SERMON: DOING THE STUFF -- Acts Sermon Series

 

Naylor Community Christian Church

Naylor, Georgia

 

I.  Introduction

            -- turn in Bibles to Acts 1:8

 

Acts 1:8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

 

            -- one day, a mother walked by and saw her young son struggling to put on his coat – try as he might, he just could not get the coat to zip up – and she saw that he was getting more and more frustrated, so she decided to step in and help

-- she kneeled down in front of him and took both sides of his coat in her hand and she showed him how to do it – "The secret," she said, "is to get the left part of the zipper to fit in the other side before you try to zip it up." – and with that, she zipped the coat up before his astonished eyes

-- after trying so hard to do it himself and seeing how easily she was able to do it, the boy looked at her quizzically and asked, “But why does it have to be a secret?"

 

-- that's a good question, and we can relate it to our topic of discussion for today – the title of today’s message is “Doing the Stuff”

– if you remember last week’s message from Pentecost Sunday, I shared with you the story of John Wimber and his question to the pastors in the churches he started visiting right after he came to put his faith in Christ

-- looking around at what all of these churches were doing – how everyone was just coming to church on Sunday and then sitting in the pew, singing a few songs, listening to the sermon, and then going home – Wimber realized that it didn’t look like what he was reading about in the Bible – and so he asked that famous question, “When do we do the stuff?” – referring to the exciting and spirit-filled lives of the early Christians and the remarkable things the early church did through the power of the Holy Spirit within them

-- and when no one had the answer, the only thing that he could assume was that it was a secret – and that’s the way that we have lived and functioned as the church over the last two thousand years – as if all the stuff that the early Christians did in the Book of Acts was just something they did

-- in fact, there are a whole group of Christians that explain away our failure to do the stuff in our churches as part of their theology – these Christians and churches call themselves “cessationists”

– to quote from the internet, “Cessationism is the view that the “miracle gifts” of tongues and healing have ceased—that the end of the apostolic age brought about a cessation of the miracles associated with that age -- Most cessationists believe that, while God can and still does perform miracles today, the Holy Spirit no longer uses individuals to perform miraculous signs”

-- in other words – in answer to Wimber’s question, “When are we going to do the stuff?” – these Christians respond, “We can’t – we’re not supposed to – that was just stuff that the early Christians did in the Bible, but we don’t do that anymore”

-- in their minds, all of the stuff we read about in the Bible was just something those people did – and the ability and the secret on how to do it ourselves is hidden from us  

            -- but what if it’s not? – what if the ability to go out and do the stuff that we read about in the Bible is not a secret? – that it didn’t end when the Bible was written – but that God expects us to continue on doing the same stuff that we read about in the Bible

-- what if the direction and the instructions on how to do all this stuff has been there all along – right in front of us – but we just didn’t see it or we just didn’t believe we could do it?

 

            -- last summer, a new Superman movie came out – and everyone here knows the story of Superman – we’ve all seen the movies or read the comics – we all know how Superman was really an alien who came from a distant planet and was sent to earth as a baby to save his life

– but then he found out that because he was living on this earth with a yellow sun that he had powers that no one else did – he could fly and he could leap over tall buildings in a single bound – he had great strength – he had x-ray vision – he couldn’t be hurt by bullets or by other weapons that were formed against him

-- but the important part of that story is that he didn’t use those powers for himself – he didn’t hoard those abilities to make himself rich and powerful and to make a name for himself as Clark Kent -- he started using those powers for good – he started doing stuff to help those around him

            -- well, I want you to understand this – that story of Superman might be fiction, but there is some truth there – and you and I are Superman – because we are not of this world, either – the Bible tells us that when we put our faith and trust in Jesus for the forgiveness of sins and for our salvation, that we are born again – we are new creations – we are not part of this world but have become aliens and exiles in this foreign land

            -- we are God’s ambassadors – we are His emissaries – representatives of His Kingdom living in the world and imbued with power from on high so that we can do the “stuff” – so that we might point people to the good news of the gospel and show them the way to God’s Kingdom

            -- as John Wimber pointed out, we should be doing the stuff that we read about in the Bible – but we haven’t been – either because someone told us we couldn’t – or we’ve been lulled into complacency through our religious traditions and practices

            -- but this needs to end – it’s time for God’s people to stand up and be the super men and super women that He has called us to be through His supernatural grace and mercy in our lives

            -- Jesus didn’t go to the cross and die in our place so that we could spend a comfortable morning on Sundays just singing and listening to stories about what other people have done

            -- Jesus died and rose again and sent His very Spirit to live within us so that we could go and do the stuff that He wanted us to do – so that we could live lives different from those around us – so that we could be His hands and feet in this world today

            -- it’s time for us to get up and do that – it’s what He commanded – it’s what He told us to do

 

II.  Doing the Stuff

            -- look back here at Acts 1:8

 

Acts 1:8 “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

            -- “But you will receive” -- you will receive what? – power – “but you will receive “power”” -- when? – “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you” – got that?

            -- this is a promise from Jesus – this is a fact that we’ve been missing -- Jesus says it right here – “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you” – that is Pentecost – that is the sending of the Holy Spirit to the church – that is the promise that when you put your faith and trust in Jesus for salvation and eternal life and the forgiveness of sins, He puts the Holy Spirit within you to give you power to do the stuff

 

            -- pay attention to what He is saying here – Jesus says, “You will” – bold, italic, underline that in your Bible – make sure you see what Jesus is saying here

– “you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you” – not, “you might” – not, “you could possibly” – not, “you will until the Bible is written” – not, “you will until all the apostles have died” – no, there are no conditions to that promise – His promise is not time-limited

            -- what does Jesus say here? – “You WILL receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you” – “You will” – it’s going to happen – Jesus Himself tells us here that we’re going to get power when the Holy Spirit comes on us

 

– power for what? – to do the stuff!

-- look what it says here – “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you” – and then what happens? – “And you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth”

 

-- so, Pentecost marks the sending of the Holy Spirit to the church – to Christians – to the people of God

– and the Holy Spirit was sent to give us power – to empower us – to give us supernatural strength and power just like Jesus had – and we are to use this power to do the stuff – once again, Jesus says, “you WILL” do this – not, “you might” – not, “you can” – but, “you Will”

-- so, what’s the stuff? -- Jesus says here that the “stuff” is what we do when we go forth in the power of the Holy Spirit to be His witnesses in the world

 

-- and I want you to understand something about this verse – this verse is the summary of the entire Book of Acts – this verse is an outline of the entire book – it tells us what is going to happen in the Book of Acts – it gives us the theme of the entire book and the game plan for the church

-- so, here in the beginning, Jesus is with His disciples – He has been teaching them about the word of God for 40 days and about who He is and why He has come – and then Jesus ascends up into heaven and sends the Holy Spirit down on the day of Pentecost to fill the church with His power and presence so that they can go forth and do the stuff

-- and the rest of the Book of Acts is simply stories about the church and the apostles going out and doing the stuff – being His witnesses in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria and the ends of the earth

-- and get this – if we are Christians, then we are part of His church – and that means that we are part of the story of Acts – the story of the church going out and doing the stuff through the power of the Holy Spirit didn’t end when Luke wrote the final words in Acts 28 – in fact, the end of the book leaves us hanging – it leaves us wanting more – do you know why?

-- because the rest of the Book of Acts is about us – about you and me and all the other Christians in this world – everyone who received power from the Holy Spirit when they became Christians and put their faith and trust in Jesus and who were called to be His witnesses to the ends of the earth

-- turn over to Acts 29 real quick and let me know when you’re there – everybody, turn over to Acts 29 – did you find it? – of course not – it’s not there – and do you know why there is not an Acts 29 in your Bible?

