It’s a hard road, it’s a hard road to take up our cross and to crucify our flesh and humble ourselves and to follow Jesus and it hurts some days, but staying in bondage is harder.

No Padded Cross
This week on Christianityworks I’m really excited because we’re starting a new series called ‘Living the Life that God always Intended.’ A lot of people believe in God, believe in Jesus, but they live life with a sneaking suspicion that there must be more to life, maybe I’m not living life to the full. I don’t know about you but I want to be all that God made me to be, I want to do all that God made me to do, I want to live that life that God always planned for me in full, but to live that life God says, “Look we’ve got to die before we can live.” You know there’s a wonderful passage in Hebrews chapter 5 verses 11 to 14, and it says this: “About this we have much to say that is hard to explain since you have become dull of understanding.” Welcome to Christianityworks! “For though by this time you ought to be teachers you need someone to teach you again the basic elements of the oracles of God, you need milk not solid food. For everyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is unskilled in the words of righteousness. But solid food is for the mature and those whose faculties have been trained by practice to distinguish good from evil.”

What the writer of Hebrews is saying there is that milk, milk is about meeting Jesus, milk is about the basic gospel salvation message and we all need that, don’t get me wrong we all need that, it’s about what Jesus did for me on the cross. But solid food, solid food is about following Him, solid food is about living that out, solid food is teaching that lifts us to a new level of maturity. What does this all mean in my life today? And Jesus said, “If anyone would follow me then let them deny themselves and take up their cross.”

Well, this week on Christianityworks we’re starting a series of solid food, of solid teaching on living the life that God always intended, and that teaching begins with that statement from Jesus, “if anyone would follow me then let them deny themselves and take up their cross.” There’s a wonderful saying and I heard it first from a woman called Joyce Myer, she said there are no padded crosses. You know something she’s right because what that denying ourselves and following Jesus means is saying, “look what I want in my life is not that important, what I am and who I am and my pleasures and my comforts they’re not the important things. The important thing is putting Jesus first, the important thing is saying, ‘I’m going to die to myself so that I can live for Jesus.’” And when we look at that picture of the cross of crucifixion it’s an ugly picture it’s not an easy thing, and Jesus is saying I want you to loose your life for my sake and in doing that you’ll gain eternal life, that means giving up some things.

That means putting up with some people that we don’t want to put up with, that means shutting our mouths when we want to fight back. That means forgiving someone when our guts are falling out and when it’s not fair. This saying of Jesus strikes at the very heart of our faith, it’s crunch time, take up your cross, die to self and live for Jesus. Have you ever watched a person die? The body fights, they call it the death rattle because it doesn’t want to give up, the flesh doesn’t want to die and yet the Bible tells us that we are in Christ. It’s as though I take my Bible I put a piece of paper in it, I close the Bible, that piece of paper is in the Bible, and if we are in Christ we have died and risen again with him, it’s a matter of history. But now Jesus is saying take up your cross every day and follow me, that is a matter of present day reality, it’s a case of living out what Jesus has done for me. The Apostle Paul writes, “Look I carry around the death of Jesus in me so that I may live His life.”

We have two options, we can stay at a distance and we can say, “Well you know something Jesus I want to believe in you from a distance and hold on to the stuff, the old self that I want to hold on to.” That’s the easiest option but it means we end up staying in bondage. The much harder choice is abandoning the old self completely to Christ, the much harder choice is saying, “You know, if I have actually died and risen again, if Jesus died for me that I might have forgiveness of sins and I’ve accepted Jesus into my life that means I am dead to sin and alive to Christ, and that means abandoning the old self completely to Jesus.” That’s hard, but that’s when we get set free and that’s when we live the life that God always intended.

“Father I pray that as we go through this teaching series beginning this week you will open our hearts to some of the things that you have to say that are hard yet some of the things Lord that you have to say that you want to use to set us free. Father I pray as we open your word right now you would open our hearts and pour your wisdom and your grace and your love in, in a way that we can accept it so that we can live the life that you always intended for us. Father, we ask this in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”

We going to go today and look at a part of the Bible which is maybe one of my favourite books, it’s Paul’s letter, the Apostle Paul, when he wrote to the church in Philippi, so it’s the book of Philippians, you’ll find it in the New Testament about half way through. And this is a wonderful letter from Paul, it’s a letter of joy and affection, have a look how the letter starts beginning in chapter 1 and verse 3. If you have a Bible grab it because we’re going to be spending some time in God’s word today.

Paul says, “I thank my God every time I remember you, constantly praying with joy in every one of my prayers for all of you, because of you sharing in the gospel from the first day until now. I’m confident of this that the One who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ. It is right for me to think this way about all of you because you hold on to me in your heart. For all of you share in God’s grace with me both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel. For God is my witness how I long for all of you with the compassion of Jesus Christ, and this is my prayer that your love may overflow more and more with a knowledge and full insight to help you to determine what is best so that in the day of Christ you may be pure and blameless having produced the harvest of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and the praise of God.”

This is a beautiful letter from Paul to his friends and he say’s, “my prayer for you is you know I rejoice for you people, I’m just delighted that you’ve come to Jesus and my prayer for you is that your love would overflow more and more with the knowledge and full insight.” Ever met a Christian like that? The love of Jesus is just pouring out of them; well the sad thing is that Christians like that are all too rare in the Kingdom of God. A W Tozer wrote, “Much of our difficulty as Christians stems from our unwillingness to take God as He is and adjust our lives accordingly. We insist on trying to modify Him and to bring Him nearer to our own image, the flesh whimpers against the rigor of God’s inexorable sense and begs for a little mercy, a little indulgence of its carnal ways, the world is full of carnal Christians.”

Dying to Self

Well yes there are a lot of carnal Christians wandering around the world today and that’s why Paul goes on to write in this letter to the Philippians that we need to die to ourselves, question is how do we do that? If we want to live the life that God always intended, how do we die to ourselves? Let’s have a read of Philippians chapter 2 beginning at verse 1, this is what Paul writes: “If then there is any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion, any sympathy, make my joy complete, be of the same mind having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit but in humility regard others as being better than you. Let each of you look not on your own interests but to the interests of others, let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.” In other words if this whole Jesus thing means anything to you, if Jesus had any impact on you at all then be of the same mind, be in full accord even if you have different views and different perspectives. When we see things differently what do we actually want? Am I looking for my will of Jesus’ will? Let’s just talk that through for a minute.

We need to be aware of the difference, when we’re in conflict with someone. Step one is often we don’t even get there to ask, “Am I trying to chase down my will or the will of Jesus Christ?” Why? Because we’re full of pride, we can’t agree, look at verse 3 again, “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as being better than yourselves.” In other words humble yourselves, back down, because pride, pride says God can only work if it’s done my way, what are my motives? Look at Jesus, Jesus said, “Come to me all you who are heavily laden and I will give you rest, take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart.” Jesus said, “I am humble in heart,” yet he made a whip and drove traders from a temple.

In Matthew chapter 23 we see the great denunciation where He called the Pharisees the “brood of vipers,” “you white washed tombs,” was that humble? Humble equals lowly, humble equals considers others to be better than yourself. Now there’s a right way and a wrong way to do that. The right way is to know who we are as a son or daughter of the living God, and willingly lay down our lives by taking up Jesus Christ. That’s what Jesus did, he said, “I have the power to lay down my life and I have the power to take it up again. Humility is a willing laying down of our lives, the wrong way of being humble is to be a victim, to be a doormat, and we can’t really be humble unless we’re secure in Jesus. I mean look at Jesus when he got angry, when he raged, when he roared as the Lion of Judah who was he doing that for, himself or others?

