very positive way.

1. UNPLEASANT CIRCUMSTANCES
   A. Paul begins by talking about unpleasant circumstances. In vs. 12 he says, "Now I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel."
   We think we have troubles, don't we? But how does your list compare to that of the apostle Paul? How many times have you been shipwrecked? How many times have you been beaten near unto death? Or how many times have you been arrested, chained up & imprisoned 24 hours a day?
   Yet Paul says, "I remember all these trials, & I see that they have all served to advance the gospel."
   Now the Greek word translated "advance" in vs. 12 has an interesting history. It originally was used for wood cutters who go before an army, clearing a way through the underbrush so that the army can proceed unimpeded.
   Paul is saying, "All these things that have happened to me have resulted in clearing the way so that the gospel might be preached more effectively."
   B. In vs. 13, he says, "As a result, it has become clear throughout the whole palace guard & to everyone else that I am in chains for Christ."
   Now here is the situation. For 24 hours a day Paul is chained to Roman soldiers, each serving a 6 hour shift. So every 6 hours a new soldier comes in & chains himself to Paul. The soldier was doing his duty, making sure the prisoner couldn't escape.
   But Paul saw this as a wonderful opportunity to tell the soldier about Jesus. There was no way that the soldier could escape. And it worked, for in the 4th chapter of this letter, vs. 22, Paul writes, "All the saints send you greetings, especially those who belong to Caesar's household."
   Now that tells us that some of these soldiers became Christians, & the gospel made its way into the pagan household of Caesar all because Paul was in prison.
   C. There was a second positive result. In vs. 14 he says, "Because of my chains, most of the brothers in the Lord have been encouraged to speak the word of God more courageously & fearlessly."
   Paul is saying, "Because of my hardships, because of the things that have happened to me, other Christians have been encouraged. They have seen how God has encourage & protected me through difficult situations, & given me strength beyond my own power."
   "Now they're facing difficult circumstances, too. But because of what they have seen in me, they're convinced that God will take care of them also."
   ILL. Bob Benson, in his book, "See You At The House," tells of a good friend who had a severe heart attack & almost died, but was now well on the road to recovery.
   Visiting him, Bob asked, "Bill, how do you feel about your heart attack?' Bill answered, ‘I hate it. It nearly killed me.'"
   Bob asked, "Would you like to have another one?" "Certainly not!" "Would you recommend it for someone else?" "Absolutely not."
   Bob went on, "Bill, now that you're feeling better, do you treasure your life more than before?" "Yes, I guess I do." "You & your wife have always had a good solid marriage, but are you closer to each other now than before?" "Yes," Bill answered.
   "And what about your relationship with God? Has that changed since your heart attack?" "Yes, I feel a whole lot closer to God now than I ever did before."
   "Bill, in the light of all this, how do you feel about your heart attack now?"
   SUM. You see, God can take the most negative things that happen to us, & make them positive, if we'll just focus on the positives that are there.
   APPL. So what are you chained to this morning? Are you chained to loneliness or grief or despair? Are you chained to an imperfect body? Are you chained to declining health? How do you really feel this evening?
   ILL. I like this story about John Quincy Adams, the 6th president of the United States. When he was 80 years old & not too long before his death, a friend asked him, “Well, how is John Quincy Adams today?”
   Adams replied, “John Quincy Adams is quite well, thank you. But the house in which he lives is becoming dilapidated. It is teetering. Time and the seasons have nearly destroyed it, & it is becoming quite uninhabitable. I shall move out of it soon. But John Quincy Adams is quite well, thank you.”
2. UNREASONABLE PEOPLE
   A. Secondly, Paul talks about unreasonable people. In vs. 15 he says, "It is true that some preach Christ out of envy & rivalry, but others out of good will." What Paul is saying is this, "There are some people who are envious of me, who see themselves as rivals, competitors in preaching the gospel."
   Now what happens when people become envious of someone else? They usually try to tear them down. They point out all the negative things they can about that person, thinking that by pulling them down, they're building themselves up.
   XXXXXXXX
   SUM. And as we are all now very painfully aware, anyone who is in a position of prominence is liable to all kinds of criticism & accusations.
   B. Even as Paul was writing this letter, he was a prisoner of the Romans because of the false accusations made by Jewish rulers in Jerusalem. Listen to what he wrote in vs. 18, "But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice."
3. UNCERTAIN FUTURE
   A. Finally, Paul mentions his uncertain future. In vs. 19 he says, "I know that through your prayers & the help given by the Spirit of Jesus Christ, what has happened to me will turn out for my deliverance."
   Paul is facing trial in Rome. If he is found innocent, he'll be freed to preach some more. If he's found guilty, he'll be executed. He knew he was either going to live, or he was going to die, depending upon the results of the trial.
   B. So he writes in vs. 20: "I eagerly expect & hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death."
   Do you hear what he is saying? "My concern is, when I stand before a pagan judge in a pagan court, that I won't do anything to embarrass Christ Jesus, my Lord.
   ”I pray that I will have enough courage to stand up in their midst, & that by what I say & do Jesus Christ will be exalted. Whether I live or whether I die doesn't matter. All I want to do is exalt Jesus."
   C. Vs. 21 is also a familiar verse. You may have memorized it at one time or another. Paul says, "For to me, to live is Christ & to die is gain." The Living Bible paraphrases it this way: "To me, living means opportuni¬ty for Christ, & dying, that's even better!"
   D. In vs's 22-23 Paul says, "If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know! I am torn between the two: I desire to depart & be with Christ, which is better by far..."
   ILL. An old country preacher lived to be 90 years old. On his death bed, as family & friends gathered around him, they saw the agony & pain he was experiencing.
   But all of a sudden everything changed, & a look of peace & a smile came upon his face. His eyes opened, & he lifted up his hands, & said, "I see it! I see it! Do you see it? It's so beautiful!" And then he died.
   That's why Paul could say, "For to me, to live is Christ & to die is gain."
   ILL. Kenneth Dodge tells about an 8 year old boy named Frank. Frank had a date with his father to go fishing on Saturday. They were going to fish the whole day. On Friday night he had everything laid out. He was ready to go!
   But Saturday morning he awoke to discover that it was raining cats & dogs, & they couldn't go fishing. So 8 year old Frank grumbled & griped all morning long. He kicked the furniture & the dog. Nothing was right. "Why does it have to rain today?"
   His father tried to explain to him that the farmers needed the rain. But that didn't satisfy Frank. "But why does it have to rain today?" he said.
   About noon the clouds broke & the sun came out. His dad said, "Well, we can't go fishing all day, but at least we can fish this afternoon. Let's go." So they went to the lake, fished all afternoon, & caught more fish than they had ever caught before. Their baskets were full, & they had a wonderful time together!
   They came home, & mom cooked some of the fish for supper. As they sat down to eat, Frank's dad looked at him & asked, "Would you ask the blessing?"
   8-year-old Frank prayed this prayer: "God, if I sounded a little grumpy earlier today, it was because I couldn't see far enough ahead."
   APPL. That's the problem, isn't it? We get so caught up in the circumstances & people & things that surround us that we just can't see far enough ahead.
   But when we take time to look & listen, we'll begin to focus more & more on the positive, because in Christ we have a wonderful future. It may seem uncertain right now, but one day we'll see Him face to face & be with Him for all eternity.
   

INVITATION: If you're here & you have a need to make your life right with the Lord
Either through baptism for the remission of your sins
Or by turning BACK to God and asking for the prayers of the congregation
we extend His invitation to you.
If you truly believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God, we urge you to make your faith known, & then to follow His example & command in Christian baptism. If you do, He has promised to forgive your sins, & give you a brand new relationship with him. We encourage you to come as we stand & as we sing.

Contributing Sermon Given By
Melvin Newland

Common Mistakes to Avoid!

Common Mistakes to Avoid!

 Psalms 31:1-20, Genesis 12:10-13

 A young woman went to her mother and told her about her life and how things were so hard for her. She did not know how she was going to make it and wanted to give up. She was tired of fighting and struggling. It seemed as one problem was solved, a new one arose.

Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three pots with water and placed each on a high fire. Soon the pots came to boil. In the first she placed carrots, in the second she placed eggs, and in the last she placed ground coffee beans. She let them sit and boil, without saying a word.

In about twenty minutes she turned off the burners. She fished the carrots out and placed them in a bowl. She pulled the eggs out and placed them in a bowl. Then she ladled the coffee out and placed it in a bowl. Turning to her daughter, she asked, “Tell me, what do you see?” “Carrots, eggs, and coffee,” she replied.

Her mother brought her closer and asked her to feel the carrots. She did and noted that they were soft. The mother then asked the daughter to take an egg and break it. After pulling off the shell, she observed the hard boiled egg. Finally, the mother asked the daughter to sip the coffee. The daughter smiled as she tasted its rich aroma. The daughter then asked, “What does it mean, mother?”

Her mother explained that each of these objects had faced the same adversity – boiling water. Each reacted differently. The carrot went in strong, hard, and unrelenting. However, after being subjected to the boiling water, it softened and became weak. The egg had been fragile. Its thin outer shell had protected its liquid interior, but after sitting through the boiling water, its inside became hardened. The ground coffee beans were unique, however. After they were in the boiling water, they had changed the water.

“Which are you?” she asked her daughter. “When adversity knocks on your door, how do you respond? Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?”

Are you the carrot that seems strong, but with pain and adversity wilts, becomes soft, and loses strength? Are you the egg that starts with a malleable heart, but changes with the heat? Does your shell look the same, but on the inside are you bitter and tough with a stiff spirit and hardened heart?

Or are you the coffee bean? Actually changing the hot water, the very circumstance that brings the pain. When the water gets hot, it releases the fragrance and flavor. If you are like the bean, when things are at their worst, you get better and change the situation around you. When the hour is the darkest and trials are their greatest, do you elevate yourself to another level?”

Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean? How do you reacted to adversity?

INTRO: Have you ever heard someone say, "That’s the first mistake I’ve made today?" Or, someone who is a little arrogant might say, "That’s the first mistake I made this year." And, of course, someone who is really obnoxious would say, "Well, that’s the first mistake I’ve ever made."

We tend to joke about our mistakes because we all make mistakes! We might make them because we have poor information, or because we have bad judgment, or just because we are making the wrong choices.

Mistakes aren’t necessarily sin, but they can become sin, because of the domino effect. One mistake often leads to another as we try to excuse or cover up our mistakes. Soon we are getting in deeper & deeper, & a chain reaction has begun.

Now, I am not an expert in most things, but I am very nearly an expert when it comes to mistakes. I have made enough mistakes in my lifetime to pretty much make me an expert. Maybe you have too!

So this morning I have taken some of my mistakes, & added some of yours mixed them all together & have reached the conclusion that there are at least 4 major categories of mistakes, & all 4 of them are found in the Bible. Listen carefully, & I think we will see ourselves in each of these 4 areas.

PANIC PROMPTED MISTAKES

1. First, there are panic prompted mistakes… mistakes that are made because we are in too great a hurry, or because we are afraid that something is going to happen. So we take quick action to try to keep it from happening.

We are worried about something & we are hesitant about letting God take control. So we handle it ourselves & the result is that we make mistakes.

ILL. You remember the story of Abraham. God told Abraham to leave his homeland & go to a land that God would show him, where he & his family would be greatly blessed. Abraham would become the father of a great nation, & all the nations of the earth would be blessed through him.

When Abraham finally got there he built an altar to God.

Time passes, & Genesis 12:10 tells us, "Now there was a famine in the land, & Abram went down to Egypt to live there for a while, because the famine was severe."

Now that is a panic prompted mistake.  When a famine arose, Abraham was afraid that he & his family would starve.

So he panicked & packed his bags & family & moved down to Egypt. The first domino fell.

The 2nd domino is found in vs’s 11-13, "As he was about to enter Egypt, he said to his wife Sarai, ’I know what a beautiful woman you are. When the Egyptians see you, they will say, ’This is his wife.’ Then they will kill me but will let you live.

“Say that you are my sister, so that I will be treated well for your sake & my life will be spared because of you."

That was mistake #2, & the dominoes are beginning to fall. One mistake led to another, & the first thing you know Abraham & Sarai were in a dangerous situation in Egypt, & only the direct intervention of God saved them.

1. Now let’s bring it down to today. People make panic prompted mistakes, & they make them primarily in two areas of life. First, in the area of romance, & second, in the area of finance.
2. How many times have we met people nearing the mystical age of 30, who haven’t met that "right someone" yet, & they are about to panic? "I am going to be a bachelor, or old maid the rest of my life. No one will ever marry me!"

So, in panic, they grab the first one they find. They get married, or they throw away their morals in the hope of catching someone, anyone. The result is a domino chain reaction that makes the situation worse, & not better.

I know people who have been there. They made mistakes back when they were 20 or 30, & now they wish they could go back & do it right. Oftentimes in the area of romance, whether it is 20, 30, or 50, people panic.

1. It can happen in the area of our finances, too. It is so easy today to get into a financial bind. MasterCard works. Visa works. Stores urge us to use their "easy payment" plans.

And the first thing we know, the bills start coming in & we suddenly realize that we just don’t have enough money to pay all our bills.

So we panic. We run down to the "quick loan" place & get a "bill consolidation loan" at lower monthly payments. But the problem is that we now have a little breathing room, so we often start charging all over again. It soon becomes worse than ever, & the dominoes are falling.

SUM: You see, panic prompted mistakes often start out as simple mistakes, but like falling dominoes, the momentum gets out of hand, & the result can be disastrous.

MISTAKES OF NEGLECT

1. Secondly, we make mistakes because of our neglect. One very clear example of this is King David. David, as you know, was a very special person. He is called a "man after God’s own heart."

But King David made just as many mistakes as we are capable of making. For example, David had 18 wives, & that is a lot of mistakes right there!

But notice 1 Kings 1:5 6 where it tells about David & Adonijah, one of his sons. "Adonijah exalted himself, saying, ’I will be king,’ so he prepared for himself chariots & horsemen & 50 men to run before him."

Now listen to this, "And his father (that’s David) had never crossed him at any time." Actually, the Hebrew word is "never pained him." What it means is that David had never physically punished him, had never spanked him had never disciplined him at any time!

The result was that Adonijah developed a selfish & rebellious nature that one day led him to say, "I want to be king, & I want to be king now! I can take the throne away from my father, & I’m going to do it!” And one reason that he was that kind of son was because of David’s neglect.

David made the same mistake that many have made, & maybe are still making. He became so busy being King, being important, being an administrator, that he neglected his family.

1. Neglect is not limited just to family, either. It can affect our spiritual lives, too.

As I mentioned last Sunday, the writer of Hebrews wrote, "Neglect not the assembling of yourselves together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another – and all the more as you see the Day approaching." (Hebrews 10:25)

We gather together to remember Jesus, to examine our own lives in the light of His Word, to rededicate ourselves to what God wants us to be, & to encourage one another.

That is why today, the Lord’s Day, is an important day. That is why gathering around the Lord’s table is such an important event.

As I talk to people I have often been told, "It is so easy to get out of the habit of going to church." That is true, isn’t it? We have all kinds of groups to help us quit drinking, or quit smoking, or to lose weight but we don’t need an organization to help us quit going to church!

It is so easy to get involved with other things & completely neglect our spiritual life, & the "assembling of ourselves together" with fellow Christians. Spiritual neglect is a mistake that leads to sin, too.

So welcome home, child of God. I pray that God & His people will make you feel so needed & wanted here that you will never, ever, drift away again.

UNRESTRAINED, DISOBEDIENT CURIOSITY

1. Thirdly, unrestrained, disobedient curiosity can be a mistake that leads to sin.

ILL. In 1 Samuel 28, King Saul is beginning to lose all confidence in himself. He has disobeyed God time & time again, & God is no longer with him. The battles are going against him, & he feels a desperate need to talk with Samuel, the prophet of God who once was his closest advisor.

But Samuel is dead. So what does Saul do? On the basis of bad advice, he disobeys God’s clear command & consults a spirit medium who claims that she can communicate with the dead.

The result is shocking, & King Saul himself is dead within 24 hours. His unrestrained, disobedient curiosity resulted in his death.

1. Unrestrained, disobedient curiosity could very well be the primary sin of many young people today, but it is not exclusive to young people.

In the teen age world, & even younger, there is so much emphasis on that which is evil & satanic & unrestrained, disobedient curiosity can suck you in. It may begin as a foolish mistake, but it can become a sin that will rob you of your soul.

I believe with all my heart that much of the drug scene is satanic influenced & controlled by Satan. And if you are playing with that, you are playing with a spiritual world that can grip your soul & squeeze it to death.

Unrestrained, disobedient curiosity. Sure, others may do it & tell you that it is perfectly okay. But I caution you to be aware of the dangers that are there, & to avoid the evils that can result from unrestrained, disobedient curiosity.

“BLIND SPOT” MISTAKES

Fourthly, there are “blind spot” mistakes… mistakes that we make because we are unable to see ourselves & the situation as it really is.

ILL. At one time the Apostle Peter had a blind spot. When he was with Paul & among Gentile Christians in Antioch he was just one of the group. Jews & Gentiles were fellow Christians worshiping together.

But when ultra-orthodox Jews who had become Christians came to Antioch, they still had their own Jewish prejudice against Gentiles. So they wouldn’t even associate with the Gentiles who had become Christians too.

Sadly, Peter, in his eagerness to welcome the new Jewish Christians into the church at Antioch began meeting exclusively with them, & no longer had anything to do with the Gentile Christians there.

Evidently Peter had a blind spot about what he was doing. He didn’t realize the hurt that this was causing in the church.

When Paul saw the division that this was creating, he confronted Peter & said, "What you are doing is wrong!" Suddenly Peter realized the result of what he had been doing & immediately made it right in the church.

Don’t we all make “blind spot” mistakes? It is so easy to see the mistakes that others make.

We go out of church on Sunday mornings saying to ourselves, "I sure hope so & so paid attention to that sermon," or "I wish that so & so had been here. He (or she) really needed to hear that."

Blind spots! The sermon may have been speaking right to you or me, & we weren’t listening because we have a blind spot. We need to open our eyes & realize that there can be blind spots in our lives, too!

SO WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO?

Folks, we could go on with this sermon because we make all kinds of mistakes. But the important question is, "What are we going to do about them?"

Turn with me to PSALM 31. This Psalm must have been written by David after he had made a bunch of mistakes. So David pours out his heart to God in this Psalm.

In vs. 2 David pleads with God, “Turn Your ear to me, come quickly to my rescue; be my rock of refuge, a strong fortress to save me.”

And in vs’s 4 & 5 he says, “Free me from the trap that is set for me, for You are my refuge. Into Your hands I commit my spirit."

Then in vs’s 9 & 10 he says, "Be merciful to me, O Lord, for I am in distress; my eyes grow weak with sorrow, my soul & my body with grief. My life is consumed by anguish, & my years by groaning; my strength fails because of my sins."

Do you hear that? David is saying, "I am laying it open to you, Lord. Here it is all the scars & scabs & ugly sores that are there. Here are the sins I have committed. I can fool others, but I can’t fool you, Lord. So here it all is."

And God sees the neglect & immorality in the life of David, but He doesn’t say, "Well, that’s it for you, David. If that is what you really are like inside, then you are no longer a man after my heart. I don’t want anything more to do with you."

But David realizes that God isn’t doing that. So in vs. 8 David praises Him, “You have not handed me over to the enemy but have set my feet in a spacious place.”