-- it’s because we are in the middle of Acts 29 right now – and we should be writing the story about us going out and doing the stuff that Jesus called us to do

-- and so, we need to ask ourselves two questions – first, what is the stuff that we are supposed to do? – and, second, how do we do it?

 

            -- let’s start with the question, “what is the stuff?”

            -- Jesus tells us here that the stuff is us serving as His witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth

            -- very similar to what He told us in the Great Commission – flip over to Matthew 28:18-20

 

Matthew 28:18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

 

            -- Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me” – so, Jesus has all the authority – that means that He is in charge – He has the power – He has the mandate – He has the calling from the Father to serve as Lord and King over all the earth – to administer the Father’s grace and mercy in this world

            -- Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me” – therefore, go and make disciples of all nations…”

            -- so, now we’re getting into some of the stuff – we are to “go” – that means that we should be moving and active and not just sitting on pews and doing nothing else, right? – that means we are to actually get up and “go” because Jesus told us to and He has all authority and power to command that of us

            -- He says we are to “go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” – what does that mean? – how do we make a disciple? – what is a disciple?

 

            -- a disciple is simply a follower of Jesus – someone who has put their faith and trust in Jesus for their salvation and the forgiveness of sin and eternal life – what we would call a Christian – really, what a Christian should be

            -- but to be a disciple means that you aren’t just believing in Jesus with your head – that you have an intellectual knowledge of Him and you affirm the truth of what the Bible says about Him – if you just do that, it doesn’t mean that you’re a disciple – it doesn’t mean that you’re a Christian – in James 2:19, it says, “You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that, and shudder” – so, it takes more than just knowing the facts about Jesus to be His disciple – to be a Christian

-- to be a disciple means that you’re all in – it means trusting Him with your heart and your spirit – it means putting all your faith in Him – not only knowing that He was God and that He died for our sins with our heads – but believing and living in that knowledge through faith – trusting in the unknown and believing that when you step towards eternity, Jesus will be there -- and then doing what He says to do and following Him wherever He goes

 

-- I’m the type of person that has to see something to fully understand it and believe it – I think that’s why I like movies so much, because I can see the picture before me – and when I think about explaining to someone the difference between believing in the facts of Jesus – the truth that He was real and died on the cross and rose again – versus having faith in Jesus and putting your life and your soul and your spirit in His hands – the best example I have found is from a movie – Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

-- if you’ve seen that movie, Indiana Jones has finally come to the place where the Holy Grail – the cup that Jesus used at the last supper – was located – it has been protected by this monk for thousands of years – the only problem is that there is a huge chasm – this huge empty space – between Indiana Jones and the monk – and in order to get to the Holy Grail, he has to get across that chasm

-- the monk tells him that there is an invisible bridge there – and that if he has faith, that when he steps out into the void of that chasm – that he will not fall, but can follow the bridge to the other side

-- and, sure enough, he does – he steps out and puts his foot in the air above that chasm – and then lifts his other foot – and he doesn’t fall, but the invisible bridge holds him up

-- that’s faith – and the difference between head knowledge of Jesus and heart knowledge of Jesus is whether you trust in Him enough to take that step into the unknown – whether you believe that He will hold you up if you step out into nothing – like Peter believing that he could walk on water because Jesus told him he could

-- to be a disciple, you have to have put all your faith and trust in Jesus – but that’s not all it means

 

– since the word disciple literally means “a follower,” that implies that you are following Him – that you are active – that you are doing stuff – that you are moving – that you have been changed by Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit – who He sent to give us power so that we could be His witnesses in the world today – and you are following Him and doing what He has called you to do – you are being obedient to His commands and His word

            -- this is what a disciple looks like – this is who we are to be – and this is what Jesus said we are to make

            -- we make disciples by first being one -- through faith in Jesus and then by moving and following Him and doing the stuff – doing the stuff means living for Jesus ourselves –following Him and doing His commands – living lives different from the world around us so that we can be example for them – so that we can show them what a disciple should look like and so that we can tell them how they can become a disciple, too

           

            -- and then, when we make a disciple, we are to baptize them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit – if you remember from last week, to baptize someone is to have them washed clean in the blood of Jesus – to have their whole bodies and souls and spirits washed by Jesus – it means that we help others to put their faith and trust in Jesus so that their sins will be forgiven and they will be saved for eternal life in Him

            -- it also means that we bring them into the church – into community – into union – with us – they are moved from being part of this world to being part of God’s kingdom – and we bring them in and make them part of us – we show them how to live for Jesus – we teach them what it means to do the stuff – and then we help them to do the stuff themselves by teaching them to obey everything Jesus commanded

 

            -- what does the stuff look like beyond making disciples and witnessing for Christ with our lives? – it can be a lot of different things – and it can be different depending on who you are and where you live and how you are gifted

            -- remember going through the series on the spiritual gifts? – there was a reason for that – to let you know how you are gifted – because when you know that, then you can do the stuff – and what is the stuff?

            -- elsewhere in the Bible we are given broad pictures of what the stuff looks like in passages like Isaiah 1:17, where we read we are to “learn to do right – seek justice – defend the oppressed – take up the cause of the fatherless – plead the case of the widow” – or in Luke 4:18-19, when Jesus said that He had been anointed by God to “proclaim good news to the poor – freedom for the prisoners – recovery of sight for the blind – to set the oppressed free – and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor”

            -- and in Micah 6:8, where we read, “what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”

            -- when we do any of that, we are doing the stuff – we are being disciples – we are being the witnesses of Christ in this world today

            -- that is our calling – that is our mission – that is what we need to be doing if we are going to claim the name of Jesus and call ourselves Christians

 

            -- the Book of Acts is literally filled with stories and examples of the apostles and the early Christians going about and doing the stuff through the power of the Holy Spirit – and since we are supposed to be the continuation of the Book of Acts right now – since we are supposed to be writing Chapter 29 ourselves – it might be a good idea for us to study the acts that are in this book and to seek to emulate them and to follow their example

            -- so, for the next little while, we’re going to be journeying through the Book of Acts doing just that – looking at the acts of the apostles and the early church – and considering how we might go forth and do stuff like they did

            -- for that is what Christ intended for us – and that is what He expects of His church today

 

III.  Closing

-- whether you know it or not, people today are looking for Jesus – in fact, there was a recent story in the Wall Street Journal about how models who look like Jesus are in high demand in Utah

-- for a growing number of people in the state, a picture isn’t complete without Jesus being in the middle – so, a lot of people have started hiring Jesus look-alikes for family portraits and wedding announcements

-- so, models who look like our conception of Jesus are showing up to walk with a newly engaged couple through a field, play with young children in the Bonneville Salt Flats, and cram in with the family for the annual Christmas card as they get their pictures taken

            -- Bob Sagers is one of these models who is in high demand for pictures – he was walking around an indie music festival in Salt Lake City when a friendly stranger approached and asked for his number. “Has anyone ever told you that you have a Jesus look to you?” – and that started a new career for Sagers

-- since the moment when he was recruited by the stranger at the festival to pose as Jesus in a painting with his family, Sagers has posed as Jesus nearly a dozen times – and he’s not alone

-- there are lots of models in Utah posing as Jesus -- charging about $100 to $200 an hour to pose with children, families, and couples at various locations in the Beehive state¹

-- but here’s the thing – just because someone looks like Jesus on the outside, doesn’t mean they are like Jesus on the inside – and just because someone claims to be a Christian, that doesn’t mean that they are a true disciple of Jesus

