Ambition - January 26, 2014 Sermon

By Pastor Greg

The Taj Mahal is one of the most beautiful and costly tombs ever built, but there is something fascinating about its beginnings. In 1629, when the favorite wife of Indian ruler Shah Jahan died, he ordered that a magnificent tomb be built as a memorial for her. The shah placed his wife’s casket in the middle of a parcel of land, and construction of the temple literally began around it. But several years into the venture, the Shah lost sight of his original vision. Rather than focusing on a tribute to his deceased wife, he began to focus on the building. And one day while, he was surveying the sight, he reportedly stumbled over a wooden box, and he had some workers throw it out. It was months before he realized that his wife’s casket had been destroyed. The original purpose for the memorial became lost in the details of construction.

The same thing can happen to a church. When something other than the Lord becomes more important, a church runs the risk of losing its purpose and meaning. This is why Jesus stood before His apostles and gave them a clear task. He gave those who would become leaders in the church clear instructions. The Lord looked at them and said "This is your task. This is why you exist. This is what you must do. Keep your eyes and heart focused on this one task - go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you" (Matthew 28:17-18).

The good news is that most of the disciples did as the Lord commanded. Their ambition was to share the Good News with anyone who would listen. And for sure this was Paul's ambition as well (Read Romans 15:14-22).

Do you want to know what really stands out here? It’s Paul’s ambition. His ambition was to preach Good News, not increase membership in the Church. He desired to bring people to the Lord, not find ways to grow the church. He searched for the lost, not those disappointed with a church. And I believe there is an important lesson here todays Church needs to learn. We need to remember that the Lord has called us to proclaim the Good News, not conduct membership drives. The Great Commission the Lord gave the Apostles applies to us as well. The Lord did not command us to increase membership. He commanded that we make disciples.

Far too often we go searching for gimmicks and programs or topics and studies designed to attract people to our church. But Paul, on the other hand, went searching for those without hope; those who had nowhere to turn and nowhere to go. He offered them peace from the conflict within their heart by telling them the Good News found in Jesus the Messiah. Not surprisingly, the Church grew. This is because Paul and the other apostles proclaimed the Good News. They turned to those far from God; those we have a tendency to turn away from, and offered them hope. They proclaimed that God is not looking to destroy them, but that He is trying to save them, which is why He sent His only begotten Son. Maybe this should be our ambition as well.

Although the Good News was the ambition of the Apostles, and especially Paul, over the years it seems the church has lost its focus. It seems the church today is more ambitious about worship styles, music preferences, times of worship, building design, furniture location, and even the style of clothing that is acceptable during worship. And although these things might enable a Church to minister to a particular group of people, these things should not become our ambition. Jesus told us to make proclaiming the Good News our ambition. So maybe the best way to address attendance or membership problems is to simply start proclaiming the Good News. Maybe we should be focusing on hope for the hopeless rather than all these other things. The person looking for healing is not too concerned about the color of the carpet in the doctor’s office. I doubt the sick person cares if the doctor is wearing a tie. They are looking for someone to restore their health. It is the same for those who are without hope. They are looking for someone to help them find spiritual healing. And the only hope for a person’s soul is found in Jesus Christ.

The Church must not lose sight of what Christ has called us to do; what our ambition should be. And I can’t help but wonder how different the American Church might be if it was Good News that we proclaimed.

Accepting - January 19th, 2014 Sermon

By Pastor Greg

As we draw near to the end of our Study of Paul’s letter of Romans, let me quickly summarize his main points. He says that from the very beginning God had a plan to redeem humanity; to purchase back that which was lost. And this plan begins by revealing our sin and convicting us of sin and judging our sin. Our behavior becomes a witness against us. And although we may argue against that judgment, in the end God is justified in His actions. But because of our faith in Christ, we find ourselves at peace with God. This brings eternal life, in no longer being slaves to sin, in being conformed into the image of Christ, comforted when we do sin, sanctified into a believer who is more like Jesus each day, redeemed by God in spite of those times we do sin, and in standing uncondemned because of Jesus. This is God’s plan which He introduced right after the first sin. He predestined that a person might receive these things because of their belief when hearing the message of salvation. Finally, after their conviction, confession, and repentance, a believer is adopted into the family of God.

