Acts of the Apostles 4:1-12 [NLTse]
While Peter and John were speaking to the people, they were confronted by the priests, the captain of the Temple guard, and some of the Sadducees. ² These leaders were very disturbed that Peter and John were teaching the people that through Jesus there is a resurrection of the dead. ³ They arrested them and, since it was already evening, put them in jail until morning. ⁴ But many of the people who heard their message believed it, so the number of believers now totaled about 5,000 men, not counting women and children.
The next day the council of all the rulers and elders and teachers of religious law met in Jerusalem. ⁶ Annas the high priest was there, along with Caiaphas, John, Alexander, and other relatives of the high priest. ⁷ They brought in the two disciples and demanded, “By what power, or in whose name, have you done this?”
⁸ Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, “Rulers and elders of our people, ⁹ are we being questioned today because we’ve done a good deed for a crippled man? Do you want to know how he was healed? ¹⁰ Let me clearly state to all of you and to all the people of Israel that he was healed by the powerful name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, the man you crucified but whom God raised from the dead. ¹¹ For Jesus is the one referred to in the Scriptures, where it says,
‘The stone that you builders rejected has now become the cornerstone.’
¹² There is salvation in no one else! God has given no other name under heaven by which we must be saved.”

Sermon
I have felt compelled to preach about prayer these past weeks and into the summer. During that time already we’ve acknowledged that prayer can be work and that it requires discipline: A place; a time; a pattern; and that’s in addition to all our more sporadic times of talking with God and enjoying His presence. We’ve seen that God calls us to pray and that Jesus assumed we would pray. But that the result of this “work” of prayer in our lives will be a relationship with God that is personal, friendly, and so very close.

I’ve encouraged us towards a prayer-pattern that parallels our Worship Service: Starting with Adoration & Praise; moving to Confession & Forgiveness; then to Meditation & Listening; a time of Petition & Intercession; and ending with more Thanksgiving & Praise.
Today I’d like to talk together about having greater and greater assurance in our prayers: Growing in confidence that the Father is, indeed, listening to our prayers, and growing in confidence that He will, indeed, answer.

Our Lord Jesus taught those first disciples three principles to help them grow in confidence and assurance about their prayers. Jesus taught them to always make their requests in Jesus’ name; to make their requests together, in agreement, in groups of two or three or more; and, to ask in faith, trusting Him to do what they had asked.

Let’s talk about these one by one.

First off, why should God listen to our prayers? Why should God listen to the President of the United States’ prayers, or even the Reverend Billy Graham’s prayers? Those who study such things say that if our galaxy – the Milky Way Galaxy – was a room like this Sanctuary, that in it all Earth would be like a pin-prick “there”. And if the universe were a room like this Sanctuary, that in it all the Milky Way would be like a pin-prick “there”.

So, [acting it out] this whole Sanctuary is the universe and “here” [pin-prick] is our galaxy. Now we’ll blow that pin-prick up to be the Sanctuary and now the Earth is this pin-prick “here”. And on the Earth, if it were this Sanctuary, each of us individually would be little pin-pricks, “here” and “here” and “here”. And we think that God Almighty, Who can fit the whole works – Earth, Milky Way, and the whole universe – into His back pocket should be paying attention to us? No. Not us. Not the President. Not Billy Graham. Nobody deserves to have God listening to our prayers. The very greatest of us is less than nothing, less than nobody, to the Great I Am!

But Jesus…

Let’s make clear that God listens to the prayers of human beings only because of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ has merged humanity and divinity into an impossible whole. He is the God-Man: Not 50/50 but 100% God, 100% Man. And on the cross He has become a bridge for human beings to get to God, by faith in Him. John 14:6 makes clear, “I am the way, the truth, and the life,” Jesus told those first disciples. “No one can come to the Father except through Me.”

There is power in asking in Jesus’ name because of Who Jesus is and because of what Jesus has done. The secret to prayer with authority and effectiveness is being a part of Jesus Christ by faith. Only through our relationship with Jesus by faith do we enter into communication and fellowship with God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.
Acts 19 records the story of some exorcists who, imitating the apostle Paul, tried to use Jesus’ name to cast out an evil spirit. These exorcists did not have a relationship with Jesus, nor were they led by the Holy Spirit. And the results were disastrous and revealing. Acts 19:13-16 says: “A group of Jews was traveling from town to town casting out evil spirits. They tried to use the name of the Lord Jesus in their incantation, saying, ‘I command you in the name of Jesus, Whom Paul preaches, to come out!’ Seven sons of Sceva, a leading priest, were doing this. But one time when they tried it, the evil spirit replied, “I know Jesus, and I know Paul, but who are you?” Then the man with the evil spirit leaped on them, overpowered them, and attacked them with such violence that they fled from the house, naked and battered.”

These “sons of Sceva” were seeking to use Jesus’ name like a magical phrase – like “hocus pocus” – because they had seen Paul use Jesus’ name with such powerful results. But demon’s recognize those in whom the Holy Spirit dwells and those in whom He does not, and they know whether or not people are acting in Jesus’ authority because of our relationship with Him by God’s Spirit, and when people are doing their own thing apart from Him.

When a child of God, rooted in a relationship with Jesus Christ, commands demon’s in Jesus’ name, they must obey: Because the Christian has the Holy Spirit; because the Christian is ministering out of his or her close relationship with Jesus. Jesus Christ is the only way anyone has any right to be in communion with the Father, and the only reason we can bring our requests to Him.

John 15:1-7 says: “I am the true grapevine, and My Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch of Mine that doesn’t produce fruit, and He prunes the branches that do bear fruit so they will produce even more. You have already been pruned and purified by the message I have given you. Remain in Me, and I will remain in you. For a branch cannot produce fruit if it is severed from the vine, and you cannot be fruitful unless you remain in Me.

“Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in Me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from Me you can do nothing. Anyone who does not remain in Me is thrown away like a useless branch and withers. Such branches are gathered into a pile to be burned. But if you remain in Me and My words remain in you, you may ask for anything you want, and it will be granted!”

My brothers and sisters: We have nothing in ourselves. We have no righteousness, no goodness, no reason why magnificent, almighty, holy-God should pay any attention to insignificant, small, sinful-us. We must acknowledge our helplessness and realize that Jesus Christ is our only hope.

Preacher R. A. Torrey said it like this: “There is no use in our trying to approach God in any other way than in the name of Jesus Christ, and on the ground of Jesus’ Own claims upon God, and on the ground of His atoning death whereby He took our sins upon Himself and made it possible for us to approach God on the ground of His claims upon God.
“While we have no claims upon God because of any goodness or service of our own, Jesus Christ, as we have said, has infinite claims upon God and has given us the right to approach God in His name, and we ought to go boldly to God and ask great things of God.”

Torrey goes on: “…Do you realize that we honor the name of Christ by asking great things in that name? Do you realize that we dishonor that name by not daring to ask great things in that name? Oh, have faith in the power of Jesus’ name and dare to ask great things in His name.”
When we pray in Jesus’ name we are acknowledging our unity with Jesus Christ: He the vine, we the branches; He the head, we His body. So when we pray in Jesus’ name we are praying as Jesus would. The prayer-pattern I’ve been setting before us gives us time to meditate on God’s Word and listen for the Holy Spirit’s direction before we go on to our varied requests for ourselves and others. When the Lord Jesus promises us that “we will receive whatever we ask for in His name,” He is not giving us a blank check, He is offering us a relationship with Himself that will grow us to know His mind and His heart and to join with Him in asking the Father for it all.

Praying in Jesus’ name, that is, knowing we’ve asked for what Jesus would ask for, and, praying in His name because He is God-the-Son and because He has taken away the sins of the world – Who Jesus is and what Jesus has done – praying in His name gives us great contentment and assurance that the Father has heard and will answer our prayers, because we know He hears and answers for the sake of Jesus.

The Lord Jesus also calls us to pray together, and if we are truly praying His will, then we should be able to agree with each other’s prayers knowing they are from Him.

In Matthew 18:19-20 Jesus says: “I also tell you this: If two of you agree here on earth concerning anything you ask, My Father in Heaven will do it for you. For where two or three gather together as My followers, I am there among them.”

We practice discernment in our praying when we pray together and agree in prayer. Just as we seek the counsel and confirmation of other Spirit-filled Christians when we believe we have received some kind of special direction from the Lord, when we pray together and agree in prayer we are seeking the confirmation of the other Spirit-filled
Christians we’ve been praying with to see if what we’ve asked for is truly Jesus’ mind and will and so can truly be asked in His name. If it can then we are assured that Jesus has been present and been praying through and among us, and we can be confident that God has heard and will answer our prayers.

I’ve been in many prayer meetings where this one prays this and that one prays that and it all seems so disheveled and chaotic. And I have been in many prayer meetings where this one prays, and then that one carefully agrees with the prayer, perhaps repeating different parts of it in his or her own words, or perhaps echoing the sentiment while adding new aspects of their own. There is always such a sense of intensity and immensity in those times of agreed upon prayer – I’m not talking about things feeling good or emotions “getting all-fired-up” – but a heaviness and sense of expectation, as though Heaven were tearing Earth wide-open and invading as we were speaking!

Of course, our faith in Jesus – and living according to that faith – is supposed to continue growing our whole lives long. It begins when we recognize that we are sinners and begin believing that Jesus’ death served as the atoning sacrifice for our sins. That’s where faith begins. But just as we’ve believed Jesus to have done what He said He’d done on the cross, the Lord Jesus wants us to keep on believing that He will keep on doing all that He has said He will do.

In Mark 11:23-24 and Matthew 21:21-22 Jesus says: “I tell you the truth, you can say to this mountain, ‘May you be lifted up and thrown into the sea,’ and it will happen. But you must really believe it will happen and have no doubt in your heart. I tell you, you can pray for anything, and if you believe that you’ve received it, it will be yours.”