Have you ever felt claustrophobic - when you feel as if your sins have dropped you into a pit? David says that "God picked him up & put his feet in a spacious place" where there was room to move again, to flex his muscles, & to be the kind of person God always wanted him to be.

And in vs’s 19-20 David cries out, "How great is Your goodness, which You have stored up for those who fear You, which You bestow in the sight of men on those who take refuge in You. In the shelter of Your presence You hide them…” God hides, & forgives, & protects.

ILL. There used to be a bumper sticker that proclaimed, "Christians aren’t perfect just forgiven.’ I like that, & it says what I am trying to say this morning. We’re not perfect, but because of Jesus we can be forgiven!

Despite all the mistakes, & all the things we do wrong, & the times we stumble & fall God still says, "Come, I want to forgive you."

Will you come as we stand & sing?

Contributing Sermon Given By: Melvin Newland

 

The Mysterious Melchizdek

The Mysterious Melchizedek
Genesis 14:11-20, Hebrews 7:1-3, Hebrews 10:11-12, Hebrews 10:14

OPEN: During WWII, the Geneva Convention allowed Allied POWs to receive gifts from home. Some of the most popular gifts were board games and decks of playing cards, and one of the most popular board games was Monopoly... especially the Monopoly games sent to them by British government. The reason this was so popular was because, hidden in the box were tools for escape. There were real bank notes mixed in amongst the Monopoly money, and – concealed inside the box - were Compasses, metal files, and a silk map (so it wouldn’t be affected by the elements). And it worked; soldiers DID use these to escape.
Decks of “playing cards” were also popular because these card decks contained special cards that, when soaked in water, revealed hidden maps of routes the POW’s could use for their escapes.
Hidden in these games - were the keys to freedom. And hidden in our text today, is one of the most important keys to OUR freedom.
But first, a little background. Abraham and his family have been living down near the Dead Sea. There were 5 major cities in the area (including Sodom and Gomorrah) and these cities were vassels of the powerful Kingdom of Elam to whom they were obligated to pay tribute. Apparently, they decided they didn’t like that arrangement any longer and they rebelled. Now, the King of Elam didn’t like that, so he led a massive army down from the North and devastated Sodom and Gomorrah - raiding their cities and carrying away plunder and captives... including Lot and his family.
When Abraham heard that this had happened, he led his own personal army of 318 men against the Northern King.
And he rescued all the captives, including Lot and his family, and brought back all the goods that had been plundered.
What I found interesting about our story today was that, as Abraham is making his way back home, we’re told: “... the king of Sodom went out to meet (Abram) at the Valley of Shaveh. And Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine. And he blessed him and said, ‘Blessed be Abram by God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth; and blessed be God Most High, who has delivered your enemies into your hand!’ And Abram gave him a tenth of everything.” Genesis 14:17-20
Did you notice that the King of Sodom comes out to meet Abraham FIRST. But it’s like Abraham ignores him and gives all his attention to this King of Salem, this man named Melchizedek. And it seems that even Melchizedek ignores the King of Sodom.
NOT that the king of Sodom was worth their attention. SODOM was one of the wickedest cities that ever existed and apparently neither Abram nor Melchizedek thought he was worth their attention.
But in this part of the story, Melchizedek is front and center. He not only gets Abraham’s attention, he gets a 10th of all the plunder Abram rescued.
Long ago, I learned that if Bible mentions something it’s there for a reason. In fact Romans 15:4 tells us that “whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.”
That would include this story about Melchizedek.
But ... wait a minute! That doesn’t make any sense! Genesis only gives Melchizedek 3 verses. And that’s the only time he’s mentioned in Genesis. In fact, in all the rest of the Old Testament, Melchizedek is only mentioned in one other verse.
And even when you get to the New Testament, the name of Melchizedek is never mentioned in the Gospels, the book of Acts, or in any of the “Pauline Epistles” nor the writings of John or Peter. It’s like the guy disappeared from history... like nobody paid him any attention.
Well... that’s not entirely true. There’s one New Testament book that dedicates – not just 3 verse but – 3 entire chapters to Melchizedek. And in those 3 chapters of that one New Testament book, this Old Testament King and Priest becomes one of the most important men in all of Bible History. He’s hidden away everywhere else in bible... but NOT in this book!
Hebrews tells us “this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him, and to him Abraham apportioned a tenth part of everything. He is first, by translation of his name, king of righteousness, and then he is also king of Salem, that is, king of peace. He is without father or mother or genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but RESEMBLING THE SON OF GOD he continues a priest forever.” Hebrews 7:1-3
Now Melchizedek was NOT Jesus. Verse 3 says He was RESEMBLING the Son of God. It’s kind of like that driver’s license you have in your wallet. Everybody hates them. It’s not a perfect resemblance of you, but its good enough that the policeman who pulls you over can tell it’s you. It’s not a perfect picture... but its close.
But when God took a snapshot of Melchizedek, it was a perfect picture - it perfectly resembled who Christ was going to be.
Now remember, there’s only 3 verses in Genesis that describe Melchizedek - And that’s deliberate, because all that God wanted you to know about Jesus is wrapped up in those 3 verses.
For example: His name was Melchizedek – which means “King of Righteousness.” And in Romans 3:22 we’re told “This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ.”
In addition, Melchizedek was the King of “Salem” – which means “King of Peace”. And in Romans 5:1 it says “we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Jesus was our King of Righteousness and our King of Peace. And when God introduced Melchizedek He deliberately left out who his parents were! We’re told that was because that declared this King had “neither beginning of days nor end of life, but resembling the Son of God he continues a priest FOREVER.” In fact, in the Book of Psalms, God makes that declaration about the coming Messiah: “The LORD has sworn and will not change his mind, “You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.” Psalm 110:4
So, what we find is that God declared that when Jesus came He would be our Peace and our Righteousness, and that He would be our PRIEST forever.
PRIEST? Why would Jesus need to be my priest? I mean, I can understand Him being my King and I can appreciate that He would RULE over my life... but why would Jesus need to be my Priest?
Well what does a priest do? In the Old Testament, a priest would make sacrifices so that sins could be forgiven. And the Bible repeatedly teaches us that the guilt/shame of our sins had to be paid for and that something had to die to PAY for my sins.
So, as our Priest, Jesus made a sacrifice for our sins. But when did He do that? He did it when He died on the cross. Hebrews tells us “Day after day every (human) priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when this priest (Jesus) had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God... by one sacrifice he has made perfect for ever those who are being made holy.” Hebrews 10:11-12 &14
When Jesus died for you and I – His one sacrifice wiped away ALL our sins for ALL time for those who believed on His name, repented of their sins and were buried in a watery grave for the forgiveness of their sins.
You see... that’s what church is all about. We haven’t gathered here just to be a social club, to slap each other on the back, sing a few songs, listen to an encouraging message, and then go out and eat some ham salad together. We are HERE at church... because Jesus died for our sins. We remember that every time we take communion. We take of the bread and Jesus said “This is my BODY broken for you.” And we take of the cup and Jesus said “this is my BLOOD that is poured out for you.” We gather every Sunday and remember His High Priestly sacrifice in this communion meal. It’s what we do and who we are.
And that’s not the only thing we do to remember His sacrifice. Every time we baptize someone into Christ, Paul tells us that we “baptize (them) into (Christ’s) death. We bury (them) with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, (they now) too might walk in newness of life... united with him in a resurrection like his.” (Romans 6:3-5)
We see His sacrifice in the Lord’s Supper and in our salvation action of baptism. His sacrifice is what we are about. And if we ever forget that this is our primary purpose and teaching... we have nothing to offer this world.
So, Jesus Is Our High Priest! And because that is true, He gives us confidence that now that our sins are removed we can boldly go into the presence of God without fear, without shame and without guilt. In God’s presence we now simply have peace!
Now, I want to go back to Genesis 14... Do you remember my saying that Melchizedek ignored the King of Sodom? Why would he do that? Well, he did that because OUR King of Righteousness, OUR King of Peace, Our High Priest... wants nothing to do with the sin. Sodom was the wickedest city on the face of the earth,
and it - and it’s king - were ultimately destroyed because of their wickedness. And so Melchizedek had nothing to do with the king of Sodom!
But while Melchizedek didn’t focus on the King of Sodom... he DID focus on someone, and he did bless that someone. Who did Melchizedek bless? Abraham. He said: “Blessed be Abram by God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth; and blessed be God Most High, who has delivered your enemies into your hand!” Genesis 14:20
Now, why would he do that? Well, he did that because Abraham believed in God and Abraham followed God and Abraham gave his life to God. And you can see that in what happens when Abraham meets Melchizedek.
ILLUS: An old preacher made this observation: “When Abraham saw Melchizedek he was looking at Christ because he resembled Christ.” SO notice that when Abraham SAW Christ that day... two things happened: “Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine.... And Abram gave him a tenth of everything.” Genesis 14:18 & 20
That was how Abraham worshiped God that day. And that’s how we should be worshiping Jesus... IF we really see Him. If you are really seeing the face of Christ that should compel us to DO something.
It should compel you to make sure you take of Communion every Sunday and it should compel you to make sure you give back to the lord every Sunday.
One last observation... the CHURCH is the one place that we know we are going to see Jesus. Ephesians says “Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.” (Ephesians 5:25) You mean Jesus died for this building? Of course not, He died for this group of people because YOU are the church. Granted He died for your own personal sins, but He also loved us as a group and He died to establish His church... US.
What’s interesting is how the church is described in Ephesians 1:22-23 which says Jesus is “the head over all things to the church, which is his body.” We are the BODY of Christ. So (work with me here) when I see the church... I’m seeing His body. When I see the church, I’m seeing Christ.
Because that is true there’s one thing I can only do at our gathering as a church. It’s only when we gather as a church that I really see Jesus. When I sit at home, I can turn on the TV and here a preacher preach a message, and I can turn on the radio to a religious radio station and listen to uplifting songs of praise, and I can turn everything off and offer up prayers to Christ. I can do all that at home. But the one thing I can’t do at home is see the “body of Christ” – which is you.
It is here that I experience ... the BODY of Christ.
CLOSE: A preacher shared a story about a woman in his church who’d gone to the doctor because she had a spot on her head that was irritating her. He looked it over and noted it was a small spot on her head and he told her was nothing to worry about... he’d look at it again in a month. But at the next appointment, the spot had grown dramatically and proved to be melanoma. It was serious enough that he scheduled surgery and removed – not only the skin on her head, but part of her skull. In addition, they inserted blue dye into her veins at the affected area to see how far the cancer may have gone in her lymph nodes.
As soon as they pumped in the blue dye she IMMEDIATELY began to feel pain. The Doctor tried to comfort her as best he could but explained that the dye had to do its work... and there was no way to relieve the pain. But many had found it helpful to “Find their happy place.” Thinking about the things that would make you feel safe, relaxed, and at peace often helped people deal with the pain.
Knowing how much this woman loved riding horses, the preacher remarked “Well, I guess your happy place was thinking about the times you’ve spent riding your horses in the field.”
“Oh no,” she said “the first thing I thought of was Church. Church was my happy place. I began to focus on the faces of people at church. I started on the right side of the building and remembered each of their faces and prayed for each one of them, thanking God that they were my friends and that I knew they prayed for me. And then I focused on the people in the praise band and was so thankful for the songs they led that made me want to praise and worship God. And then I focused on you (the preacher) and how much you loved God and how dedicated you were to studying and proclaiming God’s love... THEN I thought about riding my horses.”
Church was her happy place! Why? Why was the church her happy place? Well, it was her happy place... because when she looked on the faces of the people at church... SHE SAW JESUS.

