Why as a Baby, a Christmas Message
By Rev. Robert P. Elkins
All Scripture verse taken from the NIV Bible unless otherwise noted
Luke 2:6
“While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son.”
Have you ever wondered why God chose to come to earth incarnate, to be human flesh and blood and bone, just like you and I? If God is the God of all creation, if God is the God that created everything that was ever created in the entire universe, and he must be since we are told just that in the Bible and we find it in (John 1:1-3) for it says; “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men”. If the God of this creation can speak anything and everything into existence from nothing at all, if he can speak into existence anything he wants. If the God of all Creation can speak but a word and call something into existence whenever he wants, and again, from nothing, no formal matter, no molecules, not an atom of anything. Just say it and it’s there! If this wonderful and all-powerful God can just say the thing or object he desires and miraculously it appears! Why then did this deity of such awesome power and control use the form of a simple little baby, a helpless human child, to bring salvation to all mankind, to bring salvation to all that repent of their sins and their sinful lifestyle. Why did this God of creation select the form of a baby to come into the world?
The Jewish world of that time was waiting for “Messiah”; they were waiting for “The Christ”, to deliver them out of the chains of bondage from the mighty Roman Empire. They were in bondage to Rome as they had been to so many other empires in their past and they were waiting once again for deliverance, they were waiting for salvation and a warrior king. Make no mistake about it; the Jews knew the word of God. It was embedded in their very nature; it was as much a part of their culture as water and air were a part of their life. It was taught to the children from the moment of their birth, it was a daily religious habit that they kept. The Jews knew Torah, they studied the law, and they knew the Septuagint. They read and studied the writings of the prophets, they knew not only the history of their nation, but the prophecy that promised them a Messiah that would come to lead them from the grasp of their oppression.
Wouldn’t it have been easier for God to send his Son, to send Messiah, as a man? Wouldn’t it have been easier to send a full-grown adult being, a full-grown warrior, a leader, and a king? Wouldn’t it have been much more effective to have Jesus arrive on earth as a full-grown man and just appear in the temple of Jerusalem, just from nowhere appear from behind the massive curtain? To have Jesus just appear in kingly robes and step out from behind the curtain that separated the holy place from the Holy of Holies. If Jesus had just appeared from nowhere and stepped out from behind the curtain and into the temple where the people knew no one could go except the High Priest, and that only once a year on the day of Atonement or else it meant certain death. Friend, I am sure that would have gotten the peoples attention far more than the birth of a small common child born to simple parents! If Jesus had just come in this fashion as an adult man with a band of heavenly hosts playing trumpets and singing Hosanna to the King, my friend that would have really gotten the attention of the people. There would be no way the priests or Pharisee would have or could have rejected Jesus for anything except for who he was had he arrived in this way. If Jesus had just came and stepped out from behind that curtain no one would have ever denied his kingship or authority. If Jesus had just appeared unannounced in the temple could the priests deny his kingship and say that this isn’t the Messiah we have been waiting for so all this many long years? If Jesus had arrived with the High Priest as his witness, every man, woman and child in all of Israel would have to acknowledge, beyond a question of any doubt, that Jesus was truly Messiah and was there in all his heavenly glory for all to see. And if God had selected Jesus to arrive in this manner, wouldn’t he have saved not only the lives of all the little boys that the evil King Herod ordered slaughtered and thus stopped even more pain and suffering on his people Israel? This vile king tried to circumvent the will of God and it cost many innocent baby boys their lives. If Jesus had come as a full-grown king wouldn’t this tragedy have been avoided? O beloved how history would have been changed if Jesus had only come in his full adult state and displayed his full deity to all the people.
And here then my friend lie the crux of this scenario. Had Jesus come in any form or fashion other than as a child, a helpless little baby, had Jesus come to earth as anything other than a baby, born to a human mother, all Scripture would be a lie. All the prophecies foretelling his arrival would be wrong, every word of Scripture would be a lie and all would be subject to error. Had Jesus come in any fashion other than a baby the prophecy of Isaiah 40 concerning John the Baptist would have been false. There would have been no truth in the words John the Baptist spoke, prophesized by Isaiah, preparing the way in the wilderness because the preparations would not have been needed had Jesus just “arrived”. Had Jesus arrived on earth, as anything other than a baby the prophecy of Isaiah as that found in chapter 9 would have been useless. “Unto us a child is born, unto us a child is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulders. And his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The might God, The Everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace”. The prophecy foretold that Messiah, Christ, had to be a child, had to be an infant, a baby. And so we are back to the title of this sermon. Why a baby?
If we are looking for this God/man King called Wonderful, Counselor. If we are looking for this Prince of Peace and Everlasting Father, is this what we envision when we see a newborn baby? I don’t know about anyone else but when I see a newborn baby all I see is one so small and helpless, so dependent upon it’s parents that without those parents care and protection, with-in a matter of days or even hours, that child would die depending on the circumstances surrounding the child at any given time or place. When I see a baby I see a helpless bundle of life that can in no way defend it’s self against anything at all or against any of the evils that roam this evil world. Granted when I see a baby I know that that child, being the smallest in the home is in total control of that home and that every other person in that home has their life revolve around the schedule of that baby, Amen? And yet God chose this very pattern of life to be the vehicle he would use to come to earth, to bring deliverance and salvation to all men and be our King.
And so again we ask. Why a baby? And then we look to the Word of God and in his divine revelation he tells us the reasoning or answer to this question. Jesus came as a baby to meet every requirement of Scripture, and to meet every requirement of man. The Scriptures tell us that Jesus experienced every feeling that is common to man. That Jesus experienced every sensation that is common to man, and that he experienced every temptation that is common to man.
As a baby, Jesus had to know and experience soiled diapers and to nurse at his mother’s breast. He had to do this to experience what it was and could then relate to every infant child for all eternity because the needs of every child, regardless of where that child is born are the same. The needs of every child are identical regardless of the race, religion, or custom the child is born into. A baby born in the outback of Australia has the same basic needs as a child born on the ice packs of the Arctic. The finer details of childcare may change from location to location and place to place. Regardless of the environment the child is born into the basic needs will always be the same, be it in the ghetto’s of South Los Angles or the palaces of Palm Springs. They need food when they are hungry, they need sleep when they are tired, they need to be touched and held and loved and it doesn’t change from child to child. If you take a child born into wealth and place it in a crib and never pick it up or hold it and show it love other than to feed it or clean it. It’s going to develop a sense of rejection and have a mental state that will have a permanent negative effect on that child and this will follow that child for it’s entire life. Self-esteem will be low and a life of problems will follow. If you have a child that is born in a poor but loving home where it can be fed and cared for but also where it’s held and loved and cuddled on a regular basis that child will adjust far better than the child of wealth but neglect of attention. Every child has basic needs of love and attention and every child needs to be held and kissed and loved.
Jesus had to experience the care and love of a mother and father; he had to experience the growing process. He had to experience falling when he was learning to walk, he had to experience scraps and scratches and have his boo boos kissed by a loving mother. He needed to experience exhaustion while playing as a child or while working along side his earthly father, Joseph, as a young man. He had to be able to relate to each and every phase of life and growth that a child goes through so that he could minister to all the children and young people in the world. He had to experience their pains, their cares and their concerns. He needed to be able to relate to learning how to talk and count and develop table manners and politeness just as every child needs to learn these things. That’s why Jesus had to start as a child that’s why Jesus had to start as a baby. That’s why Jesus had to follow the same journey through life as every child does.
And if you think Jesus came with full knowledge of all these things that every child needs to learn … look at the Scriptures, he didn’t! Remember when he stayed behind at the temple at 12 years of age? What did he tell his earthly parents? “Didn’t you know I would be in my Fathers house?” Does this sound like your every day teenager or what? You can’t find your child for a few hours and then they come wandering in late and not caring at all that you’ve been going nuts, and what do they say? What excuse do they have for their being late or missing? “Didn’t you know I’d be at my friends house?” This is what Jesus did to his parents. Look at the book of Hebrews, it says in chapter 5 “During the days of Jesus’ life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission. Although he was a son, he learned obedience from what he suffered.” Jesus prayed and cried and shed tears, just like us. But he also learned obedience from what he suffered, he learned from his experiences, he learned as any other child learns, and any other person learns. Jesus had to experience learning just like we do; he had to learn just like each of us has to learn from our own personal life experiences.
Have you ever given any thought as to why the ministry of Jesus didn’t start until he was 33 years old? Have you ever wondered why Jesus didn’t start his ministry life until he was at an age when he was well into his adult years? It was so that he would grow in life and in experience, so that he could experience everything we all experience in our lives. Jesus had to learn to work with his hands; he had to grow from a child to a young teen to a young man to a full adult. And through every stage of his life he was learning to be a man, a person with every care, concern and feeling we each have. It was through these “hidden years” the years between the age of 12 and 33 that Jesus learned to be a full man. He learned the trade of a carpenter from his earthly father Joseph, he learned what it was like to earn his daily needs by the sweat of his brow, what it was like to have sore aching muscles at the end of the day. This is why Jesus knows how to minister to everyone that works for a living.
If we study the Scriptures we’ll see that Joseph, Jesus’ earthly father isn’t mentioned again after the time in the temple when Jesus was 12. We don’t know for sure as to why but I’d feel safe to say that Joseph had passed on by the time Jesus started his ministry years. Remember the words of our Lord when he was talking to his beloved disciple and his mother from the cross in regards to his mother and her future care. He said to his mother; “Woman, behold thy son” and to the disciple, John he said; “Behold thy mother”. Since we know Jesus had brothers and sisters it would be safe to say that with Jesus being the oldest child, and because of the customs of the day, he most likely had experienced the responsibility of providing for his family after the passing of his earthly father. Tradition and custom mandated that the eldest son, that being Jesus, took over the headship of the family when the patriarch passed away. Jesus would have had to accept the responsibilities of being the breadwinner for the family. And thus he would have had to experience the full range of emotions and concerns that came with this responsibility. What he learned prepared him to minister to every family.
By reaching the age of 33 years, Jesus passed through childhood, through those early learning years. Jesus passed through puberty; he experienced the changes that a body goes through. He experienced the transformation to adulthood, always learning and gaining in knowledge and understanding. He watched his friends from childhood grow as well, he saw childhood friends grow to adulthood, enter marriage and have children. And yes I’m sure he even experienced the draws or desires to take a wife and experience the intimacy of love. If this shocks you look at the Scriptures. (Hebrews 4:15) says; “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are – yet was without sin.” And that “every temptation” means just that, he was tempted by all the same things that each of us has been tempted by. And that must include something like love and marriage. Yet he didn’t yield to the temptation and he didn’t sin either.
The Scriptures are very clear in regards to this; there is no hidden thing laced in there. Jesus was tempted by it all, as a businessman he knew the temptation to make a quick profit through shoddy workmanship, he was a carpenter. But I’m sure he was an honest carpenter, an honest businessman. I’m sure Jesus was tempted to over indulge in strong drink at a party. Look at the wedding at Canaan. Do the math if you want, six 30-gallon jugs of water, that becomes 180 gallons of the finest wine ever made. Now that’s a party, that’s a temptation. There is nothing wrong in being tempted, our Lord was tempted, … often … it’s what we do with the temptation. (James 1:13) “When tempted no one should say, “God is tempting me.” For God cannot be tempted by evil nor does he tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin.”
Yes my friend Jesus was tempted as we are, he experienced all that we experience, he knew fatigue, he knew hunger, he laughed, he thirsted and he got angry. He perspired, he cried and he knew pain. He bled, he suffered and he died. And that beloved is why Jesus came to earth as a baby. That is why he didn’t come as a full-grown man, that is why he didn’t come as a warrior king and that is why he didn’t come in kingly robes. He experienced what he did, and how he did, so that he could minister to every one of us today. He experienced what he did so that he could minister to us right where we are, right where we hurt and he has experienced that hurt with us, he knows and understands what that hurt is.
But why did he do this you may ask? He did it for two reasons. First, he did it to reveal God to us. In all that Jesus did, in all that Jesus experienced, he showed us a God that loves his children. And how you may ask could he show us God’s love? He did it by and through the power of the Holy Spirit that was bestowed upon him at his baptism in the Jordan River when his cousin John baptized him. And this same Holy Spirit, this same third person of the Trinity that came to rest upon Jesus at the time of his baptism. Jesus promised him to be with us as well, for right now, today as well as yesterday and tomorrow. And indeed he, the Holy Spirit, did come in the upper room on the day of Pentecost. Throughout Jesus’ entire ministry on earth Jesus was revealing God and God’s love to us by divine revelation and that divine revelation continues to flow to us today through the Bible and through the Holy Spirit. We can see a revealed God by looking at the life of Jesus, guided by the Holy Spirit in every aspect of that life. We can see that Jesus was indeed tempted but it was the power of the Spirit that assisted him to not yield to that temptation, and that same Spirit power is ours today as well.
Jesus said; “If you have seen me you’ve seen the Father.” If we develop a close and personal relationship with Jesus Christ, we develop a close and personal relationship with the Father as well. It is impossible to separate the Father from the Son, just as it is impossible to separate the Holy Spirit from the Father or the Son. In the epistle (1st John 5:7) in the KJV it says; “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost, and these three are one.” And it is in and through the development of this intimate and personal relationship between Our Lord Jesus and man that the love of God is revealed. If we look at the oldest covenant between man and established and anointed by God, that being the marriage covenant, we can get a slight grasp of how this works. A couple, and in my mind that means a man and a woman and nothing else, Amen. A couple can know each other since childhood, may have dated for years, it may seem like they’ve been friends forever. But until they actually get married and live with one another for a while, until they become intimate, knowing every detail about the other person, they cannot truly understand the inner most complexities of their mate. As God, with the majestic Godliness of Jesus, he set aside his deity and became flesh and blood man to fully understand and know all of our complexities. And he did this so that he could love us more. He did this so that we could know God more. He did this much as the married couple, he needed to live with us and experience a man’s life from a man’s perspective. Jesus set aside his deity and walked among men to show the Fathers love and to show the Father. Much like our imaginary couple, Jesus came to have an intimate relationship with us not only so that he could experience man more but also so that man could experience and understand God more and know God’s love more.
The second reason Jesus took on our humanity was so that he could share in our suffering and pain. So that he could connect with us in our times of hurt and difficulties. Let there be no doubt, even for the strongest Christian, even for the most Spirit filled, faith filled Christian, life is still filled with pain and sorrow, suffering and hurt. At times this is a direct result of our actions even if they were filled with the best of intentions. And then again the pain comes from outside influences, from the actions of others that we come in contact with. It’s the Holy Spirit dwelling in us that mandates how we deal with these hurts, it’s the Holy Spirit’s guidance that tells us how we are to respond to these painful circumstances.
The death of a loved one hurts the Christian as much as it hurts the non-Christian. And Jesus understood that pain. It’s not recorded in the Gospel accounts but I have no doubt that when his earthly father, the man who raised him and taught him his trade, as a carpenter died Jesus grieved. I’m sure Jesus grieved just like you and I do whenever he lost a loved one or close friend. It is recorded in the Gospel accounts that when Jesus heard of the death of his cousin, John, he went off by himself and cried and grieved. And when he heard of the death of his dear friend Lazarus, again he wept. For you Bible buffs, you most likely know the shortest verse in the Bible. It’s two words, “He wept” found in (John 11:35).
The early years of Jesus’ life, between 12 and 33 as previously stated aren’t recorded but I think by looking at the recorded ministry of Jesus we can see a glimpse of his life. Jesus healed the sick countless times. Why? Because as a child he experienced sickness, he experienced all the sniffles and child illnesses of man; Jesus has shared our hurt. When people were hungry Jesus fed them. Why? Because he knew hunger, Jesus fasted for 40 days, he knew hunger, Jesus has shared our hurt. Jesus knew the pain of having a close friend betray him. Jesus and Judas had to be very close, Jesus trusted Judas with the finances of his ministry. Jesus has shared our hurt. Peter, one of Jesus’ inner circles of friends, Peter denied Jesus three times. If we read the account of the denial in the book of Luke we see that at the time of the third denial Jesus even turned and looked straight at Peter. Peter was with Jesus from the very beginning of his ministry years and yet when there was a real trial Peter abandoned him, one of his closest friends rejected him and broke his heart. Jesus has shared our hurt. In the garden Jesus grieved over a hard decision, to the point that he sweat drops of blood. We have all had terribly hard decisions to make in life, have we not? He has shared our hurt. He was whipped and beaten, his skin was torn off the bone, his blood flowed freely through the nail holes, and he suffered pain like most of us who have ever suffered and he died in the past. He has shared our hurt.
And so you see my friend, Jesus had to come as a child, he had to come as a baby. He had to grow as any child grows. He had to know the full range of our human pain; he had to know the full range our human emotions. He had to know the full range of our human endurance and the full range of our human limits. He had to know all these things so that when we come to him today with all of our pains and sufferings, when we come to him with all of our problems and illnesses he can say; “I know your pain, I know your suffering, I know your concern, I know your emotions and I know how you feel”.
Jesus came as a baby and he died as a man just so that he could say to each of us here today; “The same Holy Spirit that was with me at the time I walked this earth is still here today and He is here to lift you up from the cares and concerns you may have and to assist you through any problem you may have. My Holy Spirit that I gave at Pentecost is as alive now as he was then, he is here to be your counselor and your comforter”.
And so as we prepare to celebrate the birth of this Jesus, as we prepare to celebrate the birth of this special Holy baby that came so long ago we now know why Jesus came as a baby. We now know why he entered this earth as man and paved a way for us and all we can say is “Thank you Lord, thank you for the gift you gave so long ago. Thank you for your birth, for your death and for your love.”
Grace & peace
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Thursday, November 27, 2008
The Sovereignty of God
The Sovereignty of God
By Rev. Robert P. Elkins
All Scripture verse taken from the NIV Bible unless otherwise noted
I won’t be opening with a reading of the Scriptures but have no fear, by the time we get finished you’ll have plenty of references to look up and hopefully you will have much to review in the comfort of your own home later on.
I am sure that at some point of time in our past we have all heard the term “The sovereignty of God” or maybe “God is Sovereign”. That’s got a nice ring to it don’t you think? “God is sovereign” or “We serve a Sovereign God”. Any way we say it, we have got to admit that it really sounds impressive just to hear the way those words sound together. But how many of us really know what it means? How many of us know what the word “sovereign” fully implies and the power behind that implication? And equally important, how many of us, if asked, could show someone else even one single Scripture verse that show’s God’s Sovereignty, gives an example of God’s Sovereignty, or could explain it to them? Well hopefully friend by the time you finish with this simple teaching I am offering you can say, “yes I can” to all of these questions.