And in Matthew 8, when the Lord offers to go to the home of a Roman commander to heal his servant, the Roman commander says: “Lord, I am not worthy to have You come into my home. Just say the word from where You are, and my servant will be healed. I know this because I am under the authority of my superior officers, and I have authority over my soldiers. I only need to say, ‘Go,’ and they go, or ‘Come,’ and they come. And if I say to my slaves, ‘Do this,’ they do it.” (Vv. 8-9)

Clearly the command-structure of the Roman army gave the centurion a way to understand the command-structure of Heaven and Earth. And we can grow in such mountain-moving faith as we read the Bible, believe what we read, pray ourselves, and experience God’s answers to our prayers, and as we keep on asking the Holy Spirit to fill us, and as we keep on doing the works of Jesus that the Holy Spirit leads us and empowers us to do.

We see it all around us in the world: God does seem to work according to the largeness or smallness of our faith in what He can do. To those who trust Jesus, He is able to do great things. To those with no trust, or who discount Jesus altogether, He is able to do only a little. According to His sovereignty over the affairs of human beings, God has chosen to make faith the means by which He works in the human sphere. Faith: That deep trust that Jesus will do what He says He will do. When we greatly trust that He will do what He has said, we see great things happen! When we don’t ask Him for great things, or when our faith that He will grant us our requests is slight, well, are we surprised that we see little if nothing at all in answer? Faith is the open door that welcomes and enables our cooperation with God. And faith welcomes and enables us to receive answers to prayer.

Next Sunday evening from 7:00 to 8:30pm we will be meeting next door in the Manse for prayer. Come and pray in Jesus’ name. Come and let us agree together in our prayers. Come and let us believe together that God will be listening and that even here in sleepy little Milford that Heaven wants to tear open Earth and pouring out the riches of the God’s Kingdom and every good thing among us.

Pray in Jesus’ name this week. Pray together in agreement, when you can. And pray with faith that our Abba can and will do great things as we agree together praying in Jesus’ name!
?
And then, next Sunday evening, let’s come and pray those ways all together! He is worthy! With Him all things are possible!

Introduction
The emperor of Rome from AD 54 to 68 was Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, also known simply as Nero. The emperor was not known for being a godly person and engaged in a variety of illicit acts, homosexual marriage being among them. In AD 64 the great Roman fire occurred, with Nero himself being suspected of arson. In his writings, the Roman senator and historian Tacitus recorded, “To get rid of the report [that he had started the fire], Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace” (Annals, XV).
It was during the reign of Nero that the apostle Paul wrote his epistle to the Romans. While one might expect him to encourage the Christians in Rome to rise up against their oppressive ruler, in the chapter 13, we find instead:

Romans 13:1-7 [NLTse]
Everyone must submit to governing authorities. For all authority comes from God, and those in positions of authority have been placed there by God. ² So anyone who rebels against authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and they will be punished. ³ For the authorities do not strike fear in people who are doing right, but in those who are doing wrong. Would you like to live without fear of the authorities? Do what is right, and they will honor you. ⁴ The authorities are God’s servants, sent for your good. But if you are doing wrong, of course you should be afraid, for they have the power to punish you. They are God’s servants, sent for the very purpose of punishing those who do what is wrong. ⁵ So you must submit to them, not only to avoid punishment, but also to keep a clear conscience.
⁶ Pay your taxes, too, for these same reasons. For government workers need to be paid. They are serving God in what they do. ⁷ Give to everyone what you owe them: Pay your taxes and government fees to those who collect them, and give respect and honor to those who are in authority.

Sermon

Even under the reign of a ruthless and godless emperor, Paul, writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, tells his readers to be in subjection to the government. Moreover, he states that no authority exists other than that established by God, and that rulers are serving God in their political office.

Peter writes nearly the same thing in his first New Testament letter:  “For the Lord’s sake, submit to all human authority—whether the king as head of state, or the officials he has appointed. For the king has sent them to punish those who do wrong and to honor those who do right.
“It is God’s will that your honorable lives should silence those ignorant people who make foolish accusations against you. For you are free, yet you are God’s slaves, so don’t use your freedom as an excuse to do evil. Respect everyone, and love the family of believers. Fear God, and respect the king. (2:13–17).

Both Paul’s and Peter’s teachings have led to quite a few questions from Christians: Do Paul and Peter mean that Christians are always to submit to whatever the government commands, no matter what is asked of them?

A brief look at the various views of civil disobedience might help. Civil disobedience is the active, public, refusal to obey certain laws, demands, or commands of a government, or of an occupying international power. There are at least three general positions on the matter of civil disobedience. The anarchist view says that a person can choose to disobey the government whenever he or she likes and whenever he or she feels they are personally justified in doing so. Such a stance has no biblical support whatsoever, as evidenced in the writings of Paul in Romans 13, as we just read.

The extremist patriot says that a person should always follow and obey their country, no matter what the command. As will be shown in a moment, this view also does not have biblical support. Moreover, it is not even supported in the history of nations. For example, during the Nuremberg trials, the attorneys for the Nazi war criminals attempted to use the defense that their clients were only following the direct orders of the government and therefore could not be held responsible for their actions. However, one of the judges dismissed their argument with the simple question: “But gentlemen, is there not a law above our laws?”
The position the Scriptures uphold is one of biblical submission, with a Christian being allowed to act in civil disobedience to the government if it commands evil, that is, that the government requires the Christian to act in a manner that is contrary to the clear teachings and requirements of God’s Word.

Let’s look at some examples of civil disobedience in Scripture.

In Exodus 1, the Egyptian Pharaoh gave the clear command to two Hebrew midwives that they were to kill all male Jewish babies upon their births. An extreme patriot would have carried out the government’s order, yet the Bible says the midwives disobeyed Pharaoh and – I quote – “because the midwives feared God, they refused to obey the king’s orders. They allowed the boys to live” (Exodus 1:17). The Bible goes on to say the midwives lied to Pharaoh about why they were letting the children live; yet even though they lied and disobeyed their government, “God was good to the midwives, and the Israelites continued to multiply, growing more and more powerful. And because the midwives feared God, He gave them families of their own” (Exodus 1:20–21).

In Joshua 2, a prostitute names Rahab directly disobeyed a command from the king of Jericho to produce the Israelite spies who had entered the city to gain intelligence for battle. Instead, she let them down by rope out of her city-wall window so they could escape. Even though Rahab had received a clear order from the top government official, she resisted the command and was saved from the city’s destruction when Joshua and the Israelite army destroyed it.

The book of 1 Samuel records a command given by King Saul during a military campaign that no one could eat until Saul had won his battle with the Philistines. However, Saul’s son Jonathan, who had not heard the order, ate honey to refresh himself from the hard battle the army had waged. When Saul found out about it, he ordered his son to die. However, the people resisted Saul and his command and saved Jonathan from being put to death (1 Samuel 14:45).

Another example of civil disobedience in keeping with biblical submission is found in 1 Kings 18. That chapter briefly introduces a man named Obadiah who “was a devoted follower of the LORD.” When the queen Jezebel was killing God’s prophets, Obadiah took a hundred of them and hid them from her so they could live. Such an act was in clear defiance of the ruling authority’s wishes.

In 2 Kings, the only apparently God-approved revolt against a reigning government official is recorded. Queen-Mother Athaliah, upon the death of her son, King Ahaziah, began a purge of all the potential heirs and her competitors to the throne of Judah. However, Prince Joash, one of King Ahaziah’s many sons, was taken and hidden from the Queen-Mother so that the bloodline would be preserved. Six years later, the priest Jehoiada gathered an army around him, declared Joash to be king, and put Athaliah to death.

Daniel records a number of examples of civil disobedience. In chapter 3 Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego refuse to bow down to King Nebuchadnezzar’s golden idol in disobedience to the king’s direct command. In chapter 6 Daniel defies the decree forbidding prayer to anyone other than the king. In both cases, God rescued His people from the death penalty that was imposed, seemingly showing His approval of their actions.

In the New Testament, the book of Acts records the civil disobedience of Peter and John towards the Jewish authorities that were in power at the time. After Peter healed a man born lame, Peter and John were arrested for preaching about Jesus and put in jail. The religious authorities were determined to stop them from teaching about Jesus; however, Peter said, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to give heed to you rather than to God, you be the judge; for we cannot stop speaking about what we have seen and heard” (Acts 4:19–20). Later, those same rulers confronted the apostles again and reminded them of their command to not teach about Jesus, but Peter responded, “We must obey God rather than any human authority” (Acts 5:29).

One last example of civil disobedience is found in the book of Revelation where Antichrist commands all those across the end times to worship an image of himself. But by the Holy Spirit the apostle John, who wrote Revelation, states that Christians should disobey Antichrist and the world government and refuse to worship the image (Revelation 13:15) just as Daniel’s companions violated Nebuchadnezzar’s decree to worship his idol.

What can be drawn from these examples? The guidelines for a Christian’s rebellion against their government can be summed up as follows:

Christians should openly and publicly resist a government that commands or compels what is in direct violation of God’s laws and commands, and should work in-line with God’s ways to bring about change in that nation and government.

If a Christian disobeys an evil government, unless he or she can flee from the government, they should accept that government’s punishment for their actions. (Peter, John, and the apostles’ accepting their beatings and imprisonment would be the rationale for this.)

Of course, Christians are certainly permitted to work to install new government leaders within the laws that have been established. (Such as getting involved in campaigning and voting.)

Lastly and most importantly, Christians are commanded to pray for their leaders and for God to intervene according to His timing to change any ungodly paths that they are pursuing. As Paul writes to young Pastor Timothy, “I urge you, first of all, to pray for all people. Ask God to help them; intercede on their behalf, and give thanks for them. Pray this way for kings and all who are in authority so that we can live peaceful and quiet lives marked by godliness and dignity.” (1 Timothy 2:1–2).