Well actually he never did it for himself, he always did it for others, for little people, and when we’re in conflict, this conflict thing is so important if we are going to live the life that God always intended; we have to look at our motives and look to our interests, read verse 4 again of Philippians chapter 2. “Let each of you look not to your own interests but to the interests of others. Let the same mind be in you as was in Christ Jesus.” In other words look at your motives and we’ll get the right answer, consider others better than yourself, in other words my self doesn’t matter, my reputation, my will, my desire to control, my ego, my perception, none of those things matter. Consider others better than yourself, look to others interests, die to self. Well what if we can’t agree? Then it’s time to accept God’s authority, in all but the most exceptional of circumstances, if we’re in a church family situation we should back down, and if your conscience allows you to support the other person to the hilt, then that’s what we should do. You know it’s very rare that we’re in conflict with someone when the other person is just flat black and white sinfully wrong.

If we can’t agree with them we should be like Jesus, “let the same mind be in you that is in Christ Jesus who though He was in a form of God didn’t regard equality with God as something to be exploited. But He emptied Himself taking the form of a slave being born in human likeness and being found in human form He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death even death on a cross and as a result God highly exalted Him and gave Him the name which is above every name so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.”

Is it Biblical to back down? Absolutely that’s what Jesus did on the cross. Sometimes we think well if we let the other bloke win, I’ve lost, no, if we humble ourselves like Jesus and lay down our rights and what we deserve, what I’m entitle to then he will exalt us. Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God so that He may exalt you in due time. Disunity happens when Christians don’t yield, the question is when Jesus humbled himself even unto death on a cross what was he yielding to? Because the things that people could see were the Romans, the Sadducees, the Pharisees, the powers of darkness, evil and sin, it looked like He had been defeated, but there was something unseen. There was God, there was God’s plan, there was God’s plan to take the suffering of his Son to bring you and me eternal life, you see God had a bigger plan than what people could see. Was it easy for Jesus? No, go to Gethsemane, Jesus said, “I am deep distressed, Lord if you can take this cup of suffering from me, but not my will let your will be done.”

See Jesus wasn’t just doing it he was doing it willingly with God’s grace, that’s why Paul goes on to write, “therefore my beloved,” verse 12 of chapter 2 of Philippians, “therefore my beloved just as you have always obeyed me, not only in my presence, but much more now in my absence work out your own salvation with fear and trembling for it is God who is at work in you enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure. Do all things without murmuring and arguing so that you maybe blameless and innocent children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation in which you shine like stars in the world.”

I love that, work out your salvation in fear and trembling, verses murmuring and arguing, come on, God’s speaking to us today, God is saying if you want to have the life that I’ve always planned for you, you have to learn to die, have to learn to take up my cross and follow me and repent. Because if we murmur and argue, no, that’s not it, we need to work out our salvation in fear and in trembling.

When Losing is Winning

Well we’re looking today at living the life that God always intended for us and it’s tough you know when we’re having arguments, when we’re having descent, when we want our own way and yet God says “no, give in, yield, lay down, I have a bigger plan, its not about you winning all the time.” Just like it didn’t seem that Jesus won on the cross yet on that cross He won the greatest victory of all history because He purchased a life an eternal life for you and for me, and as we love each other, as we lay down our lives and don’t argue and we just ooze out the love of God this is how the world is supposed to know the difference between us and them. Not by a Jesus bumper sticker not by a Bible in our hands as we piously go to church on Sunday, not because we frown at the gay Mardi Gras, tsk, tsk, tsk, not because when the media wants a comment from the church they stick some Pharisee there who talks about doctrine and dogma, no!

“A new commandment I give unto you that you love one another as I have loved you, by this shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you have love one for another.” “Do all things,” in Philippians chapter 2 verse 14, “without murmuring or arguing so that you may be blameless and innocent children of God, without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation in which you will shine like stars.” That’s God’s plan, God’s plan is as He touches us with His love and we’re changed, we’re fundamentally changed, we have the same mind that was in Christ Jesus who didn’t say, “look I’m God I’m not going to the cross,” Jesus said, “no, I know it’s not fair, I know it’s not right, but I will go to the cross for Berni, I will go to the cross in fact for every person who ever lived so that if they put their faith in me they can have eternal life. You and I didn’t deserve that, we didn’t deserve a Jesus who would do that for us but He did it anyway, and people this is what you and I are suppose to look like.

This is the life that God always intended for us, so that we’re without blemish in a crooked and perverse generation in which we shine like stars, “and this is my prayer for you,” says Paul “that your love may overflow more and more.” That it would overflow out of the front of your house, that your love would flow out of the front door of your church, that your love would flow out of your heart, so the people around you cant help but notice it. But there is a price, humbling ourselves, exalting Jesus about all no matter what it costs us can be a huge price, can I ask you a question? Have you made a once and for all decision, not just in the head but in heart that yourself, your rights, your entitlements, you’re prepared to lay them down for Jesus? I believe that God is calling you today to make that decision, for the first time if you’ve never made it, or afresh.

I going to pray in a moment, it’s hard to do that but there are benefits, a thousand minor problems disappear, you know being touchy, pretence, pride, when we make that once and for all decision to lay down our lives and have the same mind as Christ. To be humble even though He was God He was found in human form and He humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death even death on a cross, are we prepared to do that? Are we prepared to lay down our rights and our lives when it’s not fair? Because at that point we begin to live the life that God always intended, why? Because we cease to worry about what the world thinks, we cease to worry about what we want and we need and we demand and we desire, the only thing that matters is that Jesus is glorified in our own lives. And then, then we shine like stars, people go “man that person loves me,” it’s a hard road, it’s a hard road to take up our cross and to crucify our flesh and to humble ourselves and to follow Jesus and it hurts some days but staying in bondage is harder.

Will you take that once and for all decision to exalt God above all? To lay down your life, to clothe yourself in Christ, will you choose from this day forth to pray for your enemies, to consider others better than yourself, to loose yourself for Jesus, to loose the battles for Jesus, no matter what the cost? Jesus humbled himself for me, he humbled himself for you, will we humble ourselves for him? Let’s pray:

“Father, what you say here is so hard some days, and it hurts so much some days, we want what we want and Lord sometimes we want to win the arguments we want to win the fights and we want to be right and we want to get what we deserve. But Jesus you allowed yourself to be nailed to a cross for us, and when we look at that cross we can’t help but be changed. And so Father, this day because of your grace, because of your love, because of your mercy, because of what Jesus did for us on the cross, this day we want to take that once and for all decision to lay down our lives, to exalt you above all things no matter what the cost, no matter what the price, no matter how much it hurts, no matter how long it takes, we will live our lives for you by your grace and your mercy. Father, send your Spirit to strengthen us to enliven us to empower us to be like Jesus. We ask that in the mighty name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

We wanna go in that hearse where we died and take a U-Haul it trailer behind us and take all that rubbish with us. Let it go! Jesus wants to set you free today.