Before going to the Scriptures it would be beneficial for us to go to the dictionary just to see what the word “sovereign” means. According to good old Mr. Webster, and his New World College dictionary. And no, this is not an advertisement for Webster’s New World College Dictionary or an endorsement of any kind. It just happens to be the dictionary I have in my office and to tell you the truth I am much happier with a huge old 1957 Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary I found in a yard sale a few years ago. I don’t know what “New World” Mr. Webster is talking about but his New World book has some word definitions that are of the vilest and obnoxious language you can think of. In particular, if you’re a parent, or have young people in or about your home, you may want to spend a little time looking at the dictionary you have and see if it’s like the one I’m talking about. Because the words old Mr. Webster put in his book today are words no decent Christian should be using much less have a full and graphic description of what they mean and they sure don’t add anything to our vocabulary other than embarrassment if we use them.
Now back to the meaning of “sovereign” and “sovereignty”. Sovereign means 1) above or superior to all others; chief; greatest; supreme 2) superior in power rank or authority 3) of or holding the position of ruler; royal; reigning 4) independent of all others. And “sovereignty” means “the state of being sovereign”. All of that sounds like God to me! Amen.
God is supreme and above all others. The Israelis or Hebrews if you will, of the Old Testament and of today still proclaim what’s known as the “Shema”. (Deuteronomy 6:4) “Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One”. What this is saying is that “we have only one God and he is the only God among the many small case “g” gods. It is this belief in the one God that made the Israelis or Hebrews so different from all the other peoples in the land in which they lived, this is what set them apart from everyone else. All the other nations around them were polytheistic, they had many gods, their people had gods of fertility, and gods for the weather, gods for food, and gods for pleasure. They had a god for every occasion and every occupation. And then here comes these strange Jewish people and they are monotheistic, they worship just one single God, a God that covers every aspect of their lives. They worship one God and this one God is the God of Creation and the God of the Harvest and the God of the Weather and he’s the God of everything and to the neighbors of the Hebrews this is strange behavior. And then they tell the neighbors that “their God” is the only God that deserves any type of worship and that their God is superior to all the other little gods and that the other gods are false and of no value. A case scenario of how to make friends and influences people “Jewish style” which if you think about it isn’t such a bad idea since they are right. This mindset is what got the Apostle Paul in so much hot water with the people in Ephesus; so much so that there was a riot over his teachings that he gave in Athens earlier. Look at the book of (Acts 17:22-31) Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: "Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you.
"The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. 'For in him we live and move and have our being.' As some of your own poets have said, 'We are his offspring.'
"Therefore since we are God's offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by man's design and skill. In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to all men by raising him from the dead."
Notice how Paul was very polite in his speech, he complimented them on their being very religious and how he noticed that they even had a god for those who didn’t know who to worship, he was the original generic god. We might want to learn a good lesson in being diplomatic from Paul’s technique. He was a gentle witness but he still got the point across.
The Jews knew that there is only one God and that that God is sovereign and above all others. King Davis knew this and recorded his thoughts in (Psalm 135:5-7) “I know that the Lord is great, that our Lord is greater than all gods. The Lord does whatever pleases him, in the heavens and on the earth, in the seas and all their depths. He makes clouds rise from the end of the earth; he sends lightning with the rain and brings out the wind from his storehouse.
Friend if you want a verse of Scripture that proclaims God’s sovereignty this is it. Verse 5 tells us that the Lord our God is great, that he’s greater than any and all other gods! That little bit of information in it’s self says he’s sovereign. But it gets better. Then it doesn’t tell us who the other gods are or where they come from and it really doesn’t matter because these other goods don’t matter. David knew and understood that it didn’t matter what title the false gods carried or how many people worshiped them, the name or number of the followers was of no importance because they were following a false god. This verse makes one blanket statement that covers it all. Remember that Kennel Ration dog food jingle from a few years ago? Change the words; use the jingle and it works perfectly. “My Gods better than your god, my Gods better than yours. My Gods better cause he’s the only God, my Gods better than yours.”
Now look at the beauty of verses 6 and 7. “The lord does whatever pleases him, in the heavens and on the earth, in the seas and all their depths. He makes clouds rise from the ends of the earth; he sends lightning with the rain and brings out the wind from his storehouse.” Friend, what else is there? God does whatever he pleases regardless of where he’s at because time means nothing to him and he’s at all places at all times. Whether he’s in the heavens or on the earth, whether he’s in the seas or at the very bottom of the seas it matters not. This verse is telling us God is in every square inch of the land of the earth and he’s in every molecule of water. This verse is telling us that God does what he wants when he wants and that he’s superior to all things and all gods. If the Almighty wants it to rain… it’s going to rain, Amen? If God wants the rain to be accented with lightning it’s going to be accented with lightning, Amen?
Friend I’m here to give you personal testimony of five years experience in the United States Navy. You will never see anything more beautiful, more majestic or more powerful in an unlimited, un-restricted, or unfettered sense of the word than a raging wind, rain and lightning storm in the middle of the ocean. The lightning flashes from the heavens to the water, from horizon to horizon in blinding brilliance, the wave caps, driven by the winds glow in the dark of night with phosphorus in the waters. And if you want to see a sovereign and majestic God in all his might and majesty you’ve got to see waves crashing over the bow of the largest warship in the world, an aircraft carrier. And that bow is 90 foot above the waterline, and those mighty waves are over 100 foot in height. Once you’ve seen that you can’t but help cry out “O God, truly you are sovereign above all gods”.
Another wonderful example of God’s sovereignty can be found in the end of verse 7. If you’ll recall the words of Jesus, he said that the winds come and go and no one knows from whence they come or where they are going. Verse 7 says that God brings the winds out of his storehouse. The KJV says “He bringeth the winds out of his treasuries.” Think of the things simple man locks up, pieces of paper with print on it, colored stones God made and pieces of the earth. Can you imagine anyone trying to lock up the wind other than a sovereign God?
If you still have your finger in Psalms, go to 115:3. “Our God is in heaven; he does whatever pleases him”. Again we see an un-restricted, all-powerful Deity of superiority over all things, reigning from heaven. This theme is repeated in (Isaiah 46: 9-10). “Remember the former things, those of long ago; I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me. I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come”. Remember the dictionary explanation? “As one superior in power, rank, or authority”. There is no greater anything above God. Can anything created be greater than the creator?
Most likely the greatest, most awesome invention man has ever devised would be nuclear power. Look at the nuclear weapon and it’s unbelievable power of destruction. This weapon is able to blow away a mountain and melt rocks. And nuclear power in electricity, a nuclear power plant burning no fossil fuel but using only the power of the atom is able to run an entire city with all of it’s needs for electric. Nuclear waste, what in the world have we made here? Something that is of no use what so ever as far as we know at this time and it will remain deadly for thousands of years. And this wonderful source of power, this awesome source of destruction, and this dreadful source of waste product was only discovered by man, men didn’t create nuclear anything, God did. Man didn’t create this power source; they only found what the Sovereign God created and hid in the ground. Only a sovereign God can create anything by speaking it into existence from nothing. And then we, mankind comes along and we then find what God created and we refashion it in some way, mix his created things together and then claim credit for creating it. We even place a patient on it and say it came from the mind of this man or that woman when in all actuality all we did was stumble upon something that was always there to begin with. Man can take a grain like wheat, grind it up to powder, add salt, yeast, a little this and that, mix in water and come up with bread. God on the other hand can speak into existence manna, which floated down from heaven in a quantity as was needed, could be gathered up for a daily ration and if you took to much it spoiled over night so that the greed of man would not be fed. Unless of course it was on the weekend, then the people could take a double portion and it was fine because God didn’t want them to labor on the Sabbath. Now that my friend is a sovereign God, he can make bread that is predisposed to rot on Sunday through Friday if you take too much and then last longer on a Saturday when he wants it to last a little longer. Who else but a Sovereign God could do that? That’s having total authority over all! Amen? Give him a praise offering for having authority over everything including heavenly bread.
In doing a study of God’s sovereignty, we need to ask, is there anything in all creation that doesn’t fall under the authority of God’s sovereignty or power? I’m not talking about something foolish like questioning as to whether God could make a rock so large that God couldn’t move it. A question with this kind of reasoning is pure foolishness and won’t be addressed; it would serve no purpose. So far we’ve talked about false gods and the relationship of the true God in all his sovereignty over them. We’ve even, to a light extent, talked about God and his sovereignty over the elements of the weather, how God sends rain or wind when he so desires. But what about some of the other aspects or objects of God’s creation, is there anything that isn’t under God’s sovereignty?
With the simple finite mind of man and our limited intelligence, it is conceivable that the created things of our will, the things that did come from our minds, will at some point be no longer under our total control or authority. Just a little side note, I read once a quote that caused me to chuckle, why is it that man’s intelligence is limited but his stupidly isn’t? Think about that for a second. Anyway, going back to our study. Look at nuclear energy, … we have it, we created it so to speak. But are we in total control of it? Once we release that energy, in whatever form we choose, do we still have total control over it? I would dare say “NO”! Once that awesome energy is released it’s free to react as it desires, we can guide it or attempt to control it but if it gets out of hand it’s on its own. Look at the nuclear reactor in Russia, once it was left uncontrolled it took off on its own and the result is a place on this earth that will be uninhabitable for years. But allow me to go to an example that will be more simplistic, something we can more relate to on a personal level.
Through the power of our Sovereign God’s Spirit, through his blessing, he has allowed man and woman to come together and create a child. This child is born, we nurture it, we care for it and it develops into a young teenager. You know where I’m going with this don’t you? Okay, I’ll skip the teenager years. This child over time grows into a full-grown adult, marries and has a family of his or her own. Once this child has grown into full maturity, once we’ve released this child into the world. Do we as parents still have total control over that child any longer? Did we ever have total control over this child? We as parents will love that child with all our heart and the child may love us with all their heart as well, but will that child, now an adult, be totally subservient to us any longer? Rather than thinking of our children, think now about ourselves, if our parents are still alive; are we, their child, totally subservient to them? Most likely not. Do parents have total control over their children for life? I’m being ludicrous here, we all know the answer is no. We all know that the parent’s sovereignty ends at some point and that child is a free spirit to be autonomous or self-governing. And with the liberal laws of society today this is almost to the point of absurdity. But that’s a different sermon for a different day.
So, what about God and his sovereignty? Is there anything or anyone that reaches that point of autonomous self-governing independence and is no longer under the sovereignty of God? The Bible must have an answer to this question so where do we look? Is God sovereign over all life and creation? How about our daily events and plans of life? The Apostle Paul seems to think that God is in control of his life. Look at (Acts 18:21). Paul’s in Corinth and he’s talking about future plans with Priscilla and Aquila. He’s leaving but he says, “I will come back if it is God’s will.” Paul knew that every step of his life was under the direction and control of God when he submitted himself to God’s spirit. I think this theme is better found in the book of James. In James’ epistle to the scattered tribes of Israel he says in chapter four, verses 13 through 15. “Now listen you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” Why you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If it’s the Lords will, we will do this or do that.” We, simple man or woman, have no knowledge as to what the future holds for us. But we are subject to the Sovereign God’s will.
At this point you may be asking yourself, “what about those who turn to a life of sin or reject God and the Scriptures?” we have to ask, is this also God’s will that they do this? This may shock you but the answer is yes! If God is sovereign and in total control then even this situation is under his authority and rule and subject to his will. But with an explanation. I’ll bet that there are at least a few who are saying to yourself right now, “I have to see how this preacher gets himself out of this mess.”
As a student of the Scriptures we will see that God lays out all of the paths of life for us. He has no hidden agenda, there are no real surprises, there’s nothing hiding in the bushes that will jump out and catch us off guard. In particular, study your Old Testament. In the Old Testament we read time and time again that the Sovereign God, talking through his prophets, tells his people that this is what I want for you. This is the path I’ve selected for you and this is the blessing I have in store for you as your reward for following my ways. If you do this and you do that, then I’ll bless you with this and I’ll bless you with that because blessing is what the Sovereign God wants for his people. And as clear as the path he’s selected for us is laid out so also is the opposite if we decide to not follow his will. His word tells us in no uncertain terms; if you don’t do this and you don’t do that then here is the penalty that your actions will warrant. And whether it’s blessing or penalty, it’s still under God’s authority and sovereignty. If God is to be a just and sovereign God, he must allow penalty to follow rebellion. If God is a true God of complete justice and love, when there is rebellion there must be consequence. So is it the will of God that some follow a sinful life style? No, that goes against his will. But it is within the will of God that they are allowed to follow that sinful life style and it will be under his complete authority that there will be justice administered if repentance isn’t shown by that person and grace and mercy asked for pleading that the blood of Jesus be applied to the sins of that life style.
What about sickness, death or disaster? Friend we live in a fallen world; we live in a world that holds sin in its heart. God doesn’t bring about these things but he allows them to come to be because God is also the creator of all his laws of nature. It wasn’t Sir Isaac Newton that created gravity; he just discovered it, God created it. God’s laws say if you lead this certain lifestyle, then this is the result of that life style. If you step off a tall building, God’s law of gravity kicks in and you crash to the ground. If you’re in a car and you go off the road and hit a tree, does God want you to be hurt? No, but he established the laws of inertia and God doesn’t on a regular basis violate his own laws so inertia kicks in and you hit the windshield if you’re not wearing a seatbelt. If your car is moving and it suddenly stops, unless your restrained by something you’re going to keep moving at the same speed the car was traveling at until something stops your foreword progress. In every motor vehicle accident there is more than one collision, the vehicle hits something; that is the first collision. Then the occupants in that vehicle hit something on the interior of the vehicle unless restrained by a seat belt; that is the second collision. That is the law of physics in action and it is a creation of God. Another example, if you smoke tobacco or anything else that people smoke, be it of the legal or illegal variety, chances are there is going to be a bad result. We all know what the body can do to protest with these substances in them, we were not designed to breath smoke; we are “air breathing” creatures. Actually we are “clean air” breathing creatures and this is becoming more and more apparent as we see the respiratory problems arise is us as we live in the dirty air we have created through the things we have done to our environment.
Friend I have to tell you that in the beginning these bodies didn’t have the problems we have today. When The Sovereign God designed this body he gave us he did so making it a really great working machine. When sin came into the world, when God had to place limits on how long these things we call home would last, that’s when the problems started to happen. Cancer? It doesn’t just happen like we would like to think, God doesn’t just allow something to “Happen” that is out of his control. Cancer is the end result of something that gained entrance to the body at some point in the past. The air we breathe, the food we eat, the location in which we live, the gene pool we came from, there was something that triggered it to begin with. It may have happened in our generation, it may have gained entrance in a past generation, who knows how long ago. But it didn’t just happen outside of the will of God, not if God is Sovereign. Heart attack? They don’t just happen, something brings it on, it may be in our family genes, and something passed on from past lifestyles. Drug addiction, alcoholism, stress, lack of exercise, diet, here’s the action … here’s the result. Did God create the evil? … No, but when sin was released into the world the evil came along with it. When man made the decision to misuse what God created, God in his infinite wisdom had already created the result of what that misuse would bring. When we use or misuse something of God’s creation there is always an end result. Sometimes we already know what that end result will be and we still do it. Is that our fault or Gods? Sometimes we use or misuse something God created and we don’t know the end result, eating a poison mushroom that we didn’t know about, we get sick and die because of our ignorance. Is that our fault of Gods? In our legal system we use the scales of justice and one of the rules of those scales is “ignorance of the law is no excuse”. I hate to tell the politicians this but whether they want to acknowledge it or not in their great quest to remove God from all government activities, in using this statement they are enacting one of the laws of God. That law of “ignorance of the law is no excuse” was established when God established all of his laws for nature.
I think one of the saddest things I’ve ever seen in all my years as a law enforcement officer working within the New York State Department of Corrections was when I took an inmate to New York City for a double funeral, his sister and his little niece. They had both drown at a family picnic, the little girl because she made the decision in her little untrained mind to go to close to the swimming pool and she fell in. The mother because she made the heroic decision to jump in to save the girl, and neither one of them could swim. Did God want that to happen? Of course not! Did he allow it to happen, yes! He’s a Sovereign God and he created the laws that say people can’t live and breathe underwater; he created us with lungs to breathe air. Both the little girl and her mother made a wrong decision and they suffered the consequences of it. Was God unjust in allowing it to happen? No. His established laws were already in effect whether the people knew them or not and unless God allows a miracle to take place those laws and the consequences of them must be followed regardless of the outcome.
Does God ever alter or change the laws that he established? Yes, but only on rare events. It’s known as miracles, if we study the Scriptures we’ll find countless times when God did just that. Old Testament examples are plentiful, parting the waters of the Red Seas, it was a miracle to bring about God’s perfect and Sovereign will for his people. Stopping the sun from moving for a while to win a battle, it was a miracle to bring about God’s perfect and Sovereign will for his people. Jonah in the belly of the whale, it was a miracle to bring about God’s perfect and Sovereign will for his people. Examples are also found in the New Testament, raising an ordinary person back from death, healing a blind person, multiplying loaves and fishes, changing water into wine, and raising a dead man, God’s only Son, back to life to defeat sin for all men and women. All miracles to bring about God’s perfect and Sovereign will for his people. Did the miracles end when the Canon was closed, when the writing of the Bible ended? Of course not, we see miracles every day. All of us have seen, heard of or experienced a miracle in our life. All of us have seen, know of someone or have experienced the power of the Sovereign God when he’s altered his own laws to minister to his people in his perfect and Sovereign will. A car that didn’t hit yours when you know it should have. A fall that should have killed you but it didn’t. A bill that was paid when you don’t know how, when your child was healed when there was no hope. Friend; miracles are those things that happen when you know in the laws of nature, in the laws of God they shouldn’t happen and they do. Does this happen all the time? No … if it did then it wouldn’t be a miracle. If it happened all the time then it would no longer be a miracle but it would be the standard, regulated law of God and the miracle factor would discontinue or cease being a miracle.