You see, this nation – this world – is not our home. We are bound to a King Who has greater hold on our allegiance than any president, king, or prime minister this world might put in power. And we are subject to His laws, to His commandments, to His ways when the laws and commandments and ways of this world’s governments conflict with them.

So when this world’s leaders and governments pass laws that tell us it’s okay to kill our unwanted, unborn children, we will not because we know it goes against the laws of our Father and His Kingdom in Heaven.
When this world’s leaders and governments tell us that it’s okay to get divorced on the one hand or to live together as husband and wife without being married on the other, we will not because we know that – even if no one else seems to be getting hurt, that – it hurts our Father in Heaven. When human powers and authorities tell us that it’s okay to marry two men or two women in holy matrimony, we will not because human authorities did not define marriage to begin with and they don’t have the authority to re-define it.

Even if someone claims to be representing God and has wonder-working powers and the might of the nations’ military’s to back them up: If they tell us it is okay to treat those of other faiths and other skin colors and other nationalities and other economic states differently – as though “they” were of lesser worth in God’s eyes than “us” – we will not. If they tell us to treat those of other genders and other sexual orientations and those of other intellectual and physical capacities and other emotional and mental states than us differently, because they can’t know a real quality of life or be productive members of society, we will not. If our friends or family members tell us it is okay to have an affair, or to lie or to cheat or to steal (as long as we don’t get caught) we will not. We won’t call people degrading names. We won’t talk about them behind their backs.

We will love the One Who laid down His life for us, the One Who has loved us first and given us new lives, the One Who has called us and made a way for us to be His friends, with every thought and emotion, with every word and deed, with all our influence and with all our stuff. We will study and trust the Word of God – the Word of God that has been passed down to us and preserved for us at the cost of countless saints and martyrs lives – and we will love all those made in the image of God, believing and trusting that “God loved the world!” And that “He gave His one and only Son so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life.”

We recognize that this will likely be hard for us. But our Abba has given us the Holy Spirit to empower us for each and every work He has called us to. And we believe He has called us to this work: To tell the world His good news; to show the world His great love.

Yes, that includes loving gays and lesbians and transgendered persons and queers: We followers of Jesus Christ will love them as 1 Corinthians 13 defines love and calls us to love one another and others. That includes the unborn and the terminally ill and those of every handicap and walk of life. That includes government officials, and those of opposing political parties. That includes our president and the members of the Supreme Court and our representatives and senators in Congress. We will never treat others as property or as numbers or as objects or as test cases. We will not in any way ignore or demean the image of God in others and the love of God for others, but in all things we will let our faith in Jesus Christ show itself through acts of love: Loving each other and others – even those who are God-haters and those who have declared themselves our enemies – every other. We will love one and all as God in Christ has loved us. Because the Lord Jesus has shown us that how we treat those around us – especially those hurting and in need – is how we are treating Him.

?And we would see You, Lord Jesus!

Notes
The first part of this sermon borrowed heavily from GotQuestions.org’s article, “When is civil disobedience allowed for a Christian?” (http://www.gotquestions.org/civil-disobedience.html)

Luke 6:12-19 [NLTse]

¹² One day soon afterward Jesus went up on a mountain to pray, and He prayed to God all night. ¹³ At daybreak He called together all of His disciples and chose twelve of them to be apostles. Here are their names:

¹⁴ Simon (whom He named Peter), Andrew (Peter’s brother), James, John, Philip, Bartholomew, ¹⁵ Matthew, Thomas, James (son of Alphaeus), Simon (who was called the zealot), ¹⁶ Judas (son of James), [and] Judas Iscariot (who later betrayed Him).

¹⁷ When they came down from the mountain, the disciples stood with Jesus on a large, level area, surrounded by many of His followers and by the crowds. There were people from all over Judea and from Jerusalem and from as far north as the seacoasts of Tyre and Sidon. ¹⁸ They had come to hear Him and to be healed of their diseases; and those troubled by evil spirits were healed. ¹⁹ Everyone tried to touch Him, because healing power went out from Him, and He healed everyone.

Sermon

Nowhere in Scripture does Jesus say, “You should pray.” We merely hear Him telling us how, when, where, and for what to pray. (He also tells us how not to pray.) The Lord Jesus makes the obvious assumption that those who follow Him will pray. And after all my years of ministry I am convinced that if Christians spoke to God more consistently, and if we heard God speaking back to us more consistently, that we would follow Him more closely and backslide into our old sins less readily and not be so easily tempted away from Him by the attractions of the world, as so many are.

But the truth is that many do not pray consistently, and many do not hear from God consistently. A friend of mine told me that the Lord once confided in him, “My people don’t pray. So all I can do is look at them trying to do My work for Me.”

Why do we need to pray? We need to pray because God wants us to put aside our passions and ambitions and learn to build the Kingdom of God from Him using the means of grace He has provided us in His Word and prayer. He wants us to put aside our self-reliance and learn how to rely on Him and His power. He is inviting us to create new things in cooperation with Him: But those things are in His mind. We have scarcely dreamed of them!

We need to pray because God Almighty wants us to realize the shallowness of what we have been able to build with our own hands and to recognize that only by means of prayer and fellowship with Him can we create anything worthwhile or enduring.

Anyone here ever heard of Martin Luther? Martin Luther lived during the 14- and 1500s and was the father of the Protestant Reformation. It was probably one of the most corrupt and self-destructive eras of European history. Unless you were of the nobility, human life had little worth. Wars were commonplace. Sexual wickedness was so widespread that it had even pervaded the monasteries. Political strife was so unsettling – even in the church – that there were three popes wrangling with each other for control of the Roman Catholic Church.

By God’s grace Martin Luther sensed the desperation of his times and God showed him the answer. Luther wrote:

Open your eyes and look into your life and the life of all Christians, particularly the spiritual estate, and you will find that faith, hope, love, obedience, chasteness, and all virtues are languishing; that all sorts of terrible vices are reigning; that good preachers and prelates are lacking; only rogues… are ruling. Then you will see that there is a need to pray throughout the world, every hour, without ceasing, with tears of blood, because of the terrible wrath of God over men…

A lot of historians talk about the Protestant Reformation as a doctrinal debate, not as a spiritual awakening or prayer movement. But Luther, the father of Protestantism, saw prayer at the heart of everything – that without prayer, nothing enduring or good could happen.

He wrote to his friend and colleague, Philip Melanchthon:

Whatever aspect matters may assume, we can achieve all through prayer. This alone is the almighty queen of human destiny. Therewith we can accomplish everything, and thus maintain what already exists, amend what is defective, patiently put up with what is inevitable, overcome what is evil, and preserve all that is good.

The Lord Jesus assumes we will pray for the same reasons He prayed: To grow close, intimate, and into one-ness with the Father; and, to have God’s guidance and empowerment for our work each day.

In our morning’s reading we get a glimpse of the Lord Jesus being caught up in extraordinary communion with the Father. That short phrase, “He prayed to God all night,” reveals a deep, mystical intimacy with God. And yet such mystical communion between Jesus and the Father was not an end in itself but the beginnings and source of actions that began shaping God’s purposes on the earth.

Through that extended, disciplined, and intimate prayer time Jesus received the guidance and empowerment He needed to know which leaders the Father had chosen for Him to be His apostles: All who were needed to set in motion the Father’s plans for bringing salvation to the human race.

In the life of Jesus, again and again, we see that His times of prayer are, yes, times of encouraging fellowship with the Father, but they also always lead up to decisive and dynamic action, preparing Jesus for the work the Father has called Him to, and setting in motion the spiritual and human forces that, together, will establish His future.

The same is true for us. the Father calls us to prayer, and the Lord Jesus assumes we will pray, in order to draw closer and grow more intimate with Him, while at the same time giving us the direction we need for the day’s work and to prepare us to receive the empowerment we’ll need for it.

We must decide to pray as a part of our decision to follow Jesus Christ. Once having made that decision and sticking to it even in the midst of distractions and enemy diversions, you will be amazed how often prayer begins to come spontaneously. You may even begin to be surprised at the discovery that you can, through the Holy Spirit, “pray without ceasing”. More next week!

According to Luke 5:1-11 [NLTse]
5:1 One day as Jesus was preaching on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, great crowds pressed in on him to listen to the word of God. 2 He noticed two empty boats at the water’s edge, for the fishermen had left them and were washing their nets. 3 Stepping into one of the boats, Jesus asked Simon, its owner, to push it out into the water. So he sat in the boat and taught the crowds from there.
4 When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Now go out where it is deeper, and let down your nets to catch some fish.”
5 “Master,” Simon replied, “we worked hard all last night and didn’t catch a thing. But if you say so, I’ll let the nets down again.” 6 And this time their nets were so full of fish they began to tear! 7 A shout for help brought their partners in the other boat, and soon both boats were filled with fish and on the verge of sinking.
8 When Simon Peter realized what had happened, he fell to his knees before Jesus and said, “Oh, Lord, please leave me—I’m too much of a sinner to be around you.” 9 For he was awestruck by the number of fish they had caught, as were the others with him. 10 His partners, James and John, the sons of Zebedee, were also amazed.
Jesus replied to Simon, “Don’t be afraid! From now on you’ll be fishing for people!” 11 And as soon as they landed, they left everything and followed Jesus.

Sermon
Did you know that you can “follow” Jesus on Twitter? (For those of you who don’t what that is, Twitter is a blend of instant-messaging, blogging, and texting where you can send out short messages to all your friends at the same time [and anybody else around the world who tends to find you and your “tweets” interesting.] You can also link a picture or movie to a “tweet”.)

