My Prayer for You - Colossians 1:1-14

The city of Colossae was probably the smallest and least “important” city that Paul wrote to.  Historically, Colossae was a prosperous city, and famous (with other cities in the region) for its fabric dyes.  But by Paul’s time, its glory as a city was on the decline. 

The city’s religious environment was much like our own today.  It was a time of religious mixing, with people borrowing a little from this a little from that.  There probably was a corruption of Christianity with elements of mysticism, legalistic Judaism, and early Gnosticism (generally speaking, Gnosticism taught that salvation is achieved through special knowledge). This letter was written to combat these problems within the Colossae society of which the church was located and this letter is relevant to us here today.

Last week we talked about the confident hope found in Jesus Christ and that it is through Him we are reconciled with God.  Today we build on that confident assurance of being a part of God’s family.  Paul did not plant the church of Colossae – to my knowledge he had not ventured there – yet, he wrote a letter to them concerning their faith.  He had heard of their love from Epaphras.  Look at verse 8 with me this morning – Epaphras declared to Paul and his disciples the Spirit-filled love of the people in the church of Colossae.  If Paul is mentioning this Spirit-filled love it means that this is an uncommon type of love in the world, but this type of love is normal in the life of these followers of Christ.  People who came into contact with these people saw a love that was not normal; it was a love that was from God and was evident to those who interacted with them. God’s love is given through the Holy Spirit; it is not received in any other way; it is commenced at salvation; it is confirmed through sanctification. When we give ourselves fully to God, we can know His love to its fullest extent and we need to understand that through this love it is complete in glorification.  When we realize that this Spirit-filled love comes from God we then come to the realization that God’s love changes us; His love enables us to love God supremely. We find this in our obedience to Him and this love is natural – not contrived; this love enables us to love others fully, even those who hurt us, even our enemies. This is a love we all need to strive for, so people will see Jesus through the life we live.

Join me as we look at today’s text beginning with vs. 9 and going through vs. 14, following along with me on your bulletin insert. In verse 9 we read together: ⁹ For this reason we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding. This is the second time in the first 9 verses that Paul has mentioned that he was praying for the church of Colossae.  As I said earlier Paul did not plant this church nor had he even visited prior to writing this letter, but by his message to the church of Colossae it shows an intimacy for fellow believers of the Good News.  He uses two phrases that his prayers for the church were not just a passing “Lord please be with the church of Colossae.” When we read in this first chapter that Paul was “praying always for you,” and “we do not cease to pray for you,” this indicates a continual prayer for these people Paul had never met personally, but had only heard about from his dear friend Epaphras.  But just what was Paul praying for the people of Colossae?  He was praying for them to be filled with the knowledge of God’s will!  That is the same prayer I have as we gather here today; that all of us here this morning will be filled with the knowledge of God’s will!  It brings us to the question – How can we increase knowledge of His will? First we must get serious about our relationship with Jesus Christ – our relationship with Jesus Christ must become important enough to us that we carve out time to spend with Him without distraction; in other words we come to seek Him with all our heart, all our soul, and all our might.  We do this by spending time in prayer. Not the “now I lay me down to sleep” or “God is great prayer,” which is okay, but we need to spend intimate time going to the Throne of Grace bearing ourselves in openness and allowing God see the real us, not the one we pretend to be.  Second, we increase our knowledge of His will by reading and studying the Word of God.  We need to spend time in focused study of His Word.  I think there is an epidemic that is staggering to me and that is the number of people in the church today – I am speaking of the Universal Church – that are biblically illiterate.  I remember when I was in seminary our first class for Old Testament went something like this.  Dr. Dean McBride walked into our very first class, which was normally a time to go over the syllabus for the course and then the professor would dismiss us to come back for the second class prepared to jump into the course.  However, the first thing that Dr. McBride did when he and Dr. Carson Brisson walked into the room that morning was ask us to take out a paper for a pop quiz.  I remember thinking; I was not in Kansas anymore because in our first class we were getting a grade before we even knew the layout of the course.  The first question we were asked was to name the northern and southern kingdoms in the time of the Old Testament? The majority got this question wrong – how many of us here today know the answer.  I am proud to say that I got the question right only because I guessed right! O by the way Israel was the northern kingdom and Judah was the southern kingdom and the grade did not count although it scared all of us to no end.  The average seminarian that morning got 4 out of 10 correct.  Because of people in churches today not knowing the Word of God intimately I began to wonder why is there a trend to walk away from the Bible and studying it.  I am hearing pastor after pastor say that attendance at their Bible Studies within their church has dropped off significantly.  A Gallup Poll taken way back in 2006 revealed the number of people who read the Bible at least occasionally had dropped to 59 percent, down from 73 percent in the 1980s.  George Gallup summarized it best when he said, “We revere the Bible but we don’t read it.” So why aren’t people reading the Bible?  Tyndale House Publishers did a survey to find the answer to this perplexing question. Their survey showed that 64 percent of Americans said they did not read the Bible because they are too busy. Eighty percent said the Bible is too confusing and hard to understand. Of course these are not valid excuses for not reading the Bible. The majority of Americans are busy but we tend to find time to do those things that we enjoy or that we deem important. Bible reading is simply not a priority to many people today.  In order to gain wisdom or knowledge we need to know the Bible and what it teaches, incorporating it into our lives – it is almost as if the church has followed the man’s example of not asking for directions when he is lost or refusing to look at the directions on how to build something until it becomes a last resort!  We turn to reading and the studying of the Word when we are in trouble or when we have nothing else to do.