And now, I’m sure that there are a few or at least one reading this that is saying to them “I’ve never seen or experienced a miracle”. Well to show you that God is still in the miracle working business I’m going to give you an example of one of God’s miracles that he works every second of the day, twenty four hours a day every day of the year. Think of our lowly sinful state, think of all those who were lost in sin and despair and had no hope of anything but God’s prefect justice and the raging fires of hell. And the Sovereign God, in his perfect love and mercy gives salvation to all that ask for it. That beloved is a miracle. Our sins and rebellion screamed out for justice, our past cried out for punishment and then God in his love said: “I think I’ll perform a miracle because this one has asked for forgiveness. This one has called out to my Beloved Son and my Son has said, “Father forgive him or her because they know not what they do.” My perfect law says that I’ve seen their actions; my perfect law says that this is the result of their actions. But my Son says: “Father, change your perfect law for this one because this one belongs to me, you gave me this one and he or she is now mine and it’s my desire that this one isn’t going to be lost”. And beloved when this happens, you’ve seen the greatest miracle of them all. When this happens you’ve gone from the perfect law of the Sovereign God that said the perfect and just punishment is eternal flames and suffering but the miracle of grace has changed that suffering to eternal glory in the presence of our Sovereign Lord and King, Jesus Christ.
I could go on a lot longer but another miracle is having a pastor that knows when to stop, it’s a miracle when you have a pastor who knows when you’ve had enough for one teaching. But before we stop completely let me give you a few verses that will show our Sovereign God and his sovereignty over Satan. Look these up when you have time or when you’re doing your Bible study this week. (John 12:31) (2nd Thessalonians 2:8) and (Revelation 12:7). God is Sovereign and that includes sovereignty over Satan, sin and salvation. I pray that when you leave this web site today you have a better understanding of what A Sovereign God is and what it means to all of us. Grace & peace.
By Rev. Robert P. Elkins
All Scripture verse taken from the NIV Bible unless otherwise noted
I won’t be opening with a reading of the Scriptures but have no fear, by the time we get finished you’ll have plenty of references to look up and hopefully you will have much to review in the comfort of your own home later on.
I am sure that at some point of time in our past we have all heard the term “The sovereignty of God” or maybe “God is Sovereign”. That’s got a nice ring to it don’t you think? “God is sovereign” or “We serve a Sovereign God”. Any way we say it, we have got to admit that it really sounds impressive just to hear the way those words sound together. But how many of us really know what it means? How many of us know what the word “sovereign” fully implies and the power behind that implication? And equally important, how many of us, if asked, could show someone else even one single Scripture verse that show’s God’s Sovereignty, gives an example of God’s Sovereignty, or could explain it to them? Well hopefully friend by the time you finish with this simple teaching I am offering you can say, “yes I can” to all of these questions.
Before going to the Scriptures it would be beneficial for us to go to the dictionary just to see what the word “sovereign” means. According to good old Mr. Webster, and his New World College dictionary. And no, this is not an advertisement for Webster’s New World College Dictionary or an endorsement of any kind. It just happens to be the dictionary I have in my office and to tell you the truth I am much happier with a huge old 1957 Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary I found in a yard sale a few years ago. I don’t know what “New World” Mr. Webster is talking about but his New World book has some word definitions that are of the vilest and obnoxious language you can think of. In particular, if you’re a parent, or have young people in or about your home, you may want to spend a little time looking at the dictionary you have and see if it’s like the one I’m talking about. Because the words old Mr. Webster put in his book today are words no decent Christian should be using much less have a full and graphic description of what they mean and they sure don’t add anything to our vocabulary other than embarrassment if we use them.
Now back to the meaning of “sovereign” and “sovereignty”. Sovereign means 1) above or superior to all others; chief; greatest; supreme 2) superior in power rank or authority 3) of or holding the position of ruler; royal; reigning 4) independent of all others. And “sovereignty” means “the state of being sovereign”. All of that sounds like God to me! Amen.
God is supreme and above all others. The Israelis or Hebrews if you will, of the Old Testament and of today still proclaim what’s known as the “Shema”. (Deuteronomy 6:4) “Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One”. What this is saying is that “we have only one God and he is the only God among the many small case “g” gods. It is this belief in the one God that made the Israelis or Hebrews so different from all the other peoples in the land in which they lived, this is what set them apart from everyone else. All the other nations around them were polytheistic, they had many gods, their people had gods of fertility, and gods for the weather, gods for food, and gods for pleasure. They had a god for every occasion and every occupation. And then here comes these strange Jewish people and they are monotheistic, they worship just one single God, a God that covers every aspect of their lives. They worship one God and this one God is the God of Creation and the God of the Harvest and the God of the Weather and he’s the God of everything and to the neighbors of the Hebrews this is strange behavior. And then they tell the neighbors that “their God” is the only God that deserves any type of worship and that their God is superior to all the other little gods and that the other gods are false and of no value. A case scenario of how to make friends and influences people “Jewish style” which if you think about it isn’t such a bad idea since they are right. This mindset is what got the Apostle Paul in so much hot water with the people in Ephesus; so much so that there was a riot over his teachings that he gave in Athens earlier. Look at the book of (Acts 17:22-31) Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: "Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you.
"The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. 'For in him we live and move and have our being.' As some of your own poets have said, 'We are his offspring.'
"Therefore since we are God's offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by man's design and skill. In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to all men by raising him from the dead."
Notice how Paul was very polite in his speech, he complimented them on their being very religious and how he noticed that they even had a god for those who didn’t know who to worship, he was the original generic god. We might want to learn a good lesson in being diplomatic from Paul’s technique. He was a gentle witness but he still got the point across.
The Jews knew that there is only one God and that that God is sovereign and above all others. King Davis knew this and recorded his thoughts in (Psalm 135:5-7) “I know that the Lord is great, that our Lord is greater than all gods. The Lord does whatever pleases him, in the heavens and on the earth, in the seas and all their depths. He makes clouds rise from the end of the earth; he sends lightning with the rain and brings out the wind from his storehouse.
Friend if you want a verse of Scripture that proclaims God’s sovereignty this is it. Verse 5 tells us that the Lord our God is great, that he’s greater than any and all other gods! That little bit of information in it’s self says he’s sovereign. But it gets better. Then it doesn’t tell us who the other gods are or where they come from and it really doesn’t matter because these other goods don’t matter. David knew and understood that it didn’t matter what title the false gods carried or how many people worshiped them, the name or number of the followers was of no importance because they were following a false god. This verse makes one blanket statement that covers it all. Remember that Kennel Ration dog food jingle from a few years ago? Change the words; use the jingle and it works perfectly. “My Gods better than your god, my Gods better than yours. My Gods better cause he’s the only God, my Gods better than yours.”
Now look at the beauty of verses 6 and 7. “The lord does whatever pleases him, in the heavens and on the earth, in the seas and all their depths. He makes clouds rise from the ends of the earth; he sends lightning with the rain and brings out the wind from his storehouse.” Friend, what else is there? God does whatever he pleases regardless of where he’s at because time means nothing to him and he’s at all places at all times. Whether he’s in the heavens or on the earth, whether he’s in the seas or at the very bottom of the seas it matters not. This verse is telling us God is in every square inch of the land of the earth and he’s in every molecule of water. This verse is telling us that God does what he wants when he wants and that he’s superior to all things and all gods. If the Almighty wants it to rain… it’s going to rain, Amen? If God wants the rain to be accented with lightning it’s going to be accented with lightning, Amen?
Friend I’m here to give you personal testimony of five years experience in the United States Navy. You will never see anything more beautiful, more majestic or more powerful in an unlimited, un-restricted, or unfettered sense of the word than a raging wind, rain and lightning storm in the middle of the ocean. The lightning flashes from the heavens to the water, from horizon to horizon in blinding brilliance, the wave caps, driven by the winds glow in the dark of night with phosphorus in the waters. And if you want to see a sovereign and majestic God in all his might and majesty you’ve got to see waves crashing over the bow of the largest warship in the world, an aircraft carrier. And that bow is 90 foot above the waterline, and those mighty waves are over 100 foot in height. Once you’ve seen that you can’t but help cry out “O God, truly you are sovereign above all gods”.
Another wonderful example of God’s sovereignty can be found in the end of verse 7. If you’ll recall the words of Jesus, he said that the winds come and go and no one knows from whence they come or where they are going. Verse 7 says that God brings the winds out of his storehouse. The KJV says “He bringeth the winds out of his treasuries.” Think of the things simple man locks up, pieces of paper with print on it, colored stones God made and pieces of the earth. Can you imagine anyone trying to lock up the wind other than a sovereign God?
If you still have your finger in Psalms, go to 115:3. “Our God is in heaven; he does whatever pleases him”. Again we see an un-restricted, all-powerful Deity of superiority over all things, reigning from heaven. This theme is repeated in (Isaiah 46: 9-10). “Remember the former things, those of long ago; I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me. I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come”. Remember the dictionary explanation? “As one superior in power, rank, or authority”. There is no greater anything above God. Can anything created be greater than the creator?
Most likely the greatest, most awesome invention man has ever devised would be nuclear power. Look at the nuclear weapon and it’s unbelievable power of destruction. This weapon is able to blow away a mountain and melt rocks. And nuclear power in electricity, a nuclear power plant burning no fossil fuel but using only the power of the atom is able to run an entire city with all of it’s needs for electric. Nuclear waste, what in the world have we made here? Something that is of no use what so ever as far as we know at this time and it will remain deadly for thousands of years. And this wonderful source of power, this awesome source of destruction, and this dreadful source of waste product was only discovered by man, men didn’t create nuclear anything, God did. Man didn’t create this power source; they only found what the Sovereign God created and hid in the ground. Only a sovereign God can create anything by speaking it into existence from nothing. And then we, mankind comes along and we then find what God created and we refashion it in some way, mix his created things together and then claim credit for creating it. We even place a patient on it and say it came from the mind of this man or that woman when in all actuality all we did was stumble upon something that was always there to begin with. Man can take a grain like wheat, grind it up to powder, add salt, yeast, a little this and that, mix in water and come up with bread. God on the other hand can speak into existence manna, which floated down from heaven in a quantity as was needed, could be gathered up for a daily ration and if you took to much it spoiled over night so that the greed of man would not be fed. Unless of course it was on the weekend, then the people could take a double portion and it was fine because God didn’t want them to labor on the Sabbath. Now that my friend is a sovereign God, he can make bread that is predisposed to rot on Sunday through Friday if you take too much and then last longer on a Saturday when he wants it to last a little longer. Who else but a Sovereign God could do that? That’s having total authority over all! Amen? Give him a praise offering for having authority over everything including heavenly bread.
In doing a study of God’s sovereignty, we need to ask, is there anything in all creation that doesn’t fall under the authority of God’s sovereignty or power? I’m not talking about something foolish like questioning as to whether God could make a rock so large that God couldn’t move it. A question with this kind of reasoning is pure foolishness and won’t be addressed; it would serve no purpose. So far we’ve talked about false gods and the relationship of the true God in all his sovereignty over them. We’ve even, to a light extent, talked about God and his sovereignty over the elements of the weather, how God sends rain or wind when he so desires. But what about some of the other aspects or objects of God’s creation, is there anything that isn’t under God’s sovereignty?
With the simple finite mind of man and our limited intelligence, it is conceivable that the created things of our will, the things that did come from our minds, will at some point be no longer under our total control or authority. Just a little side note, I read once a quote that caused me to chuckle, why is it that man’s intelligence is limited but his stupidly isn’t? Think about that for a second. Anyway, going back to our study. Look at nuclear energy, … we have it, we created it so to speak. But are we in total control of it? Once we release that energy, in whatever form we choose, do we still have total control over it? I would dare say “NO”! Once that awesome energy is released it’s free to react as it desires, we can guide it or attempt to control it but if it gets out of hand it’s on its own. Look at the nuclear reactor in Russia, once it was left uncontrolled it took off on its own and the result is a place on this earth that will be uninhabitable for years. But allow me to go to an example that will be more simplistic, something we can more relate to on a personal level.
Through the power of our Sovereign God’s Spirit, through his blessing, he has allowed man and woman to come together and create a child. This child is born, we nurture it, we care for it and it develops into a young teenager. You know where I’m going with this don’t you? Okay, I’ll skip the teenager years. This child over time grows into a full-grown adult, marries and has a family of his or her own. Once this child has grown into full maturity, once we’ve released this child into the world. Do we as parents still have total control over that child any longer? Did we ever have total control over this child? We as parents will love that child with all our heart and the child may love us with all their heart as well, but will that child, now an adult, be totally subservient to us any longer? Rather than thinking of our children, think now about ourselves, if our parents are still alive; are we, their child, totally subservient to them? Most likely not. Do parents have total control over their children for life? I’m being ludicrous here, we all know the answer is no. We all know that the parent’s sovereignty ends at some point and that child is a free spirit to be autonomous or self-governing. And with the liberal laws of society today this is almost to the point of absurdity. But that’s a different sermon for a different day.
So, what about God and his sovereignty? Is there anything or anyone that reaches that point of autonomous self-governing independence and is no longer under the sovereignty of God? The Bible must have an answer to this question so where do we look? Is God sovereign over all life and creation? How about our daily events and plans of life? The Apostle Paul seems to think that God is in control of his life. Look at (Acts 18:21). Paul’s in Corinth and he’s talking about future plans with Priscilla and Aquila. He’s leaving but he says, “I will come back if it is God’s will.” Paul knew that every step of his life was under the direction and control of God when he submitted himself to God’s spirit. I think this theme is better found in the book of James. In James’ epistle to the scattered tribes of Israel he says in chapter four, verses 13 through 15. “Now listen you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” Why you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If it’s the Lords will, we will do this or do that.” We, simple man or woman, have no knowledge as to what the future holds for us. But we are subject to the Sovereign God’s will.
At this point you may be asking yourself, “what about those who turn to a life of sin or reject God and the Scriptures?” we have to ask, is this also God’s will that they do this? This may shock you but the answer is yes! If God is sovereign and in total control then even this situation is under his authority and rule and subject to his will. But with an explanation. I’ll bet that there are at least a few who are saying to yourself right now, “I have to see how this preacher gets himself out of this mess.”
As a student of the Scriptures we will see that God lays out all of the paths of life for us. He has no hidden agenda, there are no real surprises, there’s nothing hiding in the bushes that will jump out and catch us off guard. In particular, study your Old Testament. In the Old Testament we read time and time again that the Sovereign God, talking through his prophets, tells his people that this is what I want for you. This is the path I’ve selected for you and this is the blessing I have in store for you as your reward for following my ways. If you do this and you do that, then I’ll bless you with this and I’ll bless you with that because blessing is what the Sovereign God wants for his people. And as clear as the path he’s selected for us is laid out so also is the opposite if we decide to not follow his will. His word tells us in no uncertain terms; if you don’t do this and you don’t do that then here is the penalty that your actions will warrant. And whether it’s blessing or penalty, it’s still under God’s authority and sovereignty. If God is to be a just and sovereign God, he must allow penalty to follow rebellion. If God is a true God of complete justice and love, when there is rebellion there must be consequence. So is it the will of God that some follow a sinful life style? No, that goes against his will. But it is within the will of God that they are allowed to follow that sinful life style and it will be under his complete authority that there will be justice administered if repentance isn’t shown by that person and grace and mercy asked for pleading that the blood of Jesus be applied to the sins of that life style.
What about sickness, death or disaster? Friend we live in a fallen world; we live in a world that holds sin in its heart. God doesn’t bring about these things but he allows them to come to be because God is also the creator of all his laws of nature. It wasn’t Sir Isaac Newton that created gravity; he just discovered it, God created it. God’s laws say if you lead this certain lifestyle, then this is the result of that life style. If you step off a tall building, God’s law of gravity kicks in and you crash to the ground. If you’re in a car and you go off the road and hit a tree, does God want you to be hurt? No, but he established the laws of inertia and God doesn’t on a regular basis violate his own laws so inertia kicks in and you hit the windshield if you’re not wearing a seatbelt. If your car is moving and it suddenly stops, unless your restrained by something you’re going to keep moving at the same speed the car was traveling at until something stops your foreword progress. In every motor vehicle accident there is more than one collision, the vehicle hits something; that is the first collision. Then the occupants in that vehicle hit something on the interior of the vehicle unless restrained by a seat belt; that is the second collision. That is the law of physics in action and it is a creation of God. Another example, if you smoke tobacco or anything else that people smoke, be it of the legal or illegal variety, chances are there is going to be a bad result. We all know what the body can do to protest with these substances in them, we were not designed to breath smoke; we are “air breathing” creatures. Actually we are “clean air” breathing creatures and this is becoming more and more apparent as we see the respiratory problems arise is us as we live in the dirty air we have created through the things we have done to our environment.
Friend I have to tell you that in the beginning these bodies didn’t have the problems we have today. When The Sovereign God designed this body he gave us he did so making it a really great working machine. When sin came into the world, when God had to place limits on how long these things we call home would last, that’s when the problems started to happen. Cancer? It doesn’t just happen like we would like to think, God doesn’t just allow something to “Happen” that is out of his control. Cancer is the end result of something that gained entrance to the body at some point in the past. The air we breathe, the food we eat, the location in which we live, the gene pool we came from, there was something that triggered it to begin with. It may have happened in our generation, it may have gained entrance in a past generation, who knows how long ago. But it didn’t just happen outside of the will of God, not if God is Sovereign. Heart attack? They don’t just happen, something brings it on, it may be in our family genes, and something passed on from past lifestyles. Drug addiction, alcoholism, stress, lack of exercise, diet, here’s the action … here’s the result. Did God create the evil? … No, but when sin was released into the world the evil came along with it. When man made the decision to misuse what God created, God in his infinite wisdom had already created the result of what that misuse would bring. When we use or misuse something of God’s creation there is always an end result. Sometimes we already know what that end result will be and we still do it. Is that our fault or Gods? Sometimes we use or misuse something God created and we don’t know the end result, eating a poison mushroom that we didn’t know about, we get sick and die because of our ignorance. Is that our fault of Gods? In our legal system we use the scales of justice and one of the rules of those scales is “ignorance of the law is no excuse”. I hate to tell the politicians this but whether they want to acknowledge it or not in their great quest to remove God from all government activities, in using this statement they are enacting one of the laws of God. That law of “ignorance of the law is no excuse” was established when God established all of his laws for nature.