-- true disciples of Jesus are those people who have had a supernatural experience with Him – who have put their faith and trust in Jesus’ atoning death on the cross and who believe in Him for the forgiveness of sin and eternal life – who have been transformed and changed from who they were into people of faith as evidenced by the fact that they are doing the stuff

-- I want us to be those people – I want all of us to be Superman – I want all of us to be living our lives for Jesus as sold-out Christians who trust in Him and who follow Him and who do the stuff that He has called us to do

 

-- we’ve spent quite a while this year going through what it means to be a Christian – what it means to be filled with the Spirit and what the spiritual gifts look like and how they are to be used

-- but it’s not enough to know the facts – we have to get up and go and do the stuff that Jesus has empowered us to do through His Spirit

-- so, we’re going to start digging into the Book of Acts and look at the lives of the apostles and disciples and the early church so that we might be like them – true disciples who express our faith by doing the stuff

 

-- the very first thing we have to do, though, before we do the stuff -- is make sure that we have a relationship with Jesus – that we have put our faith and trust in Him for salvation and eternal life – that we’re not just getting by with head knowledge and a reliance on facts

-- if you’re not sure if you are there or not, then I want to invite you to pray to Jesus now – to ask Him to forgive you of your sins – to affirm that you believe in Him – that He is the living God – and to put your faith and trust in Him – to take that step onto the invisible bridge that is Jesus – to know that your eternity is certain because you are depending on Him and Him alone

-- we’re going to close in prayer now, and if you would like me to pray with you, I would be happy to do so – just come down front or catch me after the service, and I will pray with you for whatever need you might have

-- with that, let us close now in prayer as we get ready to go and do the stuff through the power of the Holy Spirit within us

-- let us pray

 

 1 Source: Bradley Olson, “It Pays to Have Long Hair and a Beard in Utah—Jesus Models Are in Demand,” The Wall Street Journal (12-18-24)]

 

 

           

SERMON: THAT OLD TIME RELIGION -- PENTECOST SUNDAY

 

Naylor Community Christian Church

Naylor, Georgia

 

I.  Introduction

            -- turn in Bibles to Acts 2:1-21

 

Acts 2:1-21 (NIV)

1 When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place.

2 Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting.

3 They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them.

4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.

5 Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven.

6 When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard them speaking in his own language.

7 Utterly amazed, they asked: "Are not all these men who are speaking Galileans?

8 Then how is it that each of us hears them in his own native language?

9 Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia,

10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome

11 (both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs--we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!"

12 Amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, "What does this mean?"

13 Some, however, made fun of them and said, "They have had too much wine."

14 Then Peter stood up with the Eleven, raised his voice and addressed the crowd: "Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say.

15 These men are not drunk, as you suppose. It's only nine in the morning!

16 No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel:

17 "'In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams.

18 Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy.

19 I will show wonders in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood and fire and billows of smoke.

20 The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord.

21 And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.'

 

            -- John Wimber was a charismatic preacher and one of the founders of the Vineyard Movement, which was the catalyst for spread of non-denominational and home churches that we are seeing in our area and throughout the country right now -- he's also widely known as the composer of "The Spirit Song," which was an early praise song that enjoyed quite a bit of popularity back in the 80's and 90's

            -- Wimber came to Christ in the height of the Jesus movement in the 1960s as God moved through the hippies and the young people in those days -- he began reading the Bible -- starting with the Gospels and then went through the book of Acts -- and as he read, he got excited about what God had done in the early church -- about how God had ignited their faith and how the church was known for its love and for the presence of miraculous signs and wonders

            -- after reading all of that, Wimber decided he wanted to be a part of it -- he went out and started visiting churches in his area, but he was disillusioned by what he found -- it was the same story at every church he went to -- the service was nice and polite and very structured -- it began exactly on time -- it ended on time -- and nothing much happened in the middle

            -- Wimber looked at the people in the church and he asked them, "When are you gonna do the stuff? -- "What stuff?" they wanted to know -- "You know...the stuff -- the stuff from the Bible!"

            -- Wimber had been reading about the miraculous conversions -- the healings and the deliverance from sin and the other miracles that took place in the early church as recorded in the book of Acts -- but instead of signs and wonders, he saw no sign of life at all -- no sign of anything that would make him wonder -- that would leave him speechless -- that would draw people in from all walks of life

            -- all he experienced in the church was the deadness of the ritual that he had just sat through -- and his heart broke to know just how much of God was missing¹

 

            -- if we're honest with each other, we have to say that we know exactly what Wimber experienced in that church -- we've had our share of dry services -- of services without much happening -- of doing the same-old, same-old Sunday after Sunday after Sunday

            -- we've experienced the same thing in our own lives -- even after coming to Christ and having our sins forgiven, our spiritual lives can become dry and powerless and rarely look like the lives of Paul or Peter or any of those mentioned in the Bible -- in fact, they rarely look that different from those around us who are not Christians

            -- but this is not what God intended -- God intended for us to live amazing and exciting lives through Him -- He intended that we would walk through this land as shining beacons of light -- that we would live lives of such holiness and goodness and righteousness and power that when others looked at us, they would be drawn to the God who made us like this

            -- this is the reason for this passage today -- this is the reason why Jesus sent the Holy Spirit to be with us -- this is the reason for Pentecost -- as Jesus told us in Acts 1:8, "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you"

            -- which begs the questions – what kind of power? – and for what purposes?

 

            -- there are some in the Christian community in our country today that are seeking to express power through political and social means – this Christian nationalist movement – and the Seven Mountain Mandate that we hear of – both of them seek to transform this nation by acquiring political and governmental power – but that’s not the power that Jesus is talking about here – and that’s not the purpose of the power that Jesus is referring to in this passage

            -- Jesus is talking about the power that comes through the indwelling Holy Spirit amongst us – the power that forgives sin – that enables us to choose to live holy and righteous lives – the power that transforms us from who we were and sets our hearts and our minds on a higher calling

            -- Jesus was telling us that He was going to send His very own presence in the person of the Holy Spirit to fill us and empower us to do what He had called us to do – to be who He had called us to be – to live as His people in the Kingdom of Heaven

            -- this power that we  celebrate on this Pentecost Sunday is the same resurrection power that rose Jesus from the grave, victorious over sin and death – this is the same power that allows us to live holy lives and to speak the name of Christ to the world around us – the power to do wondrous signs and miracles in Jesus’ name – to manifest His presence and His Kingdom in the world today

                       

            -- as Rick Kirchoff says, “When God sends forth the Spirit amazing things happen -- barriers are broken -- communities are formed -- opposites are reconciled -- unity is established -- diseases are cured -- addiction is broken -- cities are renewed -- races are reconciled -- hope is established -- people are blessed -- and church -- [real church] -- happens.

            -- Today the Spirit of God is present -- God is up to something. . . [so] discouraged folks [are going to cheer up] -- dishonest folks [are gonna] ‘fess up -- sour folks sweeten up -- closed folk open up -- gossipers shut up -- conflicted folks make up -- sleeping folks wake up -- lukewarm folk fire up -- dry bones shake up -- and pew potatoes stand up! -- But most of all, Christ the Savior of all the world is [going to be] lifted up.”²

 

            -- look around at what we’re doing now – think about all the churches you know of here in south Georgia – think about you and your life in Christ

-- doesn't that sound better than what we do now? -- doesn't that sound more exciting than the Christian lives we live now?

            -- so, how does this come about? -- how can we see transformed churches and lives today? -- how can we experience for ourselves the dynamic life of Christ portrayed in the Bible -- lives characterized by purity and power -- signs and wonders?