Missing the Mark

It’s great to be with you again today, and we’re going into the second message in a series that I’ve called Living the Life that God always Intended. I guess we all want to live that life but sometimes well, I don’t know sometimes life seems as though it’s falling a bit short of what God should intend for us. We’re going to share in a message today that I’ve called “In for a Penny, in for a Pound.” I read a wonderful little poem recently that went like this, “Dear Lord, so far today I’m doing alright, I haven’t gossiped, I haven’t lost my temper, haven’t been greedy or grumpy or nasty or selfish, or self indulgent, I haven’t whined or complained or cursed or eaten any chocolate. I haven’t even spent any money on my credit card, but very shortly I’ll be getting out of bed and I think I’ll really need your help then!” It’s good isn’t it? You know we all want to better ourselves, we all want to get rid of some of that junk that’s in our lives, but how do we do that, do we watch Dr Phil or Oprah or books or…? I mean there’s a hunger out there for people to improve themselves and I don’t know about you but I’d like to be more effective as a human being. I’d like to be more effective and loving and compassionate, and I don’t know, all round just be better at living life, so I can live the life that God always intended.

But there doesn’t seem to be any real way these days of being trained in being an effective person, and the concept of sin, well that’s not a popular concept it’s like, “Oh don’t moralize, don’t talk to me about sin.” But if we examine our own lives, if we have a look at who we are and what we’re doing, we do miss the mark on so many issues. And actually the word sin in the New Testament, it’s the word hamartia and it literally means to miss the mark, to miss the point of life. We all have behaviours and character traits and flaws, maybe its pride, maybe its control, maybe its being a perpetual victim, maybe its fear, we all have things that kind of, I don’t know, rob us of the life, the rich life that God always intended.

Sin is missing the mark, sin is missing the point and sin is the basic problem of humanity. Now there are two sorts of people, those who’ve accepted Jesus as their Saviour and those who haven’t; and maybe if you’re in the first category, you’ve accepted Jesus, you believe in him, you might say, “Well I believe but I’ve still got some stuff in my life, I’ve still got habits and things in my life that I need to deal with. If you haven’t, if you’re in the category of people who haven’t yet accepted Jesus, my prayer is that there’s a hunger and there is a yearning, there’s a dissatisfaction, a sense that there must be something more and I believe that that something more is actually someone more. It’s the person of Jesus Christ in your life, but no matter whether we’ve accepted Jesus yet or not we all have things to deal with in our lives that rob us of that rich life that God always intended.

Sin is that junk, that dirt, that decay inside, it’s like our homes, our houses, you know we can have the cleanest most wonderful home but just living life in our homes will cause grunge and junk and dust. If we don’t empty the bins, we don’t dust the shelves, the place will get dirty, and so it is with sin, it’s a load, it’s a weight; it’s a burden that we have to deal with. Before I became a Christian I truly believed that Christianity was a bunch of moralistic rules, don’t do this, don’t do that. I’d love to share with you today what God’s good and perfect plan is for your life, and if you have a Bible open it up at the letter to the Colossians, its kind of half way through the New Testament. Colossians chapter 1 verses 9 to 14, this is what it says:

“For this reason, since the day we heard it, we have not ceased praying for you and asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of God’s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding so that you may lead live worthy of God fully pleasing to Him as you bear fruit in every good work and as you grow in the knowledge of God. May you be made strong with all the strength that comes from His glorious power and may you be prepared to endure everything with patience whilst joyfully giving thanks to the Father who’s enabled you to share in the inheritance of the saints in His light. He’s rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the Kingdom of His beloved Son in whom we have redemption and the forgiveness of sin.”

Bit of a mouthful isn’t it? But there are kind of a half a dozen things that come out of that passage, Paul is talking to the church, to the Colossians and he’s saying, “You know what my prayer is for you? There are six things: firstly that you would have knowledge, the spiritual wisdom and understanding that comes from knowing God. And secondly out of that that you’d live a life that’s worthy, full of fruit, full of good works, and thirdly that you would grow through that in the knowledge of God. Next, that you’d be strengthened with His power, that you’d be able to endure everything with patience and with joy so that you then live out your inheritance. And don’t forget”, says Paul here, “You’ve been transferred from the Kingdom of Darkness to the Kingdom of Light.”

Those six things to me are kind of like a spine, you know our life can be a bit like a jelly fish, all over the place and wobbly. When I look at God’s purpose, His knowledge, His Spiritual wisdom, having a good life full of fruit, all of those things are like putting a spine in my life, like giving me a sense of direction, a sense of goodness. And that last point, being transferred from the Kingdom of Darkness to the Kingdom of Light is like the foundation, He rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the Kingdom of the Son that He loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of our sins. What does that mean? It’s like being let out of jail, if you’ve seen the Shawshank Redemption, that wonderful movie when the Morgan Freeman character Red, is let out of jail and he stands on the other side of those grey, cold, dangerous, brutal prison walls. Set free, so that we can have peace, so that we can be one with God and have a relationship with Him. We’ve been transferred from inside the jail to outside the jail, from prison to freedom, and forgiven our sin and set free from our sin.

But imagine walking out of that jail a free man, what would it be like? How would we cope with our freedom?

Coping with Freedom

Well indeed, imagine walking out of jail and coping with our freedom, it turns out that there are two parts to that freedom. The first one is walking out of the gate and hearing it slam shut behind us, but that’s only the beginning, the second part then is learning to live life, it’s kind of that rehabilitation stage. In that beautiful movie the Shawshank Redemption there are two characters who end up being let out of jail, the first one is an elderly man called Brookes and he’s been in jail for fifty years and when he’s finally let out he just can’t cope and he ends up committing suicide. The Morgan Freeman character who’s called Red, he gets out but, you know he says something profound he says “first you hate these walls,” (talking about the prison walls), “first you hate them, then you get used to them, and then you depend on them.” And it’s the same for us, sometimes we’ve spent so long in the prison, sometimes we’ve labored for so long under our failures and our mistakes and our sins that we get used to it, we depend on them and it leaves scars ingrained in who we are.

Now we can believe in Jesus, we can say “Lord I believe in you,” we can have faith in Him and yet still struggle to live out the life of freedom because we have problems in our lives, issues in our lives and God has a plan for your life, He has a plan for my life, it is a good plan a plan to live an abundant life that He has always intended. Why do so called Christians still sin? Because we play by the old rules. When Red got out of jail in this movie the Shawshank Redemption he had a sort of a job, a half way job working in a supermarket and every time he wanted to go to the toilet he asked permission, and it was kind of a hangover from spending that long in prison, it’s a bit like us. Its interesting Paul asks the very same question, “Why do so called Christians still sin?” and we’ll pick it up in Colossians chapter 2 verses 20 and 21, this is what he writes.

“If with Christ you died to the Spirits of this universe why do you live as if you still belong to the world? Why do you submit to regulations, don’t handle, don’t touch, don’t do this? All these regulations refer to things that perish with use; they’re simply human commands and teachings.” We can get so tied up in human commands and teachings that we forget that Jesus died and rose again to set you and me free from the burden of sin. Free from the burden of a religion that says you are only acceptable to God if you do these good things. Over the centuries the Christian church has developed heaps of dumb man made rules, and back in the early day’s asceticism was a big thing you know people went and sat on polls, the pole sitters, for thirty eight years to prove that they loved God. People went into monastic secluded existences, you know Bishops wore rings and you have to kiss their rings, those are rules, they give the appearance of religion but they don’t work. And we can still have trials and people telling us what we should do and temptations and sin just tearing us apart inside.