I think one of the saddest things I’ve ever seen in all my years as a law enforcement officer working within the New York State Department of Corrections was when I took an inmate to New York City for a double funeral, his sister and his little niece. They had both drown at a family picnic, the little girl because she made the decision in her little untrained mind to go to close to the swimming pool and she fell in. The mother because she made the heroic decision to jump in to save the girl, and neither one of them could swim. Did God want that to happen? Of course not! Did he allow it to happen, yes! He’s a Sovereign God and he created the laws that say people can’t live and breathe underwater; he created us with lungs to breathe air. Both the little girl and her mother made a wrong decision and they suffered the consequences of it. Was God unjust in allowing it to happen? No. His established laws were already in effect whether the people knew them or not and unless God allows a miracle to take place those laws and the consequences of them must be followed regardless of the outcome.
Does God ever alter or change the laws that he established? Yes, but only on rare events. It’s known as miracles, if we study the Scriptures we’ll find countless times when God did just that. Old Testament examples are plentiful, parting the waters of the Red Seas, it was a miracle to bring about God’s perfect and Sovereign will for his people. Stopping the sun from moving for a while to win a battle, it was a miracle to bring about God’s perfect and Sovereign will for his people. Jonah in the belly of the whale, it was a miracle to bring about God’s perfect and Sovereign will for his people. Examples are also found in the New Testament, raising an ordinary person back from death, healing a blind person, multiplying loaves and fishes, changing water into wine, and raising a dead man, God’s only Son, back to life to defeat sin for all men and women. All miracles to bring about God’s perfect and Sovereign will for his people. Did the miracles end when the Canon was closed, when the writing of the Bible ended? Of course not, we see miracles every day. All of us have seen, heard of or experienced a miracle in our life. All of us have seen, know of someone or have experienced the power of the Sovereign God when he’s altered his own laws to minister to his people in his perfect and Sovereign will. A car that didn’t hit yours when you know it should have. A fall that should have killed you but it didn’t. A bill that was paid when you don’t know how, when your child was healed when there was no hope. Friend; miracles are those things that happen when you know in the laws of nature, in the laws of God they shouldn’t happen and they do. Does this happen all the time? No … if it did then it wouldn’t be a miracle. If it happened all the time then it would no longer be a miracle but it would be the standard, regulated law of God and the miracle factor would discontinue or cease being a miracle.
And now, I’m sure that there are a few or at least one reading this that is saying to them “I’ve never seen or experienced a miracle”. Well to show you that God is still in the miracle working business I’m going to give you an example of one of God’s miracles that he works every second of the day, twenty four hours a day every day of the year. Think of our lowly sinful state, think of all those who were lost in sin and despair and had no hope of anything but God’s prefect justice and the raging fires of hell. And the Sovereign God, in his perfect love and mercy gives salvation to all that ask for it. That beloved is a miracle. Our sins and rebellion screamed out for justice, our past cried out for punishment and then God in his love said: “I think I’ll perform a miracle because this one has asked for forgiveness. This one has called out to my Beloved Son and my Son has said, “Father forgive him or her because they know not what they do.” My perfect law says that I’ve seen their actions; my perfect law says that this is the result of their actions. But my Son says: “Father, change your perfect law for this one because this one belongs to me, you gave me this one and he or she is now mine and it’s my desire that this one isn’t going to be lost”. And beloved when this happens, you’ve seen the greatest miracle of them all. When this happens you’ve gone from the perfect law of the Sovereign God that said the perfect and just punishment is eternal flames and suffering but the miracle of grace has changed that suffering to eternal glory in the presence of our Sovereign Lord and King, Jesus Christ.
I could go on a lot longer but another miracle is having a pastor that knows when to stop, it’s a miracle when you have a pastor who knows when you’ve had enough for one teaching. But before we stop completely let me give you a few verses that will show our Sovereign God and his sovereignty over Satan. Look these up when you have time or when you’re doing your Bible study this week. (John 12:31) (2nd Thessalonians 2:8) and (Revelation 12:7). God is Sovereign and that includes sovereignty over Satan, sin and salvation. I pray that when you leave this web site today you have a better understanding of what A Sovereign God is and what it means to all of us. Grace & peace.
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
What is Your Time Tolerance?
What is your Time Tolerance?
By Rev. Robert P. Elkins
All Scripture verse taken from the NIV Bible unless otherwise noted
“When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, "Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don't know what has happened to him.” (Exodus 32:1)
How long are we willing to wait upon the Lord? When it comes to waiting upon our Lord what is our time tolerance? If we petitioned our Lord God in prayer right now how long would we be willing to wait for a response before we started to look for an answer from another resource or started to take matters into our own hands? If we stop to think about it, just how different are we now today than the Hebrew people were when the events of the book of Exodus were written? The Bible, that grand and wonderful Word of God tells us that after Moses had led the Hebrews out of Egypt and into the desert he then went up on a mountain and was gone for forty days. Granted if one is out in the middle of a desert where we have never been and where we know little to nothing about the region being left alone for forty days may cause a little stress in a nice compact group of say close to one million people. If you were to look in the book of Exodus in the twelfth chapter it tells us that there were about six hundred thousand men on foot and many women and children so I would think a round estimate of one million people is not all that far from the actual number, besides I doubt that anyone actually stood there and counted them as then passed by. So if we were left out in the desert with no television or cell phones, no computers or newspapers to help us pass the time and we are with one million of our closest friends how long do you think we would last before we started to get a little bit on edge?
Now we have to remember that these same million people just left Egypt, the place where they as a nation of people had been for the past few hundred years with most but not all of that time being under bondage as slaves so they were in an environment that was completely foreign to them. But they were the same million people that had just seen some mighty impressive miracles too. This group of people just witnessed the parting of the Red Sea allowing them to pass through a valley of water held back by nothing other than the power of their God. Then they witnessed that same body of water to come crashing down on the army of the Egyptians drowning every last one of them thus allowing them save exit from the land of Egypt. They had been witnessing on a daily basis how their God and protector was giving them a pillar of clouds to shield them from the scorching heat of the desert day and a pillar of fire to warm them from the cold that sets in at night in that same desert. And of course let us not forget the mighty miracles they witnessed God perform that smashed the gods of Egypt. That miracle turned the heart of Pharaoh and convinced him that it was time to allow the Hebrews to leave his land. Little things like the plagues of turning the water of the Nile River into blood. An invasion of lice, frogs, flies, locusts, the infestation of boils, cattle disease, three days of darkness and the killing of the first born child of every Egyptian family while at the same time the angel of death passing over every Hebrew family. All of these people now in the desert had just been witness to these miracles of God and were well aware of just what God could do when he so desired. But when left in the desert for forty days without their leader, Moses, how did they respond to this situation? They instantly approached Aaron and demanded a false idol be made, something they could see and touch, thinking that if they had something right there in their midst then everything would be okay. They instantly forget all of the wonders they had just seen. They instantly forgot all they had just experienced personally and they ran after a false sense of security that could do nothing for them.
If man made carved idols and golden objects could do anything, if these things generated from the mind and through the will of men could save anyone from any kind of harm, wouldn’t they have worked in saving the Egyptians? The Egyptians had many of these things; they had many gods and statues or false images. If we were to do a little research we would see that the ten plagues God brought upon Egypt were each designed to show our Lord’s might and authority over the false gods of Egypt. The Hebrews knew these things didn’t have any worth or value in offering any kind of protection and yet this is what they wanted. So what do you think of their time tolerance? Obviously the people in the desert didn’t have the benefit of knowing the verse pertaining to patience that we can look up as found in the book of (James 1:2-4). “Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” We are truly blessed to have the wisdom that is to be found in the New Testament.
(Exodus 32:2-4) “Aaron answered them, "Take off the gold earrings that your wives, your sons and your daughters are wearing, and bring them to me." So all the people took off their earrings and brought them to Aaron. He took what they handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a tool. Then they said, "These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt”.
If we look at the wording in this verse it says that Aaron, at the will of the people, collected the earrings from the people and then made a gold calf out of them. Sounds somewhat simple doesn’t it? You gather the gold, melt it down and make the little gold calf to use as a god. But now let’s give this a little thought and see what we can come up with. To start with Aaron had to collect the earrings from hundreds of thousands of people, so that had to take quite a bit of time just for the gathering of the metal. Now where are the people? In the middle of the desert right? Since there were craftsmen in the group that were experts in metal casting I’m sure they had their tools with them but Aaron had to get them together to do the casting, more time needed. Now unless someone was carrying with them a model of the calf they wanted to cast in gold a model had to be made. That’s how you make a cast idol. First you need a model of what you want to cast, usually that would be made of wood, so someone had to make that, a wooden hand carved calf; more time needed. Then you pack this in sand to make the casting mold, split the mold to get your model out and put the mold back together, melt the gold and pour the idol. All of this takes time mind you, once the idol is cast it needs to me finished, the rough edges filed off, most likely a little polishing and them at last you have a handy dandy foreign idol ready for use that of course can’t be of any value at all. You may wonder why I bothered to list all of these little details but there is a purpose in my thought process and it is something I want you to take into consideration as we look at this interesting chain of events.
Do you remember how long Moses was gone? Forty days the Scriptures tell us, that’s from the time Moses left until he returned, a somewhat long time when you are lost in the desert without a leader. But if we stop to think about it that isn’t such a long time when we look at the amount of work that was required for making the golden calf. When we think of all the steps that were required, the gathering, the mold making, and the casting process and finishing, forty days isn’t such a long time at all. So if we look at the over all picture, the Hebrew people had to have started to talk amongst themselves within days or perhaps even hours after Moses first walked out of camp and headed up the mountain. Granted a word of disturbance can pass from person to person quite quickly but we are talking about people that have just been witness to some of the greatest miracles of all time! And then within a few days at best there were thinking that all hope was lost and they had to take matters into their own hands and figure out a way to bail themselves out of the situation they were in, that being in a desert and without a leader and questioning the power and love of the God that had done so much for them. So they didn’t have much of a time tolerance did they?
And so now we bring this study around to looking at each of us today. How much time are we willing to allow to pass before we start to doubt and question our God after we have offered prayer to him for something? Just what is our time tolerance and when does it expire before we start to look for a way to solve the problem ourselves? We experience a need or concern, we offer prayer over this concern and then we wait for God’s response. But is that sufficient for us or, do we need to do more? (1st Thessalonians 5:16-18) says, “Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus”. (Psalm 62:8) says, “Trust in him at all times, O people; pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge”. And (Psalm 86:3) says, “Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I call to you all day long”. The Scriptures are pretty clear as to how much time we need to give before we start to question our God. Pray continually, in all circumstances, trust in Him at all times and call out to Him all the daylong. I guess what the Scriptures are telling us is that we are to be trusting in God and calling upon his Holy Name as long as we have breath in our bodies.
Now let’s look at what it says in (Exodus 32:7-8) “Then the LORD said to Moses, "Go down, because your people, whom you brought up out of Egypt, have become corrupt. They have been quick to turn away from what I commanded them and have made themselves an idol cast in the shape of a calf. They have bowed down to it and sacrificed to it and have said, 'These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt”. I love the way God talks to Moses here; God shows us that he really is a Father to us all. Just like a human father reacts when a child is unruly and the father is talking to the mother, this is how Father God is talking to Moses. “Moses, go down to your people, the ones you brought out of Egypt and have a talk with them because I’m mad right now and if I have a talk with them I’m liable to just wipe them off the face of the world and start all over again with a whole new bunch”. I know God didn’t say all of that in verses seven and eight, but he does when you get to verse nine and ten. (Exodus 32:9-10) “I have seen these people," the LORD said to Moses, "and they are a stiff-necked people. Now leave me alone so that my anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them. Then I will make you into a great nation”.
We can see in this verse that God is truly frustrated with the people and that God is just about ready to wipe them all from the face of the earth and start over again with Moses. The time tolerance of the people was quite evident to God, they showed very little tolerance and almost instantly reverted to seeking out an answer to their problem by creating the solution on their own, and how did they go about this? By making a false idol! So what did Moses do in the face of all of this? We know what the people did. The people made their little gold calf; God is angry, so angry that he is relinquishing his ownership of the people over to Moses and contemplating removing them from the picture and starting over again. And what did Moses do? He went back to his Lord in prayer, Moses prayer to his Lord because he knew in his heart of hearts that God was still in charge and that no matter what this God of Love that Moses served would never abandon his children, Moses knew that no matter what, God will always love us. In prayer Moses reminded God that the Hebrews were his people, that they were the people of the promise that was made between God and Abraham many years ago and that they, God and Abraham had made a covenant and that that covenant needed to be honored. You see friend, God doesn’t mind if we remind him of what his Word says to us. God doesn’t get mad when we tell him what he has promised us through his Word, when we give him a gentle reminder of his promise to us. That’s what pray is all about isn’t it? We have a need and we present that need to our Lord in the name of his Son Jesus. “Father you know I need shelter and food today, please provide it because your word tells me you will”. “Father you know I need protection today from my enemies, please provide that protection because your word tells me that you will hide me under your wings like a mother hen protects her children”. God doesn’t get upset if we remind him of what he has told us in his Word, the Bible. God may not always answer in a way that we would like to hear but he always answers just the same. When we pray God hears those prayers and answers them but at times we aren’t ready for what he says in his reply because he doesn’t always say yes. Why? Because when we are praying we only pray over what we can see or know about, our view of the situation is limited to our vision, our perception of the situation and our knowledge. And when God is responding he is seeing the big picture, he is seeing what is hidden from our view or range of understanding. (Isaiah 55: 8-11) “ "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways," declares the LORD.
"As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it”. When we pray we need to do so in faith, we need to be praying knowing that the God of all Creation is there and hearing our prayers and even when he isn’t responding in a way that we desire or in what seems like the proper time frame God is responding and His will is going to be done, even if we don’t understand what that will is.
There are so many different situations or questions about what appears to be unanswered prayer that I couldn’t even begin to answer them but I do know that we as a people belonging to the Lord God Almighty have to remain in faith no matter what is happening in our life around us. We pray for a friend or family member who is in poor health and they die, is that unanswered prayer? Consider that maybe God did answer and his answer was to allow that person to gain entrance into God’s heaven. We look at death from our viewpoint; we love them and want them here with us. But are they better off here with us or in heaven? I have said many times to the people who were sitting under my teachings in the church, we spend more time trying to pray a person or a people out of heaven than we do trying to pray them into heaven. Death is inevitable, none of us will be able to avoid it, and from the Christian perspective although death is the end of life as we know it, it isn’t the end of life, it’s the beginning of new life on a spiritual plane, new life in glory with our God. Am I saying that we shouldn’t be praying for healing of the sick or injured? No I’m not, prayer should be an important part of every aspect of life and that includes matters of health. But I truly feel that we should be praying for the Lord’s will to be done in the life of the person or people we are praying for, and that of course includes ourselves. “Father, if it is your will I pray that you would place your healing hand on this dear sister”. “Father if it is your will I pray that you would bless the finances of the family that has just lost everything in a fire”. “Lord God Almighty, you know of the suffering of the people in that storm area, if it is your will please minister to them in a way that only you can do”. I think you can see where I am going with this line of thought. Praying in the will of the Father and then waiting upon God to move in response to that prayer.
Is there any problem in praying repetitively? Of course not, the Scriptures tell us of the persistent woman who requested healing for her child and even when rebuked by Jesus and placed in juxtapose with a dog she continued to plead her case until Jesus granted her request. We find this story in (Matthew 15:21-28) “Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. A Canaanite woman from that vicinity came to him, crying out, "Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is suffering terribly from demon-possession."
Jesus did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him, "Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us."
He answered, "I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel."
The woman came and knelt before him. "Lord, help me!" she said.
He replied, "It is not right to take the children's bread and toss it to their dogs."
"Yes, Lord," she said, "but even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters' table." Then Jesus answered, "Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted." And her daughter was healed from that very hour”.
Again we see where perseverance is rewarded in the Scriptures in the Parable of the Unjust Judge as found in (Luke 18:1-8) also known as The Parable of the Persistent Widow “Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. He said: "In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared about men. And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, 'Grant me justice against my adversary.'
"For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, 'Even though I don't fear God or care about men, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won't eventually wear me out with her coming!' "
And the Lord said, "Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?” Notice in the very first verse of (Luke 18) that it even says Jesus gave this parable so that his disciples would understand the principle of praying continually and not giving up.
I don’t think there is any negative question about our time tolerance when we offer prayer repeatedly unto our Lord. Repetitive prayer is the same as continuous prayer and continuous pray is encouraged in the Scriptures.
(1st Thessalonians 5:16-18) “Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus”. Repetitive prayer is a show of continued faith, unbroken faith. Repetitive prayer shows a great time tolerance inasmuch as it says, “I’m still here Lord, I’m still praying to you and I’m still waiting for you to answer”. Repetitive prayer is not taking matters into our own hands like the Hebrews did in the wilderness and it’s not making a golden calf to look upon for an answer to our prayer. Repetitive prayer is hanging on in the windstorm when it appears that the entire world is shaking around us. Repetitive prayer is saying “Lord I’m willing to wait upon you because I know who you are and I know that you are going to answer my prayers. How you are going to answer I don’t know, but I have faith in you and I know that you will do what is best for me and in you I will not question”.
If we stop to think about it, just what is prayer? Prayer is an open line of communication between our God and us. Now change that thought just a bit and prayer is an open line of communication between our Heavenly Father and us. Now change that thought just a bit more and prayer is an open line of communication between a father and his children, God is our Father and we are his children. So prayer is just communication between two parties and who would try to set a limit on the words that were spoken between themselves and their children in a healthy relationship? Another way to look at this is to think of it as a marriage. Doesn’t the Word of God tell us that we will be the bride and God, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is going to be the bridegroom? So prayer is the same as communications between a bridegroom and his bride, two locked in love, communicating in the language of lovers.
Prayer doesn’t always have to be us asking something from God. Prayer is also just talking to God and listening to his response. In the premarital counsel I give to every couple prior to the wedding I stress over and over again the importance of communication between the two. That is equally important between our Lord and us. We need to have that open line of communication to have a healthy relationship between us. We need to be able to talk with our Heavenly Father and then listen to what he has to say to us and as previously stated, it isn’t always asking for something and waiting for it to arrive. It’s talking about the little things as well as the big things. It’s open communication and that communication will greatly affect the time tolerance we have in relation to our Lord.
And so in closing, what is your time tolerance when you are communicating with your God? The more time tolerance we have with our God the better the relationship. The healthier our time tolerance which includes listening time and allowing time for God to talk back to us is a good indication of how well our relationship with our God is. And subsequently the better our relationship with God the better our relationship is with those around us. A healthy relationship with God will always equate to a healthy relationship with God’s other children, even the ones that are not walking in the light yet. Our fuse will burn slower, the things that ignite us will be less and less and the explosions will be smaller or maybe even stop altogether.