            -- well, it all starts with the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives – working in us and through us to sanctify us and make us holy so that we might be holy as God is holy – through faith, the Holy Spirit works in us to accomplish His will and to bring glory to God in the world today

 

II.  Holiness -- Positional and Progressive

            -- in order to truly understand and live Pentecostal lives – Spirit-filled lives – in this world today – we have to get back to the basics of our faith – we have to remember why Jesus came and who He wants us to become

            -- turn over to John 13:1

 

John 13:1 It was just before the Passover Festival. Jesus knew that the hour had come for him to leave this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.

 

2 The evening meal was in progress, and the devil had already prompted Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot, to betray Jesus. 3 Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God; 4 so he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist. 5 After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him.

 

6 He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?”

 

7 Jesus replied, “You do not realize now what I am doing, but later you will understand.”

 

8 “No,” said Peter, “you shall never wash my feet.”

 

Jesus answered, “Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.”

 

9 “Then, Lord,” Simon Peter replied, “not just my feet but my hands and my head as well!”

 

10 Jesus answered, “Those who have had a bath need only to wash their feet; their whole body is clean. And you are clean, though not every one of you.”

 

            -- we’ve talked about this passage before – the familiar story of Jesus washing the feet of His disciples that night in the Upper Room when He shared the Last Supper with them – so, I’m not going to go through this in great depth

            -- but there’s one thing I want you to see here in this passage – especially in the interchange between Jesus and Peter – Jesus comes to Peter and bends down to wash his feet and Peter says, “No, you shall never wash my feet”

            -- Jesus replies in verse 8, “Unless I wash you, you have no part with Me” – then Peter goes all in – “Then don’t just wash my feet – wash my hands and head as well”

            -- but look what Jesus tells him – verse 10

 

John 13:10 Jesus answered, “Those who have had a bath need only to wash their feet; their whole body is clean. And you are clean, though not every one of you.”

 

            -- Jesus talks about two different types of washings here – the first is a bath – the complete and total washing of a person – the second is the washing of the feet

            -- those two types of washings correspond to two of the reasons why Jesus came and why He sent His Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost

 

            -- first, Jesus came to give us a bath and cleanse us from unrighteousness – this bath is our baptism into the faith – and with all love to my Baptist brethren, Jesus wasn’t talking about water in this passage – Jesus is talking about washing us clean from our sins through His body and His blood – when Jesus refers here to those who have had a bath, He is talking about our salvation

            -- as it says in Ephesians 5:25-27, Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her to make her holy – cleansing her by the washing with water through the word – to present her to Himself as a radiant church – without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish – but holy and blameless

            -- so, Jesus came in love – John 3:16 – For God so loved the world… -- He came in love so that He could give us a bath – so that He could wash us with water through the word – so that He might make us holy as He is holy

-- Jesus came as our atoning sacrifice – taking our place on the cross and dying for our sins so that we would be washed clean of our sins – with our sin nature and our unrighteousness washed away in the sight of God the Father – so that we might rise with Jesus in the resurrection, justified and saved through His atoning death and sacrifice

-- this is what Jesus is talking about here when He refers to those who have had a bath in His conversation with Peter – this is justification – this is salvation – this is being washed in the blood of the Lamb for the forgiveness of sins

 

            -- now here’s an important point I want you to get -- justification -- salvation through faith in Christ – makes us holy in the sight of God – and here is how this works

-- because Jesus substituted His holy and sinless life for ours -- our position -- our standing -- before God has been changed -- the Bible says that we were once objects of wrath -- far away from God because of our sin -- now, we are near to God because of what Jesus has done for us – His righteousness has been given to us – to use the theological term – Jesus’ righteousness has been imputed to us

-- our unrighteousness and our sins have been washed away – when we bathed in the blood of Christ, we were cleansed – and we rose with Him in victory over sin and death and were covered with the very righteousness of Jesus

            -- so, if you have been saved through faith in Christ, then you are one of the people that He is talking about here who has had a bath – His righteousness covers you, so that when God looks at you, He sees you through Jesus

-- and this means that our standing – our position – our relationship with God -- has been changed -- we are new creations and we are no longer part of this world – we are now part of the Kingdom of God

-- theologians call this being “positionally” holy – holy because the holiness and righteousness of Jesus have been imputed – have been given – transferred – to us

-- everybody got this? – this is important that you know this

 

            -- the second washing that Jesus talks about here in John 13 in His conversation with Peter is the washing of our feet – this is what He was doing to His disciples in the upper room

-- Jesus came first to give us a bath – and then, He tells Peter, He came to wash our feet – what in the world does that mean?

 

-- when I was in school, I had a professor who said that you can learn anything you need to know about an animal just by looking at its mouth and its feet – the mouth tells you what the animal eats – it tells you what kind of animal it is – whether it’s a predator or prey or a scavenger – just looking at the mouth tells you a lot about an animal

-- but the most important thing was to look at its feet – because its feet told you where it lived – and it how it made its way through this world – when you look at a duck and you see its webbed feet, you know that ducks were made for the water

-- now, look at your feet – what can you learn about yourself by paying attention to your feet?

-- your feet carry you through this world – sometimes, your feet carry you to holy places, like this place – sometimes, though, your feet carry you to places where you shouldn’t be – places where Jesus wouldn’t want you to go – places where angels fear to trod

-- but most of the time, our feet just carry us throughout our day in this fallen world that we live in – and because this world is fallen – surrendered to the curse and to sin – our feet get dirty – we pick up dirt and grime and filth – just from walking through this world – and we have to do something about it

 

-- so, the second reason Jesus came was to wash our feet -- to wash off the dust and filth and grime of this world that we pick up in our daily lives so that can be made totally and completely clean again

            -- the washing of our feet is what we call “sanctification" – and this is the primary role of the Holy Spirit in our lives and in the life of the church today

-- sanctification is just a fancy way of saying that Jesus sent the Holy Spirit to us to empower us to become holy as He is holy by washing our feet every single day – this is visible holiness – sanctification – the washing of our feet – is how the Holy Spirit helps us to transform our behaviors so that we actually live holy lives as the people of Christ

 -- I told you a few minutes ago about imputed righteousness – about the fact that our standing – our position – before God had been changed through Jesus’ death and resurrection and that we were now positionally holy in His eyes – we changed our position – we moved from being part of this world to being part of God’s Kingdom

-- sanctification is a different type of holiness – this is the power of the Holy Spirit working in us and through us to help us live the Christian life in this world today – to live holy and righteous lives through His power and His presence

-- the power of the Holy Spirit is given to us – it is “imparted” to us – so that we might become truly righteous – inside and out – theologians call this “imparted” righteousness or progressive holiness

-- progressive means that it is a work in progress – it means the Holy Spirit works in us and through us so that we might become more and more righteous and more and more holy the longer we walk with Him in faith

            -- we do this by following His commands and living lives in obedience to Him -- progressive holiness or sanctification is becoming holy in our behavior -- letting our outside begin to match our inside

 

            -- so, I want to make sure you get this, because this is important – this is foundational – you need to know this so that you can build upon this foundation in your life

 

            -- we’re talking about two separate things here:

 

            1.  Those who have had a bath – those who are positionally holy -- these are the Christians – those who have put their faith and trust in Jesus’ atoning sacrifice on the cross and have been cleansed of their sins

– the righteousness of Christ has been imputed to them – it has been given to them – and their standing – their position – before God the Father has been changed – they have been moved from the kingdom of this world into the kingdom of heaven

 

            2.  Those who need only to wash their feet – this is referring to progressive holiness – to sanctification – to imparted righteousness -- to the daily washing of our feet by the Holy Spirit’s power and presence in our lives

            -- this is the process where our behavior and attitude and emotions and very being are transformed from who we were before Christ to who He wants us to be – the washing of our feet through the Spirit – progressive holiness – is when Christians start to live out the Christian life of faith and obedience to Jesus