External rules don’t cut it, they don’t change our lives, and we think, “how will we ever cope, how will we ever live the life that God always intended?” Those good things of His knowledge and wisdom and good works and good fruit and growing in wisdom and knowing who we are in Christ that Paul writes about in Colossians chapter 1 verses 9 to 14. How will we ever life those good things in our life? Well the answer is in Colossians chapter 3 versus 1 to 4, have a listen. “Well, if you’ve been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above where Christ is seated, seated at the right hand of God, set your mind or your affections on the things that are above not on the things that are on earth because you’ve died and your life is hidden with Christ. When Christ who is your life is revealed then you also will be revealed with him in glory.”

I love the way it starts, “so if you have been raised with Christ.” In other words because of the fact that Jesus died for you and rose again and in effect you’re in Christ and you’ve died with Him and risen again and you have a new life, a new start, a new beginning, because of that, based on that fact that you are free. Stop looking back, stop trying to drive the car through the rear vision mirror, stop thinking about how good things were in jail, stop focusing on the old things, the things of this world. But instead and I love the King James Version it says, “Set your affections on the things that are above.” Don’t you love it? Paul doesn’t give the answer by starting with the things we have to do, he doesn’t say do this, don’t do that, that’s the start, no he starts with our heart, our motivations, our thoughts. It’s out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaks. Set your affections on the things that are above, on God, on Jesus.

It’s interesting you know, when I first met my wife Jacqui, before we were married and we were going through the courtship, before I met her, there was some other candidates in my life, but when I saw her I thought, “No, this is the woman who I want to marry.” So I sought her out, we went on a picnic, we went to a bush dance, we went to a dinner party we went to the same home group and she sought me out to the exclusion of all the other previous candidates to be Mrs Dymet. What I did was, my focus, my hope, my affections were set on her and the rest didn’t matter. Before I came to Christ I used to think that I’d have to give up a bunch of things that I liked and get nothing in return, I made the mistake of saying, “Well, I accept Jesus I have to work hard and there’ll be rules and that will be my religion.” That’s about as dumb as saying well I have to marry my wife and be a good and faithful husband, it skips the vital step of relationship.

Can I tell you something? Being married to Jacqui is fun, I love my wife, I enjoy her company and it is so easy to be a good husband to her when I’m enjoying her. Why wouldn’t it be the same with Jesus? Why wouldn’t it be that we would set our affections on Him? And all of sudden the hard work goes away, the legalistic works and rules, get a revelation, that doesn’t work, rules don’t change us on the inside, relationships do! The enjoyment of a relationship with Jesus of spending time with Him, of seeing God, of letting His spirit work in us and well up this joy that we can’t conjure up out of thin air, man that changes you, that makes a difference, and then all of a sudden our attitudes change, what we do, who we are changes. Hebrews chapter 12 verse 6 says, “God rewards those who diligently seek Him.” And when we try and make it rules based and works based, the Bible, 1 Timothy chapter 4 verse 1, calls that the doctrine of demons.

Well what does that look like? What does that feel like? How do we live out that relationship?

Living the Life

Well how do we live out that life? How do we take this wonderful relationship and live it out so that it changes us? Paul answers that question in Colossians chapter 3 verses 3 to 10, he says this. “For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God, when Christ who is your life is revealed then you also will be revealed with him in glory. Put to death therefore whatever in you is earthly: fornication, impurity, passion, evil desire and greed which is idolatry, on account of these the wrath of God is coming on those who are disobedient, these are the ways that you also once followed when you were living that life. But now get rid of those things anger and wrath and malice and slander and abusive language from your mouth. Don’t lie to one another seeing that you’ve stripped off the old self with its practices and having clothed yourselves with a new self which is being renewed in the knowledge according to the image of its creator.”

In other words he begins again; therefore because you’ve set your heart on Jesus, because you’re having this wonderful relationship with Jesus, as a result of that, as a result of your freedom get rid of all this stuff, not in your own strength that’s the low road. You and I are never going to get rid of our sin, our failings, our poor behaviour on our own, I can’t change myself but Jesus can. The thing that’s changed me over the last eleven years of walking with Jesus is not my cleverness in changing myself but the fact that I enjoy being with Him so much, I enjoy the times of prayer and the times of worship and the times of reading His word so much, and that carries me through each day with a joy that I can’t put into words. Because I enjoy that so much I want more of Jesus, I want to hear Him and see Him and know Him and as a result of that because my heart, my affections are set on Him all the other stuff that follows along behind, things that I think and do and attitudes progressively changes to look more like Jesus, the image of my creator.

Relationships transform us, rules don’t and I love how Paul ends up that little bit and says, “having clothed yourself with a new self which is being renewed in the knowledge according to the image of its creator – grow in that knowledge. Not just dry head knowledge but heart knowledge, spirit knowledge.” And I do that, people say, “Well Berni I want to be like that, I want to grow,” get into God’s word, open the Bible every day, don’t let it gather dust on the shelf or down by the bed, open God’s word each and every day and let Him speak to you, spend time in fellowship with Him. Just quietly with no agenda, resting, listening, praying, worshipping and when God’s word convicts us of something – let’s say unforgiveness – I mean unforgiveness is like a cancer, you might be able to think of a person who has hurt you so much and Jesus turns around and says, you want my forgiveness you go and forgive them first. You can read it in Matthew chapter 6 verse 14. Now that’s a struggle its like “I have a right not to forgive that person,” and Jesus said, “I know, but humble yourself, obey me and go and forgive them anyway,” and there’s a struggle, there’s a laying down of our will to Jesus.

You know what we just read there in Colossians says that we have died to this world and we are alive in Jesus. The problem is we want to go in that hearse where we died and take a U-Haul it trailer behind us and take all that rubbish with us, let it go! Jesus wants to set you free today of the rubbish in your life and me free of the rubbish in my life, the stuff that He calls sin and it means we have to let it go because we love Him more than we love the sin. Because our relationship with Him is so much more important to us than all that other stuff that we have a right to hang on to. And people sometimes think of prayer as being a chore, being hard but when it’s a personal relationship, when we set our affections on the things that are above its exciting, its not a burden. I love spending time with my wife it’s not a burden to me, I love spending time with Jesus, it’s a wonderful habit a habit of hanging around Him and then hanging around people who’s lives are drenched in His Spirit, listening to them, watching them, letting them influence us. Word, prayer and fellowship is what equips us for the battles of life.

When we do that stuff, we grow in the knowledge because we’ve put God on and taken the old person off, we grow in the relationship in the knowledge of who we are and then what we do follows along behind who we are, when God changes us what we do changes. God has a plan for your life, God has a plan for my life, it is a good and perfect and wonderful plan, and if we want to live the life that God always intended, we have to stop mucking around. Are you in for a penny, or in for a pound? Is this serious? Because if it is it’s time, seriously, to make a decision to set our affections on the things that are above, not on the things on earth because we’ve died to that stuff and our life is hidden in Christ, in God. Live the life, live the life that God always intended, if you’re in for a penny be in for a pound.

You and I, we believe in Jesus, we are sealed with His Holy Spirit. It is God’s desire to have a close and intimate relationship with us.

Valley of Dry Bones

We all go through stages in life. Well, frankly when it feels like life is just like a desert full of dry bones – empty, dry, difficult, tough and we think, “Hang on a minute. What ever happened to all God’s promises? Whatever happened to this wonderful life that God is supposed to have planned for me, even before time began? Come on! What happened to it?” We all go through those wilderness experiences from time to time. And today we are looking at the third message in a series called: “Living the Life that God Always Intended.”