Contributing Sermon
Given by Jeff Strite

Who's Got Your Back?

Who's Got Your Back?
Genesis 12:1-9

OPEN: A mother was read a Bible story about Abraham to her 5-year-old daughter. when she finished, she started asking her a few questions about it. “What was Abraham's name before God changed it?” She looked puzzled for a moment... then smiled as she asked, “Lincoln?”
God changed Abraham’s name? Well... yeah. In our story today, we see that Abraham’s name had ONCE been Abram. Abram means “exalted Father” and Abraham means “Father of a multitude.”
But now, why would God do that? Why change this man’s name? Well God seems to do that a lot in Scripture especially when He’s making a major change in the person’s life. For example,
Jacob became Israel;
Simon was renamed Peter;
and Saul was transformed into Paul.

And of course in Revelation 2:17 God promises us “To the one who conquers I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, with a new name written on the stone that no one knows except the one who receives it.”
Even we can get a new name.

In each of those people’s lives (Jacob, Simon and Saul) there was like a rebirth that took place. They became different men than when they had their old names.
So what became different about Abraham?
What did God DO with him?
Well Abraham was once just a normal guy. He was a shepherd and a husband and he tried to live a life pleasing to God.

But then, one day God says “I want to do something special with you. I want to make a covenant (or contract) with you. And that’s what this Genesis 12 passage is all about. God introduces Himself to Abraham... and then He makes a promise. “I want you to leave your home and your kinfolk... and go to a land I’ll show you.
And I’ll make you into a great nation; I’ll bless you and make your name great; I’ll make you into a blessing for others; if others bless you, I’ll bless them, but if they curse you... I’ll curse them.”

And when all was said and done Abraham became one of the important people in the Bible. In the Old Testament, we read the phrase “Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob over and over again.

And Abraham’s grandson Jacob was renamed Israel and became the father of the 12 tribes of Israel. So, literally, Abraham was the great-grandfather of the 12 tribes of Israel. So when God said he would make Abraham into a great nation... Israel comes to mind.

But then, in the New Testament we’re told that Abraham is Our Father too! Galatians 3:7-9 says “Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham. And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, ‘In you shall all the nations be blessed.’ So then, those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.”

So God made Abraham the father of,
not just the people of Israel,
but ALSO of you and me,
and of every Christian who ever lived.

AND, that means that this covenant God made with Abraham (Genesis 12) applies to us right now.
ILLUS: Two young Christian men got into a debate. One of the men didn’t think the promises God made to Abraham in Genesis 12 applied to us. He was particularly offended with the promise: I’ll bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you.” “You can’t claim that promise,” he said. “That is only made to Abraham. Now, that really annoyed the other man because he was pretty sure that was wrong, but he didn’t know quite why! But then he read in Galatians 3:29 “And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise.”
The promises found in Genesis to Abraham are ours because we’re Abraham’s offspring.

For example, when I die, my children will be heir to my estate (such as it is) I hope they don’t plan on getting rich!. As my heirs they inherit everything that belongs to me!!! In the same way, we are heirs of Abraham - so, we get what he got... including his promises.

For example, God told Abraham “I’ll bless those who bless you.” And Jesus said, “whoever gives one of these little ones even a cup of cold water because he is a disciple, truly, I say to you, he will by no means lose his reward." (Matthew 10:42) Are you Christ’s disciple? Well, that means that whoever blesses you will be blessed by God.

And God told Abraham “I’ll curse those who curse you.” Paul wrote: “God considers it just to repay with affliction those who afflict you” (2 Thessalonians 1:6) What’s that mean? It means God will curse those who curse you.

Well, that’s kinda cool. But what does that mean to us?
Why should I care?
Well, I should care because it means God will watch out for us. He’s got our back. Romans 8:31 says: “If God is for us, who can be against us?” God’s basically saying – “You mess with my kids, I’ll mess with you.”

So, that’s interesting. God will bless those who bless me... and curse those who curse me. Curse those who curse me? HMMMMM!!! I kinda like that. I mean, have you ever had people at work that were jerks who gave you a hard time? Or family members who’ve mistreated you? Or course you have! It’s only right that God nail them for their behavior. Right? I mean - they don’t know who they’re messing with!
But that’s not quite how God thinks. In Proverbs 24:17-18 we’re warned “Do not rejoice when your enemy falls, and let not your heart be glad when he stumbles, lest the LORD see it and be displeased, and turn away his anger from him.”

His judgment upon them is intended to make us feel pity for our enemies and give us an opportunity to reach out to them. That’s why II Peter 3:9 says “The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.” God doesn’t want to destroy your enemies – He wants to convert them. Thus, when He brings judgment upon our enemies, we should pray for them and feel a sorrow for them that leads us to try to bring to Christ.

Now, what about the part of the covenant with Abraham where God said He would bless him and then make him a blessing to others? Does God promise to “bless us?” Of course He does. In John 1:16 we read “From the fulness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another.” And in Romans 8:32 we’re told “He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?” God promised to bless us, just like He promised Abraham.

Now, that doesn’t mean we don’t encounter difficulties, and frustrations and hardships and pain, and even death. It doesn’t mean we’ll avoid those things in this life. But what it does mean is that we have an edge – we’ve been promised God blessings.
Aside from the answered prayers and active ways that God works in our lives... just by following God and listening to His guidance in Scripture, studies have shown that faithful Christians tend to live longer and better lives than those who don’t go to church. It’s true.

ILLUS: A study from Duke University Medical Center found that people who regularly attended things like church and Bible study had a 50% lower risk of dying over a 6-year period than others
of the same age and health status. In other words we tend to live (on average) 6 years longer than those who don’t follow Christ.

Other studies have found that Christians experience less anxiety and stress. Why? Because we realize that God will always be there for us, and we’re repeatedly told to not be afraid, but to be strong and courageous.

And we’re less likely to abuse drugs and alcohol. Why?
Because those who abuse those things are seeking ways to avoid the difficulties of this world and mask their pain.
By contrast God leads us through our hardships and comforts us in the midst of our difficulties. In addition, we’re less likely to commit suicide.

Years ago, there was a book written about how to commit suicide – and in the forward the author explained that he doubted Christians would want to read his book. Why?
Because Christians are constantly reminded that our life has value and that we have a purpose no matter what happens in our lives.

And, we tend to be more grateful for what we have than others are because we’re constantly reminded in Scripture to rejoice and be thankful for everything that we have. The rest of the world tends to constantly complain about what they don’t have and what they’ve lost, but God say “Rejoice in the Lord always, again I’ll say rejoice.” Philippians 4:4

So God blesses us and equips us to be better prepared to handle life.

But then, God told Abraham that he would be a blessing to others. That promise applies to us as well.

Jesus commanded “So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them” Matthew 7:12.
And Paul wrote “So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith” Galatians 6:10. And Hebrews 13:16 tells us “Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.”

Being a blessing to others is kind of our job description. It’s what each one of us should be known for. We sing the song “LET THE BEAUTY OF JESUS BE SEEN IN ME!

One last thought... why did God choose Abraham? I mean Abraham wasn’t portrayed as a mighty warrior like David facing Goliath, and he never built a city or ruled over a mighty nation. And he didn’t even come from a particularly godly family.

In Joshua 24:2 God told Israel “Long ago, your fathers lived beyond the Euphrates, Terah, the father of Abraham and of Nahor; and they served other gods.” Abraham grew up in a pagan society!

So why pick Abraham?
What set him apart from others of his day?
Well, I think it may have a lot to do with something I’ve read in
II Chronicles 16:9 (NKJV) “The eyes of the LORD run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him.”

God looked inside Abraham’s heart and saw a man who’d be loyal to him. Or as I Samuel 16:7 says “man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart.” Just like God looks in our hearts to see if we’re loyal to Him as well.

I think we get an idea of the kind of man Abraham was by what’s said in our text this morning: “Then the LORD appeared to Abram and said, ‘To your offspring I will give this land.’ So he built there an altar to the LORD, who had appeared to him. From there he moved to the hill country on the east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east.
And there he built an altar to the LORD and called upon the name of the LORD.” Genesis 12:7-8

In those two short verses we find Abraham building not one, but two altars. In fact, throughout his life, it seems like everyplace Abraham went ... he built an altar! Why an altar?