            -- easy way to remember this – imparted righteousness or imparted holiness is Jesus becoming a part of our daily life

 

-- This is the area where the church and where most Christians are failing today -- more than anything else, it is a lack of progressive holiness – of relying on the Spirit for power and righteousness -- that has led us to experience powerless lives and churches

-- it is this lack of holiness that has causes us to look just like the world around us and not as the people God called us to be

-- if we want to experience the full and abundant life that Christ called us to -- the full and abundant life that we see portrayed in the men and women of the Bible -- then we have to start with holiness

-- the good thing is, we don't have to do this on our own -- actually, we can't do this on our own -- we are totally incapable of doing good -- of being holy -- in our own lives – we need help

-- and that's what this passage from Acts is all about – Jesus sent the Holy Spirit to indwell us and fill us with His presence and power so that He can enable us to live for Christ in our daily lives – to choose righteousness over sin – to choose obedience instead of disobedience – to empower us to quit living lives of sin on a daily basis – the Holy Spirit is the source of holiness and power for Christians and for the church today

 

III.  The Holy Spirit

            -- turn back over to Acts 2, where we read of the Day of Pentecost, when Jesus sent His very Spirit to be with the church in the world today

            -- just as a reminder – this was not the start of Pentecost – Pentecost was already an established Jewish religious celebration – Jews still celebrate it today

-- the Jewish celebration of Pentecost commemorated the day when the Israelites made their way to Mt. Sinai after they left Egypt -- when they got to Mt. Sinai, God met them there and gave them the law -- this moment, more than any other, defined the Israelites as a nation, as the people of God

-- Pentecost commemorated the giving of the Law to the people

            -- 4000 years later – on the first Pentecost after the death and resurrection of Jesus -- God sent the Holy Spirit to the church -- and just like the giving of the law defined the nation of Israel, the giving of the Spirit defined the church – the presence of the Holy Spirit within believers is what made the church possible – and it was His power that manifested the miracles and wonders and signs that we read about in the New Testament and that are supposed to be part of the Christian experience

            -- let's look at this passage about Pentecost and see how we might receive and experience a fresh outpouring of the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives today

 

            -- look back at verse 1-4 [read Acts 2:1-4]

 

Acts 2:1 When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place.

2 Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting.

3 They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them.

4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.

 

            -- as this passage opens, we read that the disciples were all together in one place -- now that can mean a couple of different things

            -- first, it can mean a literal place -- Luke might mean that the disciples were all together in the Upper Room or they were all together in the temple or in some other area -- that is probably the case

            -- but there is a different meaning to this that we need to understand -- for the first time since Jesus had brought the disciples together, they were all together in one place in their spirit and in their understanding and in their relationship with God -- they were of one accord

            -- when Luke says the disciples were all in one place, he’s referring to both their physical position and their spiritual condition

 

            -- if you read through the gospels, it's rare to find the disciples in one accord -- the gospels tell us that the disciples constantly bickered and quarreled with each other -- they constantly wanted the best places at the table and the highest positions in the kingdom -- they were constantly jockeying for position -- but, now, something has happened that has changed this bickering and fighting for position to being in unity with one another – what changed?

            -- the resurrection of Jesus -- Jesus has died and come back -- their sins have been forgiven -- and Jesus has spent the last 40 days with them in an intense Bible course -- teaching them how the Old Testament Scriptures all pointed to Him and His ministry

            -- and, so, for the first time since we have read about the disciples, we find them in one place -- physically and spiritually -- they are of one accord, and they are finally ready to be baptized with the Holy Spirit – to have their feet washed through imparted righteousness

 

            -- contrary to popular opinion, the disciples had already received the Holy Spirit by this time -- in John 20:22, we read that after Jesus rose from the dead and appeared to them, "He breathed on them and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit." -- the Holy Spirit already lived within them -- but the disciples couldn't experience His power because they were not open to His presence – in a very real sense, they didn’t understand how the Holy Spirit was to live in them and through them

            -- some people have used the analogy of water in your home as a picture of the Holy Spirit – all the pipes in your home are filled with water – it’s there, just waiting to be used – but in order to access the water, we have to open a valve – we have to turn the spigot – and then the water can flow

            -- it’s the same way with the Holy Spirit -- once we have been saved -- once we have asked Jesus to forgive us of our sins and live within our hearts, He sends the Holy Spirit to indwell us -- to live within us

            -- the problem is that we don't know how to release His power in our lives – we don’t open the spigot – and even though the Holy Spirit is within us, we don't let Him work through us -- we continue to try to live life in our own strength and that doesn’t work

            -- the first step to getting our feet washed – the first step in progressive holiness – is to turn the valve – to open the spigot – to allow the Holy Spirit to flow through us

-- this happens through faith – by trusting and believing that He is with us and in us – and then trusting in Him and asking Him to impart His righteousness and holiness to us – to substitute His power and His righteousness for our own -- that is what the disciples were doing in this passage here in Acts 2

-- they had had the Holy Spirit for some time, but the valve was shut – the spigot was closed – they were quenching His ability to work in their lives – but here in Acts 2, they finally opened themselves up to the presence of God – and the power and presence of the Holy Spirit poured out in their lives like a mighty rushing wind and they all saw tongues of fire that rested on each of them

            -- this is not the normal way the Spirit comes upon us now -- we don't see the Spirit coming upon anyone else in the Bible in this way -- but this was what the disciples needed at this moment

            -- Jesus had ascended to heaven 10 days earlier -- and, for the first time, the disciples were truly physically alone -- so they needed to hear God's presence -- they needed to see God's presence -- and so the Spirit came on them and baptized them in power in this miraculous way -- it was what the early church needed in order to know that God was with them

            -- as soon as the disciples were filled with the Holy Spirit, Luke tells us that a crowd gathered because of the noise and commotion -- when is the last time you heard of people being drawn to a church service because of the noise and commotion? -- but that's exactly what happened here

 

            -- Peter began to preach to the crowd and to tell them the good news of Jesus -- he recognized that what was happening was the fulfillment of the promise that God gave to the prophet Joel -- skip down to verse 17-21

 

Acts 2:17 "'In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams.

18 Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy.

19 I will show wonders in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood and fire and billows of smoke.

20 The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord.

21 And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.'

 

            -- God was pouring out His Spirit on all people -- men and women -- young and old -- everyone who turned to Jesus for the forgiveness of sins would now receive the Holy Spirit in their lives -- this gift of God was for everyone -- from the youngest Christian to the oldest saint -- all could receive and be filled with the presence of God in their lives

            -- God was sending the Holy Spirit to wash the feet of the disciples – and because of this, the church would experience signs and wonders as the Holy Spirit worked in them and through them

-- they would experience and witness transformed lives and changed hearts -- they would be empowered to live holy and obedient lives, as they allowed the Holy Spirit to be part of their daily walk with Christ

-- through His power and His presence in their lives, they experienced ever-increasing holiness and righteousness in their lives – and were empowered to do what Jesus told them to do – to walk where He sent them – and to change this world for Him  

 

IV.  Closing

-- I read about this Baptist preacher and his wife who decided they needed a dog -- ever mindful of their congregation, they knew the dog must be obedient and righteous, just like all good Baptists – the dog had to have all the qualities of a Baptist – so, they visited an expensive kennel and explained their needs to the manager, who assured them he had just the dog for them.