Now, let’s get real. Sometimes we go through those desert experiences and its one thing to say God is a God who blesses, God is the God who wants to do all these wonderful things but it has to apply; it has to work in the middle of those desert experiences. So, if you have a Bible, grab it. We’re going to go to the Book of Ezekiel today. Ezekiel chapter 37, beginning at verse 1. Let’s have a bit of a read. “The hand of the Lord came upon me and He brought me out by the Spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of a valley. It was full of dry bones. He led me around them – there were very many lying in the valley and they were very dry. Now God said to me, “Man, can these bones live?” and I answered Him, “O Lord God, only you know.” Ezekiel was one of the first men deported out of Jerusalem to Babylon in 597BC. Here’s the story. Let’s just go back and understand where Israel was at. Many years before God had spoken to Abraham and He’d promised Abraham the Promised Land, the land of the Canaanites. But as it turned out, through a series of events, this nation Israel; the children of Abraham, ended up as slaves in Egypt and so God brought them out. Moses led them out through the Red Sea. They spent forty years in the wilderness – ultimately they made it into the Promised Land.

They spent some time under some judges; some rulers appointed by God, and then they had a King, they had another King, they had a third King and all of a sudden the Israeli nation split between the ten tribes in the north, which was ultimately called Israel and the two tribes in the south called Judah. The ten tribes in the north were wiped out and that left the two tribes down in Jerusalem – Judah and Benjamin, and they were the ragtag remnant. But even they weren’t faithful to God, so in 586/587BC they were deported because the Babylonian Empire rolled over the top of Jerusalem, destroyed everything, destroyed God’s Temple – this is the place were God lived, remember – and took them captive into Babylon. So the Israelites felt – “well, you know, where’s God? What’s happened to God? Why did God let this happen?” God always promised if they were faithful, they would live with plenty in the land of milk and honey but if they were unfaithful to God; if they worshipped other idols; if there was sexual immorality; if they didn’t look after the poor then God’s judgement would come upon them and that’s exactly what happened.

The Babylonian Empire was a tool of judgement by God. So they went into a seventy year exile in Babylon and this prophesy comes at a time when they had been exiled; when they just didn’t know where their God was or whether the Babylonian King was stronger than their God or whether the Babylonian gods were stronger than their God and it felt like a valley of dry bones. They were slaves; they were exiled; there was nothing going on, and this is the time when they felt that God had failed them. But God leads Ezekiel into this vision; this valley of dry bones. Have you ever felt like that? Have you ever felt – my life is like a valley in a desert full of dry bones?

Israel was called ‘Israel’ because Jacob – and you can read about it in chapter 32 of Genesis, verse 28 – because Jacob struggled with God; struggled with an angel all night and the word ‘Israel’ literally means, ‘he struggles with God”. And we struggle with God sometimes. We struggle to live a life that’s faithful to God. A life that’s full of everything that God promised us – sometimes we end up in a place that we would rather not be in or we feel like we’re exiled; we feel like God’s a million miles away. It’s hard; it’s tough; it’s that valley full of dry bones. And in comprehending the Old Testament – that salvation history that we just quickly went over – we need to see ourselves as Israel. Israel was enslaved in Egypt the way we were born enslaved into sin and through the parting of the Red Sea they were set free.

Just as we through the cross have been set free and they ultimately ended up in the Promised Land and our Promised Land is the Kingdom of God. Our Promised Land is a wonderful, beautiful, intimate relationship with God that He opens up to us by His grace. And even sometimes when we are in that relationship; we’ve been saved by Jesus because we believe that what He did for us on the cross was to set us free; even when we know that, sometimes we feel exiled. Sometimes that’s because we’ve done some things that we are living through the consequences of, and sometimes it’s just life; things happen. Husbands and wives die; we get sick; we lose our jobs; we go through those things and when we are struggling; when we are suffering, it can feel like God is a million miles away; it can feel like when we look out over our lives it is like a desert valley full of dry bones. But even though we feel that, God is our God. God is our God and He’s in that place and today, if your life is feeling like a valley of dry bones, instead of a land of milk and honey, then this message is for you, because God means you and me to live the lives that He always intended. So how do we do that when we are walking through this valley of desperately dry bones?

His Word and Breath

Well, we are walking through our valley of dry bones; this desert which our life sometimes becomes and the question is: How do we live through that? How do we have a faith in God that makes a difference to our lives? Well, let’s pick up the story in Ezekiel chapter 37 and we’ll pick it up beginning at verse 4. This is what he writes: “Then God said to me, “Son of man, prophesy over these bones, speak to them and say to them, “Dry bones, hear the Word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God to these bones, “I will cause breath to enter you and you shall live. I will lay sinews on you and will cause flesh to come upon you and I will cover you with skin and I will put breath into you and you will live and you will know that I am the Lord your God.” So Ezekiel writes, “I prophesied as I had been commanded by God and as I prophesied, as I spoke to these bones, suddenly there was a noise, a rattling and the bones came together, bone to bone. I looked and there were sinews on them and flesh came upon them and the skin had covered them but still there was no breath in them.”

Who or what is a prophet? Well, a prophet in the Old Testament is someone who speaks God’s Word out, prophet’s that in the New Testament too. Prophesy means to speak out the will of God. Now sometimes we think of it as predicting the future and sometimes a prophet does speak something about the future, but ninety five percent of the prophesies that are in the Old Testament are about the lives of people then and there. And in this first prophesy that God commands Ezekiel to make, God’s Word goes forth.

It’s interesting – God’s Words are containers of God’s power and when we speak God’s Word over things, God changes things. God said to Ezekiel: “Prophesy – speak my word. Tell these dry bones that they will live.” Now we don’t know who these dry bones are yet. We’ll find out a bit later in the story. So, Ezekiel obeys God and he speaks to the dry bones. He says: “God said you’re to live,” and what happens? In this first prophesy God’s Word issues forth and what was the result? Look at verse 7 again. “So I prophesied as I had been commanded and as I prophesied suddenly there was a noise; a rattling and the bones came together – bone to bone – and there was flesh and there was skin and there was sinew, but there was no breath in them.” How true can that be of us? We can accept God’s Word; we can believe the Gospel; we can believe and know that we have eternal life and that puts flesh and sinew on our bones – gives us life. But of what present benefit is a pure intellectual ascent to the Gospel – here and now in our Babylon; in our valley of dry bones – does knowing in our heads bring joy and satisfaction to our life? Come on – does it? No! Does this intellectual ascent to God’s Word win souls into the Kingdom? Does the mere acceptance of God’s Word enable our lives to shine out the many-splendoured love of Christ into this lost and fallen world? No!

First came God’s Word from Ezekiel’s mouth but surely – surely there must be more to it than just God’s Word? What’s the point, that all these dry bones come together and they get sinew and they get flesh and they get skin and yet there’s no breath in them. Let’s read on the story, beginning at verse 9 in chapter 37 of Ezekiel. “Then God said to me: “Prophesy to the breath. Prophesy mortal and say to the breath: “Thus says the Lord God: “Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain that they may live.” I prophesied as God commanded me and the breath came into them and they lived and they stood on their feet – a vast multitude.” This word ‘breath’ that’s used here in the Hebrew Old Testament is the word ‘ruwach’ – It means ‘moving air’. The Greek word in the New Testament is ‘pneuma’, from which we get ‘pneumatic’ – you know, pumping up a tyre. But in the Old Testament, in the Hebrew, it’s ‘ruwach’ the breath of God; the wind, and it’s used interchangeably for ‘wind’ and for ‘God’s Spirit‘.

