Will we do the will of the One who redeemed us?

 

Read 2 Corinthians 9

We should.

We ought to.

It’s the right thing to do.

We’re supposed to.

That’s what the rules say, right?

Don’t want to get out of line, do you?

There’s a whole bunch of people who want to just stay within the lines and follow the rules and never even wonder why we have the rules, the directives, the commandments of God.

Just put your head down and grind it out.

There are times for just that: Head down and grind it out. Lean into it. You are not sure of the whole journey but know for the moment you need to just keep pushing forward.

Do you remember Jesus telling his disciples that he no longer regarded them as servants but as friends? He chose us to bear fruit. We are more than servants.

Yes, we still serve, but we know there is more than just following the rules. God has revealed himself to us in Christ Jesus. These are no longer arbitrary rules that seem to put us through a maze.

These are directions, guidelines, counsel, and commands rooted in love. Our love must be first for God then for others. When we grasp love, we grasp the intent of the Commander—what God wants from us.

We no longer consider the law a minefield of places where we must or must not step. Both are important if you find yourself in one. I never thought that I would ever find myself in a minefield, but then one day, there you are. I was blessed that nobody was shooting at me at the time.

Where you step or don’t step is important, but you can’t go through life with the paradigm that it’s a minefield. You would be a basket case. You can’t do every day negotiating a minefield. We need something positive to steer by. We need a target on which to focus.

We need to keep our eyes fixed on Jesus.

How do we do this? Let’s get to the core of our incentives and motivations. Is it not to go to hell? Your profession of faith received the gift of life from God.

Is it to live a flawless life? You are probably not going to make it through the rest of the day, perhaps the rest of the hour.

Or, and this is a big or, is our driving desire to please God and to put a smile on his face? That’s a motivation with some latitude. That’s what you give your senior commanders, not the buck private who just goes where you send him.

We are treated as friends, as family. We are trusted with our mission and commission, and our hearts desire to please God and fulfill the assignments he gave us.

Now to this morning’s chapter.

This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of the Lord’s people but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God. Because of the service by which you have proved yourselves, others will praise God for the obedience that accompanies your confession of the gospel of Christ, and for your generosity in sharing with them and with everyone else. And in their prayers for you their hearts will go out to you, because of the surpassing grace God has given you. Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!

When you—when we—do the things that God commands and we do them out of love for God and for our neighbor, people see that we obey our God and they will give thanks to him.

Our actions can be the catalyst that brings people to thank God. If they thank God, they may seek God. If they seek God, they will find him.

People are searching to fill a void in their lives. Fear gets in the way, and people resist and refuse to accept that God is real, he is good, and he loves them. It’s easier to live a meaningless life, or so that’s what many think.

The truth is that once you profess your belief in God and receive Jesus as Lord, your life choices become easier. You will know the right thing to do. You will know.

Whether you do the godly thing or not can be another story. It can be a big challenge on occasion.

That doesn’t mean that your circumstances are easy, but your choices are.

Will my decision bring people closer to God?

Will my choice cause people to give thanks to God?

Will what I do lead people to profess Jesus is Lord?

Will this course of action put a smile on God’s face?

It’s the whole God’s Way and Everything Else mantra that I gave you for most of a year.

Paul told the believers in Corinth that this offering that they were making would cause people to give thanks to God. That’s something to get behind or to use last week’s term, jump on the bandwagon

If what we do prompts people to give thanks to God, then we have hit the target. We are putting a smile on God’s face.

I think that we did that last Sunday afternoon. We pray that many people who thanked us also thank God and come to know him as Lord.

What’s next? It doesn’t have to be a scheduled event. It just needs to be a purposeful decision in the course of your day. What sort of decision?

To give.

To forgive.

To serve.

To pray, especially with and for someone.

To acknowledge someone, just so they know that you know they are there.

To love one another. Every time we decide to do this, we make a way for people to give thanks, not so much to us, but to God. People see who we belong to.

Our choices can bring people closer to God, perhaps for the first time in their lives. Imagine being the one who first brings the good news to someone.

Now imagine bringing the good news to someone who has heard it a thousand times but this time, it registers.

Sometimes our acts of giving and kindness can prompt someone to give thanks to God, and to thank God means you believe in God. That gets us one step closer to helping people profess Jesus is Lord!

Amen.

Do it all in the Name of the Lord

 Read Colossians 3

Let’s keep it simple this morning.  How much is the tithe?

That’s right, it’s ten percent.  Tithe means tenth.  That’s an easy one.

How much did God’s people give of their income over the course of a year?  If you count all of the feasts and other gatherings, it was probably over twenty-five percent.

Some of these offerings were enjoyed by the people as they gave them.  Some blessed others.  Some opened the floodgates of heaven.