            -- he left, and a few minutes later, he came back with a gorgeous black lab – the preacher looked at it and said, “He looks good, but is he a Baptist dog?” – the man said, “Watch this”

-- he told the dog, “Fetch the Bible" – and the dog went to the bookshelf where there were a lot of books, including several translations of the Bible – he looked for a few seconds, and then pulled out a King James Version Bible and brought it over to his owner

-- the preacher was amazed – but the man said, “I’m not done yet” – He told the dog, “Find Psalm 23” – and the dog, showing marvelous dexterity with his paws, flipped through the pages of the Bible, found the correct passage, and pointed at it with his paw.

            -- that was enough for the preacher – he bought the dog and took him home – and that night, when a group of parishioners dropped by, he proudly began to show off his new dog – they told him to get a Bible, which he did – and then they had him look up several passages – each time, the dog did just what the preacher asked

            -- Finally, one man asked "Can the dog do normal dog tricks too?"

            -- the preacher said, “I don’t know – let’s see” – he pointed his finger at the dog and said, “Heel”

            -- the dog immediately jumped up on a chair, placed one paw on the preacher's forehead – looked up towards heaven – and began to howl -- The preacher turned to his wife in complete shock and disbelief. "We've been swindled! That manager sold us a Pentecostal dog!"

 

            -- while healings and miracles and spiritual gifts all began on the Day of Pentecost after the resurrection of Jesus, this isn’t the main point of this passage – Pentecost isn’t important because of these miraculous signs – instead, it is important because this date marks the sending of the Holy Spirit to the church to fill us with His power and His presence and to help us progress in righteousness and holiness in our daily lives

-- Spirit-filled churches and Spirit-filled people should be the norm for Christians in this world today – people should be able to look at us and see that there is something different about us – that we are not like this world or the people of this world – that we are truly holy and righteous disciples who live for Christ every single day

-- this is what God considers normal for Christians and churches -- this is what we should expect in our worship services and in our lives -- this is our goal – this is what Pentecost is all about

            -- if you are not living lives of obedience to God -- if you can't describe yourself as "holy" -- if you are not experiencing signs and wonders in your life – then it might be that your spigot is closed – it might be that you’re quenching the work of the Spirit in your life

-- we should be able to compare who we are today with who we were in the past and be able to see a difference – there should be a change – in our behaviors – our attitudes – our emotions – our being

-- maybe you started off that way, but you let the world close your spigot to just a trickle – maybe it’s time to get your feet washed again – maybe it’s time to pray to the Holy Spirit and ask Him to fill you with His presence and power and wash your feet and make you into the person God wants you to be

-- so, as we close this morning, I want us to come together like the disciples did on that first Pentecost Sunday after the resurrection of Christ – I want us to come together in one accord – to be in one place with each other – physically and spiritually

-- to be honest about the need to have our feet washed again – to be honest about our need for the Holy Spirit to fully be in our lives

-- I can't think of any better way to do this today than for us to share in Holy Communion -- to receive within us again the power and presence of the living Christ -- to come before His table for cleansing and the washing of our feet – for the forgiveness of those daily sins that make our feet dirty – and to be filled anew with the presence of the Holy Spirit

            -- I'm going to close in prayer right now and then we'll share Holy Communion together

 

            -- one last thing before I close – I know I opened the fire hose on you this morning and hit you with a lot of information – I pray that the Holy Spirit opens your minds and hearts to receive what He has for you

– but let me encourage you to do this – go back and study these passages again – we recorded the message on Facebook, so you can go back and rewatch it or catch the parts you slept through

-- also, the transcript of today’s message is on my blog site – the link is on our Facebook page – so, if you want to go back and look up what we said or any of the passages I referred to, you can read the transcript and take your time with it this week

– because this is important – Pentecost is important – living holy and obedient lives for Christ is important – and we’ve not been doing a good job of that in the church today

            -- with that, let's pray

 

¹Modified from sermon by Rodney Buchanan, Pentecostal Power, http://www.sermoncentral.com/sermon.asp?SermonID=59048

²Modified from sermon by Rodney Buchanan, Pentecostal Power, http://www.sermoncentral.com/sermon.asp?SermonID=59048

SERMON: GOLDEN CALVES AND OTHER IDOLS

 

Naylor Community Christian Church

Naylor, Georgia

 

I.  Introduction

            -- turn in Bibles to Exodus 20:1-6

 

Exodus 20:1 And God spoke all these words:

 

2 “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

 

3 “You shall have no other gods before me.

 

4 “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.

 

            -- in the heyday of game show television, there was a show called “To Tell the Truth” – I’m not sure how many of you remember this, but the premise of the show was that a real life person with a famous story would appear on the show alongside two other people who were imposters -- people pretending to be the real thing

            -- the affidavit of the real person would be read out – and then a group of panelists would ask the three people questions to find out who was real and who were the fakes

            -- for instance, in one of the more famous episodes, the notorious Frank William Abegnale – who the movie, “Catch Me If You Can,” was based on – appeared on the show in 1977

            -- three men walked out from behind stage and each of them said, “I am Frank William Abegnale” – one was dressed as a doctor – one as an airline pilot – and the last as a prisoner -- the host, Joe Gargiola, read Abegnale’s affidavit:

 

“I, Frank William Abegnale, am known as the world’s greatest imposter – In the course of my nefarious career, I’ve pawned myself off as a doctor, lawyer, college instructor, stock broker, and airline pilot – to become an airline pilot, I merely bought a rubber ID card for $5, affixed an airplane logo from a model plane hobby kit, and in no time at all, was copilot for a major airline – as a bogus lawyer, I actually worked on a state attorney general’s staff – for two years, I also cashed over $2,500,000 in bad checks in 26 countries – ultimately, I was sentenced to 72 years in prison – I served one year in France – one year in Sweden – I then served four years in a federal prison in this country –paroled, I now devote my life to prevention and detection of crime”

 

            -- the men took their place and answered the questions from the panelists, who were trying to determine which man was the real Abegnale and which ones were not – one of the rules was that the real person could not lie, but the others did as they impersonated the real person

            -- in this episode, not a single one of the four members of the panel were able to determine which one of the three was the real Frank William Abegnale – and so, the imposters won the game

 

            -- now, of course this show would never work today – in this world where people share every aspect of their lives online and nothing is truly private, there is no way someone could appear on stage and the world not know who they were – it would be obvious who the real person was – or maybe not

            -- I’ve been thinking a lot about idols lately – those false gods who pretend to be the real God – those false images that a lot of people worship without even knowing – even when the real God stands up and says, “I am God. Worship Me!” – some people still worship an imitation

 

II.  Idol Worship Today

            -- look at the first commandment that God gave the Israelites– Exodus 20:1-3

 

Exodus 20:1 And God spoke all these words:

 

2 “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

 

3 “You shall have no other gods before me.

 

 

            -- and God reiterates the importance of that command with the Second Commandment – verse 4

 

Exodus 20:4 “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5a You shall not bow down to them or worship them

 

            -- what God is talking about here is exactly what I was referring to – God says that there are a lot of false gods out there in the world – even today – and we are not to worship them – to have them before Him – to afford them higher value and worth than God – to worship them in place of Him

 

            -- a lot of times, when we think about these two commandments, we join them together – we say that God commands us not to worship idols – and that is true – but when we think of the term “idol,” what we actually think of are the graven images that God refers to in the Second Commandment when He says, “you shall not make for yourself an image”

 

            -- that was the big controversy in the news last week – unless you totally stayed off social media and didn’t look at any news at all, you probably are aware that a 22-foot tall golden statue of Trump was put up at his golf course in Florida – and a group of pastors led a prayer service in front of the statue as they dedicated the statue

            -- when this happened, there was an immediate outcry from the religious community saying that these pastors had put up a golden statue of Trump as a graven image and were worshiping the statue

– A lot of religious people said that what happened in Florida was no different from what happened when the Israelites had Aaron make a golden calf for them to worship while Moses was up on Mount Sinai – they said that it was heresy and the worship of a false god

-- now, the pastor who was in charge of the ceremony defended the group’s actions and said that they weren’t worshiping Trump – that the statue of Trump was just a “symbol of resilience, patriotism, and courage” and that it was created and “done from love” – that the statue was meant to be a symbol of the “hand of God over President Trump's life” and a “thank-you” to God for preserving the president’s life in multiple assassination attempts.