But, did you know that you can “follow” Jesus on Twitter? Yup. (Or at least someone who’s set up an account named “Jesus Christ”.) You can “follow” sports figures on Twitter. You can “follow” Hollywood celebrities. You can “follow” politicians, and your teachers, and your neighbors, or different businesses: Whomever or whatever you might find interesting or curious about at a given moment you can “follow” on Twitter. But, back to “following” Jesus…

When Jesus encountered Peter and Andrew and James and John that day on the shore of the Sea of Galilee two thousand years ago, what happened? Let’s look in the Word together, if you have your Bibles open. Looking at v. 8, after the miraculous catch of fish, we see that they recognized Jesus’ holiness – this was not just any other man – and at the same time we see them recognizing their own unworthiness. And then we see the Lord Jesus do this amazing thing: In all His holiness and splendor He calls these unworthy fishermen to join Him and follow Him; and then they left their nets and their boats (and James and John even left their dad), and they went to be with Jesus.
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For Jesus and for the Christian disciple, “following” Jesus Christ is being with Him and learning from Him and being like Him. It’s leaving behind what used to be our life in order to make Him our life. We see this across the Gospels and Acts and written about in all the letters and even The Revelation? Disciples – followers of Jesus – are always with Jesus: They listen to His teachings; they watch Him interact with lepers and prostitutes and heal the sick and cast out demons. He teaches them to pray, and how to trust God when they don’t have enough food or don’t have the money to pay their taxes. And the Lord sends them out two-by-two to try it all on their own. And they experience some successes and some failures. And they come back to Him to watch and listen and learn some more.

Notice that for disciples it’s not just the Scriptures that are so helpful to them, but it is Jesus’ personal presence with them – the living Word of God bringing the written Word of God to life within them: Teaching them, guiding them, empowering them by the Holy Spirit. And it’s the same today: The day Jesus ascended into Heaven He said to those who were with Him and following Him, “I will be with you always, even to the end of the age.” And then He ascended to the Father in Heaven and sent us the Holy Spirit to indeed be with us always – teaching us, guiding us, empowering us, Jesus’ spiritual presence with us always – even to the end of the age.

It gets me thinking how trite and trivial reading the Bible can sometimes be. What I mean is that, sometimes we can open up the Scriptures and read about Jesus Christ. We can sit here in our pews Sunday after Sunday and hear about Jesus Christ. And that does sometimes inspire us or make us feel good, but it is not the same as following Jesus, the way He first called Simon Peter and Andrew and James and John to “Come!” and follow Him. And reading about Him and hearing about Him can get us thinking of ourselves as lesser disciples. Afterall, we think that we can’t be with Him to watch Him and listen to Him and learn how to be like Him the way those first disciples could, right? But that’s not true!

The truth is, each one of us has been called by Jesus to “Come!” and follow Him the exact same way that He called those first fishermen to become fishers of people.

When you and I read the Word of God or hear the Word of God read, the Lord is not calling us to digest a variety of new information or facts or a new list of “to do”s or “to don’t”s, He is calling us to be with Him. In the reading, in the hearing, the Lord Jesus is calling us to follow Him: To be there with Him by the Sea or with the leper or before the mockers and to be there to watch Him and listen to Him as we read or hear.

Paul’s and the other apostles’ letters are a little different. In the letters Jesus is calling us to sit at His feet and let Him teach us and correct us and challenge us and rebuke us; to ask Him our questions (by the Holy Spirit) and to listen for His response in prayer or in His words as we continue read or hear.

But we never leave. There’s no leaving Him to get back to work or to get our schoolwork done or to take care of family responsibilities or to watch TV. No. We’re His disciples. And He’s called us to stay with Him throughout our days and nights, joining with Him at school and our workplaces and homes in doing our part among the hurting and the lonely, the sick and the outcast, and responding as we’ve watched and heard Him do when facing those who might make fun of us for our faith.
Simon Peter, Andrew, James, and John continued to fish (sometimes) as they followed Jesus. The apostle Paul continued his trade as a leather-worker as he followed Jesus. But they were no longer identified by their trade. Now they were known by everyone who knew them as followers of Jesus.

This new life we’ve been given in Christ is not a religion or a philosophy or a teaching or even a crusade. Christianity is following the risen Lord Jesus through the ministry of the Holy Spirit Whom He has given to us. And Jesus is not some celebrity or political leader out there who’s comments and activities are fun to keep track of from afar. No. Jesus is with us and wants us to be with Him, to follow Him.

So, think about your life in Christ: Are you following Jesus from the comfort of your pew or easy chair, learning some more Christian facts and moral directives as you read and study? Or are you up and running and following Jesus by the seashore, and along Broad Street, and into your school and your workplace and as you write your notes and talk with your friends?
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Jesus is calling us – Jesus is calling you – to “Come!” to follow Him, and to change the world!

John 15:1-17 [NLTse]
“I am the true grapevine, and My Father is the gardener. ² He cuts off every branch of Mine that doesn’t produce fruit, and He prunes the branches that do bear fruit so they will produce even more. ³ You have already been pruned and purified by the message I have given you. ⁴ Remain in Me, and I will remain in you. For a branch cannot produce fruit if it is severed from the vine, and you cannot be fruitful unless you remain in Me.
⁵ “Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in Me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from Me you can do nothing. ⁶ Anyone who does not remain in Me is thrown away like a useless branch and withers. Such branches are gathered into a pile to be burned. ⁷ But if you remain in Me and My words remain in you, you may ask for anything you want, and it will be granted! ⁸ When you produce much fruit, you are My true disciples. This brings great glory to My Father.
⁹ “I have loved you even as the Father has loved Me. Remain in My love. ¹⁰ When you obey My commandments, you remain in My love, just as I obey My Father’s commandments and remain in His love. ¹¹ I have told you these things so that you will be filled with My joy. Yes, your joy will overflow! ¹² This is My commandment: Love each other in the same way I have loved you. ¹³ There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. ¹⁴ You are My friends if you do what I command. ¹⁵ I no longer call you slaves, because a master doesn’t confide in his slaves. Now you are My friends, since I have told you everything the Father told Me. ¹⁶ You didn’t choose Me. I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce lasting fruit, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for, using My name. ¹⁷ This is My command: Love each other.

Sermon
Chapter 14 of John ends telling us that Jesus and His disciples have left the “upper room” where they just finished celebrating their “last supper” Passover Seder. I imagine that they have made their way through the pilgrim-crowded streets of Jerusalem, the air heavy with the smell of roasted lamb from all the Passover meals being shared throughout the city.

As they make their way out of Jerusalem and across the Kidron Valley to the Mount of Olives, I think they must have passed through a vineyard with its row after row of grape vines strung out across their arbor-frames. The Lord stops at a vine loaded with branches as His disciples gather around Him. He finds in this plant a symbol of His relation to them. This natural vine is, in His eyes, an image – an earthly copy – of the true, eternal, essential, spiritual vine. And He speaks to them of His future union with them and all His people by directing them to this object that is before all their eyes.

Out in the distance, perhaps, is a great bonfire which Jesus and the disciples know is the hired workers burning the pruned-off worthless-branches to keep warm. And Jesus points there, too, to the fire, to bring home His illustration, as well…

[Pull out and held up a power strip. Advance a slide onto the screen that says, “JESUS”, and point back and forth between the strip and the screen until people get the idea that the power strip is representing Jesus. (Make sure the power strip is already plugged into an outlet.) Then pull out a lamp. Advance onto the screen a slide that says, “YOU & ME & OUR FELLOW CHRISTIANS”, and point back and forth from the lamp to the screen until people understand that the lamp represents us. Then plug the lamp into the power strip. (And the lamp will light up.) Then repeat that process with the other lamps, making sure one of the lamps doesn’t light up. After the last lamp is plugged in, look back at the lamps and make a big deal of noticing the one lamp that isn’t lit. Fool around with the lamp for a bit, and when it doesn’t light, theatrically unplug it and throw it into a trash can, having it make some great big crashing sound. Advance the slideshow to say, “FOR THE BURN BARREL”. Then go and plug another working lamp in its place…]

Jesus is One with His Church: He is the head, we are the Body; He is the husband, we are His Bride; He is the vine, we are the branches; He is the life, and we live that life. And yet I don’t think that most Christians think of themselves as a part of Him, as one with Him. No, we are such selfish creatures that we tend to only be aware of ourselves and our feelings in the light of our experiences: Us the center of all there is!
But the truth is that Jesus – not any of us – is the center of all there is. As Paul sings in the Christ-hymn of Colossians 1: “Christ is the visible image of the invisible God. He existed before anything was created and is supreme over all creation, for through Him God created everything in the heavenly realms and on earth. He made the things we can see and the things we can’t see—such as thrones, kingdoms, rulers, and authorities in the unseen world. Everything was created through Him and for Him. He existed before anything else, and He holds all creation together. Christ is also the head of the church, which is His body. He is the beginning, supreme over all who rise from the dead. So He is first in everything. For God in all His fullness was pleased to live in Christ, and through Him God reconciled everything to Himself. He made peace with everything in heaven and on earth by means of Christ’s blood on the cross.” (Vv. 15-20)

Jesus Christ is the center of life, the center of the universe: He is the visible image of the invisible God; He is the first to exist and supreme over all creation; He is the creator of everything there is, and everything there is was created specifically for Him, and He holds everything together; He is the first to rise from the dead, and it has been through Jesus’ blood that peace has been established throughout the heavens and across the earth. Yes, Jesus is the center! And Jesus says we are one with Him.

Before Paul had become a Christian, while he was leading the Jewish leadership in persecuting the Church, the Lord Jesus appeared to Paul, asking him, “Why are you persecuting Me?” The Lord made no distinction between Himself and His followers whom Paul was persecuting, between Himself and His Body, between Himself and His bride, between Himself and His Church: “Why are you persecuting Me?” Jesus asked.

In his first letter to the Corinthians Paul writes that if you sleep with a prostitute that you are uniting Jesus with that prostitute. Paul doesn’t say that it is like uniting Jesus with a prostitute, he says, “Should a man take his body, which is part of Christ, and join it to a prostitute? Never!” (6:15) We are united, we are one, we are a part of Christ!