When talking about a time tolerance and about God with both in the same line of thought we have to remember that it is us that needs to work on what our tolerance is because God has already shown us what his is. He has allowed us to flounder and fall so many times and he has never held it against us. That’s why he sent his Son into the world. Jesus has already paid the price for our shortcomings and sins. He did so out of love and it is also out of his love for us that he hasn’t returned to claim us as his bride yet. He is holding off his return allowing as many as possible to make the decision to follow him and avoid the consequences, the just consequences our actions merit but his love is shielding us from and that of course is eternity in hell. If you haven’t made that decision to follow Jesus there is still time to do so. All we need to do is to ask Jesus to come into our life, ask him for the forgiveness of our sins and mean it in our heart. It really is just that simple, there is no time tolerance to experience, once the plea is given the results are instantaneous and salvation is our forever. So now I have to ask you. How long is your time tolerance when it comes to salvation? If you haven’t asked for salvation yet just how long are you going to wait? That’s something to think about isn’t it?
Grace and peace
By Rev. Robert P. Elkins
All Scripture verse taken from the NIV Bible unless otherwise noted
“When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, "Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don't know what has happened to him.” (Exodus 32:1)
How long are we willing to wait upon the Lord? When it comes to waiting upon our Lord what is our time tolerance? If we petitioned our Lord God in prayer right now how long would we be willing to wait for a response before we started to look for an answer from another resource or started to take matters into our own hands? If we stop to think about it, just how different are we now today than the Hebrew people were when the events of the book of Exodus were written? The Bible, that grand and wonderful Word of God tells us that after Moses had led the Hebrews out of Egypt and into the desert he then went up on a mountain and was gone for forty days. Granted if one is out in the middle of a desert where we have never been and where we know little to nothing about the region being left alone for forty days may cause a little stress in a nice compact group of say close to one million people. If you were to look in the book of Exodus in the twelfth chapter it tells us that there were about six hundred thousand men on foot and many women and children so I would think a round estimate of one million people is not all that far from the actual number, besides I doubt that anyone actually stood there and counted them as then passed by. So if we were left out in the desert with no television or cell phones, no computers or newspapers to help us pass the time and we are with one million of our closest friends how long do you think we would last before we started to get a little bit on edge?
Now we have to remember that these same million people just left Egypt, the place where they as a nation of people had been for the past few hundred years with most but not all of that time being under bondage as slaves so they were in an environment that was completely foreign to them. But they were the same million people that had just seen some mighty impressive miracles too. This group of people just witnessed the parting of the Red Sea allowing them to pass through a valley of water held back by nothing other than the power of their God. Then they witnessed that same body of water to come crashing down on the army of the Egyptians drowning every last one of them thus allowing them save exit from the land of Egypt. They had been witnessing on a daily basis how their God and protector was giving them a pillar of clouds to shield them from the scorching heat of the desert day and a pillar of fire to warm them from the cold that sets in at night in that same desert. And of course let us not forget the mighty miracles they witnessed God perform that smashed the gods of Egypt. That miracle turned the heart of Pharaoh and convinced him that it was time to allow the Hebrews to leave his land. Little things like the plagues of turning the water of the Nile River into blood. An invasion of lice, frogs, flies, locusts, the infestation of boils, cattle disease, three days of darkness and the killing of the first born child of every Egyptian family while at the same time the angel of death passing over every Hebrew family. All of these people now in the desert had just been witness to these miracles of God and were well aware of just what God could do when he so desired. But when left in the desert for forty days without their leader, Moses, how did they respond to this situation? They instantly approached Aaron and demanded a false idol be made, something they could see and touch, thinking that if they had something right there in their midst then everything would be okay. They instantly forget all of the wonders they had just seen. They instantly forgot all they had just experienced personally and they ran after a false sense of security that could do nothing for them.
If man made carved idols and golden objects could do anything, if these things generated from the mind and through the will of men could save anyone from any kind of harm, wouldn’t they have worked in saving the Egyptians? The Egyptians had many of these things; they had many gods and statues or false images. If we were to do a little research we would see that the ten plagues God brought upon Egypt were each designed to show our Lord’s might and authority over the false gods of Egypt. The Hebrews knew these things didn’t have any worth or value in offering any kind of protection and yet this is what they wanted. So what do you think of their time tolerance? Obviously the people in the desert didn’t have the benefit of knowing the verse pertaining to patience that we can look up as found in the book of (James 1:2-4). “Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” We are truly blessed to have the wisdom that is to be found in the New Testament.
(Exodus 32:2-4) “Aaron answered them, "Take off the gold earrings that your wives, your sons and your daughters are wearing, and bring them to me." So all the people took off their earrings and brought them to Aaron. He took what they handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a tool. Then they said, "These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt”.
If we look at the wording in this verse it says that Aaron, at the will of the people, collected the earrings from the people and then made a gold calf out of them. Sounds somewhat simple doesn’t it? You gather the gold, melt it down and make the little gold calf to use as a god. But now let’s give this a little thought and see what we can come up with. To start with Aaron had to collect the earrings from hundreds of thousands of people, so that had to take quite a bit of time just for the gathering of the metal. Now where are the people? In the middle of the desert right? Since there were craftsmen in the group that were experts in metal casting I’m sure they had their tools with them but Aaron had to get them together to do the casting, more time needed. Now unless someone was carrying with them a model of the calf they wanted to cast in gold a model had to be made. That’s how you make a cast idol. First you need a model of what you want to cast, usually that would be made of wood, so someone had to make that, a wooden hand carved calf; more time needed. Then you pack this in sand to make the casting mold, split the mold to get your model out and put the mold back together, melt the gold and pour the idol. All of this takes time mind you, once the idol is cast it needs to me finished, the rough edges filed off, most likely a little polishing and them at last you have a handy dandy foreign idol ready for use that of course can’t be of any value at all. You may wonder why I bothered to list all of these little details but there is a purpose in my thought process and it is something I want you to take into consideration as we look at this interesting chain of events.
Do you remember how long Moses was gone? Forty days the Scriptures tell us, that’s from the time Moses left until he returned, a somewhat long time when you are lost in the desert without a leader. But if we stop to think about it that isn’t such a long time when we look at the amount of work that was required for making the golden calf. When we think of all the steps that were required, the gathering, the mold making, and the casting process and finishing, forty days isn’t such a long time at all. So if we look at the over all picture, the Hebrew people had to have started to talk amongst themselves within days or perhaps even hours after Moses first walked out of camp and headed up the mountain. Granted a word of disturbance can pass from person to person quite quickly but we are talking about people that have just been witness to some of the greatest miracles of all time! And then within a few days at best there were thinking that all hope was lost and they had to take matters into their own hands and figure out a way to bail themselves out of the situation they were in, that being in a desert and without a leader and questioning the power and love of the God that had done so much for them. So they didn’t have much of a time tolerance did they?
And so now we bring this study around to looking at each of us today. How much time are we willing to allow to pass before we start to doubt and question our God after we have offered prayer to him for something? Just what is our time tolerance and when does it expire before we start to look for a way to solve the problem ourselves? We experience a need or concern, we offer prayer over this concern and then we wait for God’s response. But is that sufficient for us or, do we need to do more? (1st Thessalonians 5:16-18) says, “Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus”. (Psalm 62:8) says, “Trust in him at all times, O people; pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge”. And (Psalm 86:3) says, “Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I call to you all day long”. The Scriptures are pretty clear as to how much time we need to give before we start to question our God. Pray continually, in all circumstances, trust in Him at all times and call out to Him all the daylong. I guess what the Scriptures are telling us is that we are to be trusting in God and calling upon his Holy Name as long as we have breath in our bodies.
Now let’s look at what it says in (Exodus 32:7-8) “Then the LORD said to Moses, "Go down, because your people, whom you brought up out of Egypt, have become corrupt. They have been quick to turn away from what I commanded them and have made themselves an idol cast in the shape of a calf. They have bowed down to it and sacrificed to it and have said, 'These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt”. I love the way God talks to Moses here; God shows us that he really is a Father to us all. Just like a human father reacts when a child is unruly and the father is talking to the mother, this is how Father God is talking to Moses. “Moses, go down to your people, the ones you brought out of Egypt and have a talk with them because I’m mad right now and if I have a talk with them I’m liable to just wipe them off the face of the world and start all over again with a whole new bunch”. I know God didn’t say all of that in verses seven and eight, but he does when you get to verse nine and ten. (Exodus 32:9-10) “I have seen these people," the LORD said to Moses, "and they are a stiff-necked people. Now leave me alone so that my anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them. Then I will make you into a great nation”.
We can see in this verse that God is truly frustrated with the people and that God is just about ready to wipe them all from the face of the earth and start over again with Moses. The time tolerance of the people was quite evident to God, they showed very little tolerance and almost instantly reverted to seeking out an answer to their problem by creating the solution on their own, and how did they go about this? By making a false idol! So what did Moses do in the face of all of this? We know what the people did. The people made their little gold calf; God is angry, so angry that he is relinquishing his ownership of the people over to Moses and contemplating removing them from the picture and starting over again. And what did Moses do? He went back to his Lord in prayer, Moses prayer to his Lord because he knew in his heart of hearts that God was still in charge and that no matter what this God of Love that Moses served would never abandon his children, Moses knew that no matter what, God will always love us. In prayer Moses reminded God that the Hebrews were his people, that they were the people of the promise that was made between God and Abraham many years ago and that they, God and Abraham had made a covenant and that that covenant needed to be honored. You see friend, God doesn’t mind if we remind him of what his Word says to us. God doesn’t get mad when we tell him what he has promised us through his Word, when we give him a gentle reminder of his promise to us. That’s what pray is all about isn’t it? We have a need and we present that need to our Lord in the name of his Son Jesus. “Father you know I need shelter and food today, please provide it because your word tells me you will”. “Father you know I need protection today from my enemies, please provide that protection because your word tells me that you will hide me under your wings like a mother hen protects her children”. God doesn’t get upset if we remind him of what he has told us in his Word, the Bible. God may not always answer in a way that we would like to hear but he always answers just the same. When we pray God hears those prayers and answers them but at times we aren’t ready for what he says in his reply because he doesn’t always say yes. Why? Because when we are praying we only pray over what we can see or know about, our view of the situation is limited to our vision, our perception of the situation and our knowledge. And when God is responding he is seeing the big picture, he is seeing what is hidden from our view or range of understanding. (Isaiah 55: 8-11) “ "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways," declares the LORD.
"As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it”. When we pray we need to do so in faith, we need to be praying knowing that the God of all Creation is there and hearing our prayers and even when he isn’t responding in a way that we desire or in what seems like the proper time frame God is responding and His will is going to be done, even if we don’t understand what that will is.
There are so many different situations or questions about what appears to be unanswered prayer that I couldn’t even begin to answer them but I do know that we as a people belonging to the Lord God Almighty have to remain in faith no matter what is happening in our life around us. We pray for a friend or family member who is in poor health and they die, is that unanswered prayer? Consider that maybe God did answer and his answer was to allow that person to gain entrance into God’s heaven. We look at death from our viewpoint; we love them and want them here with us. But are they better off here with us or in heaven? I have said many times to the people who were sitting under my teachings in the church, we spend more time trying to pray a person or a people out of heaven than we do trying to pray them into heaven. Death is inevitable, none of us will be able to avoid it, and from the Christian perspective although death is the end of life as we know it, it isn’t the end of life, it’s the beginning of new life on a spiritual plane, new life in glory with our God. Am I saying that we shouldn’t be praying for healing of the sick or injured? No I’m not, prayer should be an important part of every aspect of life and that includes matters of health. But I truly feel that we should be praying for the Lord’s will to be done in the life of the person or people we are praying for, and that of course includes ourselves. “Father, if it is your will I pray that you would place your healing hand on this dear sister”. “Father if it is your will I pray that you would bless the finances of the family that has just lost everything in a fire”. “Lord God Almighty, you know of the suffering of the people in that storm area, if it is your will please minister to them in a way that only you can do”. I think you can see where I am going with this line of thought. Praying in the will of the Father and then waiting upon God to move in response to that prayer.
Is there any problem in praying repetitively? Of course not, the Scriptures tell us of the persistent woman who requested healing for her child and even when rebuked by Jesus and placed in juxtapose with a dog she continued to plead her case until Jesus granted her request. We find this story in (Matthew 15:21-28) “Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. A Canaanite woman from that vicinity came to him, crying out, "Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is suffering terribly from demon-possession."
Jesus did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him, "Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us."
He answered, "I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel."
The woman came and knelt before him. "Lord, help me!" she said.
He replied, "It is not right to take the children's bread and toss it to their dogs."
"Yes, Lord," she said, "but even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters' table." Then Jesus answered, "Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted." And her daughter was healed from that very hour”.
Again we see where perseverance is rewarded in the Scriptures in the Parable of the Unjust Judge as found in (Luke 18:1-8) also known as The Parable of the Persistent Widow “Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. He said: "In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared about men. And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, 'Grant me justice against my adversary.'
"For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, 'Even though I don't fear God or care about men, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won't eventually wear me out with her coming!' "
And the Lord said, "Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?” Notice in the very first verse of (Luke 18) that it even says Jesus gave this parable so that his disciples would understand the principle of praying continually and not giving up.
I don’t think there is any negative question about our time tolerance when we offer prayer repeatedly unto our Lord. Repetitive prayer is the same as continuous prayer and continuous pray is encouraged in the Scriptures.
(1st Thessalonians 5:16-18) “Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus”. Repetitive prayer is a show of continued faith, unbroken faith. Repetitive prayer shows a great time tolerance inasmuch as it says, “I’m still here Lord, I’m still praying to you and I’m still waiting for you to answer”. Repetitive prayer is not taking matters into our own hands like the Hebrews did in the wilderness and it’s not making a golden calf to look upon for an answer to our prayer. Repetitive prayer is hanging on in the windstorm when it appears that the entire world is shaking around us. Repetitive prayer is saying “Lord I’m willing to wait upon you because I know who you are and I know that you are going to answer my prayers. How you are going to answer I don’t know, but I have faith in you and I know that you will do what is best for me and in you I will not question”.
If we stop to think about it, just what is prayer? Prayer is an open line of communication between our God and us. Now change that thought just a bit and prayer is an open line of communication between our Heavenly Father and us. Now change that thought just a bit more and prayer is an open line of communication between a father and his children, God is our Father and we are his children. So prayer is just communication between two parties and who would try to set a limit on the words that were spoken between themselves and their children in a healthy relationship? Another way to look at this is to think of it as a marriage. Doesn’t the Word of God tell us that we will be the bride and God, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is going to be the bridegroom? So prayer is the same as communications between a bridegroom and his bride, two locked in love, communicating in the language of lovers.
Prayer doesn’t always have to be us asking something from God. Prayer is also just talking to God and listening to his response. In the premarital counsel I give to every couple prior to the wedding I stress over and over again the importance of communication between the two. That is equally important between our Lord and us. We need to have that open line of communication to have a healthy relationship between us. We need to be able to talk with our Heavenly Father and then listen to what he has to say to us and as previously stated, it isn’t always asking for something and waiting for it to arrive. It’s talking about the little things as well as the big things. It’s open communication and that communication will greatly affect the time tolerance we have in relation to our Lord.
And so in closing, what is your time tolerance when you are communicating with your God? The more time tolerance we have with our God the better the relationship. The healthier our time tolerance which includes listening time and allowing time for God to talk back to us is a good indication of how well our relationship with our God is. And subsequently the better our relationship with God the better our relationship is with those around us. A healthy relationship with God will always equate to a healthy relationship with God’s other children, even the ones that are not walking in the light yet. Our fuse will burn slower, the things that ignite us will be less and less and the explosions will be smaller or maybe even stop altogether.
When talking about a time tolerance and about God with both in the same line of thought we have to remember that it is us that needs to work on what our tolerance is because God has already shown us what his is. He has allowed us to flounder and fall so many times and he has never held it against us. That’s why he sent his Son into the world. Jesus has already paid the price for our shortcomings and sins. He did so out of love and it is also out of his love for us that he hasn’t returned to claim us as his bride yet. He is holding off his return allowing as many as possible to make the decision to follow him and avoid the consequences, the just consequences our actions merit but his love is shielding us from and that of course is eternity in hell. If you haven’t made that decision to follow Jesus there is still time to do so. All we need to do is to ask Jesus to come into our life, ask him for the forgiveness of our sins and mean it in our heart. It really is just that simple, there is no time tolerance to experience, once the plea is given the results are instantaneous and salvation is our forever. So now I have to ask you. How long is your time tolerance when it comes to salvation? If you haven’t asked for salvation yet just how long are you going to wait? That’s something to think about isn’t it?
Grace and peace
Friday, October 24, 2008
Why Were You Sent?
Why Were You Sent?
By Rev. Robert P. Elkins
All Scripture verse taken from the NIV Bible unless otherwise noted
Luke 4:43
"But he said,"I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent."
Jesus knew why he was sent here to earth, there was never a question in his mind what the Father planned for his calling to be and Jesus walked forward to his calling with every breath of life he had in him. Driven by love for men and women he went forward and never looked back or turned aside for a minute. Jesus knew why he was sent, Jesus knew what the task at hand was. Jesus was 100% fully aware of what his mission was. What his divine appointment was and as you read further in the Gospel of Luke you will see that he also knew the final outcome of his sojourn here on earth. Jesus knew the will of his Father, he knew he was to share the good news concerning the Kingdom of God with as many as time and circumstance would allow and he knew what the cost to himself would be and he knew what his sacrifice would entail and he never once turned away.
And now I ask you, why were you sent? Do you know what God had in mind for you when you were created? When your life was formed maybe many or but a few short years ago do you know what God had in store for you to bring you to this very place today, this day, this hour, this minute? Do you have any idea just what the mighty mind of the All-Powerful Living God of all Creation had planned for your life? Have you felt a call from God on your life today? Perchance he's speaking to your heart right now. Can you hear his voice? Do you even want to hear his voice or are you a bit afraid of what he might be calling you to do? Is his voice clear and calm and distinctive? Perhaps it's muffled and hard to understand, but just the same can you hear it?
Jesus gave a very clear and distinctive directive to his disciples in Matthew 28. "Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of The Father and of The Son and of The Holy Ghost. And teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you and surly I am with you always, to the very end of the age."