Well, altars were places where a worshiper would offer up a burnt offering. But it was also a place where people were declaring “I’m here. I’m available. I’m not too busy to honor you and listen to what you have to say.”
And later, as people would come across these alters they could remember that GOD was real and part of their lives.

ILLUS: For us older folks, we remember what a busy signal was. Younger folk with their cell phones may hear “the party you’re calling is not available” OR the call goes to voice mail

but we heard “EHHH, EHHH, EHHH, EHHH.” The line was busy. We couldn’t get through. And the sound was realllly annoying!

Imagine how annoying it is to God when we’re too busy to listen to Him.

An altar was Abraham’s way of saying “I’m not too busy for you. I’m available. I’m listening, and I want to hear what you have to say.”

That’s the kind of person God is looking for. Someone who’s not too busy to hear Him.
Someone who is always “listening” to hear God in Sunday School, and Bible studies,
and your prayer times
and private reading of the Bible.
And especially here at worship services.

Now, I realize that there are people who come to church because it’s the “thing to do” and they’re just putting in their time.

And if that’s why you’re here, I can work with that.

But I hope the reason you’re here is to HEAR God,
to learn how to be His child and how to be loyal to Him.
And most importantly, if you’re not a Christian today,
my prayer is that you hear the most important message God has to give you today – His offer of salvation.

INVITATION

Contributing Sermon
Given by Jeff Strite

A Confident Meaningful Prayer Life

A Confident Meaningful Prayer Life  

1 John 5:13-17

 

INTRO:

Good evening.   Last week we talked about “What Shall I Render Unto The Lord” and one of the things we saw the Psalmist offered to God was prayer.   This morning we talked about how David went to the God when he had lost his footing.   For this evening I would like to look at some things about prayer in our walk before the Lord.

 

Clearly prayer is something we often hear about and people have many different concepts about what prayer consists of and how best to approach the throne of God.

 

Let me start with a story. Three men were discussing the proper posture for prayer. The first said that one should be on one's knees with your head bowed in reverence to the Almighty.  The second argued that one should stand with your head raised looking into the heavens and speak to the face of God as would a little child. The third spoke up and said "I know nothing about these prayer positions, but I do know this: the finest praying I've ever done was upside down when I fell into a well!"

 

On the subject of prayer, let us see what the Apostle John has to tell us today. In 1 John 1:9 he talked about the value of confessing our sins to God in prayer. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” In 1 John 2:1 he talked about how Jesus Christ who is the righteous One, is our advocate in prayer.   “My little children, these things I write to you, that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” In 1 John 3:22 he talked about how God answers prayer if we do what He asks of us. “And whatever we ask we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments and do those things that are pleasing in His sight.”

 

1. Turn with me in your Bible to 1 John 5 where John is going to share with us how to pray with confidence. 1 John 5:13-15 – “13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life. 14 This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. 15 And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him.”[para]
   1. John in verse 13 confirms again that this is written to those in Christ, those who are Christians and he confirms to them that since they adhered to the fundamentals of the faith (a proper view of Christ, obedience, love), their salvation was sure.
   2. In verse 14 John turns to prayer and shares with us how to pray for our prayers to be answered. Here is the 1st requirement, is our prayer request in line with God’s will? Have you ever heard the expression “banging your head against a brick wall”? It’s the idea of trying to do something or trying to talk to someone but nothings happening.
      1. I read something from one preacher who said; “I have heard many prayers from all sorts of people and sometimes I believe certain people haven’t got a clue what they are asking for.” He said; “I have heard prayers for God to accept homosexuals into His church because they can’t help being homosexual, it is the way they were born. In other words just carry on with your sinful behavior. It’s ok.”   “I’ve heard prayers to God for Christ to come into people’s lives without the need for baptism.” “I’ve heard prayers to God at funerals where the minister will ask God to accept this person who is now deceased and didn’t even know God, into His kingdom.”
      2. After reading that I thought wow, they are all banging their heads against a brick wall, so to speak. They are banging their heads against a brick wall because they do not know the will of the Father.
      3. For people to pray according to God’s will, they first need to know what God’s will is! Prayer is not about assuming that God will automatically answer that prayer. There are times, and we need to understand this, that God will on occasion say “No” to our requests. Especially if the request is not according to His will.
      4. Why does the model prayer say “Thy will be done”? (Matthew 6:9-10). When we pray, “Thy will be done,” we acknowledge God’s right to rule. We do not pray, “My will be done”; we pray, “Thy will be done.” Asking that God’s will be done is a demonstration of our trust that He knows what is best. It is a statement of submission to God’s ways and His plans. We ask for our will to be conformed to His.
      5. I would like to read you a poem by Claudia Minden Welsz; it’s called “And God Said, NO."

I asked God to take away my pride, And God said, "No."

He said, “It was not for Him to take away, But for me to give it up”.

I asked God to make my handicapped child whole, And God said, "No."

He said, “Her spirit is whole. Her body is only temporary.”

I asked God to grant me patience, And God said, "No."

He said, “Patience is a by-product of tribulation. It isn't granted, it is earned.”

I asked God to give me happiness, And God said, "No."

He said, “He gives the blessings, the happiness is up to me”.

I asked God to spare me pain, And God said, "No."

He said, "Suffering draws you apart from Worldly cares and brings you closer to Me."

I asked God to make my spirit grow, And God said, "No."

He said, “I must grow on my own, But he will prune me to make it fruitful.”

I asked God if He loved me, And God said, "Yes."

He gave me His only son, who died for me. And I will be in Heaven someday because... I believe.

I asked God to help me love others As much as He loves me,

And God said, "Ah finally, you have the idea."

6. Our prayers are dependent upon the will of God. Even Jesus' own example of prayer illustrates that answer to prayer depends upon whether or not it is in harmony with God's will.  Remember when Jesus was praying in the Garden?   He’s praying to God and what did He say? Matthew 26:39-42 – “39. He went a little farther and fell on His face, and prayed, saying, "O My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will.'' 40. Then He came to the disciples and found them asleep, and said to Peter, "What, could you not watch with Me one hour? 41. "Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.'' 42. He went away again a second time and prayed, saying, "O My Father, if this cup cannot pass away from Me unless I drink it, Your will be done.''” Two times Jesus prayed and said, “Father, your will be done.”
7. Remember the apostle Paul was struggling with a thorn in his flesh?  He said in 2 Corinthians 12:7-9 – “7. And lest I should be exalted above measure by the abundance of the revelations, a thorn in the flesh was given to me, a messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I be exalted above measure. 8. Concerning this thing I pleaded with the Lord three times that it might depart from me. 9. And He said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.'' Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.”  Three times Paul asked God to take his torment away and three times God said, “No.” Why? Because it stopped Paul from becoming big headed and so his request to God wasn’t in line with God’s will.
8. What we see here emphasizes the importance of studying the Bible. The more we learn God's revealed will through His word the more likely we will pray according to His will.  The more we pray according to His will, the greater confidence we can have that our prayers will be answered accordingly.