How much should the New Testament believer—the born-again Christian—give to the Lord?

That’s easy and you don’t even have to be good at math.  You just have to remember the song.  Jesus paid it all.  All to him I owe.

Yes, it’s one hundred percent.  We are to give everything to the Lord.  Our life truly belongs to him now.

The logistics don’t involve a complete monetary and property transfer.  It is a transfer of the heart and mind.  It is a wholesale exchange of the ways of the world for the ways of God that we know in Christ Jesus.

It is a continuation of what brought us to Jesus—repentance.  Repentance is more than just turning around and going the other way, though that’s a part of it.  It is turning away from the evil of this world and turning to God.

It is leaving behind the old thinking, habits, and passions that anchored us to the world and seeking God and his kingdom and his righteousness.  OBTW—when we leave our old thinking, habits, and passions behind, we don’t get a claim check for them like at a pawn shop thinking, maybe one day I will be back for them.

Paul says it well as he began this chapter.

Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. Here there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.

You remember the warm-up drill that we do most Sundays, right?  I am crucified with Christ.  Christ lives in me.  Paul tells us that is more than a few catchy words.  It is how we are to live.

We seek God, his kingdom, and his righteousness by taking on the yoke of our Master, Jesus Christ.

If anything pulls us away from following him, we disconnect from that temptation or habit or earthly desire and refocus on our Master.

Actually, Paul tells us to put these sinful ways to death. We see one of the forms that Paul used to describe this.  Take off the old self and put on the new self.

Take off your dirty clothes and put on clean clothes.

Take off that which defiles you and put on that which cleanses you.

Take off your sinful human nature and put on God’s loving nature.

We repent before we receive Jesus as Lord and we continue to repent as we strive to live as this new creature that we have become in Christ.

It’s a process.  It’s work.  It’s worth it.

It is where our blessings and peace and fulness reside.

These are big blue arrows.  How about some specifics?

OK, get rid of anger, rage, malice, slander, foul language, lying, lust, greed, idolatry, and all evil desires.

In its place take on the things that you have learned from Christ.  Take on the image of Christ.  Become his image and likeness in all that you do.

That’s good imagery, now how about some specifics.

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.

That sounds a bit like the fruit of the Spirit. Listen further.

Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts. And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Thankfulness, peace, wisdom, gratitude, admonishing each other not by our human nature but by God’s word and his hymns and spiritual songs.  That’s not a chewing-out.  It’s restoration, redemption, and reconciliation.

We have gone from general to specific in Paul’s instructions.  Now let’s go from these specifics to the most general approach to responding to God’s grace that we knew in Christ Jesus.

And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

In every breath we take, in every thought we think, in every action, we are to do it in the name of the Lord.  Our response to this gift of salvation that came completely from God is to give our lives completely to him.

Realize that in so doing, God fills our lives with so many good things.  God takes everything and uses it for the good of those who love him.  God has always looked out for what is best for us even when we didn’t have a clue.

Trust in the Lord with all of your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and he will make your paths straight.

Let everything you do be done for God and for God’s glory.  Once you have given up your life to him, you will see how full your life become.

Amen.

Matthew 5 - Part 2

 

Read Matthew 5

Do you know how I know that 2020 is the craziest year ever?  I checked a package of salt that I had and it said expires December 2020.

Salt has been around at least since the beginning of the world.  How do I know?  When Lot’s wife turned into a pillar of salt as she looked back at Sodom, nobody commented, “What’s that stuff?”

Salt has been around.  Man didn’t have to invent salt.  It’s not like gravy that someone had to say, we need something to go with chicken fried steak.  Salt has been around.

But what is it to be the salt of the earth? Salt has many qualities.  It seasons.  It preserves.  It can make you scream if you rub it in an open wound.

Salt can make you thirsty.  Salt pills used to be the cure-all for sports-related cramps.  Then came Gatorade.

Of all of these, I think being the salt of the earth is to be the God seasoning of the planet.  People should taste the goodness of God when they encounter us. 

And then there is light.  Light and darkness are common themes in the Bible. 

Isaiah said that light was coming.  John said that the light had come.  Jesus said he was the light.  Now he tells us that we are the light. We are to be light in this world.

When we profess Jesus as Lord, his light should emanate from within us.  Unless we cover up the light, but who would do that?

What’s the point of having light and not letting it shine?

What’s the point of salt that is not salty?

Why would anyone want either of these?  Salt that has lost its saltiness should not even exist.  A light that is brought into a room and then covered so as not to illuminate the room makes no sense.

You are the salt of the earth.  You are the light of the world.

Do not deny who you are by how you live.

Be the salt of the earth.  Be the light of the world.

Amen.