When Jesus talked to the 11 disciples, at this time Judas was no more, was he talking to just those present then or was he talking to us today as well? Are not the Scriptures still the living word of God talking to all generations? Friend, today there are many disciples out there. A disciple is a follower of a teacher who offers instruction regardless of what that teaching may be. Charles Manson had a following of disciples. Although Charles Mansion never actually harmed Sharon Tate or any of the others that died in the killing spree, his disciples did. He instructed them in the task he wanted them to carry out and they did as instructed. And consequently Charles and his disciples went to prison, they for committing the act and he for conspiracy to commit the act. Martin Luther had disciples, they came to be known as Protestants, Martin Luther led a revolt against the Roman Catholic Church through his writings and teachings and his disciples followed his lead. Dr. Martin Luther King had disciples; they followed Dr. King's teachings and example and were able to alter the course of history for the mightiest nation to ever inhabit this planet we call earth. So when Jesus said go and make disciples he was referring to not only his first 12 disciples, now minus one. He was referring to anyone and everyone who hears his words, making all followers of the teachings he had passed on to us through the Bible.
Notice the language of Jesus' words in Matthew 28. "Teach them to obey everything I have commanded you."
Like the original Ten Commandments here also we see not a suggestion but a command. Like the first ten, his second set of commandments are simple but penetrating and profound. Love your neighbor … don't cheat your government … don't condemn others when they do likewise as you have done ... you who are without sin, you can cast the first stone. There isn't anything complicated in the teachings of Jesus Christ. There is no intricate formula that needs to be found, the words of Jesus Christ were the words every man and woman of that day could understand and the same holds true today, the words of Jesus even now can easily be understood. Jesus didn't try to baffle or confuse anyone; he didn't try to prove a point or show his superiority, although he could have. And he could have done just that at any moment to the amazement of all whom were with in hearing range. He didn't say love this ethnic group but not that one. He didn't say to love this group because of their finances but not the poor, the ones left outside in the cold with no food or a few rags to cover their nakedness. And more importantly, when Jesus was teaching his disciples, both then and now, it wasn't only by what he said but by what he did as well. Jesus, the greatest teacher or rabbi of all time led by example to the most finite detail of perfection, grace and beauty. When Jesus taught he did so with his words, which are all important, but he also did so with his heart too. When it was unfashionable to talk to women he talked to women, many women, he showed them kindness when they were considered nothing more than so much property, he instilled pride and self respect in them, he did by word and example which is what we should be doing, he blessed them. He lifted them from a lowly station and told them that God loved them.
When it was unfashionable to talk to the Samaritans he talked to the Samaritans. He used colorful word pictures and subtle innuendoes. He made them the hero's of his parables. The Good Samaritan who did what was right in the eyes of God over the Jewish priest who walked by unmoved or unconcerned. And it was a Samaritan that carried the cross of our beaten and bloodied Lord to Gilgotha when all of the righteous Jews taunted and spat at him. When it was unfashionable to be in the very presence of a leper Jesus not only went into their presence but he healed them, and as was his fashion of rocking the establishment, he healed by touching them, he touched the untouchable and loved the unlovable. When it was unfashionable to heal on the Sabbath Jesus did heal on the Sabbath. Through his acts of love and kindness, he spoke with his heart and healed all that called to him regardless of the day or the hour, and he told the Pharisee I must do so because I am the Lord of the Sabbath. And as before stated, when Jesus did these things there was no intricate formula to be found other than the love of God.
He did these things with love, pure and simple love. He loved the woman at the well, and she a Samaritan. He loved her enough to tell her of the living water of which once she drank she would never thirst again. He loved her enough to tell her of that water that would quench her spiritual thirst forever and forever. He loved the woman caught in adultery enough to forgive her sins and with a simple word prevented her life from coming to a close that very moment. He loved the blind man enough that he gave him his sight. And how complicated was that healing? What were the tools or medicines he used? Spit and mud, no intricate formula there. Jesus used things to present a simple love, the very heart of God. The Roman Catholics have an icon they call the Sacred Heart of Jesus. In paintings and statues and mosaics they show Jesus with his heart on the outside of his body and in many ways this is the true picture of the factual disciples of Jesus Christ. Mother Teresa wore her heart on the outside for all to see. She showed simple love to all men and women found in the lowest of possible positions or conditions. She showed love to the untouchable of the caste system in India, those who live in dirt and live on dirt, the lowest of low and she loved them when it was unfashionable. Rev. Billy Graham wears his heart on the outside for all to see. He presents the message of Jesus Christ to millions of people and he uses simple words that all can understand. He ministers to people of every kind and color in every country and condition, through every language in every opportunity he can. He presents the love of God as often as he can and will until he's called home to receive his reward from the Father. Each of these people has heard the call of God on their lives and they knew why they were sent.
And that brings us back to where we started in the very beginning. Do you know why you were sent? Notice I said sent and not called? All of us are in some fashion called by God. His call is upon every man, upon every woman and upon child alive in the world. But not all listen with an open ear or a open heart, not all respond and not all follow his calling without adapting it to fit their own personal agenda. Because you see, if you're a disciple of Jesus Christ, if you're a follower of his teachings, it's not a question of if you are sent. He didn't make it an option he made it a command. He didn't say “if you feel like it” or “if you have time go out to the nations and make disciples and followers”. He didn't say when your church steps out there in a ministry with your men's or woman's group and are led by the Spirit you should join them as well. What Jesus did say was a command … GO! I'm sending you now. And that's what he expects us to do, we are in his army and he's the Commander in Chief and when he gives a command he expects us to carry it our without question. He expects us to go out to the nations just as he said to the original 11 disciples.
So again I have to ask you. Do you know why you were sent? Jesus gave us his words, isn't that enough to convince the doubter? The words and actions of Jesus are recorded for all to read. Isn't that enough to convince the doubter? If we have his words, if we have a map of his footsteps what more do we need? A thousand Bibles piled in the fellowship hall of a church will never lead one person to salvation if those Bibles aren’t handed out. We have beautiful Christian songs with lyrics that can melt the hardest heart but what good are they if no one sings them to the unsaved? The apostle Paul understood this concept perfectly. That's why he wrote to the church in Rome. "How, then can the call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one in whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, how beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news." How shall they preach unless they are sent? Let there be no doubt in the mind of anyone here, you have been called and you have been sent. I think just by your being here you've acknowledged the call. If you hadn't, you'd be elsewhere right now, cleaning your car or working on your house or something like that. Or maybe you'd be home just sleeping the day away.
It stirs my soul to see so many people in churches acknowledging that they know that they have been sent by God to perform some task to follow the command of their King. There is ministry going on in many of these churches, the heart of the church is beating, the flow of life is going out the doors and into the community. Many hearing or reading this in many ways show daily that they have been sent. But Jesus doesn't expect us to go out there alone. He told us that he would never leave us or forsake us. He's going to come along with us, right at out side in any and all situations. He's given us the Comforter, the Counselor to keep us company, and to direct our steps as well. He's given each of us a special ability, a blessing, and if you listen to his voice and follow his lead he'll tell you what those abilities are.
As I've already said, the heart of the church is beating, it isn’t dead by a long shot. For many of us we were on the gurney but we hadn’t flat lined yet. At one point we may have been in that coma type lull but the EMT's showed up, that's "THE EMERGENCE OF THE MIGHTY TRUTH. And that might truth is that God had a plan for his church from the very beginning and what God predestines will come to fruition regardless of Satan's scheme of things. The EMT's applied CPR to the patient, that's CHRIST his PEOPLE and RESOLVE. The faithful show resolve, they show determination, they call upon the name of their Lord Jesus, they join hands in prayer and they come together in unity adapting to that word of Scripture put to song: "We are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood a chosen nation, a peculiar people some more peculiar than the rest! You of course know I altered that just a little don’t you?
But you know I don't care how peculiar you are or what assortment of Hodge- Podge people we have, if every person is willing to bend the knee and acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, if every person is willing to set aside their own personal agenda and work for the furtherance of Gods Kingdom. If every person is willing to be Spirit led and not self led there's nothing that old rascal Beelzebub can do to stop the people of God. If you're fueled by the love of Jesus, the brakes of Satan aren't strong enough to stop the wheels of progress from rolling throughout your area and planting seeds of Gospel power to every place your foot touches down. If the love of Jesus is being paved before you the rocks of Satan will be smoothed over at every turn of the path God has called you to.
If you had been present when I did my very first sermon after I received my credentials to preach from the Assemblies of God denomination, you would have heard me ask each person present that day a simple question. I asked the people there if they knew where they'd be standing when the storm of God passes by because at some point God is going to come upon the face of the earth and cover it like a mighty storm. Today I'm asking you the same thing and I’m adding a new twist, I’m asking if you know why you were sent? God is sending you to do the same things he did when he was here so many years ago walking the land of Israel. And by your acknowledgement if that is how you will respond to my question, he will again be walking the land through your legs and seeing your eyes and your heart. The Father is sending you as he sent his Son Jesus, the message hasn't changed in thousands of years nor will it ever change.
Preach his love … teach his love … show his love … know his love … and live his love.
Let it be seen in every thing you do, every word you say and every action you take. Jesus knew why he was sent, and you know why you were sent. He sent you as his ambassador, he sent you as his servant, and he sent you as his brother or sister. He sent you as himself, a part of his very body, an extension of his very self. Let every step you take and every word you say reflect the love of Jesus and if you heed this message, every one you meet will also know why you were sent. Because you see my friend, when they meet you they will actually be introduced to Jesus Christ and it will be through your being sent to them that at some point we will all meet again in glory when our Lord returns for us.
If you've heard his voice today and you know why you were sent rejoice now and show him how much you love him. Talk to him, he’s listening, pour out your heart and start today to show everyone else around you that there is no doubt, there is no question. You know why you were sent!
Grace & peace
By Rev. Robert P. Elkins
All Scripture verse taken from the NIV Bible unless otherwise noted
Luke 4:43
"But he said,"I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent."
Jesus knew why he was sent here to earth, there was never a question in his mind what the Father planned for his calling to be and Jesus walked forward to his calling with every breath of life he had in him. Driven by love for men and women he went forward and never looked back or turned aside for a minute. Jesus knew why he was sent, Jesus knew what the task at hand was. Jesus was 100% fully aware of what his mission was. What his divine appointment was and as you read further in the Gospel of Luke you will see that he also knew the final outcome of his sojourn here on earth. Jesus knew the will of his Father, he knew he was to share the good news concerning the Kingdom of God with as many as time and circumstance would allow and he knew what the cost to himself would be and he knew what his sacrifice would entail and he never once turned away.
And now I ask you, why were you sent? Do you know what God had in mind for you when you were created? When your life was formed maybe many or but a few short years ago do you know what God had in store for you to bring you to this very place today, this day, this hour, this minute? Do you have any idea just what the mighty mind of the All-Powerful Living God of all Creation had planned for your life? Have you felt a call from God on your life today? Perchance he's speaking to your heart right now. Can you hear his voice? Do you even want to hear his voice or are you a bit afraid of what he might be calling you to do? Is his voice clear and calm and distinctive? Perhaps it's muffled and hard to understand, but just the same can you hear it?
Jesus gave a very clear and distinctive directive to his disciples in Matthew 28. "Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of The Father and of The Son and of The Holy Ghost. And teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you and surly I am with you always, to the very end of the age."
When Jesus talked to the 11 disciples, at this time Judas was no more, was he talking to just those present then or was he talking to us today as well? Are not the Scriptures still the living word of God talking to all generations? Friend, today there are many disciples out there. A disciple is a follower of a teacher who offers instruction regardless of what that teaching may be. Charles Manson had a following of disciples. Although Charles Mansion never actually harmed Sharon Tate or any of the others that died in the killing spree, his disciples did. He instructed them in the task he wanted them to carry out and they did as instructed. And consequently Charles and his disciples went to prison, they for committing the act and he for conspiracy to commit the act. Martin Luther had disciples, they came to be known as Protestants, Martin Luther led a revolt against the Roman Catholic Church through his writings and teachings and his disciples followed his lead. Dr. Martin Luther King had disciples; they followed Dr. King's teachings and example and were able to alter the course of history for the mightiest nation to ever inhabit this planet we call earth. So when Jesus said go and make disciples he was referring to not only his first 12 disciples, now minus one. He was referring to anyone and everyone who hears his words, making all followers of the teachings he had passed on to us through the Bible.
Notice the language of Jesus' words in Matthew 28. "Teach them to obey everything I have commanded you."
Like the original Ten Commandments here also we see not a suggestion but a command. Like the first ten, his second set of commandments are simple but penetrating and profound. Love your neighbor … don't cheat your government … don't condemn others when they do likewise as you have done ... you who are without sin, you can cast the first stone. There isn't anything complicated in the teachings of Jesus Christ. There is no intricate formula that needs to be found, the words of Jesus Christ were the words every man and woman of that day could understand and the same holds true today, the words of Jesus even now can easily be understood. Jesus didn't try to baffle or confuse anyone; he didn't try to prove a point or show his superiority, although he could have. And he could have done just that at any moment to the amazement of all whom were with in hearing range. He didn't say love this ethnic group but not that one. He didn't say to love this group because of their finances but not the poor, the ones left outside in the cold with no food or a few rags to cover their nakedness. And more importantly, when Jesus was teaching his disciples, both then and now, it wasn't only by what he said but by what he did as well. Jesus, the greatest teacher or rabbi of all time led by example to the most finite detail of perfection, grace and beauty. When Jesus taught he did so with his words, which are all important, but he also did so with his heart too. When it was unfashionable to talk to women he talked to women, many women, he showed them kindness when they were considered nothing more than so much property, he instilled pride and self respect in them, he did by word and example which is what we should be doing, he blessed them. He lifted them from a lowly station and told them that God loved them.
When it was unfashionable to talk to the Samaritans he talked to the Samaritans. He used colorful word pictures and subtle innuendoes. He made them the hero's of his parables. The Good Samaritan who did what was right in the eyes of God over the Jewish priest who walked by unmoved or unconcerned. And it was a Samaritan that carried the cross of our beaten and bloodied Lord to Gilgotha when all of the righteous Jews taunted and spat at him. When it was unfashionable to be in the very presence of a leper Jesus not only went into their presence but he healed them, and as was his fashion of rocking the establishment, he healed by touching them, he touched the untouchable and loved the unlovable. When it was unfashionable to heal on the Sabbath Jesus did heal on the Sabbath. Through his acts of love and kindness, he spoke with his heart and healed all that called to him regardless of the day or the hour, and he told the Pharisee I must do so because I am the Lord of the Sabbath. And as before stated, when Jesus did these things there was no intricate formula to be found other than the love of God.
He did these things with love, pure and simple love. He loved the woman at the well, and she a Samaritan. He loved her enough to tell her of the living water of which once she drank she would never thirst again. He loved her enough to tell her of that water that would quench her spiritual thirst forever and forever. He loved the woman caught in adultery enough to forgive her sins and with a simple word prevented her life from coming to a close that very moment. He loved the blind man enough that he gave him his sight. And how complicated was that healing? What were the tools or medicines he used? Spit and mud, no intricate formula there. Jesus used things to present a simple love, the very heart of God. The Roman Catholics have an icon they call the Sacred Heart of Jesus. In paintings and statues and mosaics they show Jesus with his heart on the outside of his body and in many ways this is the true picture of the factual disciples of Jesus Christ. Mother Teresa wore her heart on the outside for all to see. She showed simple love to all men and women found in the lowest of possible positions or conditions. She showed love to the untouchable of the caste system in India, those who live in dirt and live on dirt, the lowest of low and she loved them when it was unfashionable. Rev. Billy Graham wears his heart on the outside for all to see. He presents the message of Jesus Christ to millions of people and he uses simple words that all can understand. He ministers to people of every kind and color in every country and condition, through every language in every opportunity he can. He presents the love of God as often as he can and will until he's called home to receive his reward from the Father. Each of these people has heard the call of God on their lives and they knew why they were sent.
And that brings us back to where we started in the very beginning. Do you know why you were sent? Notice I said sent and not called? All of us are in some fashion called by God. His call is upon every man, upon every woman and upon child alive in the world. But not all listen with an open ear or a open heart, not all respond and not all follow his calling without adapting it to fit their own personal agenda. Because you see, if you're a disciple of Jesus Christ, if you're a follower of his teachings, it's not a question of if you are sent. He didn't make it an option he made it a command. He didn't say “if you feel like it” or “if you have time go out to the nations and make disciples and followers”. He didn't say when your church steps out there in a ministry with your men's or woman's group and are led by the Spirit you should join them as well. What Jesus did say was a command … GO! I'm sending you now. And that's what he expects us to do, we are in his army and he's the Commander in Chief and when he gives a command he expects us to carry it our without question. He expects us to go out to the nations just as he said to the original 11 disciples.
So again I have to ask you. Do you know why you were sent? Jesus gave us his words, isn't that enough to convince the doubter? The words and actions of Jesus are recorded for all to read. Isn't that enough to convince the doubter? If we have his words, if we have a map of his footsteps what more do we need? A thousand Bibles piled in the fellowship hall of a church will never lead one person to salvation if those Bibles aren’t handed out. We have beautiful Christian songs with lyrics that can melt the hardest heart but what good are they if no one sings them to the unsaved? The apostle Paul understood this concept perfectly. That's why he wrote to the church in Rome. "How, then can the call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one in whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, how beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news." How shall they preach unless they are sent? Let there be no doubt in the mind of anyone here, you have been called and you have been sent. I think just by your being here you've acknowledged the call. If you hadn't, you'd be elsewhere right now, cleaning your car or working on your house or something like that. Or maybe you'd be home just sleeping the day away.
It stirs my soul to see so many people in churches acknowledging that they know that they have been sent by God to perform some task to follow the command of their King. There is ministry going on in many of these churches, the heart of the church is beating, the flow of life is going out the doors and into the community. Many hearing or reading this in many ways show daily that they have been sent. But Jesus doesn't expect us to go out there alone. He told us that he would never leave us or forsake us. He's going to come along with us, right at out side in any and all situations. He's given us the Comforter, the Counselor to keep us company, and to direct our steps as well. He's given each of us a special ability, a blessing, and if you listen to his voice and follow his lead he'll tell you what those abilities are.
As I've already said, the heart of the church is beating, it isn’t dead by a long shot. For many of us we were on the gurney but we hadn’t flat lined yet. At one point we may have been in that coma type lull but the EMT's showed up, that's "THE EMERGENCE OF THE MIGHTY TRUTH. And that might truth is that God had a plan for his church from the very beginning and what God predestines will come to fruition regardless of Satan's scheme of things. The EMT's applied CPR to the patient, that's CHRIST his PEOPLE and RESOLVE. The faithful show resolve, they show determination, they call upon the name of their Lord Jesus, they join hands in prayer and they come together in unity adapting to that word of Scripture put to song: "We are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood a chosen nation, a peculiar people some more peculiar than the rest! You of course know I altered that just a little don’t you?