So when this prophesy comes out about ‘breath’, what God’s talking about; what Ezekiel’s talking about, is God’s Spirit breathing life into these bodies. Great that they’ve got flesh, great that they’ve got bones, great that they’ve got skin but they need breathe. And verse 11 there says: “Then God said to me, “Mortal, these bones are the bones of the whole house of Israel. They say our bones are dried up, they say our hope is lost, we’re cut off completely, therefore prophesy and say to them, “Thus says the Lord God, I’m going to open your graves and bring your up from the graves, O my people and I will bring you back to the land of Israel.” God is breathing breath back into His people, through His Holy Spirit, the breath came into them – they lived, they stood on their feet, literally they were a vast multitude; an exceedingly great host – is one of the translations.

Remember that old song: ‘All I need is the air that I breathe and to love you’. That’s what God is saying here. We just can’t live life the way God intended if we believe from a distance, that God is God and Jesus is Jesus and that Jesus died for us and rose again. If we believe that in our heads from a distance, we are like this vast army of bones with flesh and sinew and skin but no breath; no ‘ruwach’, no life. Is a tyre without air still a tyre? Course it is, but it’s useless. Is a bird without a song still a bird? Of course it is, but how can it sing forth the glories of God? Is a Christian who doesn’t walk in the Spirit still a Christian? Yes, but how can such a person delight themselves in God and pour the compassion of Christ into this world? Ephesians chapter 1 verses 13 and 14 say this: “In Him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the Gospel of your salvation, were marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit. This is the pledge of our inheritance toward redemption as God’s own people, to the praise of His Glory. The point is that every Christian has the Holy Spirit. If we don’t; if we don’t have the Spirit of Christ in us then we don’t belong to Him.

Right towards the end, Jesus spoke before He was crucified, a lot about the comforter, the Counselor, the Spirit; another comforter just like Him and in a few weeks we are going to be starting a series on Christianityworks called “The Holy Spirit and Me.” That’s going to be a great series. But Jesus spoke a lot about the Spirit of God and we want to shy away from that. Some people in the church have seen some sort of extreme versions of Christianity where people are kind of swinging off chandeliers and they’ve gone ’Oh, this Holy Spirit thing is not for me’ and in our western culture we like to be very rational and one of the greatest Pentecostal scholars that I know, Barry Chant, once said to me, he said, ’So many stupid things have been done in the name of the Spirit of wisdom and truth.’ It’s a good balanced view isn’t it? Just because some people have done some silly things, doesn’t mean that the Holy Spirit isn’t one of the Three Persons of the Godhead. Father, Son and Holy Spirit and Jesus said: “You know, If you love me if my word is in you, then we will come and set up our home inside you,” and He does that through the presence of the Holy Spirit. God’s address on this earth is you and me if we believe in Jesus. We are meant to have the Spirit of God breathed into us because that Spirit is the Spirit that brings hope.

A Certain Hope

Well, this message is a message of hope. This message is a message about people like you and me who travel as Israel did through that exile in Babylon, with that sense that life is just a dry valley full of dead bones. And then God comes and breathes some life into us through His Spirit and this is what He says at the end of this story in Ezekiel, chapter 37 verse 11: “Then God said to me, “Man these bones are the whole house of Israel. They say: ’our bones are dried up and our hope is lost and we are cut off completely.’ So tell them; prophesy; go and say to them: “This is what your God says: “I’m going to open your graves and I’m going to bring you up from your graves, all my people and I will bring you back to the land of Israel, back to the Promised Land and you shall know that I am your Lord, when I open up your graves and bring you up from your graves, O my people. I will put my Spirit within you and you will live and I will place you on your own soil and then you will know that I, the Lord God, have spoken and will act.” This is what God says.

Who does it all? I mean, the Israelites; they’re exiled. Babylon is the world power; they’re slaves in this place called Babylon. Who does it all? God does! God speaks hope; God breathes life. God does it by placing His Spirit in each one of us when we are in our ’Babylon’; when we are in our valley of dry bones and we think ’there is nothing I can do’. That’s the whole point because God wants ’to do’; God wants to breath; God wants to touch; God wants to bring life into you and me. You and I if we believe in Jesus, we are sealed by His Holy Spirit and it is God’s desire to have a close and intimate relationship with us. If you doubt me, listen to the tender words of Jesus as He prays to the Father, and the subject of that prayer is you and me. He prays this just before He is crucified. It’s in John chapter 17, beginning at verse 20. He says: “Dad, I don’t ask this just on behalf of my disciples, here and now, but also on behalf of all those who will believe in me through their word, that we may all be one. Dad, as you and I are one, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me, Dad, I have given them, so that they may be one as we are one. Father, I desire that those also whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory.”

Just before He’s betrayed; just before He gets crucified, He prays for you and for me and He says: “Dad, the reason I’m doing this is because I love them and I want them to be close to me and I want them to be with me and to see my glory.” That is the Word of God today if you are traveling through a valley of dry bones. Jesus died, and that is an historical fact, to enable us to be close to God, to remove the sin; the barrier that stops us from being close but He also poured out His Spirit. And that’s what we are going to be looking at in a few weeks in that series: “The Holy Spirit and Me.”

The present reality is that God wants to be in us to enable us actually to have a tender, personal relationship with Him. If we give intellectual ascent only to His Word; if we in effect, stand outside the open door and say; ’how wonderful it is that Jesus died for me so that door could be opened so that one day – one day – I’ll walk through it.” It is so sad that so many Christians choose to live their lives in this way – to wander amongst the dry bones in Babylon, when all the time, Jesus died that we might be filled with His Holy Spirit. Jesus died that we might have a tender, intimate relationship with Him. Jesus died so that we would know Him first hand.

Jesus waits to be wanted. At the cross, the veil in front of the Holy of Holies in the Temple was torn, through the greatest sacrifice of all time, through the death of the Son of God and the point of tearing that apart was the Holy of Holies; the place where God is, where previously only the High Priest could go on the day of Yom Kippur, God’s presence is now open to each one of us – even in the valley of dry bones; even in the desert; even in our Babylon. God purchased our freedom with His Son’s blood. And let me say to you, very kindly but very directly, to wait outside is to deny the very thing that Jesus died for and that’s abhorrent. That’s so sad; the Spirit of God, this Holy Spirit is God Himself in us. The same Spirit who raised Christ from the dead is at work in us through His immeasurably great power.

Why would we deny Jesus’ will? Why wouldn’t we come boldly before the throne of grace and turn to the Spirit of God through the Lamb of God that you, like David, might declare: “God when you said to me, “Seek my face,” my heart said unto you, “Your face, Lord, will I seek.” God’s plan; the life that God always planned for you and me to live, is a life of abundant blessing in the presence of God, in a deep, tender, warm relationship with God Himself. How sad that so many people choose to wait in the valley of dry bones. Today the Word of God for you and for me is this: God wants to breathe His Spirit, His presence, His power, His love, His mercy, His holiness, His grace into your life and mine. Not tomorrow, not next year, not when we die and go to be with Him – NOW!

God is a sovereign God. God is a powerful God. God is a God who makes decisions. God is the God who calls you and me to do whatever He wants us to do.

What’s My Mission?