This is the Gospel. This is the Good News that humanity so desperately needs to hear. For those who recognize their sinfulness and wickedness and helplessness, there is hope. And it comes not through effort or works or any other deed we might perform, but instead through faith and belief. This is what Paul was teaching in the first half of the letter. It is straightforward and simple. No wonder so many people use this outline of Romans as a tool to help others find salvation through Jesus.

What shall we say about such things? God is for us, not against us. How shall we respond to such wonderful things? What should we do in response to all that God has done for us? Paul tells us that we are to allow ourselves to be transformed into a Christian who is genuine, respectful, loving, considerate, sensitive to the convicting power of the Spirit, and to be accepting of one another.

I’m not sure if you noticed what Paul has been saying since the beginning of chapter 12. He says that our reaction to God’s redemption plan should not only transform our relationship with God the Father, but also with the people we meet and those who live around us. Salvation must cause a transformation in our lives. And that transformation must not merely flow upward to God but outward toward humanity as well. Salvation is much, much more than mere head knowledge or even heart-felt joy. It is also transformative. The gift of grace must transform the way we live, the way we serve, and the way we love God. But salvation should also transform the way we see, the way we serve, and the way we love others. This is so important that Paul dedicated 4 chapters of this book simply to address how this transformation should affect our relationship with other people. The final point he makes is that as believers we are to be accepting of one another (Romans 15:1-15).

Let me remind you that Paul’s letter of Romans was written to the Church; written to Christians in the Roman church and for the Christians in the Roman church. It was written to guide these believers into one central truth; that what God has done for one, He has done for all. In other words, to the Jewish Christian and to the Gentile Christian, Paul says that if God has accepted one group because of their faith in Jesus, He has accepted those in the other group for the very same reason. If God has accepted one person in spite of all their weaknesses and shortcomings, He has accepted the next person in spite of their weaknesses and shortcomings as well. The Jewish Christian must not despise and alienate the Gentile Christian. And the Gentile Christian must not do the same to the Jewish Christian. As Paul had written earlier, “There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male and female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus.  And now that you belong to Christ, you are the true children of Abraham. You are his heirs, and God’s promise to Abraham belongs to you” [1] (Galatians 3:28-29).

Although certain sections of Romans may be deeply theological, for the most part Paul teaches the elementary foundations of Christianity. He moves us from sin to conviction to confessing to salvations to transformation. This process, he says, should be familiar to all who have been saved (Romans 15:15). And since it is something all Christians have experienced, it is this truth that should unite us together.

I tell you the truth: we may not all agree on certain aspects of God’s Kingdom[2], but we should agree that just as God accepted us because of our faith, He has accepted our Christian brother or sister as well. And this is the kind of attitude which is fitting for followers of Christ (verse 15). Instead of focusing on the things that divide us[3], maybe we should be focusing of this truth: that each of us has been accepted by God because of our faith in Christ. It is this truth that unites us. It is this truth that draws us together. It is this truth that we should be celebrating as the Body of Christ.

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[1] Tyndale House Publishers. (2007). Holy Bible: New Living Translation (3rd ed.) (Ga 3:28–29). Carol Stream, IL

[2] There is a big difference between convictions and personal preferences. For example, I don’t eat certain foods, like shellfish, because of preference. I don’t like the taste or the texture. It has nothing to do with conviction. On the other hand, I no longer listen to certain styles of music, even though at one time it was the kind of music I preferred. One night, during prayer, the Spirit convicted me about my preference in music. This is why I threw many of my records in the trash. My taste had not changed, but I was convicted about my taste or preference. As believers, we need to be aware that there is a big difference between convictions and preferences. And we need to be aware that the Kingdom of God is not built upon our preferences or our convictions.

[3] As Paul reminds us in Romans 14, convictions are directed at each person, not at the church as a whole. One believer is convicted to pray more often. Another is convicted to fellowship more often. It would be wrong for either individual to demand that all Christian spend time alone in prayer or that all Christians spend time in social fellowship. These are the things that divide us. We must recognize that God convicts us each differently in order to accomplish a different task. Thank God for diverse convictions!

Conviction - January 12th, 2014 Sermon

By Pastor Greg

There is a joke that has been around for years about the wealthy man who begged to take his money with him when he died. God agreed, and when the man did die, he appeared at the Pearly Gates with a suitcase. St. Peter said that there were no carry-on’s allowed, but the man insisted he had permission. Peter opened the suitcase, looked at the bricks of gold the man had brought along, and exclaimed, “Seriously, you brought paving material”? Of course, a person would need to be familiar with the description of Heaven found in Revelation 21:21 to fully appreciate this story. But the truth remains: what we might consider to be precious here on earth is not the most valuable treasure in Heaven.