But you know I don't care how peculiar you are or what assortment of Hodge- Podge people we have, if every person is willing to bend the knee and acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, if every person is willing to set aside their own personal agenda and work for the furtherance of Gods Kingdom. If every person is willing to be Spirit led and not self led there's nothing that old rascal Beelzebub can do to stop the people of God. If you're fueled by the love of Jesus, the brakes of Satan aren't strong enough to stop the wheels of progress from rolling throughout your area and planting seeds of Gospel power to every place your foot touches down. If the love of Jesus is being paved before you the rocks of Satan will be smoothed over at every turn of the path God has called you to.
If you had been present when I did my very first sermon after I received my credentials to preach from the Assemblies of God denomination, you would have heard me ask each person present that day a simple question. I asked the people there if they knew where they'd be standing when the storm of God passes by because at some point God is going to come upon the face of the earth and cover it like a mighty storm. Today I'm asking you the same thing and I’m adding a new twist, I’m asking if you know why you were sent? God is sending you to do the same things he did when he was here so many years ago walking the land of Israel. And by your acknowledgement if that is how you will respond to my question, he will again be walking the land through your legs and seeing your eyes and your heart. The Father is sending you as he sent his Son Jesus, the message hasn't changed in thousands of years nor will it ever change.
Preach his love … teach his love … show his love … know his love … and live his love.
Let it be seen in every thing you do, every word you say and every action you take. Jesus knew why he was sent, and you know why you were sent. He sent you as his ambassador, he sent you as his servant, and he sent you as his brother or sister. He sent you as himself, a part of his very body, an extension of his very self. Let every step you take and every word you say reflect the love of Jesus and if you heed this message, every one you meet will also know why you were sent. Because you see my friend, when they meet you they will actually be introduced to Jesus Christ and it will be through your being sent to them that at some point we will all meet again in glory when our Lord returns for us.
If you've heard his voice today and you know why you were sent rejoice now and show him how much you love him. Talk to him, he’s listening, pour out your heart and start today to show everyone else around you that there is no doubt, there is no question. You know why you were sent!
Grace & peace
Thursday, October 9, 2008
Don’t Give Up Your Birthright
Don’t Give Up Your Birthright
By Rev. Robert P. Elkins
All scripture verse is from the NIV Bible unless otherwise noted
Genesis 25:29-34
“Once when Jacob was cooking some stew, Esau came in from the open country, famished. He said to Jacob, "Quick, let me have some of that red stew! I'm famished!" (That is why he was also called Edom.)
Jacob replied, "First sell me your birthright."
"Look, I am about to die," Esau said. "What good is the birthright to me?"
But Jacob said, "Swear to me first." So he swore an oath to him, selling his birthright to Jacob.
Then Jacob gave Esau some bread and some lentil stew. He ate and drank, and then got up and left. So Esau despised his birthright.”
I love the Old Testament; it’s rich in story and full to bursting with practicable application for living in a godly fashion even in today’s society. Although it was wrote a few thousand years ago the story lines are laced with golden threads that weave into pages just filled with perception, wisdom and knowledge without limit. Over the years, preachers have read these words of gold, and then prayed to our Lord for His anointing before they presented their best teachings. Then, by and through, the unction of the Holy Spirit in an uncountable amount and diverse results, sermons of every kind and color have been poured out like a fine wine offering. Each uniquely different from the other, all flowing with form and color and marvelous imagery while at the same time all relying on the same foundation, the living word of God. Amen? As man’s mind appears to have no limits, so too the sermons when guided by the Holy Spirit. As man searches the Scriptures and scans those beautiful passages, both from the Old and New Testament, like a stream of living water the words flow ready and willing to quench the dry, thirsty and parched throats of the gathered congregations who assemble in God’s house’s of worship at the call of the shophar, the Ram’s horn trumpet, like days gone by. I’d love to have one of those to sound the call to worship and to have that sound echo through the sanctuary. I don’t know about you but for me it would be exciting, it would be another tie to the rich past of our roots that do lead back to Judaism. Whether we want to acknowledge it or not, our roots do go back to the Jewish faith and we are all serving a Jewish carpenter!
When the people are called together as we are today in their house of worship, when they enter the doors, those portals that ring salvation on the inside and the world on the out, they come eager for a taste of what God’s choice words have in store for them. And my friend, those words are fully capable of reviving the parched and thirsty soul because if they are from the Bible they are the words of living water that Jesus talked of to the woman at the well.
And now it is time to present the meat of the sermon, you’ve tasted the hors d’oeuvre but it’s time for the main course . How many reading this today have ever had a touch of that Esau-itise spirit in them at some point in their lives?
Lets look at the characters in this pericope. We have Esau and Jacob, brothers from the same parents but other than that they have little in common it appears. Esau is the big old grizzly bear kind of guy, he’s covered with course red hair and from the reading we can kind of get the feeling that if he doesn’t drag his knuckles on the ground when he walks he surely isn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer. Or I think one could rephrase it as “He doesn’t have both his oars in the water and he paddles with the one and just spins in circles”.
Jacob on the other hand gives the appearance of being a bit more refined. Well-groomed and neat, most likely handsome in appearance and somewhat intelligent. He and I were most likely somewhat the same don’t you think? Jacob appears to be a dapper kind of fellow who had a plan and a goal, with the prodding and assistance of a less than scrupulous mother. But that’s another sermon for another time.
Esau has been out in the open country and when he returns he is famished. He drags his hairy self into the house, sits down at the kitchen table, slams down two glasses of ice tea and says, “What’s for supper?” His brother Jacob, the happy homebody is in the kitchen cooking up a storm with his Betty Crocker cookbook in one hand and the Taste of Home cookbook in the other. Esau being the sophisticated gent that he is doesn’t care what’s in the pot. He knows it smells good, it looks good and if Jacob is the cook it’s got to be good as well. Jacob is kind of like the Emeril Lagassie of Genesis. Esau says, “Quick, give me a bowl of that or I am going to pass away from hunger”.
You see my friends if you’ve ever read this story in its entirety you’d know that these two guys, these two brothers, are members of one of the many truly documented dysfunctional families of recorded history. Going back to mom and dad, and grandpa and grandma they were all equally quirky in their behavior. And now this strange family trait has been passed on to the boys of Isaac and Rebecca. The two boys we are looking at now. So Jacob says to his brother, grab yourself a bowl and get a spoon, sit yourself right down and get ready for the meal of meals, the food of all foods, good old lentil stew! Ummm yummy. If I’m projecting this right you should almost be able to see Jacob reaching out, taking the bowl and stirring the stew. Waving the bowl under his hairy brother’s nose letting him savor the aroma, lightly seasoned with ram, lamb, or mutton. And knowing that his big hairy brother, having no table manners, no couth whatsoever, sitting with the spoon in his hand and his tongue hanging out like a dog panting over his bone, Jacob knows that the hook has been set, now all he has to do is reel him in like a big fish.
“Oh hungry brother, before you eat would you do me a small favor? Would you give me your birthright?”.
And of course the not so bright Esau says, “Yes”. Jacob knew that having the birthright meant having some very special perks. To start with the holder of the birthright gets a double portion of inheritance above everyone else. If your brother gets 5 sheep, you get 10. If one of the other kids gets 50 acres of land you get 100 acres. If there are servants to be had you got twice as many as the other siblings, I think you get the picture.
This birthright of the first born also came with a special blessing as well. A blessing of prosperity was prayed over you, a prayer for success that brought wealth and children and sheep and camels and the visa gold charge card. And the kicker was that all the other kids of the clan had to show you special honors. You were now the head of the clan, you was “Da Man”. And it was the blessing and the rewards that Jacob was after, he knew what he was asking for and how to go about getting it. And he also knew that his hairy brother Esau was thinking from his stomach and not his head. He knew Esau would say “sure, you got it, I’m hungry enough to eat a elephant so it’s yours, do with it what you want but give me the food now.” And so the two brothers traded what they had. Jacob gave up a bowl of stew, and Esau gave up the blessing, the promise, the wealth, and the honors that went along with the blessing. He gave up his birthright.
How many reading this have known the promises of God? How many of you know what he has said through his Word, the Bible? How many of you know what God has promised to us and know what God said he would do for us and then traded it all away for a bowl of worldly stew? How many reading this have given up our birthright as a child of God and traded it all away for the short term right now instant blessing of the world? How many of us are guilty of trading away for today all the promises of tomorrow that God has given us?
Now you may be thinking “What does it matter, I’m not a first born, I know that I’m a child of God but that blessing of the first born doesn’t apply to me?” Well friend have I got good news for you! I’m here to tell you that not only does this blessing apply to you as a first born but that it gets even better.
Whether we want to acknowledge it or not, all of us, that’s you and me, that’s all of us are children of the Most High Lord God Almighty. I don’t care who your earthly parents were; you are still God’s child. I don’t care anything about the circumstances that surrounded your birth. I don’t care how you were conceived, whether you are saved or unsaved, red white yellow or black, you are a child of God. There is no one reading this in any house, in any hotel on any boat or in any bus, or any other place on the face of this earth that was conceived and given birth into the human family that was brought about outside of the will of the All Powerful God. Our Father in Heaven is the Father of all created life and with out the intervention of God there would be no life in any of us. Amen? And like it is with our earthly parents, some of us are closer to our heavenly Father than are others. And that my friend is not by God’s design but it’s by our free will and personal choice. Some have said; “Father I love you, I’ll embrace you, I’ll walk with you and I’ll serve you”. And then there are others that have said, “I know who you are but I don’t want to get to close, not just yet”. And then sadly I have to say that there are those who say, “ I don’t acknowledge you at all and I don’t even want to think that you exist”.
I think I’m safe in saying that I doubt there are many of this last group just mentioned reading this today. And if you know of anyone that is in that last group that don’t want to even acknowledge that there is a God it’s a shame that they won’t read this message unless you send it to them or guide them to this site. That my friend is something you can do and it will only take a minute of your time. If you are of the second group, the ones who acknowledge God but like to stay at a distance I’d love to sit down with you and over coffee have a nice long talk with you if it were possible but chances are it isn’t. But I would like to encourage you to develop a close personal relationship with your God and heavenly Father and I’d love to assist you in developing it in any way I can. God is never far away and he is always willing to draw you closer to him. Always remember that it is man who distances himself from God and never God who distances himself from man. God has been known to leave a nation, a people, but he is always near to a person when we call upon him with a sincere heart.
But now for that special group, the ones who have bent the knee to our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ and have acknowledged him for whom he is. Now I’m acknowledging those who have openly admitted that they are sinners and it is by grace and through the blood of Jesus and only through Jesus that we are saved. I’m talking to those who have asked for forgiveness, accepted his grace, are born again or born from above by the power of the Holy Spirit and are filled with new life by the in-filling of the Spirit of God. If you’re in this group say “AMEN” because you’ve got something to shout about.
Whether you know it or not, each of us in this last group are entitled to the blessings of the firstborn child. And that blessing is ours regardless of who we are, how old we are or how long we’ve been saved. It’s regardless of our gender, man or woman, boy or girl, regardless of our color, black, red, yellow or white, regardless of our parents or our children, regardless of our income or our position in life or the church we attend or where we work. None of those things matter even the least little bit or carry any substance if we are a born again child of God. And to that you can say’ “Amen”. Although at the time of Jacob and Esau there was only one birthright blessing bestowed, and that went to the firstborn male heir unless like Esau you screwed up and were cheated out of what was rightfully yours. Lets look the context of the blessing Esau passed up by trading away his birthright. (Genesis 27 28-29)
“ May God give you of heaven's dew
If you want to know about all of this you’ll find it in Genesis chapter 27. Should you decide to read this chapter on your own I think you will be amazed to see what lengths Jacob went through with the assistance and approval of his mother to deceive his father. Once the blessing was given it could not be rescinded or transferred. It was a one shot only done deal and there was no amending it. But now each of us can have this firstborn blessing, this birthright blessing because in the eyes of the heavenly Father we are all firstborn and fully entitled to blessing as a child of God.
(Romans 8:17) says; “The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs – heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.” The key word there was “CO-HEIRS” if we are co-heirs with Christ then we share equally with the Son of God not only in the suffering of Christ but in the blessings as well. If you are a co-heir on an insurance policy you get an equal share of the policy value with anyone else who is listed on the policy. As a co-heir you share not more and certainly not less but in equal measure of the blessing of the first born and original holder of the blessing. Just think about that for a moment. What the Father promised the Son he also promises the co-heir children as well. If we share in his suffering then we share in his glory. I believe that here in this instance that good old phrase from the 70”s fits in quite nicely, “God said it; I believe it and that settles it. Amen!”
In Genesis it said that Esau, the rightful heir of the birthright blessing was coming in from the open country and was famished. Esau was out in the wilderness and when he came home he was famished, he was hungry, he was beyond hungry. He was so hungry that he tossed his blessing to the wind with no common sense at all. My friend as a minister of the Lord I’m here to encourage you to not do as Esau did and throw away your blessing. Don’t be so hungry for the instant gratification, the right now, right this instant short term blessing of the world so as to loose the blessing the Lord has in store for you as co-heirs with Christ. Our open country or wilderness may be any of a number of things and as long as we wander in this wilderness area we are going to be hungry until we come in from the cold and enter into the grace of Jesus to be fed with his love and companionship. If you’re married, your wilderness area may be looking at another person, stay with your first love and protect your blessing. If you’re a student, your wilderness area may be to run with the crowd that are headed in the wrong direction, stay with your first love, your Lord and friend Jesus and protect your blessing. Don’t throw away your birthright blessing for the little things of un-lasting nature. Illegal gain, lust of the flesh, greed, jealously, we all know how long our list is. For some it may be an inch long for others it may be a mile. But however long it is I can assure you that it isn’t worth throwing away your birthright for it. Maybe we could add gossip and strife, maybe we could add anger or violence or any of the other things listed in the Bible. But whatever it is I can assure you that it isn’t worth throwing away your birthright blessing.
Esau didn’t look towards his tomorrows; he only looked at the right now, the instant right now, right away, he didn’t exercise his mentality very well. . Had he used his head and given the proposition some thought he would have realized that what he was giving away was of far greater value than what he was getting in return. If Esau had been following the leading of the Holy Spirit rather than the lusts of the flesh he would have known the deal he was getting was no deal at all. And this pericope is here in the Bible for us to use as a learning tool today. This isn’t just another cute story about a dysfunctional family of antiquity. This is here for our benefit to be learned and applied to each of us, to you and I this very day.
I don’t know what lies in your open country; I don’t know what is out there that could entice you to follow the lead of Esau. But I do know that whatever it is, whatever can make you as hungry as Esau was even if you feed that hunger on anything other than the perfect will of God it’s not going to fill the void for very long. Whatever we use will never be as sweet or as pleasant as the promises of God and the birthright he has in store for his children. The promises of God are full and wonderful; they will fill your every empty space and never leave us desiring for anything else once we’ve experienced them.
And how do we get them, how do we gain these promises? How do we grab hold of this birthright we’re hearing about? To start with we need to grab hold of Jesus Christ and hold on for dear life. We’ve got to hold on like our very life depended upon it because my friend it does! We have to take hold of him and let him take hold of us. We need to wrap our arms around him and allow him to wrap his arms around us, to become 100% totally dependent upon Jesus for everything we need, be dependent upon him to lift our spirits, feed our soul, feed our every yearning and provide our every need in this life and the next. We need to walk in intimate closeness with him, talk to him on a regular basis through prayer, listen to him as he talks to us, read his words as found in the Scriptures, eat his words as if they were a delicacy of pure delight, make them a very part of our every fiber and being. The King James Version of the Bible says we need to draw nigh unto him. That means to pull him in close. That means that we need to draw so close to Christ that when someone sees us they are looking into the eyes of Jesus. We need to draw so close that when we talk we are talking the language of Jesus. If you were to come to my house you would find a sign in my driveway that says; “Welcome, Jesus spoken here”. That’s my goal for life, to live and breath, to think and act as Jesus did and it should be yours as well. I may not have reached that goal yet but I’m working on it. I’m a work in progress and the work won’t end until I’m standing before my Lord in glory. We all need goals to keep us motivated and driven to perfection and I can’t think of a better goal that to be as Christ like as we can be. Remember, we may not have reached that goal just yet but we should never stop I’m trying to reach it. We need to daily say, “I may never reach that goal in this life but I know I’m not going to stop trying until the day my final breath is taken. Until then I’ll continue serving my Lord and Savior until I hear those words I’ve been waiting for. “Well done my good and faithful servant”. Is not that your goal as well? If it is say amen and give a cheer to Jesus. If we are striving to hear “well done my good and faithful servant” we are walking in the right direction and we’re in the right place.
I’m here to promise anyone reading these words that if you are ready to start developing a life style that walks in faith, talks in faith, acts in faith, prays in faith, hopes in faith and waits in faith. If you’re here to do this and so much more Jesus is here to meet you and he’s ready to give you what you need to meet that goal. I know this is the truth because his word says that he’s already done all of this … it has already happened at the day of Pentecost. When Jesus sent the Holy Spirit he sent him with every tool we would or could ever want to help us reach that goal. We’ve already got everything we need all we have to do is use it. All we have to do is reach out in faith and its all right there right now.
Our Christian walk won’t always be a cake walk, it’s not always going to be a walk in the park, it’s not always going to be easy or perfect and it’s not always going to be joyful or fun. At times it’s going to be hard to hang in there for the long haul. But if we hang on to Jesus we can do it, we can reach out and hang on tight. Remember the words of (James 1:2-4). “My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.” {KJV}
When it seems like our open country is way to big to get across, when our open country has the appearance of a vast dry desert and we start to question or doubt go to (Numbers 23:19-20).
“God is not a man that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and then not fulfill? I have received a command to bless; he has blessed, and I cannot change it”.
He’s already done it; it’s a done deal friend. All we have to do is receive it, the promise is there, the gift is there, the Spirit is there. It’s all for our taking if we will only receive. Don’t be an Esau; don’t walk out on your birthright. God’s given us a free gift and I don’t know about you but I want every gift my Father has promised me as a co-heir with his Son Jesus.