Which means that when you are going through disappointments and trials, that Jesus is going through them with you, too. When you are feeling alone and betrayed, you are in fact sharing those moments with Jesus Christ. When no one can know how you feel, Jesus knows.
When Jesus says, “Remain in Me” He is using the verb form of the noun for dwelling place. Jesus is saying, “Dwell in Me.” Jesus dwells in us, and He’s chosen us and given us a new life so that we may dwell in Him. And we do dwell in Him when we obey His commandments and when we love one another, laying down our lives for each other.

It is the reality of the Lord Jesus Christ dwelling in us and us dwelling in Him that results in the fruitfulness of our character that Galatians 5:22-23 speaks about, making us more loving and joyful, more peaceful and patient, more kind and good and faithful and gentle and self-controlled. It is the reality of the Lord Jesus Christ dwelling in us and us dwelling in Him that results in the fruitfulness of our ministries and witness, that Jesus says produces crops 30 times, 60 times, 100 times what was planted! (See Matthew 13:23.) It is the reality of the Lord Jesus Christ dwelling in us and us dwelling in Him that results in a fruitfulness that grows us to more often know and do the right thing, and a growing righteousness that results in eternal life.

Even so, like the lamp that didn’t light, we can sometimes look good and like we’re “dwelling in Him” to others, while not truly be dwelling in Jesus at all. Perhaps we have not truly understood Jesus’ message about the Kingdom; or perhaps we are that kind of person who has tended to live for Jesus with great joy, but when life’s troubles or persecution-for-being-a-Christian comes we fall away from Him; or perhaps the worries of life and the attraction of wealth have choked His fruitfulness in our lives? [to THE BURN BARREL!]

The Lord Jesus leads the disciples away from the vineyard and up toward the place they’ll be spending the night on the Mount of Olives saying, “I have told you these things so that you will be filled with My joy. Yes, your joy will overflow!” (V. 11) Notice that the Lord did not say that you and I will have joy like His on account of these things. No. His joy – the Lord Jesus’ Own joy, because we’re a part of Him, His Own joy – will fill us. As He dwells in us and as we dwell in Him, such will be our unity, such will be our fellowship, such will be our communion, that that same joy Jesus Himself has on account of doing all that the Father sent Him to do – His Own joy – as we daily do all that Jesus sends us to do – His Own joy will be ours!
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And in that place as the closest and most intimate of friends, He hears and answers our prayers.

1 John 3:11-24 [NLTse]

¹¹ This is the message you have heard from the beginning: We should love one another. ¹² We must not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and killed his brother. And why did he kill him? Because Cain had been doing what was evil, and his brother had been doing what was righteous. ¹³ So don’t be surprised, dear brothers and sisters, if the world hates you.

¹⁴ If we love our brothers and sisters who are believers, it proves that we have passed from death to life. But a person who has no love is still dead. ¹⁵ Anyone who hates another brother or sister is really a murderer at heart. And you know that murderers don’t have eternal life within them.

¹⁶ We know what real love is because Jesus gave up His life for us. So we also ought to give up our lives for our brothers and sisters. ¹⁷ If someone has enough money to live well and sees a brother or sister in need but shows no compassion—how can God’s love be in that person?

¹⁸ Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions. ¹⁹ Our actions will show that we belong to the truth, so we will be confident when we stand before God. ²⁰ Even if we feel guilty, God is greater than our feelings, and He knows everything.

²¹ Dear friends, if we don’t feel guilty, we can come to God with bold confidence. ²² And we will receive from Him whatever we ask because we obey Him and do the things that please Him.

²³ And this is His commandment: We must believe in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another, just as He commanded us. ²⁴ Those who obey God’s commandments remain in fellowship with Him, and He with them. And we know He lives in us because the Spirit He gave us lives in us.

When asked which was the greatest commandment of all the Lord Jesus answered, “To love God; to love Him with all our hearts and minds; to love Him using everything we have; and, to love Him using all of our influence and talents and time.” But Jesus went on also saying, “And there’s another commandment that’s just as great as loving God: Loving those around you; in all the same ways you love yourself, to love those around you.” And the Son of God underlined what He’d said, saying, “Everything that God has had to say can be summarized to ‘love God’ and ‘love those around you like you love yourself’.”

“What is love?” has been the most searched phrase on Google, according to the company. Our society has answered that question in a variety of ways. Some say that love is “a powerful neurological condition like hunger or thirst, only more permanent.” That love can be viewed as “a survival tool – a mechanism we have evolved to promote long-term relationships, mutual defense, parental support of children, and to promote feelings of safety and security.”

Some say that love depends on where you are in relation to it. “Secure in it, it can feel as mundane and necessary as air – you exist within it, almost unnoticing. Deprived of it, it can feel like an obsession; all consuming, a physical pain.”

Another definition is that love is “perfect, amazing, beautiful, just plain awesome, the tears on your pillow, the outbursts of laughter in the middle of class, friendship set on fire, like a war between your head and your heart, both your enemy and your best friend, what keeps you going back to her [or him], pain and happiness at the same time…” Or, “love is like when you tell a guy you like his shirt, then he wears it every day”.

God tells us that love is “patient and kind. That love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. That love does not demand its own way. That love is not irritable, and that love keeps no record of being wronged. Love does not rejoice about injustice, no, love rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up; love never loses faith; love is always hopeful, and love endures through every circumstance.”

Does any of that get you thinking about your “love” relationships? Is your “love” like that?

James Baldwin said that “love is battle; love is war”. And there is surely a battle going on in our culture and our world over love.

Our culture calls a child whose parents never got married a “love child”, and speaks of sexual activity of almost any kind as “making love”, even though God tells men and women to get married before they start being sexual. People say, “I love chocolate.” People say, “I love God” even while they are doing what God has told them not to do; even though Jesus has said that if we truly love Him then we will do what He’s said.

Yes, there’s a big difference between what our culture considers love and what God considers love. And God’s Word, the Bible, says that “God is love.”

Let’s go back to 1 Corinthians 13, the Bible’s “love” chapter. Love is

• “patient and kind”
• “not jealous or boastful or proud or rude”
• “does not demand its own way”
• “is not irritable”
• “keeps no record of being wronged”
• “does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out”
• “never gives up”
• “never loses faith”
• “is always hopeful” and,
• “endures through every circumstance”.

How does your love for your husband, how does your love for your wife, stand up to that? Much nicer to have “love” just be some warm-fuzzy feeling or some ache or desire, isn’t it? How does your love for your kids or your parents measure up? Nicer just to be able to say, “I love you” and mean something vague and well-meaning, isn’t it? How about your love for God?

Are you patient and kind towards God? Are you jealous or boastful or proud or rude towards God or around God? Do you demand your own way with God? Are you irritable with Him? Do you remember all the times you feel God’s treated you badly or wrong? Have you given up on God? Have you lost faith in God? Do you love God?

In our reading this morning from 1 John 3, the apostle John is writing about love. He compares a love-relationship with Cain and Abel, and that we shouldn’t be surprised how badly non-Christians can sometimes treat us just because we are Christians, because unbelievers see us doing right things while they are doing wicked things, and it makes them jealous and angry and feel judged. And they take that out on us.

All the more reason to love each other, John says. And if you hate a fellow-Christian, he writes, then you’re just acting like an unbeliever, like Cain.

Giving up our lives is what love is all about, the Holy Spirit says through John. Jesus showed His love for us by giving up His life for us, and we show our love for Him and for one another by giving up our lives.

Because God Himself is love it is impossible to truly love another person without God’s help. When we are truly loving others we are showing that God’s Own nature is within us. That’s why we are called “children of God” because only God is love, and so to truly love one must have God’s Spirit within them: The Holy Spirit Who fills our hearts with God’s love.

As a pastor I am very familiar with the height and breadth and depth of God’s love. Many people will give me a hug or send me a card, saying, “I love you, Pastor.” I know they are wanting me to say, “And I love you!” I do that now, but I didn’t used to. Because I know all that love is! I know all that love means! And I know how short I fall. And I don’t want to say hollow words.

But the Lord’s taught me that while I can’t love anyone – that is, truly love anyone – that by Christ in me I can. It is God’s first loving us that moves us to truly love. It is God’s nature growing in us as we trust and obey Holy Spirit more within us that moves us to true love. It is God’s work upon us through the loving teaching, the loving fellowship, and the loving discipline of His church – God’s loving family – that moves us to truly love. Yes, we have to give all we have and are to love God and those around us God’s way, but as we do it is our trusting in that power that raised Jesus from the dead that will grant all of our efforts and work to transform our minds and hearts.

And John tells us that the greatest effort and the greatest work we are called to do is to give up our lives. We are all much more focused on the ways we want others to love us and give up their lives for us! But God doesn’t call us to make sure others are loving us or to make sure that others are giving up their lives for us. No. He calls us to love Him and those around us, and to give up our lives for Him and for them. Giving up our lives so that we might take up God’s life! Laying down our plans and dreams so that we might pursue God’s plans and dreams.

Oswald Chambers said, “We have no right to judge where we should be put or to have preconceived notions as to what God is fitting us for.  God engineers everything; wherever He puts us, our one great aim [must be] to pour out a wholehearted devotion to Him in that particular work.

And whatever those works might be day by day – big and little works, big and little sacrifices, faithfully doing the seemingly world-changing and faithfully doing the seemingly inconsequential – all the things that trusting Him leads us to do – whatever attitudes, words, and actions that believing in Jesus Christ and giving up our lives might lead us to, when we do them, it is Him doing them in us, and it is called love.

Let’s pray for God to help us be like Him, and to fill us with His Spirit, so that we might truly love…

O Father: You tell us in Your Word that You have loved us from the very beginning of the universe, of the world… That the perfect love You have for Yourself Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, has multiplied and overflowed, and so You created us – Your covenant-people, Your beloved, Your church – to be the focus of Your love. But we did not love You in return. No, we loved ourselves. And so our love grew twisted, and our ideas about love grew twisted…

But in Jesus, Father, You have shown us what real love looks like again! Forgive us our sinfulness. Restore us to fellowship with You and each other, and teach us about love and how to love. Fill us with Your Holy Spirit and grant us greater and greater surrender to You in us. We love You, Father, and want to truly love You more. We love each other, Father, and we want to truly love each other more.