21. That brings us to the 2^nd requirement of prayer. We not only need to pray according to God’s will but we also need to keep God’s commandments.  John has already stressed the importance of keeping the lord’s commands in reference to prayer in 1 John 3:21-22 where he writes; “21. Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence toward God. 22. And whatever we ask we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments and do those things that are pleasing in His sight.”,
    1. He’s saying even if we are asking for something that would normally be within God's will for us, if we are not keeping His commandments can we really expect God to answer our prayers? I don’t believe we can expect God to answer our prayers if we just live our lives in anyway we want.
    2. Peter tells us in 1 Peter 3:12 – “For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and his ears are open to their prayers; but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.''”   The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous,-- who are the righteous?  We need to go back to 1 John 3:22 where John tells us the righteous are those who "do those things that are pleasing in His sight."
    3. Sometimes we struggle to do what is pleasing to Him don’t we?  We know what to do but we don’t do it. Maybe we need to pray to God for strength to do what He wants us to do.  God understands that we struggle at times to live according to His will, but folks, pleasing Him is His will.  He wants to help us live by His will, but He can only do that if we ask Him for help.
    4. Allow me to illustrate. A father was watching his young son try to dislodge a heavy stone. The boy couldn't budge it. "Are you sure you are using all your strength?" the father asked. "Yes, I am," said the exasperated boy. "No, you are not son," the father replied. "You haven't asked me to help you."
22. We struggle to pray with confidence because we don’t fully know what His will is or we struggle to keep His commandments, it is then that we should be praying for God to help us understand His will and to help us keep His commandments.
    1. The Psalmist says in Psalm 119:18 – “Open my eyes, that I may see Wondrous things from Your law.” What is the Psalmist asking? He is asking God to help him understand God’s will, so that he can live his life by God’s will.
    2. A little later in the same Psalm, he says, Psalm 119:173-176 – “173. Let Your hand become my help, For I have chosen Your precepts. 174. I long for Your salvation, O Lord, And Your law is my delight. 175. Let my soul live, and it shall praise You; And let Your judgments help me. 176. I have gone astray like a lost sheep; Seek Your servant, For I do not forget Your commandments.”
    3. The Lord’s commands are not burdensome; His commandments are there for us to delight in. His commandments are there to sustain us in everyway.  
23. After what John says in 1 John 3:21-22 talking about confidence in prayer, he goes on to say in verse 23 – “And this is His commandment: that we should believe on the name of His Son Jesus Christ and love one another, as He gave us commandment.”   Not only are our prayers to be according to His will, not only are they to be on the condition that we keep His commands, but prayer requires that Christians remain in Jesus and His words remain in us.
    1. Jesus said referring to prayer in John 15:7- “If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you.” Jesus just summarized what John has been saying to us in 1 John. Confidence in prayer depends upon keeping His commandments, but keeping the commandments is the key to remaining in Jesus.  
       1. John says the exact same thing back in 1 John 3:24 – “Now he who keeps His commandments abides in Him, and He in him. And by this we know that He abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us.”
       2. What John is telling us here? If being confident in our prayer lives depends upon asking according to God's Will, and it depends upon Jesus' words remaining in us; then won't knowing Jesus words help us know what God's will is?  Won’t that help us to know what and what not to ask for in our prayer lives?
    2. 3^rd that brings us to John’s final point concerning prayer, we should pray like we mean it. One of the great themes running through John’s 1st letter is the theme of love.  Knowing that, it shouldn’t be surprising for us to find him talking about prayer and love together. He goes on to say in 1 John 5:16-17 – “16. If anyone sees his brother sinning a sin which does not lead to death, he will ask, and He will give him life for those who commit sin not leading to death. There is sin leading to death. I do not say that he should pray about that. 17. All unrighteousness is sin, and there is sin not leading to death.” Time and time again John has stressed the importance of brotherly love. He says in 1 John 3:16 that we "ought to lay down our lives for each other”  He asks us in 1 John 3:17 that if "If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him?”[para] It’s not surprising then that he says we should be willing to pray for each other.
       1. You’ve heard the story about the little boy who was with his father in boat fishing at a local lake. He asked his father, “Where do all the fish come from dad?” His dad said, “I don’t really know son.”    Then he asked his dad, “Dad where do all the clouds come from dad”?  Again his dad said, “I don’t really know son.” This went on for a few minutes and then he finally asked his dad, “Dad do you mind me asking you all these questions?” His dad said, “Not at all son, how else are you going to learn anything?”
       2. Like the little boy, to get the right answers we need to ask the right questions.   There is no escaping the fact that this is a difficult text to understand.  It has led to some unfortunate views that do not agree with the rest of scripture very well.
          1. What is the "sin that doesn’t lead to death”?
          2. What is the sin that “does lead to death”?
          3. What does John mean when he says, "God will give him life"?
       3. At this point I will be giving my understanding of the verses. In the context of this section John makes it very clear in verses 1 thru 8 he is addressing Christians, brethren. In verses 14-15 it is clear the subject is prayer.   In verse 16 John is saying, “Listen, if anyone sees his brother sin.” John is talking about after the fact, after the sin has taken place that one should pray for a brother who has sinned. Or he will ask as some translations have it.
       4. Let’s look at this part about praying for our brother a bit more before we continue. Since we are commanded to love our brethren’s soul and care for their physical well being (1 John 3:10, 17; 4:20), John now commanded that we pray for our brother who is in sin. Just as we pray for one who is ill in body, physical illness, so we pray for one who is spiritually ill.
       5. What do we know about prayer and sin? Let me give you some texts:
          1. Sin equals lawlessness and unrighteous acts (1 John 3:4; 5:17).
             1. The one “born of God” does not continue in sin (1 John 3:9).
             2. The one “of the devil” continues in sin (1 John 3:8, 10).
             3. A premise is therefore established; i.e., All sin, but the righteous do not continue in sin. The righteous repent and confess their sins and those of the devil do not.
          2. Repentance is demanded and brought forth by truth (Luke 13:3; Acts 2:38, 17:30; 2 Corinthians 7:9).
          3. Repentance moves one to “confess” their sins (2 Corinthians 7:9; 1 John 1:9).
          4. The desire for heaven and truth motivates one to purify them self (Matthew 13:16-17; 1 John 3:3).
          5. Here another premise is established: God will forgive the sinner who confesses their sin (1 John 1:9); however, He will not forgive nor will He hear the prayers of a sinner who continues in his sin through stubbornness and hardness of heart (Psalms 51; Isaiah 57:15; 66:2).
          6. The sin “not unto death” must therefore be the sin a Christian commits and receives forgiveness through humility and contriteness of heart (1 John 1:9; 3:3).
          7. We understand that, and indeed in the invitation we state that, if someone has sinned and comes forward, confesses that sin and repents we will pray for them and with them.  The sin that doesn’t lead to death and the sin that does, isn’t a specific sin. It depends on the response a person has to their sin.
       6. What kind of sin could a Christian commit that would lead to death? James says in James 1:13-15 – “13. Let no one say when he is tempted, "I am tempted by God''; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone. 14. But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. 15. Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death.” According to James, any temptation can lead to sin and death.   But what we need to remember is that sin does not produce "death" until it is "full-grown."
          1. How do we avoid sinning toward death? What is the sin that doesn’t lead to death? John gives us the answer in 1 John 1:9 – “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
          2. When we put these scriptures together we can clearly see that the sin that leads to death is the un-repented and un-confessed sin. If we follow this understanding of the text it is obvious that the sin that doesn’t lead to death is the sin which has been confessed and repented of.  
          3. It is this sin about which John says that we can pray for our brethren and God will forgive.  Common sense tells us that we cannot expect God to forgive a person who refuses to repent.  That why John says in 1 John 5:16 – "I do not say that he should pray about that."
       7. We need to remember that when John is talking about death here, he’s talking about spiritual death.  Remember when Adam was in the Garden and God said to him in Genesis 2:16-17 – “"Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; "but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.''”
          1. We know that both Adam and Eve ate from the tree and they were cast out of the Garden but they didn’t die physically, did they?   They died spiritually.
          2. In 1 John 5:16 John says, “16. If anyone sees his brother sinning a sin which does not lead to death, he will ask, and He will give him life”. If the "death" in this passage is "spiritual death"; it is natural to believe the life is "spiritual life."
          3. How then shall a brother pray for a sinning brother who is currently in sin yet is not one who has hardened their heart and rejected God?
             1. First we can pray that they will come to the realization of their sin, that they are in danger and repent. 1 John 4:6 – “We are of God. He who knows God hears us; he who is not of God does not hear us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.”
             2. Second if they repent then we can pray for help that they remain strongly opposed to their temptations. You see the "life" which God will give the repentant sinner in answer to our prayers could also be described as "forgiveness." What we can not pray for is the forgiveness of a brother that does not repent.
          4. One writer puts it this way.   In our experience that there are two kinds of sinners.  There is the person who may be said to sin against their will; that is they sin because they are swept away by passion or desire, which at the moment is too strong for them; their sin is not so much a matter of choice as it is a yielding to temptation which at the moment they are not able to resist. Then there is the person who sins deliberately for the set purpose having their own way, although well aware that it is wrong.
          5. These two people may begin the same way. It is the experience of every person that the first time that they do something wrong, they do it with shrinking and with fear; and, after they so it, they feel grief and remorse and regret.
             1. But, if they allow themselves again and again to flirt with the temptation and to fall, on each occasion the sin becomes easier; and, if they think they escape the consequences, on each occasion the self-disgust and the remorse and the regret become less and less.   In the end they reach a state where they can sin without fear.
             2. It is precisely that state which is the sin which is leading to death.  So long as a person in their heart of hearts hates sin and hates themselves for sinning, so long as they know that they are sinning, as long as they live they are never beyond repentance and, therefore, never beyond forgiveness; but once they begin to revel in sin and to make it the deliberate policy of their life, they are on the way to death, for they are on the way to a state where the idea of repentance will not, and cannot, enter their head.
          6. In 1 John 1:9 John tells us that, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”  That is what the brothers and sisters of the sinner are praying for, that the sinner repent. That’s why he says in 1 John 5:16 that “If anyone sees his brother commit a sin that does not lead to death, he should pray and God will give him life.”
             1. Now the question occurs, why would we bother to pray for a repentant Christian if their sins will be forgiven anyway? That’s a good question and I suggest we consider the Book of James.  James 5:16 – “ Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.”  When you know of another’s sin and they repent you can pray they are forgiven, not of God but of man, then pray for the strength they need to resist further temptation. The sin of a person can be a snare to brothers and sisters if they do not forgive the repentant person. In a sense you pray not only for their healing and support but for your own as well.
             2. This is where many people make a mess of it.  Our newspapers are filled with celebrities and people who have been caught in the act of doing something terrible.  Many publications are in the business of exposing people’s lives.   When they discover that a person has done something wrong, they share it with the world and they make them feel like a criminal.  Listen folks, that’s not how it works in the Lord’s church.
             3. When a Christian confesses their sin to God and has shown that they have repented, that should be the end of the matter.  Like Paul says in 1 Corinthians 13:4-5 – “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.”[NIV]

 

CONCLUSION:

Folks, prayer is a privilege and a wonderful blessing, especially when we pray with confidence and pray like we mean it.

Don’t pray for someone publicly if you don’t mean what you say.

Don’t ask God to heal someone spiritually if you don’t want them to be healed.

Don’t ask God to forgive someone if you don’t want to forgive them.

Don’t ask God to help you live the life of a Christian if you have no intention of living that life.

Mean what you pray and pray from the heart.

 

Like the hymn says, “What a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear, what a privilege it is to carry everything to God in prayer”.

 

How is our prayer life this evening?  How do we each feel about our prayers to God?

Are we remaining in Jesus, and letting His words remain in us?

Are we keeping His commandments and doing the things that are pleasing in His sight?

Are we asking according to God's Will?

Are we praying not only for ourselves, but for each other?

Are we praying for those Christians who have been overtaken by sin, but who have demonstrated that they are repentant?

We all need the fullness of God's blessings in our lives.

Let's encourage one another to do whatever we can to be able to pray with both confidence and with meaning.

 

 

 

 

Lessons on Suffering and Grief from Psalms

Lessons on Suffering and Grief from Psalms

Psalm 69:1-3

 

INTRO: Good morning.   Our lesson this morning is going to be a study from Psalms and the life of King David.   I will generally use the KJV or the NKJV but some verses I will paraphrase.   I’ve left this lesson until last in the series and to fully appreciate what we see in the Psalms we need to take a look at some of David’s life, primarily from First Samuel.