Too often Christians will build the Kingdom of God with piles of hay or dry grass. Too often Christians will make the little things the important things. As I shared last week, too often we forget that the Kingdom of God is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness. And just like some within the early Church, some Christian’s today demand that Grace is not entirely sufficient; they claim that there is more to Salvation than merely faith in Christ.

We read in the book of Acts that the early Church faced constant insistence by some that the Grace of God given to a person who confesses Jesus as Lord was not entirely sufficient for Salvation. They constantly insisted that non-Jewish Christians begin practicing certain Jewish traditions in order to really be saved. As Paul and Barnabas were preaching among the Gentile people, some Jewish Christians demanded that these Gentile believers needed to adopt some of the practices of the Jewish faith. Yet, as Paul often argued, if these practices and customs were unable to save the Jew, why impose them upon a Gentile? The Jew who followed the requirements of the Law still needed the Grace of Jesus. Why force Gentiles to follow these rules if they didn’t work in the first place? So a division arose within the early Church, especially among those congregations where Jew and Gentile were worshiping together.

This is the problem Paul has been addressing all along in Romans; stressing that neither Jew nor Gentile is without excuse. Neither group is better or worse than the other. Both groups were marked by sin. Both groups needed Jesus. And in Romans 14 Paul is attempting to draw the two groups away from divisiveness and into unity. Christ’s sacrifice upon the cross was sufficient. We need not add anything to this message, especially a demand that all Christians have the same convictions. Yes, all Christians must be convicted that they are sinners in need of a Savior, but any other conviction a Christian might face is one of obedience; obedience to the Holy Spirit who is calling each individual into holiness and righteousness (Read Romans 14:14-23).

Lest we become judgmental against the Christians who insisted everyone share the same convictions, let me remind you that we struggle with the same thing today. Say that the Holy Spirit begins to convict you about something in your life. You are already a believer. You’ve already become a Christian. But He begins to prick your heart about something you should not be doing or about something you should start doing. Being an obedient Christian, you do as the Spirit has directed. For example, you stop watching certain television shows and instead spend your time praying. When you obey the Spirit’s conviction, you will find great peace and joy; for what you have done pleases the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. Naturally we want others to experience the same joy. So we go to our brother and sister telling them about the joy we have found. But don’t we expect them to then feel the same conviction? Don’t we expect them to walk the same path we are on? Don’t we expect them to do just as we have done? And of course when they don’t, we have a tendency to think less of them and their faith, and more highly of our own. And when we do this we are no different that the Christians we read about here in Romans.

We are not all going to share the same convictions. We are not all going to live out our faith identically. My walk with Christ is going to be different than your walk with Christ. The Spirit is going to convict me in ways different than you. The Spirit is going to gift me differently than He gifts you. The point here is that rather than criticizing another believer for not sharing our same convictions, we should be encouraging them to submit to the convictions the Spirit has placed within them. After all, it is the Holy Spirit that convicts. And the last time I checked there are no openings in the Trinity. God is not looking for Christians to join the Junior Holy Spirit club. He is looking for Christians who are in fellowship with one another, who encourage one another, and who build up one another. The Holy Spirit does His work of convicting us of sin. It is the Spirit who says, “This is the way, walk in it” whenever we turn to the right or the left (Isaiah 30:21). Therefore, as Warren Wiersbe has said, “The mature Christian must exercise love and patience and be careful to not cause a less mature Christian to stumble or fall. And a less mature Christian must “grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 3:18). The weak must learn from the strong, and the strong must love the weak. The result will be peace and maturity to the glory of God”.

If we allow the Spirit to do His full work in our life, we will not just be convicted about our relationship with God. We will also be convicted about how our life as a Christian affects those around us. It is the mature Christian who thinks not just vertically, but horizontally as well. We are to submit to the Spirit’s conviction in our relationship with the Father and in our relationship with one another. Both are important.