Lord: You have made Yourself like us. Make us like You. In Jesus’ name…

Isaiah 25:6-9 [NLTse]

⁶ In Jerusalem, the Lord of Heaven’s Armies will spread a wonderful feast for all the people of the world. It will be a delicious banquet with clear, well-aged wine and choice meat. ⁷ There He will remove the cloud of gloom, the shadow of death that hangs over the earth. ⁸ He will swallow up death forever! The Sovereign Lord will wipe away all tears. He will remove forever all insults and mockery against His land and people. The Lord has spoken!

⁹ In that day the people will proclaim, “This is our God! We trusted in Him, and He saved us! This is the Lord, in Whom we trusted. Let us rejoice in the salvation He brings!”

Sermon

Most people are afraid of death. Most people are afraid of themselves dying or of their loved ones dying. It is that fear of death that gives terrorists such power. It is that fear of death that has made the healthcare industry so profitable. It is that fear of death that keeps so many parents up at night worrying about their kids, and so many husbands or wives worrying about their beloveds, and that keeps so many other friendships and caring relationships that are so burdened by worry: Because of so many people’s fear of death.

But Jesus tells us that these people uuu are not dead, but just sleeping, at least to Him. The leader of a synangogue came to Jesus asking Him to help his daughter who was deathly ill, only she died before Jesus could get to her. And Jesus said of the synagogue leader’s daughter who had died, that she was just sleeping, and then He raised her from death and she came back to life. (See Matthew 9, Mark 5, and Luke 8.)

Jesus said to His disciples about the death of their friend, Lazarus, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but now I will go and wake him up.” The disciples didn’t get what He was saying and so responded, “Lord, if he is sleeping, he will soon get better!” (Because they thought Jesus had meant that Lazarus was actually sleeping.) So He told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead.” And then Jesus went and called Lazarus – who’d been dead for 4 days – back from death to life. (See John 12.)

The Sadduccees – a Jewish denomination that didn’t believe in the resurrection of the dead – came to Jesus once seeking to prove to Him their belief that once dead always and forever dead. But Jesus asked them, “Haven’t you ever read about this in the writings of Moses, in the story of the burning bush? Long after Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had died, how God said to Moses, ‘I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? So He is the God of the living, not the dead…” (See Mark 12.)

Jesus told a story once about a rich man and a poor man that well-illustrated what happens at death because in the story both men died. The rich man had been greedy and hard-hearted, so when he died his soul went to Hell, where he suffered greatly. The poor man had loved the Lord (we are to assume), so when he died his soul went to Heaven, where he met father Abraham and was greatly comforted. So the story gives us a picture of what happens to people at death: Our bodies are inactive – they rest, they sleep; but our souls continue just as alive and awake as before either in Heaven with the Lord being comforted or in Hell apart from the Lord suffering torment. But, either way, we’re not dead. These are not dead. [Pointing to the slide of Milford Cemetery.] Jesus has conquered death!

In Jesus Christ there is no more fear, of death or anything else! Do you remember that the very first thing the angel said to the women when they arrived at the tomb was, “Don’t be afraid!”? Well, that was not only a verb of command – exclamation point, “Don’t be afraid!” – but it was an ongoing action verb – most literally saying, “Don’t ever be afraid again!” Why could the angel tell them to never be afraid again? Because Jesus was no longer in the tomb! He had risen from the dead! Jesus has defeated death!

In our reading this morning – 500 years before the birth of Jesus – Isaiah prophesied that the Christ would “remove the cloud of doom, the shadow of death that hangs over the earth.” (V. 7) And now Jesus has suffered that doom for us, and so it has been removed. And we no longer live in shadow but we are the direct recipients of Jesus’ marvelous light: We and all those who believe and have ever believed! That’s what Jesus has done! That’s what His victory over death and Hell has done!

He’s proved wrong the Sadduccees and any who would say that after this life there is nothing, only oblivion, only worm-food. And He’s likewise proved wrong all those who believe in reincarnation and that we all have many lifetimes behind us and many lifetimes still to come. No, at death our bodies sleep while our souls live-on in comfort or suffering. But there will come a time when He returns – when He, Jesus, physically raised from the dead, returns – and when He will raise us – but not spiritually this time, physically – will raise us physically from the dead. And we will go on to life or go on to death depending on our deeds and whether or not our deeds were motivated by faith.

So it all comes down to faith. Not trying to keep our loved ones alive, but sharing faith with them. And not just a deathbed conversion! But sharing with them a lifetime of trusting and resting, free from fear and believing in our beloved Jesus! Faith is what counts.

So, do you believe that God raised Jesus from the dead? Do you believe that God will raise you from the dead? Do you believe that upon your death that your soul will go to be with Jesus in Paradise while your body sleeps – rests – in the grave? Do you believe that when Jesus returns to raise you from the dead that a new Heaven and a new Earth will be created for all to live in where holiness and righteousness and love and grace will be the law of the nations? Do you trust God with those you love? (That is, trusting Him to judge them fairly and to give them life if they love Him?) Do you trust God with those you love who have already died? (Your parents, unborn children, children or brothers and sisters who’ve died too young, friends, neighbors, husbands, wives? Do you trust God to do what is best and right and most loving for you and for them?)

All this and so much more is what everyone means when they say, “Jesus has conquered death.” His resurrection gives us a bedrock of evidence for our faith so that we need never be afraid of anything or anyone ever again! Because if He is for us, who or what can be against us? Secure in His Kingdom, secure as members of His family, with the apostle Paul ^“I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of Hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (See Romans 8.)

That is what Jesus’ resurrection from the dead promises and guarantees. That is what has secured us in this life and in the resurrection-life to come: Not our own goodness or righteousness. (After all, none of us are really all that good, are we? Though we’re getting better.) No, what secures us is God’s love for us, and our trusting in His love more than in our worries, fears, and circumstances; the death-defeating love that Jesus Christ has shown us in rising forever from the dead!

Matthew 27:1-2, 11-26 [NLTse]

Very early in the morning the leading priests and the elders of the people met again to lay plans for putting Jesus to death. Then they bound Him, led Him away, and took Him to Pilate, the Roman governor…

Now Jesus was standing before Pilate, the Roman governor. “Are You the king of the Jews?” the governor asked Him.

Jesus replied, “You have said it.”

But when the leading priests and the elders made their accusations against Him, Jesus remained silent. “Don’t you hear all these charges they are bringing against You?” Pilate demanded. But Jesus made no response to any of the charges, much to the governor’s surprise.

Now it was the governor’s custom each year during the Passover celebration to release one prisoner to the crowd—anyone they wanted. This year there was a notorious prisoner, a man named Barabbas. As the crowds gathered before Pilate’s house that morning, he asked them, “Which one do you want me to release to you—Barabbas, or Jesus Who is called the Messiah?” (He knew very well that the religious leaders had arrested Jesus out of envy.)

Just then, as Pilate was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent him this message: “Leave that innocent Man alone. I suffered through a terrible nightmare about Him last night.”

Meanwhile, the leading priests and the elders persuaded the crowd to ask for Barabbas to be released and for Jesus to be put to death. So the governor asked again, “Which of these two do you want me to release to you?”

The crowd shouted back, “Barabbas!”

Pilate responded, “Then what should I do with Jesus Who is called the Messiah?”

They shouted back, “Crucify Him!”

“Why?” Pilate demanded. “What crime has He committed?”

But the mob roared even louder, “Crucify Him!”

Pilate saw that he wasn’t getting anywhere and that a riot was developing. So he sent for a bowl of water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, “I am innocent of this Man’s blood. The responsibility is yours!”

And all the people yelled back, “We will take responsibility for His death—we and our children!”

So Pilate released Barabbas to them. He ordered Jesus flogged with a lead-tipped whip, then turned Him over to the Roman soldiers to be crucified.

Sermon

This week from Palm Sunday leading up to Easter Sunday is most often called “Holy Week” by Christian people, and many Christian churches seek to celebrate during Holy Week those same things that Jesus celebrated 2,000 years ago: His “inaugural” entry into Jerusalem where the crowds treated Him and hailed Him their king; His “last supper” with the disciples on Thursday; His trial before the religious leaders and Pontius Pilate that led to His crucifixion on Friday; and, of course, the women finding the tomb empty in the cemetery at sunrise Easter morning, and the Lord appearing to them all alive – resurrected! Victor over death! – later on Easter day.

So the Lord lived the same sequence of days we’ll be celebrating. On that first Palm Sunday the crowds shouted, “Hosanna! Save us!” They had seen Him heal, provide food, control the weather, and bring people back from the dead! And they’d decided that Jesus was the One to lead them in overthrowing Rome and those of their own leaders who had conspired with the Romans. He was the One to reestablish David’s kingdom!

Even so, five days later, this same crowd – now seeing Jesus beaten, bloodied, chained, and seeming to be helpless in the custody of those conspiring Jewish leaders and in the judgment hall of Rome’s Pontius Pilate – cry, “Crucify Him!” and take upon themselves and their children the responsibility for Jesus’ death.

Couldn’t they make up their minds? Wouldn’t they commit to one side or the other?

Elijah faced similar indecision when he gathered the leaders of Israel on Mt. Hermon (along with all the prophets and priests in Israel who were serving Baal at that time). Elijah challenged them: “How much longer will you waver, hobbling between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow Him! But if Baal is God, then follow Him!” (See 1 Kings 18)

The picture Elijah is describing is one of a person who has legs that are different lengths, “hobbling” along. My older brother, Dick, was born with his legs being different lengths. I never remember Dick ever seeming any different from anybody else – he was my big brother! – and he was too brave to show any of us how horribly painful it was. (I learned that later.) But I know the “hobbling” (as Elijah calls it) kept him from playing any of the running-related sports he would have liked. He didn’t have the balance for it with his legs out of whack like that…

In Matthew 23 the Lord Jesus yells at the religious leaders for such “hobbling”. He said, “What sorrow awaits you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees.” Jesus called them, “hypocrites!” because what they taught was so different from what they did, and because the darkness in their hearts was so opposite from the righteous, holy appearances they wanted the people to see.