 

I want us to notice what God has to say about David in First Samuel 13:13-14 where Samuel is telling Saul his kingdom will not continue – “13. And Samuel said to Saul, "You have done foolishly. You have not kept the commandment of the Lord your God, which He commanded you. For now the Lord would have established your kingdom over Israel forever. 14. "But now your kingdom shall not continue. The Lord has sought for Himself a man after His own heart, and the Lord has commanded him to be commander over His people, because you have not kept what the Lord commanded you.''” The Lord has sought for himself a man after his own heart and in First Samuel 16 we read that when Samuel was shown the youngest son of Jesse “the Lord said, "Arise, anoint him; for this is the one!”. That’s what God has to say about David. David was a man after His own heart.

 

What an awesome thing to be able to say that about any man. What we will do in our lesson this morning is take a look at the big picture of David's life. We will consider the major events that happened to him and how he was greatly blessed.  

 

Unfortunately because of the sin of his father-in-law Saul he was also greatly sinned against. Even though he was greatly blessed, he was also greatly persecuted by Saul and suffered grievously, yet he never allowed the sin committed against him to cause him to become bitter and hate Saul back.  He never sinned against the man who sinned against him. In this examination of David's life we see how David learned to deal with his grief, and his sorrow, and his depression.

 

18. That being said now let's start with David's life and we will begin in First Samuel 18.  It is after the slaying of Goliath that we read in First Samuel 18:1-2 – “And it was so, when he had finished speaking to Saul, that the soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul. Saul took him that day, and would not let him go home to his father's house anymore.”
    1. Whenever I think of best friends, people who are historically known for being the very best of friends, I think of Jonathan and David.   They were the best of friends.
       1. You would think this would be a time of joy, Goliath is defeated and David and Jonathan have become the very best of friends.  Yet right off the bat Saul started being negative toward David.
       2. After the killing of Goliath and the great victory over the Philistines, when they were coming back into the city the people were rejoicing over the victory. The women were singing "Saul has slain his thousands, and David his ten thousands.'' (Verse 7).
    2. This angered Saul and he became jealous of David.   “Then Saul was very angry, and the saying displeased him; and he said, "They have ascribed to David ten thousands, and to me they have ascribed but thousands. Now what more can he have but the kingdom?''”[NKJV] (Verse 8)
       1. We read on in Verses 12 and 13 – “12. Now Saul was afraid of David, because the Lord was with him, but had departed from Saul. 13. Therefore Saul removed him from his presence, and made him his captain over a thousand; and he went out and came in before the people.”[NKJV] Here we find David was promoted and Saul hoped the Philistines would be the end of David. (verse 17)
       2. In verses 14-16 and I paraphrase “14 In everything he did he had great success, because the Lord was with him. 15 When Saul saw how successful he was, he was afraid of him. 16 But all Israel and Judah loved David, because he led them in their campaigns.” [para] Everybody loved David.  Wherever he went, whatever battle he went into, they won. Whatever David did God blessed it. Every time they came back from victory there's David at the head of it. The people greatly loved David.  Wow, how much better could it get for a man?
    3. In verse 20 we learn; “Now Saul’s daughter Michal was in love with David, and when they told Saul about it, he was pleased.”[para] David has been elevated in the kingdom of Saul to a leadership role in the army.   The King’s son is his best friend.  God is with him and everywhere he goes he has victory.   All the people love him.  Now the King's daughter is in love with him and David ends up marrying her.
       1. Let me ask you; that must be pretty good, right? That's awesome! You're married to the King's daughter and his son is your best friend and you're a leader of the army.  Everybody loves you.  Everything's great in your life—well, not quite.
       2. Saul started to put two and two together and began to realize that David was going to be the future king and not Jonathan. Saul became intent on killing David.   In First Samuel 19:1-7 we learn that Saul told his son Jonathan and all the attendants to kill David but Jonathan warned David and then talked his father Saul into an oath not to put David to death.
       3. That did not last long as we find in First Samuel 19:11-12 – “11. Saul also sent messengers to David's house to watch him and to kill him in the morning. And Michal, David's wife, told him, saying, "If you do not save your life tonight, tomorrow you will be killed.'' 12. So Michal let David down through a window. And he went and fled and escaped.”[NKJV]  
    4. David can't go home.  He can't go back to his wife because if he does he'll be killed. In chapter 20 David meets Jonathan and asks; “What have I done? What is my iniquity, and what is my sin before your father, that he seeks my life?” Jonathan is not convinced Saul would really kill David but they form a pact, Jonathan will warn David if this is so.   Jonathan’s conversation with his father does not go well. Verses 30-34 – “30 Saul’s anger flared up at Jonathan and he said to him, “You son of a perverse and rebellious woman! Don’t I know that you have sided with the son of Jesse to your own shame and to the shame of the mother who bore you? 31 As long as the son of Jesse lives on this earth, neither you nor your kingdom will be established. Now send someone to bring him to me, for he must die!” 32 “Why should he be put to death? What has he done?” Jonathan asked his father. 33 But Saul hurled his spear at him to kill him. Then Jonathan knew that his father intended to kill David. 34 Jonathan got up from the table in fierce anger; on that second day of the feast he did not eat, because he was grieved at his father’s shameful treatment of David.”
       1. The cards are on the table and Jonathan goes to the place where he and David agreed to meet and warns David to flee. In verse 41 it says; “they wept together, but David more so”
       2. These two men who are historically known as probably being the best friends that ever were, now realize they can't be around each other anymore.  
       3. David’s forced to flee for his life. He has to be away from his wife. He has to be separated from his very best friend.  The position in the government is gone. Everything he was blessed with was taken from him by his father-in-law who intends to kill him… and he hasn’t done anything wrong. He had served Saul faithfully.
       4. David stays in strongholds in the wilderness and remained in the mountains. Saul sought him every day but God did not deliver David into his hand.
       5. Every day David was running for his life, hiding and living in caves. He went from being a leader of the military to living in a cave, running and hiding like an animal.   He had lost everything. Everything.
    5. That was the background we need to know in order for us to understand David’s emotional state, and now we will look at what David says in Psalm 69:1-3 - “1. Save me, O God! For the waters have come up to my neck. 2. I sink in deep mire, Where there is no standing; I have come into deep waters, Where the floods overflow me.   3. I am weary with my crying; My throat is dry; My eyes fail while I wait for my God.” In verse two he is not saying that he is literally in a swamp.   It is the idea he can not get his footing. He can't get his mind and his emotions stable.   It doesn't matter how hard David works at it, he cannot find mental and emotional stability.
       1. This man after God's own heart is suffering with depression.  That's what this describes.  I'm bringing this up so we understand depression itself is not, never has been, never will be sinful.   This may be a man after God’s own heart but he is a man, he is human.
          1. Being depressed is part of the human condition that we sometimes experience because of great loss. It is what David is going through. He is experiencing depression because he has lost everything.
          2. This is a man who is a man's man.  He's one of the greatest soldiers that probably ever lived.  Yet here he is. He's crying his eyes out and he can't stop crying. He's crying so much that his throat is dry. It doesn't matter how hard he tries he can't get his emotional footing.  As he says in verse two I sink in deep mire where there is no standing.  I can't stand. I've come into deep waters.  David feels like he's up to his neck, he's drowning.
       2. In Psalm 31:9-10 – “9. Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I am in trouble; My eyes waste away with grief, Yes, my soul and my body! 10. For my life is spent with grief, And my years with sighing; My strength fails because of my iniquity, And my bones waste away.”[para] Folks, that's very deep depression. His eyes were wasted away with grief, his soul, his body was wasting away, his life, his spirit. Notice David’s lament in verse 10. It is not an every now and then thing, he says;. My life is spent with grief and my years with sighing. This is something he struggled with because of the great loss.
          1. It is something that we can understand because we sometimes see it in our lives. There may be moments in our life when we are so blessed by God, and then because of circumstances unfortunately the blessings are gone.  It could be the loss of our health. It could be the loss of our family. It could be the loss of our possessions.  It could be the loss of our job. It could be the loss of our marriage.
          2. Christians go through all of those things, losing their marriage, losing their possessions, losing their family.   Whenever we have great loss that is where the emotional struggle comes from, the grief being so intense, so deep that it just presses down upon us and we find our self struggling continually with our emotions.
       3. David writes in Psalm 6:2-3 – “2. Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I am weak; O Lord, heal me, for my bones are troubled. 3. My soul also is greatly troubled; But You, O Lord how long?” Do we see the pain?   Do we see the grief?    Verse 4 – “Return, O Lord, deliver me! Oh, save me for Your mercies' sake!”
          1. Now verses 6 and 7 – “6. I am weary with my groaning; All night I make my bed swim; I drench my couch with my tears. 7. My eyes waste away because of grief; It grows old because of all my enemies.”
          2. We realize what's happening to him is because of his enemies, what they have done and are doing to him in the present.  He talks about how he's crying all night long. That's extremely deep grief.   What we are seeing in the scriptures is what happened to David, how everything was taken from him and how it affected him. It crushed him in his emotions.
       4. Psalm 18:6 – “In my distress I called upon the Lord, And cried out to my God; He heard my voice from His temple, And my cry came before Him, even to His ears.”
          1. This is one of the main lessons I want us to see.   When those times happen in your life when you're struggling in your emotions when you're finding you can't control it, because you're crying so much, because you're hurt so deeply, you need to learn to go to God first and often. You need to realize he really is there. Cry out to him. He will hear your prayer. He is in your life.  You are not alone.
          2. There is nothing wrong with you grieving.  There's nothing wrong with you if you're struggling with depression. Nothing is wrong with you. You are experiencing a natural human emotion. When you're going through it remember how David turned to God in prayer.
       5. It says again in Psalm 61:2 – “From the end of the earth I will cry to You, When my heart is overwhelmed; Lead me to the rock that is higher than I.” OK let’s tie these two together.  Remember what he said back in Psalm 69 about where he is standing?   It was like standing in mire and he can't get his footing.  What is he seeking for?   He's seeking for stability.  He's wanting stability in his emotions, stability in his mind, stability in his heart and life again.   He's needing rock underneath him that won't budge.
          1. Here in Psalm 61 is where he realizes the rock is not going to be himself.   The rock is going to be God.  
          2. Notice how he says My heart is overwhelmed.   That idea of being overwhelmed, there is more coming at you than you can handle.  It's coming so heavy, so fast, so much;… you cannot emotionally deal with it. That will happen to us at times in our life.   There will be times when you feel like you're not controlling your emotions and something is wrong with you.   It is not your normal frame of mind and what you're experiencing is part of what it is to be a human.
          3. It says in Psalm 25:17 – “The troubles of my heart have enlarged; Oh, bring me out of my distresses!”
          4. Psalms 143:11 – “Revive me, O Lord, for Your name's sake! For Your righteousness' sake bring my soul out of trouble.”    He understands the only way he can get out of this is with God.
          5. Psalm 28:7 – “The Lord is my strength and my shield; My heart trusted in Him, and I am helped; Therefore my heart greatly rejoices, And with my song I will praise Him.”  You cry out for help and God will give you help.   You cry for strength and God will give you strength.   When you can't go any further… He will hold you up.
          6. Psalm 30:5 – “… Weeping may endure for a night, But joy comes in the morning.” David understood weeping for a night.   He understood crying to the point his bed is covered in tears but he also understood there is joy at the end of the storm and the joy comes from God.
          7. These are lessons we need to understand.   Getting the joy, the strength, the stability back in our life, finding the rock that we can stand on, are all in our relationship with our Lord.  