Considerate - January 6th, 2014 Sermon

By Pastor Greg

A rat looked through a crack in the wall to see the farmer and his wife opening a package. He was aghast to discover that it was a rat trap. Retreating to the farmyard the rat proclaimed the warning; "There is a rat trap in the house, a rat trap in the house!" The chicken said, "Excuse me, Mr. Rat, I can tell this is a grave concern to you, but it is of no consequence to me." The pig told him, "I am so very sorry Mr. Rat; there is nothing I can do about it but pray. Be assured that you are in my prayers." The cow said, "Like wow, Mr. Rat. A rat trap. I am in grave danger. Duh?" So the rat returned to the house, head down and dejected, to face the farmer's rat trap alone. That very night a sound was heard throughout the house, like the sound of a rat trap catching its prey. The farmer's wife rushed to see what was caught. In the darkness she did not see that it was a venomous snake whose tail was in the trap. The snake bit the farmer's wife. The farmer rushed her to the hospital, and she returned home with a fever. Now everyone knows you treat a fever with fresh chicken soup, so the farmer took his hatchet to the farmyard for the soup's main ingredient. However, his wife's sickness continued to get worse, and many friends and neighbors came to sit with her around the clock. To feed them the farmer butchered the pig. The farmer's wife did not get well. She died, and so many people came for her funeral that the farmer had the cow slaughtered to provide meat for all of them to eat.

The moral of the story is: when there is a rat trap in the house, the whole farmyard is at risk. LORD, teach us to live as a community.

There are many attributes that should be found within the Christian who has fully realized what God the Father has done for them. The believer who understands the depth of Christ’s work upon the cross should respond to that sacrifice by being transformed into a person unlike the rest of the world. They should become genuine, respectful, and loving toward all people. But also a Christian should begin to realize that they no longer live for themselves. In response to all that God has done for them, a Christian needs to develop a sense of community; to be considerate of other people. Paul speaks of this in Romans 14:1-13.

A Christian has a responsibility to consider the affairs of others. A Christian needs to consider how their actions might affect the faith of another believer. A Christian should live as part of a community; as a member of one body, fully aware that their actions do have an effect on those around them. And this considerate attitude is so important that Paul says “each one of us will give an account of himself to God” (Romans 14:12). Paul is not talking about our salvation here. That’s already been settled. But here he says that even our considerate attitude will be evaluated by the Lord when He judges the faithful service of all believers.

An inconsiderate Christian does not care how their words and actions affect another person. But an inconsiderate Christian also passes judgment against others; even other Christians. Paul gives two examples that had become major issues in the Roman church. One was dietary restrictions and the other focused on which day was the right day for worship. And it seems these two issues had become more important than the Great Commission; more important than sharing the Good News of Christ with the people of this world. So rather than laboring for the Lord, these Christians were building a kingdom of straw and dry grass; things that will burn up in the end.

The lesson for today’s church is obvious. The Kingdom of God is to be built upon things that last and endure; in other words, built upon the promises of Christ, not the latest trends or fads or issues circulating through the church. The Kingdom of God is not built upon whether you speak in tongues or not, or whether you are a pacifist or not. It is built upon the Word of the Lord and Christ alone. But sadly, the inconsiderate attitude found within the Roman Church is still found today. Even today, personal beliefs about issues have become more important than faith in Jesus Christ.

Paul’s point in this section can best be summarized in verse 13. “Decide instead to live in such a way that you will not cause another believer to stumble and fall”. As Christians we no longer have the freedom to think only of ourselves. As Christians we represent the Lord. And as the Lord's ambassador, we must consider those around us. But my, oh my, is this a difficult task. It is so easy to flippantly disregard those around us, saying they are the one with the problem. Like Cain we mutter ‎"Am I my brother's keeper"?

By becoming a believer, we become the Lord’s servant. And interestingly enough, the person in the pew next to you is a servant as well. We all have the same Master. As servants, we should be busy working for the Lord. And I have found that busy hands have little time for criticism. People who are busy winning souls to Christ have more important things to do than to investigate the lives of the saints![1] We’ve forgotten that we are all co-laborers for Christ.

Somehow the church has lost the concept of community. Even within the Church you will find little regard for how the actions or attitudes of one may impact the many. But this attitude should not be found among Christians, says Paul. A Christian has lost the right to act any way they choose or say anything they wish. Yes, you have even lost the right to speak your mind without regard to how your words might affect those around you. We belong to the Lord, says Paul, whether we live or whether we die. And as the Lord’s, our right must be replaced with responsibility.

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^[1] Wiersbe, W. W. (1996). The Bible exposition commentary (Ro 14:4). Wheaton, IL: Victor Books.