As some of you may know, the word “hypocrite” comes from the Greek word hupokrites: An actor. And that’s what indecision and a lack of commitment does to a person: They become actors, acting this way with this person or this group of people and acting that way with that person or that group.

When we will not decide, when we will not commit, we experience the pain inside and the unsteadiness outside of hobbling back and forth, and we take upon ourselves the roles of hypocrites, trying to figure out what those around us are looking for and trying to act in whatever ways are necessary to please them.

Can you think of topics that you hobble back and forth about?

Do you ever act one way around one person or this group of people but act another way around some other person or some other group?

How about when it comes to the Lord: Do you hobble, or act differently with different people, when it comes to Him?

Of course, isn’t it great that our Father’s not like that with us? He’s sent prophets and priests and in the fullness of time His Own Son to publicly proclaim to all the Earth humankind’s sinful nature and yet His steadfast love for us! And He had God-the-Son to be publicly tried and crucified to not only pay the penalty for our sin but to also put our sin nature to death! (And then He made sure it all got written down so that every generation could know such good news, as well!) And He calls us to public baptisms and public confirmations and public declarations of faith so that everyone might know that He’s chosen us and made us His Own!

There is no indecision with God. He shows us no divided loyalties. No hobbling, no pretending with our Abba. He’s all in! And He calls us to be like Him: All in! All boldly and publicly in!

Let me make clear what I’m trying to say is on the table here as we sing, “Hosanna!” this Palm Sunday, 2015: Our Father in Heaven doesn’t want us to worship Him when it’s easy or popular to do so, but later Baal when Baal’s the one on top. He doesn’t want us to go along with the crowd in order to save us from troubles or pain. No. God wants us to always do and to want to do what He wants no matter who we’re with at any given time. He’s wholly committed to us and He wants us to be wholly committed to Him.

So, with that in mind, where in your life are you undecided with the Lord? Are you bold for Him at Youth Group or YoungLife but you find yourself going along with what everybody else is doing and wearing back at school? Do you “Amen!” sermons about truth and sacrifice while telling little white lies on your taxes or going along with dishonest practices at work?

Is the Holy Spirit talking to you today? Is He calling to your attention different parts of your life that you are keeping from Him? If this is you (and it is all of us!) what can we do about it?

Well, the Lord commands us to two complimentary behaviors that each of us can do to put our “people-pleasing” to death, and to focus more whole-heartedly on pleasing Him.

The first comes to us from the Book of Proverbs 3:5-6. A famous and much-loved passage: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not rely on your own insight. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make straight your paths.” The Lord makes clear that if we’ll let those around us know why we don’t cuss and why we don’t sleep around, why we don’t lie or cheat, why we don’t join in the gossip and nasty joke-telling – “Because the God I believe in and follow doesn’t want me to be a part of those kinds of things” – if we acknowledge Him, that is, if we make it clear to everyone around us that He’s the reason we do the good things we do, that He will then make our lives “straightforward”.

Now, notice that He’s not saying that we won’t have any troubles or trials or heartaches or heartbreaks if we acknowledge Him in all our ways. No. But He is saying if we make sure others know He’s the reason for doing what we do, that the troubles and trials and hardships that do come our way will simply be straight-forward for us: We’ll know what to do or we’ll have His peace in the midst of them… (That is, if we commit to Him, and if we boldly acknowledge to those around us that we are His.)

The second way God’s Word helps us combat pleasing others and helps us focus on pleasing Him comes from Joshua’s final address to the leaders of Israel. As we’ve already said, Joshua had rebuked them for their hobbling and hypocrisy of faith. But when they told him that they wanted to worship the Lord alone, Joshua said, then “Throw away the foreign God’s that are among you and yield your hearts to the Lord, the God of Israel.” (Joshua 24:23)

This is simply repentance. What is in your life that does not please God? (I don’t care who it does please, and no longer do you!) What is in your life or a part of your life that does not please God? These are your idols that our Abba is calling you to throw away. They may be TV shows and DVDs you like to watch. Perhaps it is music you like to listen to that doesn’t fit with your faith. Perhaps your idols are things you do in your bedroom, ways you treat different kids at school or different colleagues at work or different neighbors around town or different family members around your home. Or maybe your idols are specific practices you have that you know hurt God’s heart. Maybe your idols are what you eat and drink or how much you eat and drink. Perhaps your idols are things you say or things you don’t say…

The Lord is calling us to stand for Him, firmly on both feet. Plant your banner! Commit! He’s calling us to take off our masks and be real: That is, to really be who He’s redeemed us to be!

Because you’re a slave to those around you when you seek to please them. You can’t be free when you’re always trying to make those around you happy. And Jesus came to set us free! Being free – that is, not burdened about the consequences of your actions, not burdened by the agreement or disagreement or the favor or lack of favor of those around us – being free is a sign of the Christian life. Being free, light, unburdened, undistracted, and undivided to simply seek God’s will and then to do it: That is why King Jesus died on the cross: So that you and I would be free to please Him alone.

Remember: People had no power over Jesus. And people have no power over Jesus-in-you!

The Gospel According to Luke 9:51-10:2 [NLTse]
^9:51 As the time drew near for Him to ascend to Heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem. ⁵² He sent messengers ahead to a Samaritan village to prepare for His arrival. ⁵³ But the people of the village did not welcome Jesus because He was on His way to Jerusalem. ⁵⁴ When James and John saw this, they said to Jesus, “Lord, should we call down fire from Heaven to burn them up?” ⁵⁵ But Jesus turned and rebuked them. ⁵⁶ So they went on to another village.
⁵⁷ As they were walking along, someone said to Jesus, “I will follow You wherever You go.”
⁵⁸ But Jesus replied, “Foxes have dens to live in, and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place even to lay His head.”
⁵⁹ He said to another person, “Come, follow Me.”
The man agreed, but he said, “Lord, first let me return home and bury my father.”
⁶⁰ But Jesus told him, “Let the spiritually dead bury their own dead! Your duty is to go and preach about the Kingdom of God.”
⁶¹ Another said, “Yes, Lord, I will follow You, but first let me say good-bye to my family.”
⁶² But Jesus told him, “Anyone who puts a hand to the plow and then looks back is not fit for the Kingdom of God.”
^10:1 The Lord now chose seventy-two other disciples and sent them ahead in pairs to all the towns and places He planned to visit. ² These were His instructions to them: “The harvest is great, but the workers are few. So pray to the Lord Who is in charge of the harvest; Ask Him to send more workers into His fields.”

Sermon
I believe the Lord is fulfilling this plea among us today…
Our reading this morning marks a turning point in the Gospel of Luke: From the Lord Jesus’ ministry around the Sea of Galilee to His journey towards Jerusalem. A turning point and a journey that would end in the Lord Jesus’ suffering and death. It was a journey which could have been accomplished in two or three days, yet it seems to have taken Him about five months!

Luke’s and John’s gospels together present a picture of a Jesus with a vast program to fulfill and with only a limited amount of time in which to do it. He was set on making a great appeal to the entire nation before He came to Jerusalem for the last time. So the picture here is the Lord Jesus moving from place to place to place, always surrounded by crowds of people, so that all the country which had not yet heard Him in person (especially the more remote parts of Judaea) might have opportunity to see and know that the Messiah, the Son of God, was in their midst.

A part of Jesus’ itinerary brought Him through Samaritan territory, as Sue Ann read. Luke writes, “He sent messengers ahead…to prepare for His arrival.” And Luke 10:1 goes on from there reporting, “The Lord now chose seventy-two other disciples and sent them ahead in pairs to all the towns and places He planned to visit.” Now the assumption is often that these messengers were to prepare accommodations for His arrival, but the words could just as easily mean that that they were to prepare the various townspeople for His arrival.

And I think that that is more likely what Luke had in mind. And as Holy Week and Easter Sunday draw near, I believe that, likewise, the Lord is sending us out to prepare our various friends and neighbors and coworkers for Jesus’ arrival.

Before I go on I’d like to ask you all a question: Who here is here because of someone else in the Sanctuary? I mean, someone else here invited you and so you came and have kept coming? Or you knew that so-and-so came here and so you decided to try it, too, and you’ve kept coming? Or something like that? …

Doesn’t it feel good to know that you’re the reason someone’s come to Christ, or come to enjoy the life in Christ’s church that we have here? … Yeah, me too!

I bring all this up because in American culture, going to church on Easter is something many people do by tradition. It’s a societal norm. The majority of Easter visitors aren’t seeking God, and they’re not looking for a church to join. They’re doing what Americans do on Easter:
1) They give their children presents on Easter morning.
2) They hold an Easter Egg Hunt.
3) They attend church.
4) And they eat a nice meal together as a family.

I don’t say this to judge people, I just say it to describe people. For many Americans, attending church on Easter morning is simply the third item on their list of Easter things to do.

Now, you and I know that these people are sinners and broken and need Christ. All people are sinners and broken and need Christ. So there’s every reason for them to Worship with us on Easter Sunday morning, find Christ here, and want to return! Yet, because they have no intention of returning (because they’re not looking for a church to belong to, they’re just looking for a church for Easter), because they have no intention of returning, if we hope to reach them across Holy Week or Easter Sunday morning we may have to prepare them for Jesus’ arrival.
Now, an important part of preparing them is preparing for them. And I think of when my wife and I invite guests to our home. Amy’s always so good at thinking of ways to make others feel comfortable and thinking of what they might enjoy doing with us while they are over. So when we know they have young children, for instance, we get out our kids old toys and ask our kids if they would look after and entertain them so that their folks – our guests – can relax and enjoy their time with us. Amy’s always careful to find out what people can or cannot, like or don’t like, to eat… And I think of the same thing around here: What might discourage a visitor from returning? And what might encourage someone to do so?