• The story doesn't end there.   There will be times in our life when other people will sin against us.    That is what happened to David.  David was sinned against by his own family.  Saul was his father-in-law and his father-in-law was the one wanting to kill him.   David could have allowed the sin committed against him to make him extremely bitter, angry and filled with wrath, hatred, and malice. He could have allowed that to happen to him—but he did not.
  1. In this we find one of the great lessons from David. How he did not allow the sins committed against him to overcome him, to overwhelm him spiritually, to where he in turn—sinned.
     1. First Samuel 24:2-7 – “2 So Saul took three thousand able young men from all Israel and set out to look for David and his men near the Crags of the Wild Goats.
     2. 3 He came to the sheep pens along the way; a cave was there, and Saul went in to relieve himself. David and his men were far back in the cave. 4 The men said, “This is the day the Lord spoke of when he said to you, ‘I will give your enemy into your hands for you to deal with as you wish.’”
     3. Then David crept up unnoticed and cut off a corner of Saul’s robe. 5 Afterward, David was conscience-stricken for having cut off a corner of his robe. 6 He said to his men, “The Lord forbid that I should do such a thing to my master, the Lord’s anointed, or lay my hand on him; for he is the anointed of the Lord.” 7 With these words David sharply rebuked his men and did not allow them to attack Saul. And Saul left the cave and went his way.” [para]
  2. David rose and secretly cut off a corner of Saul's robe.  What happened?   David rose up and quietly cut off a corner of Saul's robe and then David's heart troubled him because he had cut off Saul's robe.
     1. All right stop right here.   We understand the men that were with David in the cave said David should kill Saul.   He's with his men hiding in the cave, and Saul goes into the cave to relieve himself. David then comes up and cuts off the corner of Saul’s robe.
     2. Then David is ashamed.   I can't believe I cut off the corner of his robe!    I shouldn’t have done that! When in reality his men are probably standing back there saying, hey, you didn't kill him. He was right there and God led him into you, you could've killed him.  Saul had been chasing David all over but David did not kill him.
     3. He said to his men The Lord forbid that I should do such a thing to my master, the Lord’s anointed . I don’t know about you but I find that amazing.   Amazing that someone has that degree of character.  
  3. Yes, David is indeed a man after God's own heart because he did not allow the sin committed against him to in turn, cause him to have malice towards Saul and to harm him. David then confronts Saul telling him “Some urged me to kill you, but I spared you; I said, ‘I will not lay my hand on my lord, because he is the Lord’s anointed.’ 11 See, my father, look at this piece of your robe in my hand!”
  4. At the end of First Samuel we see the Philistines defeating Israel and Saul and his sons die.   Second Samuel 1:11-12 – “11. Then David took hold of his own clothes and tore them, and so did all the men who were with him. 12. And they mourned and wept and fasted until evening for Saul and for Jonathan his son, for the people of the Lord and for the house of Israel, because they had fallen by the sword.” This is an amazing story. For years David had been running for his life.  
     1. David had even gone down to the Philistines and was living among them.   He has finally gotten to the point now where he's doing pretty well for himself.  He's got a large following then he hears a message. Saul and Jonathan were killed in battle.
     2. What would you expect to hear from someone who has been told the man who's been trying to kill you all these years, is dead?   You might think, well that is a relief, now David can go home.   How about a celebration? No, there was no rejoicing over the death of Saul. David tore his clothes and it wasn't just for Jonathan, he's weeping over the death of his enemy.
     3. Here we see the magnitude of this man's heart.   In Proverbs 24:17 – “Do not rejoice when your enemy falls, and do not let your heart be glad when he stumbles;”  That's the way David was.  He did not rejoice to hear that his enemy had fallen.
  5. To the contrary do you know what he did?   He wrote a song for him. You know David’s a psalmist.  Here in Second Samuel we have the song that David wrote for Jonathan and Saul. We find David’s lament in Second Samuel 1:17-27 – “17 David took up this lament concerning Saul and his son Jonathan, 18 and he ordered that the people of Judah be taught this lament of the bow (it is written in the Book of Jashar):[NKJV]

 

19 “A gazelle lies slain on your heights, Israel.

   How the mighty have fallen!

20 “Tell it not in Gath,

   proclaim it not in the streets of Ashkelon,

lest the daughters of the Philistines be glad,

   lest the daughters of the uncircumcised rejoice.

21 “Mountains of Gilboa,

   may you have neither dew nor rain,

   may no showers fall on your terraced fields.

For there the shield of the mighty was despised,

   the shield of Saul—no longer rubbed with oil.

22 “From the blood of the slain,

   from the flesh of the mighty,

the bow of Jonathan did not turn back,

   the sword of Saul did not return unsatisfied.

23 Saul and Jonathan—

   in life they were loved and admired,

   and in death they were not parted.

They were swifter than eagles,

   they were stronger than lions.

24 “Daughters of Israel,

   weep for Saul,

who clothed you in scarlet and finery,

   who adorned your garments with ornaments of gold.

25 “How the mighty have fallen in battle!

   Jonathan lies slain on your heights.

26 I grieve for you, Jonathan my brother;

   you were very dear to me.

Your love for me was wonderful,

   more wonderful than that of women.

27 “How the mighty have fallen!

   The weapons of war have perished!””

 

1. It says that Jonathan and Saul in life they were loved and admired. David, are you talking about the same Saul? When I read this song written by David about Saul being loved and admired I think, well David must be thinking about Saul before he tried to kill him.   Before Saul busted up his marriage and before he put David in danger and running for his life and before he destroyed David’s and Jonathan’s friendship.
2. David says in verse 24 Daughters of Israel, weep for Saul. That brings to mind the way the Lord would put it in the New Testament.   Love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you. (Matthew 5:44)   The Apostle Paul tells us in Romans 12; Do not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with good.

 

CONCLUSION:

There unfortunately will to be things that will happen in our life and it is not time and chance, it is some body intentionally doing it.   It certainly is one thing when its due time and chance that bad things happen to you.   It is another matter entirely when a person is doing it to you and they're doing it intentionally, trying to cause you harm.

 

How do you deal with that?   The way to deal with that is love your enemy even if he's your enemy.   Do not allow the evil committed against you by other people to overwhelm you, to overcome you, to poison your heart, and to poison your life.  There are many people who suffer because of some one sinning against them and those in the church of Christ also experience this.   There are those who have been greatly sinned against by people in their own family.   Then they struggle in their emotions on how to get past it.   If that happens to one of us I hope we remember David and Saul.

 

David did not allow the evil in Saul's heart and the wickedness committed against him by his father-in-law to make him wicked.   He continued to love the man and honor the man all the way, even when he was dead. Never ever do we see him hating Saul or wanting to do harm to Saul.

Yes he prayed for deliverance.  He's wanted God to punish his enemies but whenever Saul was right there in front of him he would not take advantage. David even is upset that he cut off the corner of Saul’s robe.   We are not to allow the sin committed against us to overwhelm us.  

 

In our life when we go through moments of great loss we are going to grieve.    We find our selves emotionally unstable and we struggle for that stability.   When we feel that way, and can not seem to get our footing, we need to remember David.   The way he found stability after years of grieving was by having the rock of God supporting him. That is the way for us to overcome and deal with the grief in our life, to realize that stability is not of our self, the stability is of God.

 

There might be somebody here this morning who is not a member of the one body.

It may be you believe that Jesus actually is the Christ, the Son of the living God and you're willing to openly confess your faith and motivated by your faith make the commitment of repentance to serve God and follow God’s word all the days of your life.

If you are willing to make that commitment we’ll be glad to assist you and baptize you into the one body for the remission of your sins.

 

If you’re child of God already and there's sin between you and your God we want to encourage you to deal with it.

Our God is gracious.

He's merciful.

He's willing to forgive us.

Take your sin to God.

Confess it to him and turn from it.

We as your family will pray for you.   We will pray with you.

We will do the best we can to try to encourage you and help you.

 

If you're subject to the Gospel call in any way let us know while we stand and sing the song which has been selected.

 

 

Invitation song: ???

Reference sermon by: Wayne Fancher