– he went on to say, "Let me be very clear. We worship the Lord Jesus Christ and Him alone” – he defended his actions by saying that their prayers before the statue of Trump were not the worship of Trump

-- but still, the optics were not good – when you see a group of pastors and Christians bowing their heads before a golden statue and praying, it sends the wrong message – it looks like you’re worshiping a golden image, whether that’s accurate or not -- as Skye Jethani said, “your allegiance is revealed by your behavior and your rhetoric” – if you have to immediately defend what you did by saying, “This is not a golden calf that we’re worshiping,” it should be an indication that you’ve crossed a line – whether you meant to or not

–This event really calls to mind what God warned against and commanded against in the First and Second Commandments here in Exodus 20

 

            -- we all understand the problem with the worship of graven images – like the golden calf from Exodus that Aaron made for the Israelites

            -- I do want to point out something about that, though – technically, the Israelites said they were not worshiping a false god -- if you look at what Aaron says about the golden calf in Exodus 32:4 -- when he gets done making the calf and putting it up on an altar before the people -- he points at it and tells them, “This is your God, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt” – they justified their actions by saying had made an image of the true God in the form of a golden calf

            -- Aaron was telling the people that the calf was Yahweh – the Lord God Almighty – and he said the statue was just a symbol – a representation of God – and that the people were still worshiping God – just doing so with the calf before them as an image to focus their worship

            -- but even though they told themselves they were worshiping the real God, they were still very much guilty of idolatry because they had made a graven image and were worshiping it

 

            -- [hold up Jesus figure] have y’all seen these things? – these little rubber figures of Jesus that are popping up everywhere? – on cruises, people have started a game where they hide little rubber duck figures all over the ship, and people hunt for them during the cruise – well, they’ve started hiding these figures of Jesus, too – and I found one on the cruise and brought it back and gave it to Kim

            -- and I know a guy in town that buys these things in bulk, and he passes them out to people so they can carry Jesus with them wherever they go -- and I know I gave one to Kim – but I sort of have a problem with these – because you can take them to be a graven image – which is a violation of God’s law

            -- Jesus says that He is with us always – that He will never leave us or forsake us – and that we have His very presence in us in the person of the Holy Spirit – but when you give someone one of these little figures and then tell them, “Now you can take Jesus with you wherever you go,” – you’ve kind of made an idol that you’re worshiping – you’re substituting the real thing for a graven image – in this case, a little rubber figure

            -- I’ve still got it here, obviously – partially, because I didn’t really know what to do with it – it just seems wrong to just throw it away – that would be like throwing away Jesus, you know? – but if you think like that – if you think that throwing this piece of rubber away is the same as throwing Jesus away – you might have crossed a line, just like Aaron and the Israelites did with the golden calf – and I’m aware of that – it concerns me

 

            -- but what concerns me more than these graven images are the idols that God commands us not to worship in the First Commandment – God makes it pretty clear here in verse 3 – “You shall have no other gods before Me”

            -- and I want you to catch something here – the gods that He is referring to in verse 3 – in the First Commandment – are not the graven images He forbids in the Second Commandment – in verses 4 to 6

            -- this is where I said we kind of join these two commandments together – because we assume that to worship another god before Him means that we have an idol in our life – and just like I pointed out – when we think of idols, we think of things – graven images – statues – pictures – little Jesus figures – things we can hold in our hands and move around – things that we can see and touch -- that are created and fashioned by people as symbols or representations of God or foreign gods, such as Buddha

            -- but that is not what God is talking about in the First Commandment – that is the Second Commandment

            -- so, what is the concern of the First Commandment? – when God says to have no other god before Him, what is He talking about?

 

            -- here’s where we start to understand my reference to the game show, “To Tell the Truth” – so, to remind you of what I said, in that show, there were three people who came out before the panel – one was the real person – the other two were imitations – they were pretending to be the real person – and a lot of the times, they fooled the panelist

            -- we have a problem, as humans, in making false gods by creating imitations of the Lord God Almighty in our heads and in our hearts – not making a graven image of anything, like the Second Commandment forbids – but we have a false god of our own making that we worship in place of the real God – and this tendency – this natural bent that we all have and that God warns us about here – worries me a lot – because I see this in our world today – I see this in my own life – and it’s something we need to be aware of and guard against

            -- so, when we are talking about idols, there are two types – first, there is the common understanding of an idol – a graven image – a golden calf – a little Jesus figurine -- or a golden statue of anything that you worship – even if you say you’re worshiping God and this is just a symbol that helps you focus your worship – that’s an idol – and God says don’t do this in the Second Commandment – so, graven images are the first type of idol

            -- the second type of idol is the god that we create in our minds and our hearts in place of the real God – the invisible god that we think about and pray to and worship instead of the God of the Bible

            -- when we make a god like this – the god we think of – the god we see in our minds – the god we envision with the eyes of our hearts – this becomes the image of what we think god looks like and sounds like and does – we have substituted a false god for Yahweh – and this is a big problem

 

-- idols distort our concept of God -- when we make an idol of God, we are substituting the real God for something less – we are replacing God with something that we have created ourselves

-- that’s why the first two commandments are so important – they tell us how we are to relate to our maker – God begins this passage by reminding us of who He is – of proclaiming His name and His presence before us – look at verse 1

 

Exodus 20:1 And God spoke all these words:

 

2 “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

 

-- then, He tells us that we are to worship Him only -- to not put any other god before Him -- we are told to worship Him as He truly is -- the transcendental, all mighty God, omniscient, omnipresent, and all powerful -- NOT an image or representation of who we think He is or how we conceive Him to be

-- when we do that, we are literally creating God in our own image – and when we worship this idol that we have created -- whether that is by making a graven image, a physical statue, a picture we look at, or whether we simply hold an incorrect vision of Him in our minds -- we have ceased to worship the true God of the Bible – we are worshiping a false god

           

-- why do we do that? -- short answer – we do it for two reasons -- self-imaging and control

– first, when we create an idol – whether physical or invisible – we are creating a god that we can relate to on own terms – a god that meets our needs – a god that understands us and sympathizes with our situations – we start worshiping a god who is exactly what we thought he should be – how he should look and act and think – we become the creator of a god that we desire because he likes the things that we like – he loves the people and things we love – and he hates the people and things we hate – our idols looks and thinks and behaves just like us

-- the second reason we create idols is for control – idols allow us to control our god – idols allow us to shift our likes and desires – our wants and needs – onto our god

– because god looks like we want him to look and does what we want him to do – we control him -– all we have to do is say the right words or make the right sacrifices and god has no choice but to grant our petitions – in idolatry, God serves us

-- that’s why people want idols – that’s why we have this tendency in our hearts to create idols in our own lives – it’s because it’s easy – and it really puts us in charge

            -- but that is not the way of God – that is not the way of the Lord God Almighty

 

-- God knew that our tendency as humans, when confronted with things that we can't understand or that are too big for us to grasp, is to boil it down to its simplest element -- to make a representation of it, so that we could understand it

-- that’s why we try to pigeon-hole God – to put God in a box – and say, “This is what our God looks like – this is what He does – everything about God is right here in this box and He never does anything outside of the confines of this man-made box”

-- when we do that with God, we are limiting Him -- it results in us not giving Him the full glory due Him -- it causes us to see Him as less than He really is

-- that is the reason God gave us these commandments to follow – we are not to create idols or images of God because to do so is to make a lesser version of Him – we are to only worship the Lord God Almighty as He is revealed to us in His word – not as we think He should be

-- I think John Wesley summed it up best when he wrote, "Our religious worship must be governed by the power of faith, not by the power of imagination." 