I have to say, it is fabulous to be with you again this week here on the program ‘Christianityworks’. We are going to be going to the fourth message in a series that I’ve called: “Living the Life God Always Intended”. I don’t know, call me simple; call me plain but I have this crazy notion that God has a plan for my life and He has a plan for your life and it is a good plan; a wonderful plan; a plan to bless; a plan to grow us; a plan to give us eternal life through Jesus Christ. So as you look at life, you know, you look ahead, can’t change what’s gone, we can’t can we? But as we look forward you think; “Why wouldn’t I want to live the life that God always intended? Well, let me ask you, what does that life look like or what has God put you on this earth for? What are the wonderful and special gifts that God has just given to you that you can use to bless other people?

In other words, what’s your mission in life? What is it that God wants you to do with your faith because when we come into relationship with Jesus – I don’t know how it is for you – but for me it is the most awesome thing. For me when I get up in the morning and I just have that quiet time with Him, it changes my day; it changes me. I spent my whole life trying to change me and what I have discovered is I can’t. I’m as smart as they come but I can’t change me. What changes me is when I spend that time with Jesus and just rest in Him and He gives me a joy and a peace that – I don’t know, I can’t put into words – and then my day is different, you know, it’s not the way it used to be.

So God changes us and He gives us this faith and He says; “Look, go and put this faith to work in the world. Go and do something with that faith, in other people’s lives.” I know what that looks like in my life, for me it’s doing exactly what I am doing now. God blessed me to be a mouth in the Kingdom of God. I love doing that for Him and I trust that’s it’s a blessing to you. But you are not me – we are different the two of us – and so what is it for you? What mission has God laid into your heart for the rest of your life to make an eternal difference in the lives of other people?

Some people know what the answer to that is, other people don’t. Other people kind of do but have lost their way a little bit and you think; did God really call me to do that, is this really what my shtick is in life? So today we are going to look at a message: “No Fox Holes. No Nests” Because God has called us to a pretty exciting; a pretty radical mission in this world. The sad thing is, when we know Jesus and we know how wonderful He is and we have this certainty of eternal life and we don’t do anything with it in other people’s lives.

I see it in churches. You know, I was speaking in a church a few years ago and this was a church that was dying – it was inward focused, it was trying to build itself and I said to the people, because a lot of them were older – I said; “Have a look around, look to your left and look to your right and in ten years only one of the three of you will be here. If you keep doing the same thing, week after week after week, and playing church the same way, week after week after week, the church is going to die. Now praise God, they got a new pastor and this man breathed life into it, God breathed life into the church through him and his wife and now it’s a growing and thriving church.

But the picture of that church can be the picture of our lives. My faith walk, your faith walk can end up being like that church, just the same old, same old, same old, same old! You know what I am saying! That doesn’t mean that we don’t get tired sometimes, and it doesn’t mean that we don’t go through tough times sometimes, but God’s got a plan for your life; He’s got a plan for my life. It’s a good plan and it’s a plan to use you and to use me in other people’s lives. You know the worst thing that we can do is make like it’s the minister’s job to go and touch other people’s lives, as though somehow “the minister” is a one stop shop with all the giftings that God promises us. If that’s the model we have, let me tell you, it’s not in the Bible – it’s not how it works – we’re a body. You have gifts that I can’t begin to dream of.

I look at my daughter, whose fifteen; Melissa, she can draw things that for the rest of my days, I simply will not be able to do. She can do things I can’t and I can do things that she can’t and that makes the world go around. Amen? So let’s get back to it – solid question, right in your face – what is your mission on this world? Is it to do church, the same old, same old, is it to do that faith walk the same old, same old or is this radical Jesus; this radical Saviour, maybe today, speaking to you and saying; “I have a plan and it’s a plan to use you in a way that you haven’t begun to imagine?”

I’d like to stir you up today. My prayer is that the Holy Spirit will stir you up today and really empower you to go out and be Jesus to a lost and hurting world. But how do we get empowered by Jesus, how do we go and connect with our community, how do we share this fabulous, wonderful freedom that Jesus has given us? Well, that’s what we are going to look at today.

Who Built the Church?

Well, let’s get back to it – what’s your mission? Some people say ‘well, my mission is to build the church; my mission is to get involved in my local church and my local community and together we build a church and we do mission, you know, we touch the world, we do what we do through the local church.’ I have to tell you, that maybe is not such a bad plan. The church is a part of God’s plan; the church is the body; the fellowship; the group that meets together and those people are a family. Your church that you attend, that you are a part of, is your family in Christ. My church is my family in Christ. But is it really our job to build the church, is that what ‘mission’ is all about? Is that what my mission should be, is that what your mission should be? What should define the way we do church? You know, half the time, the way that we do church is because we have always done it that way before. Churches have lives of their own – you know – they find it as hard to change as any other organisation. “We’ve always done it this way, so we will do it that way.” And the way we do things and have always done things, defines how we do mission. And you know something; the way that we do mission defines how we see Jesus.

But shouldn’t it be the other way around? Shouldn’t it be this relationship we have, this radical Jesus, that changes us and then He breathes His mission, for you and me and for our churches, into our hearts and then be go and do that and we build our church in order to do the mission that Jesus has called us to do. You know, maybe we’ve got it round the wrong way. We start with how we do it, which kind of sets up how we do mission and how we do mission; how we touch people; how we go out and be Jesus, ends up effecting how we see Him. I don’t know – I think that’s the wrong way around.

Look at Jesus – this is what He said. He made it a very uncomfortable statement. People came to Him and they wanted to follow Him. Have a listen to this – it’s in Matthew. If you have a Bible, grab it, Matthew chapter 8, beginning at verse 18 to 21. This is what he says; “Now when Jesus saw the great crowds around Him, He gave orders to go over to the other side. A scribe then approached Him and said; “Teacher, I’ll follow you wherever you go” and Jesus said to him; “You know something, foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.” Another of His disciples said; “Lord, Lord first let me go and bury my father,” but Jesus said to him; ‘Follow me and let the dead bury their own dead’.”

You know what we want? You know what we want out of church? We want to have a comfortable foxhole and a comfortable nest – we’re home builders. We like it to be nice, we like it to be comfortable, we like to have the family around us and, in a sense there is nothing wrong with that, but notice this radical Saviour. If you or I were Jesus and someone came to us and said; “I’m going to follow you anywhere,” would you say to them; “Well, listen, foxes have holes and birds have nests but I’ve got nowhere to lay my head, you still want to follow me?” Is that how we would have responded? I don’t think so!

Jesus is talking about a radical sort of following – a sort of following of ‘Him”, that puts Him first. Not our comfort; not the way we want church to be; not the way we would like our mission to be but putting Him first and Jesus, when He first stood up, the first time, to preach, this is what He said about His mission. He said; “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord has anointed me. He sent me to bring good news to the oppressed; to bind up the broken hearted; to proclaim liberty to the captives; release to the prisoners; to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.”

I love that – Jesus knew what His mission was and it wasn’t a mission that He thought up all on His own. See what that said? I’m reading from Isaiah chapter 61: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because the Lord has anointed me.” What’s an anointing? An anointing is an appointing. When God anoints you to do something, He’s appointing you to do that and when God does it; when God chooses our mission for us, then our future is assured. We sometimes want to race off and do things that God didn’t plan – Jesus knew that wasn’t the right way – Jesus knew He had to follow the call that God had placed on His heart. “The Lord has anointed me to bring good news; to set the captives free; to bind up the broken hearted…” A carpenter? And Jesus knew that His job was to go out – Jesus didn’t sit in the air-conditioned comfort of heaven and wait for us to come to Him after we had sorted our act out – He came and became a man – He had no home, He had no money, He had no status or position – He just came because His Father had anointed Him to go and preach the good news of salvation.