If you believe this would you pray with me;
Father I believe in your word … I believe you want to give me every good gift…. By faith I’m now claiming those gifts… I’m claiming my birthright as a co-heir with Jesus Christ… I’m claiming all that is rightfully mine… I want a double portion as my inheritance … and I’m not going to give it away… I’m not going to let the enemy steal my blessing… I’m taking back what he has stolen from me… And he’s not getting anything else... I’m trusting in Jesus Christ for everything I need or want… I’m not looking to the world and it’s false blessings any more... I’m not seeking the things that will be eaten by moths or decay… I’m looking for the things that will last throughout all eternity… I’m looking for my birthright that says … I will be standing inside the gates of heaven … and I’ll settle for nothing less… Jesus I give you my heart today… I give you my strength and every fiber of my being… Use me as you see fit ... Mold me to be the very image of you ... Guard over me and protect me today ... Holy Spirit, light my path and guide my steps… Fill me as only you can … fill every part of me to over flowing … and send me to the world to deliver your message … let me tell everyone I meet … the Father wants all of his children … to inherit their birthright blessing ... I offer you this prayer, in Jesus name. Amen!
Grace & peace
By Rev. Robert P. Elkins
All scripture verse is from the NIV Bible unless otherwise noted
Genesis 25:29-34
“Once when Jacob was cooking some stew, Esau came in from the open country, famished. He said to Jacob, "Quick, let me have some of that red stew! I'm famished!" (That is why he was also called Edom.)
Jacob replied, "First sell me your birthright."
"Look, I am about to die," Esau said. "What good is the birthright to me?"
But Jacob said, "Swear to me first." So he swore an oath to him, selling his birthright to Jacob.
Then Jacob gave Esau some bread and some lentil stew. He ate and drank, and then got up and left. So Esau despised his birthright.”
I love the Old Testament; it’s rich in story and full to bursting with practicable application for living in a godly fashion even in today’s society. Although it was wrote a few thousand years ago the story lines are laced with golden threads that weave into pages just filled with perception, wisdom and knowledge without limit. Over the years, preachers have read these words of gold, and then prayed to our Lord for His anointing before they presented their best teachings. Then, by and through, the unction of the Holy Spirit in an uncountable amount and diverse results, sermons of every kind and color have been poured out like a fine wine offering. Each uniquely different from the other, all flowing with form and color and marvelous imagery while at the same time all relying on the same foundation, the living word of God. Amen? As man’s mind appears to have no limits, so too the sermons when guided by the Holy Spirit. As man searches the Scriptures and scans those beautiful passages, both from the Old and New Testament, like a stream of living water the words flow ready and willing to quench the dry, thirsty and parched throats of the gathered congregations who assemble in God’s house’s of worship at the call of the shophar, the Ram’s horn trumpet, like days gone by. I’d love to have one of those to sound the call to worship and to have that sound echo through the sanctuary. I don’t know about you but for me it would be exciting, it would be another tie to the rich past of our roots that do lead back to Judaism. Whether we want to acknowledge it or not, our roots do go back to the Jewish faith and we are all serving a Jewish carpenter!
When the people are called together as we are today in their house of worship, when they enter the doors, those portals that ring salvation on the inside and the world on the out, they come eager for a taste of what God’s choice words have in store for them. And my friend, those words are fully capable of reviving the parched and thirsty soul because if they are from the Bible they are the words of living water that Jesus talked of to the woman at the well.
And now it is time to present the meat of the sermon, you’ve tasted the hors d’oeuvre but it’s time for the main course . How many reading this today have ever had a touch of that Esau-itise spirit in them at some point in their lives?
Lets look at the characters in this pericope. We have Esau and Jacob, brothers from the same parents but other than that they have little in common it appears. Esau is the big old grizzly bear kind of guy, he’s covered with course red hair and from the reading we can kind of get the feeling that if he doesn’t drag his knuckles on the ground when he walks he surely isn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer. Or I think one could rephrase it as “He doesn’t have both his oars in the water and he paddles with the one and just spins in circles”.
Jacob on the other hand gives the appearance of being a bit more refined. Well-groomed and neat, most likely handsome in appearance and somewhat intelligent. He and I were most likely somewhat the same don’t you think? Jacob appears to be a dapper kind of fellow who had a plan and a goal, with the prodding and assistance of a less than scrupulous mother. But that’s another sermon for another time.
Esau has been out in the open country and when he returns he is famished. He drags his hairy self into the house, sits down at the kitchen table, slams down two glasses of ice tea and says, “What’s for supper?” His brother Jacob, the happy homebody is in the kitchen cooking up a storm with his Betty Crocker cookbook in one hand and the Taste of Home cookbook in the other. Esau being the sophisticated gent that he is doesn’t care what’s in the pot. He knows it smells good, it looks good and if Jacob is the cook it’s got to be good as well. Jacob is kind of like the Emeril Lagassie of Genesis. Esau says, “Quick, give me a bowl of that or I am going to pass away from hunger”.
You see my friends if you’ve ever read this story in its entirety you’d know that these two guys, these two brothers, are members of one of the many truly documented dysfunctional families of recorded history. Going back to mom and dad, and grandpa and grandma they were all equally quirky in their behavior. And now this strange family trait has been passed on to the boys of Isaac and Rebecca. The two boys we are looking at now. So Jacob says to his brother, grab yourself a bowl and get a spoon, sit yourself right down and get ready for the meal of meals, the food of all foods, good old lentil stew! Ummm yummy. If I’m projecting this right you should almost be able to see Jacob reaching out, taking the bowl and stirring the stew. Waving the bowl under his hairy brother’s nose letting him savor the aroma, lightly seasoned with ram, lamb, or mutton. And knowing that his big hairy brother, having no table manners, no couth whatsoever, sitting with the spoon in his hand and his tongue hanging out like a dog panting over his bone, Jacob knows that the hook has been set, now all he has to do is reel him in like a big fish.
“Oh hungry brother, before you eat would you do me a small favor? Would you give me your birthright?”.
And of course the not so bright Esau says, “Yes”. Jacob knew that having the birthright meant having some very special perks. To start with the holder of the birthright gets a double portion of inheritance above everyone else. If your brother gets 5 sheep, you get 10. If one of the other kids gets 50 acres of land you get 100 acres. If there are servants to be had you got twice as many as the other siblings, I think you get the picture.
This birthright of the first born also came with a special blessing as well. A blessing of prosperity was prayed over you, a prayer for success that brought wealth and children and sheep and camels and the visa gold charge card. And the kicker was that all the other kids of the clan had to show you special honors. You were now the head of the clan, you was “Da Man”. And it was the blessing and the rewards that Jacob was after, he knew what he was asking for and how to go about getting it. And he also knew that his hairy brother Esau was thinking from his stomach and not his head. He knew Esau would say “sure, you got it, I’m hungry enough to eat a elephant so it’s yours, do with it what you want but give me the food now.” And so the two brothers traded what they had. Jacob gave up a bowl of stew, and Esau gave up the blessing, the promise, the wealth, and the honors that went along with the blessing. He gave up his birthright.
How many reading this have known the promises of God? How many of you know what he has said through his Word, the Bible? How many of you know what God has promised to us and know what God said he would do for us and then traded it all away for a bowl of worldly stew? How many reading this have given up our birthright as a child of God and traded it all away for the short term right now instant blessing of the world? How many of us are guilty of trading away for today all the promises of tomorrow that God has given us?
Now you may be thinking “What does it matter, I’m not a first born, I know that I’m a child of God but that blessing of the first born doesn’t apply to me?” Well friend have I got good news for you! I’m here to tell you that not only does this blessing apply to you as a first born but that it gets even better.
Whether we want to acknowledge it or not, all of us, that’s you and me, that’s all of us are children of the Most High Lord God Almighty. I don’t care who your earthly parents were; you are still God’s child. I don’t care anything about the circumstances that surrounded your birth. I don’t care how you were conceived, whether you are saved or unsaved, red white yellow or black, you are a child of God. There is no one reading this in any house, in any hotel on any boat or in any bus, or any other place on the face of this earth that was conceived and given birth into the human family that was brought about outside of the will of the All Powerful God. Our Father in Heaven is the Father of all created life and with out the intervention of God there would be no life in any of us. Amen? And like it is with our earthly parents, some of us are closer to our heavenly Father than are others. And that my friend is not by God’s design but it’s by our free will and personal choice. Some have said; “Father I love you, I’ll embrace you, I’ll walk with you and I’ll serve you”. And then there are others that have said, “I know who you are but I don’t want to get to close, not just yet”. And then sadly I have to say that there are those who say, “ I don’t acknowledge you at all and I don’t even want to think that you exist”.
I think I’m safe in saying that I doubt there are many of this last group just mentioned reading this today. And if you know of anyone that is in that last group that don’t want to even acknowledge that there is a God it’s a shame that they won’t read this message unless you send it to them or guide them to this site. That my friend is something you can do and it will only take a minute of your time. If you are of the second group, the ones who acknowledge God but like to stay at a distance I’d love to sit down with you and over coffee have a nice long talk with you if it were possible but chances are it isn’t. But I would like to encourage you to develop a close personal relationship with your God and heavenly Father and I’d love to assist you in developing it in any way I can. God is never far away and he is always willing to draw you closer to him. Always remember that it is man who distances himself from God and never God who distances himself from man. God has been known to leave a nation, a people, but he is always near to a person when we call upon him with a sincere heart.
But now for that special group, the ones who have bent the knee to our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ and have acknowledged him for whom he is. Now I’m acknowledging those who have openly admitted that they are sinners and it is by grace and through the blood of Jesus and only through Jesus that we are saved. I’m talking to those who have asked for forgiveness, accepted his grace, are born again or born from above by the power of the Holy Spirit and are filled with new life by the in-filling of the Spirit of God. If you’re in this group say “AMEN” because you’ve got something to shout about.
Whether you know it or not, each of us in this last group are entitled to the blessings of the firstborn child. And that blessing is ours regardless of who we are, how old we are or how long we’ve been saved. It’s regardless of our gender, man or woman, boy or girl, regardless of our color, black, red, yellow or white, regardless of our parents or our children, regardless of our income or our position in life or the church we attend or where we work. None of those things matter even the least little bit or carry any substance if we are a born again child of God. And to that you can say’ “Amen”. Although at the time of Jacob and Esau there was only one birthright blessing bestowed, and that went to the firstborn male heir unless like Esau you screwed up and were cheated out of what was rightfully yours. Lets look the context of the blessing Esau passed up by trading away his birthright. (Genesis 27 28-29)
“ May God give you of heaven's dew
and of earth's richness—
an abundance of grain and new wine.
May nations serve you
May nations serve you
and peoples bow down to you.
Be lord over your brothers,
and may the sons of your mother bow down to you.
May those who curse you be cursed
and those who bless you be blessed."
If you want to know about all of this you’ll find it in Genesis chapter 27. Should you decide to read this chapter on your own I think you will be amazed to see what lengths Jacob went through with the assistance and approval of his mother to deceive his father. Once the blessing was given it could not be rescinded or transferred. It was a one shot only done deal and there was no amending it. But now each of us can have this firstborn blessing, this birthright blessing because in the eyes of the heavenly Father we are all firstborn and fully entitled to blessing as a child of God.
(Romans 8:17) says; “The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs – heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.” The key word there was “CO-HEIRS” if we are co-heirs with Christ then we share equally with the Son of God not only in the suffering of Christ but in the blessings as well. If you are a co-heir on an insurance policy you get an equal share of the policy value with anyone else who is listed on the policy. As a co-heir you share not more and certainly not less but in equal measure of the blessing of the first born and original holder of the blessing. Just think about that for a moment. What the Father promised the Son he also promises the co-heir children as well. If we share in his suffering then we share in his glory. I believe that here in this instance that good old phrase from the 70”s fits in quite nicely, “God said it; I believe it and that settles it. Amen!”
In Genesis it said that Esau, the rightful heir of the birthright blessing was coming in from the open country and was famished. Esau was out in the wilderness and when he came home he was famished, he was hungry, he was beyond hungry. He was so hungry that he tossed his blessing to the wind with no common sense at all. My friend as a minister of the Lord I’m here to encourage you to not do as Esau did and throw away your blessing. Don’t be so hungry for the instant gratification, the right now, right this instant short term blessing of the world so as to loose the blessing the Lord has in store for you as co-heirs with Christ. Our open country or wilderness may be any of a number of things and as long as we wander in this wilderness area we are going to be hungry until we come in from the cold and enter into the grace of Jesus to be fed with his love and companionship. If you’re married, your wilderness area may be looking at another person, stay with your first love and protect your blessing. If you’re a student, your wilderness area may be to run with the crowd that are headed in the wrong direction, stay with your first love, your Lord and friend Jesus and protect your blessing. Don’t throw away your birthright blessing for the little things of un-lasting nature. Illegal gain, lust of the flesh, greed, jealously, we all know how long our list is. For some it may be an inch long for others it may be a mile. But however long it is I can assure you that it isn’t worth throwing away your birthright for it. Maybe we could add gossip and strife, maybe we could add anger or violence or any of the other things listed in the Bible. But whatever it is I can assure you that it isn’t worth throwing away your birthright blessing.
Esau didn’t look towards his tomorrows; he only looked at the right now, the instant right now, right away, he didn’t exercise his mentality very well. . Had he used his head and given the proposition some thought he would have realized that what he was giving away was of far greater value than what he was getting in return. If Esau had been following the leading of the Holy Spirit rather than the lusts of the flesh he would have known the deal he was getting was no deal at all. And this pericope is here in the Bible for us to use as a learning tool today. This isn’t just another cute story about a dysfunctional family of antiquity. This is here for our benefit to be learned and applied to each of us, to you and I this very day.
I don’t know what lies in your open country; I don’t know what is out there that could entice you to follow the lead of Esau. But I do know that whatever it is, whatever can make you as hungry as Esau was even if you feed that hunger on anything other than the perfect will of God it’s not going to fill the void for very long. Whatever we use will never be as sweet or as pleasant as the promises of God and the birthright he has in store for his children. The promises of God are full and wonderful; they will fill your every empty space and never leave us desiring for anything else once we’ve experienced them.
And how do we get them, how do we gain these promises? How do we grab hold of this birthright we’re hearing about? To start with we need to grab hold of Jesus Christ and hold on for dear life. We’ve got to hold on like our very life depended upon it because my friend it does! We have to take hold of him and let him take hold of us. We need to wrap our arms around him and allow him to wrap his arms around us, to become 100% totally dependent upon Jesus for everything we need, be dependent upon him to lift our spirits, feed our soul, feed our every yearning and provide our every need in this life and the next. We need to walk in intimate closeness with him, talk to him on a regular basis through prayer, listen to him as he talks to us, read his words as found in the Scriptures, eat his words as if they were a delicacy of pure delight, make them a very part of our every fiber and being. The King James Version of the Bible says we need to draw nigh unto him. That means to pull him in close. That means that we need to draw so close to Christ that when someone sees us they are looking into the eyes of Jesus. We need to draw so close that when we talk we are talking the language of Jesus. If you were to come to my house you would find a sign in my driveway that says; “Welcome, Jesus spoken here”. That’s my goal for life, to live and breath, to think and act as Jesus did and it should be yours as well. I may not have reached that goal yet but I’m working on it. I’m a work in progress and the work won’t end until I’m standing before my Lord in glory. We all need goals to keep us motivated and driven to perfection and I can’t think of a better goal that to be as Christ like as we can be. Remember, we may not have reached that goal just yet but we should never stop I’m trying to reach it. We need to daily say, “I may never reach that goal in this life but I know I’m not going to stop trying until the day my final breath is taken. Until then I’ll continue serving my Lord and Savior until I hear those words I’ve been waiting for. “Well done my good and faithful servant”. Is not that your goal as well? If it is say amen and give a cheer to Jesus. If we are striving to hear “well done my good and faithful servant” we are walking in the right direction and we’re in the right place.
I’m here to promise anyone reading these words that if you are ready to start developing a life style that walks in faith, talks in faith, acts in faith, prays in faith, hopes in faith and waits in faith. If you’re here to do this and so much more Jesus is here to meet you and he’s ready to give you what you need to meet that goal. I know this is the truth because his word says that he’s already done all of this … it has already happened at the day of Pentecost. When Jesus sent the Holy Spirit he sent him with every tool we would or could ever want to help us reach that goal. We’ve already got everything we need all we have to do is use it. All we have to do is reach out in faith and its all right there right now.
Our Christian walk won’t always be a cake walk, it’s not always going to be a walk in the park, it’s not always going to be easy or perfect and it’s not always going to be joyful or fun. At times it’s going to be hard to hang in there for the long haul. But if we hang on to Jesus we can do it, we can reach out and hang on tight. Remember the words of (James 1:2-4). “My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.” {KJV}
When it seems like our open country is way to big to get across, when our open country has the appearance of a vast dry desert and we start to question or doubt go to (Numbers 23:19-20).
“God is not a man that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and then not fulfill? I have received a command to bless; he has blessed, and I cannot change it”.
He’s already done it; it’s a done deal friend. All we have to do is receive it, the promise is there, the gift is there, the Spirit is there. It’s all for our taking if we will only receive. Don’t be an Esau; don’t walk out on your birthright. God’s given us a free gift and I don’t know about you but I want every gift my Father has promised me as a co-heir with his Son Jesus.
If you believe this would you pray with me;
Father I believe in your word … I believe you want to give me every good gift…. By faith I’m now claiming those gifts… I’m claiming my birthright as a co-heir with Jesus Christ… I’m claiming all that is rightfully mine… I want a double portion as my inheritance … and I’m not going to give it away… I’m not going to let the enemy steal my blessing… I’m taking back what he has stolen from me… And he’s not getting anything else... I’m trusting in Jesus Christ for everything I need or want… I’m not looking to the world and it’s false blessings any more... I’m not seeking the things that will be eaten by moths or decay… I’m looking for the things that will last throughout all eternity… I’m looking for my birthright that says … I will be standing inside the gates of heaven … and I’ll settle for nothing less… Jesus I give you my heart today… I give you my strength and every fiber of my being… Use me as you see fit ... Mold me to be the very image of you ... Guard over me and protect me today ... Holy Spirit, light my path and guide my steps… Fill me as only you can … fill every part of me to over flowing … and send me to the world to deliver your message … let me tell everyone I meet … the Father wants all of his children … to inherit their birthright blessing ... I offer you this prayer, in Jesus name. Amen!
Grace & peace
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