           

-- as J. Ligon Duncan pointed out, [in these first two commandments] “God is saying, "When you think about Me, you have to think about Me in accordance with the word. Images distort Me, representations distort Me. Your imaginations distort Me. So, if you want to know Me, you have to know Me by My word."

-- that is why the Bible tells us that Jesus is the Word of God – God made flesh – if you want to know what God looks like and what God says and what God does, look at Jesus

-- we are not called to worship a lesser god of our own making – we are called to worship and serve the God of the Bible – the Lord our God – the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob – Yahweh – our Creator God – the one and only God

 

III.  Imaginary Gods

-- I’m not worried about you going home and making a golden calf in your backyard today – I don’t think the big concerns in the church today is people making graven images or physical idols that they bow down to and worship – although, the events of this past week make me wonder

-- no, the real danger to us is in creating a lesser god in our minds that we put before the real God – by following a false, substitute god that we have created with our own imaginations

 

-- a few years ago, I was speaking to a friend of mine who has been led astray by some false teachings in regards to salvation and universalism – as I was reminding him of what the church has always taught in regards to salvation and eternal punishment for rejecting Christ – of what the Bible says about this -- he responded by saying, “My God is a God of love – My God would never send someone to Hell forever”

-- I’ve had other people tell me something similar – “I believe in a God who loves everyone – I don’t believe in a God of wrath or judgment”

 

-- have you ever heard anybody say anything similar? – are you hearing what they’re saying? – are you realizing what they’ve done?

-- they have created in their mind an idol – a false god – someone who looks just like them and who acts just like them and who agrees with them on every issue of the day

-- I see that a lot right now – in our churches – in politics – in our culture – it’s everywhere – people are worshiping man-made gods and not the God of the Bible

 

-- I read a book called “Imaginary Jesus,” by Matt Mikalotos – it’s a fiction book, but it makes a great point – the main character likes Jesus a lot – in fact, he couldn’t believe how much they had in common -- They shared the same likes, dislikes, beliefs, and opinions – in the book, he sees Jesus as a real person that he shares time with at restaurants and in life

-- but then he finds out that the guy he knows as Jesus . . . isn’t really Jesus – just like the two imitators on the game show, “To Tell the Truth,” the Jesus that the main character has been hanging out with is an Imaginary Jesus -- a comfortable, convenient imitation that he has created in his own image – and he realizes that the real Jesus is still out there somewhere . . . and he needs to find him

-- throughout the book, the main character keeps running across Jesus’s everywhere he goes – but after a few moments, he realizes they, too, are imaginary – so, the whole book is about the main character getting rid of the imaginary Jesus’s in his life so that he can find the real Jesus the Bible tells us about

-- this is what I’m talking about – this is what is going on in our country and in our churches today – we’re following imaginary Jesus’s – false gods – idols – rather than the true Jesus of the Bible

 

-- think for a moment about the rhetoric that is coming from both sides of the political aisle in America right now – all of us know that we are as divided as a country can get – we have the right on one side and the left on the other and both of them think the other is evil and the enemy

-- but here’s the kicker – both sides have created their own image of God – both sides have made God into an idol – and, so, each side believes their God approves of only them – that their God is pleased with what they are doing and with their chosen leaders – and that He disapproves of everything the other side is doing -- and this is true whether we’re talking about the right or the left

-- what they have done is created a god in their own image – someone who looks just like them and acts just like them and is pleased with them – and neither side is worshiping or giving allegiance to the real God of the Bible that we see here in Exodus 20

-- and that’s exactly what God was warning us against and commanded us not to do in these first two commandments

 

            -- think about it like this -- our vehicles today have warning lights on them to let us know when something is wrong – if you’re driving along and the oil light starts flashing red, it lets you know something’s wrong with the oil

            -- here’s the warning light for idolatry – when someone says – when we say – “My God thinks like this” or “I believe in a God who…” – that’s a warning sign that you may be forming an idol of God in your mind

            -- rather than knowing God and seeing what His word says about something, you’ve instead created a God that thinks exactly like you on this given subject

            -- when we are worshiping the true God of the Bible, then it’s not “I believe in a God who” – it becomes, “God tells us in His word” or “As the Bible says here, God is like this or has commanded this”

-- so, even though we may not have graven images in our homes and in this church, we are still in danger of creating idols in our minds and our hearts

– that is why it is so important for us to know God’s word and to know Him through His word so that we aren’t making Him in our own image, but we are letting Him make us in His image and His likeness

 

IV.  Closing

            -- let me close by sharing with you something that has become a pet peeve of mine – not a single week goes by that I don’t see someone on social media asking the question, “What is a good church to go to?”

            -- and that’s not a problem, in and of itself – I think everyone needs to be in a good church – to be part of the church -- the problem I have with it is that most people don’t stop there

            -- they ask, “What’s a good church to go to?” – but then they say, “I want a church that…” – and then they go on to list the things that they want – it must have a young crowd – it must be an older crowd -- it must have children’s programs – it has to be large, but not too large – it has to have good worship music – it has to have a preacher that preaches from the Word – it must be diverse – it must be non-denominational – must have classes for young and older children – the list just goes on and on and on

            --  I see posts like this every single week – and here’s my issue – these folks aren’t looking for a church – they aren’t looking for Jesus – they’re looking for an idol that meets their wants and their wishes and their desires – they want a place and they want a god that thinks like them and talks like them and looks like them and affirms everything that they are doing and saying – and that gives them everything they want

            -- that is idolatry – that is the problem we have in America today

 

            -- we’re not looking for God – we’re looking for a god that checks all our boxes – and when we do that, we are creating an idol in our life

            -- we need to be on guard against that – because creating an idol causes us to worship a lesser god in our minds – and leads us to limit God in our lives and our prayers because we have made Him out to be something that He is not

– that was the primary concern God had with the Israelites -- even though they did frequently go into straight-up idol worship by adopting pagan gods and worshiping them from time to time in place of Yahweh – His biggest concern was the Israelites not worshiping Him for who He truly was

            -- God is the only One who is to be exalted – the Lord God Almighty is the only God, and there are none before Him – and so we are not to create idols of Him or anything else – to not let anything else replace Him in our lives – but to worship and serve only Him

 

            -- so, as we close this morning – I promise I’m getting there -- I want you to take a moment and think about Jesus – Jesus was killed because He didn’t fit the image that the Jewish leaders and priests thought of the Messiah – Jesus didn’t look and sound and act like the Messiah they wanted – the Messiah they envisioned in their heads

– they didn’t want a Messiah who said that we should love everybody, even our enemies – they didn’t want a Messieah that said we should put people above tradition or church law, especially if that meant healing on the Sabbath -- they didn’t want a Messiah that advocated peace and love to all, especially if that meant the Romans

            -- Jesus wasn’t the Messiah they wanted because He didn’t fit their boxes – they were looking for an idol that they had created and that they wanted, but God showed up instead

 

-- so, as we join in prayer, think for a moment about the God you worship in your life – if your God looks and sounds and behaves just like you or like the political party you follow or like the culture you prefer – then let that be a caution light to you that you may have allowed yourself to follow an idol rather than the God of the Bible

-- make sure you’re following God and that you’re only worshiping God and not an idol that you have created – for that is a danger to all of us

-- let’s pray