He wasn’t into building institutions; He wasn’t into building establishments. He was into touching people and touching lives and sometimes we can decide that we have a job and we are going to do it for God. Well, God doesn’t much like that. We are going to read a story right now, of David. David the King of Israel; the greatest King that Israel ever had and had a good run and he just felt he wanted to do something for God. This is coming from Second Samuel chapter 7 – its way up in the front third of the Old Testament. This is what it says:

“Now when King David was settled in his house and the Lord had given him rest from all his enemies around him, the King said to the prophet Nathan, “See, now I’m living in a house of cedar but the Ark of God it’s out in a tent,” and Nathan said to the King, “Go, do all you have in mind, for the Lord is with you.” But that same night the Word of the Lord came to Nathan, “Go and tell my servant, King David, “thus says the Lord, are you the one to build me a house to live in? I haven’t lived in a house since the day I brought up the people of Israel from Egypt to this day. I’ve been moving about in a tent and tabernacle. Where ever I have moved about among all the people of Israel, did I ever speak a word with any of the leaders of Israel, whom I commanded to shepherd my people, saying, “Why haven’t you built me a house of cedar?” Now, therefore, thus you shall say to my servant David, thus says the Lord of Hosts, “I took you from the pasture, from following the sheep to be a prince over my people Israel and I have been with you wherever you went and have cut off all your enemies from before you and I will make for you a great name, like the name of the great ones of the earth and I will appoint a place for my people Israel and I will plant them so that they may live in their own place and be disturbed no more and evil doers shall afflict them no more, as they formally did. I appointed judges over my people and I will give rest to you from all your enemies. Moreover, the Lord declares to you, that the Lord will make you a house, when your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring after you and I will establish your kingdom and he shall build a house for my name and I will establish my throne forever.”

That’s pretty awesome! David thinks he is going to do something for God and God says, “Hang on a minute – woe, woe, just stop for a minute, David – did I ever ask you to build me a house?” Wow, so what do we do with that? What does mission look like if we can’t do things for God?

Get Out There….

Well, we are looking at – what’s our mission in life? What is it that God has called us to do? We’ve just read the story of King David, when God had cut all of David’s enemies off and God had brought him to his home; the Promised Land, the land of the Canaanites that God had promised to Abraham and David is sitting in his beautiful palace; in his beautiful cedar house and David thinks to himself, “Well, you know man, God has been in that tent, you know, the Ark of the Covenant is out in that tent and I’ve got a beautiful house so I am going to build God a house.” And God turns round to him and said, “David, David, did I ever ask you to build me a house? Do I need you to build me a house? I tell you what David, I’ll bless you, I’ll build you a house. Your house will last forever and your son will build my house for me.”

We sort of sometimes think of God as a performing puppy. You know, like God is there to do tricks for us; God is there to be our God on our terms, but it’s not the way it works. God is a sovereign God; God is a powerful God; God is a God who makes decisions; God is the God who calls David to be King; God is the God who calls you and me to do whatever He wants us to do. Can I encourage you – don’t try and do something that you think is right without knowing that it’s God’s call on your life. We are not here to make ourselves comfortable; we are not here to make a nice comfy little fox hole for ourselves or a nice comfy little bird’s nest for ourselves, whether that’s our church or whether that’s our home or whether that’s our lives.

Being a Jesus follower; being a Christ follower; being someone who says, “I’m giving my whole life to Jesus and I’m prepared to lose that life in order to gain it.” Being one of those means saying, “God, whatever you want me to do, whoever you want me to be, whatever your call is on my life, that’s what I want to do, that’s who I want to be, that’s how I want to serve you. This is so, so important! God is a gracious God. You know that story that we read about David before in Second Samuel chapter 7 and David kind of got a little bit ahead of himself and maybe thought, ‘Well, I’m the King, you know, I can decide these things.” God just came to him through a prophet and said, “No, no my child David, let me bless you.”

God doesn’t need me to do things for Him. God doesn’t need you to do things for Him. God knows the whole plan; He knows what’s going to happen; He knows how it is going to turn out; He knows whom He has chosen and appointed and anointed to do which job. Our bit – our bit is just walking into that. That’s why the Apostle Paul writes in Ephesians chapter 2 verse 10 that we have been created in Christ Jesus to do good works that He prepared before hand for us to do. Why wouldn’t we want to do the ones that He prepared before hand? Why wouldn’t we want to live the life that God laid out before hand? Why would we want to run off and do it our own way and say, “But I believe in Jesus. You know, Jesus is my Lord. Praise God! Halleluiah! But I’m still going to lead my life the way I want to. I’m still going to do it the way I want to.” That’s a recipe for disaster and you know something, when we try and do that, there’s no joy in it, there’s no peace on it, there’s no ‘holy ease’ in doing what we do. Doing what I do, I know that God’s called me to do it, there’s a ‘holy ease‘. That doesn’t mean that it’s not hard work – it doesn’t mean that I don’t have to spend a lot of time studying and learning, preparing – it doesn’t mean that there’s not a lot of admin and …. all those things. But when I sit down to do this, there’s a blessing on it. There’s nothing else that I would rather be doing than what I’m doing right now because its God’s anointing, it’s God’s selection. I’ve spent enough of my life walking outside God’s will; I’ve spent enough of my life thinking I can be like David and do it my way. God is a sovereign God; God is a God who even chose His Son and anointed Him to do a specific thing.

If God’s called you to build a church then God will build that church through you. Praise God! But if God’s called you just to touch one life, one of your children; if God‘s called you to do something that only you can do, that other people can’t do, even if it’s not glamorous, even if a whole bunch of other people don’t see it, if God’s called you to do that thing, do that thing. Do it well, do it with all your heart, do it no matter what the cost to you, because when we are walking in God’s plan, when we’re living in God’s plan, that’s the life God always intended. And there is such an incredible joy in that – there’s such a richness in that, that I can’t begin to put into words. Maybe God put you on this earth just to touch that one next door neighbour who needs Jesus. Maybe God put you on this earth to be a sound technician. Maybe God put you on this earth to be one of the pastoral care people in your church, without any position or title or salary, just going around, being Jesus, and touching people. Maybe God put you on this earth to be an evangelist. Maybe God put you on this earth to bring up your kids so that they could go and touch a whole bunch of other people with the love of Jesus.

We shouldn’t think of ourselves more highly than we ought, but with sober judgement, look at the gifting that God has given to us and you know something, when we aren’t operating in that gifting; when we aren’t operating in God’s anointing; when we aren’t following His call on our life, it’s like wearing a shirt that doesn’t fit; it’s like wearing shoes that don’t fit – it’s uncomfortable. Maybe we can go forward but it doesn’t feel good but praise God, when we are living the life that God always intended, there is a joy and a fulfillment and a satisfaction in that that God has always planned.

Let me encourage you and challenge you today in your life. Are you living the life that God always intended? Have you bowed down your life before Him and said, “Lord, whatever you want me to do, I will do. Call me and I’ll follow and Lord, if you haven’t called me yet, I’ll wait and I’ll pray and I’ll be patient and Father, just tell me, tell me what it is, because Lord God, I want to live the life that you always intended for me.