One thing that has already come to my mind is parking. I want to ask all of us, for the next two weeks (because next Sunday is Palm Sunday and then Holy Week and then the next Sunday is Easter) for the next two weeks I want to ask each of us to not park directly in front of the church or in front of the Ann Street doors. Please park across the street in front of The Diner or over in the Wells Fargo lot or farther up or down Ann Street. Let’s save the very best parking spots for visitors for these holy days.

Greeters: I want to encourage you across these next two weeks especially to keep the doors open (if it’s warm enough) or to stand outside the doors, to help people find their way who may be coming for the first time. Of course, we all want to be friendly, but remember that new people want to feel welcome, not accosted!

I want to ask you all to walk around the church buildings – outside and in – asking yourselves, “What might discourage someone from coming back? And what kind of change might encourage them to do so? (You can bring what you’ve noticed to Elder Marilyn Neel or myself, and we hope you’ll also bring your willingness to join us in addressing whatever it might be.)

A second thing we can do to help prepare the people around us for Jesus’ arrival is to pray for them. Have you ever heard that we should talk with Jesus about our friends before we talk with our friends about Jesus? Yeah. I want each of us to write down the names of seven people we hope would come to Christ this Easter. They can be local people or people who live far away: Friends, family members, favorite teachers, coworkers, … (Of course, it would be great if at least some of them were local people so that you could also reach out to them.) But pray for these seven people every day between now and Easter Sunday (at least). Ask God to prepare them for Him. And then invite them to church. (At least those ones who live around here.)

Now, inviting seven people to church can be a lot of people to look out for, so, take advantage of Holy Week and invite one next week to Palm Sunday, a different one to our Maundy Thursday Seder Dinner, a different one to Good Friday night Worship, and a different one to Easter Sunrise or Easter Sunday morning Worship.

It’s a lot of services to attend all in one week. But Holy Week was the most important week on Jesus’ calendar, and it provides us with a richly diverse opportunity to both worship and reach out to those around us!

The Lord Jesus said, “The harvest is great, but the workers are few. So pray to the Lord Who is in charge of the harvest; Ask Him to send more workers into His fields.” We don’t have to be great preachers or evangelists to prepare people for Jesus’ arrival; to help our friends and neighbors know that the Messiah, the Son of God, is in our midst; or, to be the ones who in future years people look back on as the one the Holy Spirit used to bring them to Christ. It can be as simple as inviting those around us to church. Palm Sunday, the celebrations of Holy Week, and Easter provide us with multiple opportunities to do so!

The Gospel of Matthew 14:22-33 [NLTse]

²² Immediately after [feeding the five thousand], Jesus insisted that His disciples get back into the boat and cross to the other side of the lake, while He sent the people home. ²³ After sending them home, He went up into the hills by Himself to pray. Night fell while He was there alone.

²⁴ Meanwhile, the disciples were in trouble far away from land, for a strong wind had risen, and they were fighting heavy waves. ²⁵ About three o’clock in the morning Jesus came toward them, walking on the water. ²⁶ When the disciples saw Him walking on the water, they were terrified. In their fear, they cried out, “It’s a ghost!”

²⁷ But Jesus spoke to them at once. “Don’t be afraid,” He said. “Take courage. I am here!”

²⁸ Then Peter called to Him, “Lord, if it’s really You, tell me to come to You, walking on the water.”

²⁹ “Yes, come,” Jesus said.

So Peter went over the side of the boat and walked on the water toward Jesus. ³⁰ But when he saw the strong wind and the waves, he was terrified and began to sink. “Save me, Lord!” he shouted.

³¹ Jesus immediately reached out and grabbed him. “You have so little faith,” Jesus said. “Why did you doubt Me?”

³² When they climbed back into the boat, the wind stopped. ³³ Then the disciples worshiped Him. “You really are the Son of God!” they exclaimed.

Sermon – “Where Are You?”

God gives us a new life when we begin trusting Him through our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, and we are adopted into God’s Family. Foundational to this new life is belonging to Jesus, and the knowledge that nothing – no power in Heaven or on Earth – can ever separate us from Him. (See John 10:27-28 and Romans 8:38-39) Theologically this is called “The Principle of Position”: That is, having trusted God through Christ, we Christians have been moved to a new place in the creation – a new position. That new place – that new position – is in Christ.

More recent Bible translations, like the New Living Translation in our pews, talks of being in Christ as being “united with” Jesus and as “belonging to” Him, but, most literally, the Bible speaks of us as being “in” Jesus Christ. Colossians 3:1-4 describes being in Christ this way, “Since you have been raised to new life with Christ, set your sights on the realities of Heaven, where Christ sits in the place of honor at God’s right hand. Think about the things of Heaven, not the things of Earth. For you died to this life, and your real life is hidden with Christ in God. And when Christ, Who is your life, is revealed to the whole world, you will share in all His glory.”

This idea of having a “new position” in Christ – our true life now being “with Christ in God” – however, confuses many Christians, and can seem like one of those intellectual realities that doesn’t really “hit the road” in our daily living. Many Christians can wonder, “If I’m now in Christ – if I’m now living with Jesus in God – then why do I still struggle with sin? Why do bad things continue to happen to me and those around me if I’m in Christ?”

So let’s look at that.

The Bible makes clear that the power of sin over Christians has been removed by Jesus’ death on the cross. Romans says,  “Everyone has sinned… Yet God freely and graciously declares that we are righteous… For God presented Jesus as the sacrifice for sin.” (3:23-25) In 2 Corinthians we read,  “For God made Christ, Who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ.” (5:21) And Hebrews tells us that “once for all time, [the Son of God] has appeared at the end of the age to remove sin by His Own death as a sacrifice.” (9:26) Even so, every Christian experiences temptation: And sometimes overcoming that temptation and sometimes falling into sin.

What then is the benefit to belonging to God and being in His Family? What then does it matter to be in Christ and now with Him in the heavenly places with God? Being in Christ means that everything Jesus is, we Christians are because God has credited all of Jesus’ righteousness to our account. So, it’s not as though our accounts were simply “Paid In Full”, they’ve been “Overpaid”!

And this is God’s eternal point of view. In our humanity we can only experience history in the present. We look back on the past and we look forward to the future. But God is not bound by space or time. (He created space and time!) So God is able to view all of history as a completed act: Past, present, and future are all within God’s “eternal present” viewpoint. (Revelation 1:8; John 8:58) From His perspective, we are already complete, and so totally acceptable to Him. He sees us as a finished product.

Our Father sees you and I having died with Christ on the cross. (See Galatians 2:20; Romans 6:6) Our Father sees you and I dead to sin. (See Romans 6:7, 11) Our Abba in Heaven sees us raised to new life in Christ and living the eternal life. (See 2 Corinthians 5:17; 1 John 5:12-13) He has completely and eternally forgiven you and I of all sin. (See Psalm 103:11-12; Romans 8:1) Our Daddy knows He has blessed you and me with every spiritual blessing. (See Ephesians 3:1) He enjoys your and my presence, seated with Him in the heavenly places. (See Ephesians 2:6) He experiences you and me enjoying the fullness of our inheritance as His children right alongside Jesus Christ. (See Romans 8:17)

Our position in Christ is not affected by our personal performance. It doesn’t change depending on our feelings. Because it is God’s perspective, our position in Christ is a spiritual absolute; as unchanging as God Himself.

Of course, although our position in Christ is God’s perspective, our day-to-day experience is our perspective. We must keep living in a world corrupted by sin and in bodies corrupted by sin.

Now, our position in Christ will become our daily experience when we see the Lord Jesus face-to-face when He returns. But until then, even though the world and sin and corruption are our daily experience, we are to live focusing our minds on God’s perspective! Our old self rules in our lives when we live according to our own desires. Our new selves are evident when we live according to our position in Christ through our surrender and obedience to God’s desires. And God wants us to live according to our position in Christ.

Which is the only way spiritual maturity occurs: It is only when we acknowledge our position in Christ and put that to work in our practical experience that we grow in Christ, because only that is living by faith. (See 2 Corinthians 5:7) Likewise, it is only when we get caught up and lost in our daily circumstances and ignore the realities of our position in Christ that we are overcome by the world.

We can see this played out in our reading from Matthew. What happened when Jesus walked up to the storm-tossed boat and called for Peter to come to Him? Peter climbed down out of the boat and began walking on the water with Jesus. Peter left what his mind, the world, and his day-to-day experiences taught him was possible and focused on Christ. Peter believed that because Jesus had called him, that what Jesus was doing he could do, too! And when did Peter begin sinking? When he saw the strong wind and waves! Once He took his eyes off Jesus he got caught up and lost in his circumstances again. And down he went! God wants us to live as He sees us in Christ!

And the Lord shows us how safe it is for us to try, even if we will eventually lose our focus and fail. After all, what did Peter do when he realized he’d lost his focus and was sinking? He cried out to Jesus to help him and, the Bible tells us, Jesus “immediately reached out and grabbed him”! The Lord is near to save us when we seek to live our lives in Him. Even when at some point we fail. So it’s safe to try! And to try and try and try again!

As believers we must learn to look at ourselves from God’s perspective. We live effectively for Christ and we grow and mature spiritually when we live according to our position in Christ and not according to what we’re sensing and experiencing throughout each day. We experience victory and growth when, by faith, we live out our position in Christ throughout each day.

For Christians, life, with all its ups and downs, is an experience of becoming like Jesus. Even the problems are used to make us more like Him. (See Romans 8:28) Living out our position in Christ gives us the exciting prospect of becoming more like Jesus every day, and as we wait for His return. (See 2 Corinthians 3:18)