Paul prays that the church of Colossae and us here today that will receive spiritual understanding and we need to understand how we receive this understanding this morning.  Guess what – it comes from the same two traits I have explained concerning increasing our knowledge of God’s will.  Our receiving of spiritual understanding comes from the Word of God and Prayer.  But it doesn’t stop there, Jesus said in John chapter 14:26, "But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you."  We also gain spiritual understanding from the Holy Spirit when we surrender to His guidance in our life.  Now this is important for us to understand this morning – we need to come to a point of surrender and let me say that is difficult because we have to get out of our own way or at least get out of God’s way; we have to come to the point of saying to God it is all about You and Your plan for my life and not what I desire or expect out of my life.  This is challenging because we don’t want to be so exposed since making this type of commitment gives us a feeling of defenselessness, but in reality it is a place of power – for when we get to the point of giving our complete and total life to Jesus, we can finally say what Jesus said to Paul, "My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness." Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me."  It is in our surrender and admittance of our need of Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior that His strength works through us.

We will pick up the pace just a bit, let us read verses 10 and 11 together: ¹⁰ that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; ¹¹ strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, for all patience and longsuffering with joy. Beginning in verse 10 Paul begins to tell us about the fruits of gaining a knowledge of God’s will and an increase in spiritual understanding. We need this knowledge of His will and spiritual understanding so we will walk worthy of the Lord. Paul is praying that we will live according to the same knowledge we have received, living it out in our walk as a Christian.  When we have a true knowledge of God’s will our walk of faith will match what the Bible teaches in how a follower of Jesus Christ should walk with Jesus Christ as his or her Lord and Savior.  We also need this knowledge and understanding so we will fully please Him. We come to the point where we want “to please God in all respects” – not man – not family – we desire a complete, whole-hearted pleasing of Him and this becomes our highest desire.  We need this knowledge and understanding so we will be fruitful in every good work. When we walk in total commitment to God He will give us opportunities to be fruitful and instead of looking at how we can’t do something, we will see this as an opportunity to glorify God.  When we are fruitful it glorifies God, not ourselves!  We need this knowledge and wisdom so we will increase in our knowledge of God.  Instead of making excuses or placing other things in front of the Lord, we desire to spend more time in intimate prayer and the reading of His Word, with the key word here being “intimate,” we will desire and carve out a time of intimacy each day with the Lord.    Finally by doing these things we can live our life more for Him and we will be strengthened with all might according to His glorious power.  As we draw closer to God, He will draw closer to us and we will become stronger in Him.  This whole section is about spending a more intimate time with our Lord and Savior and let me tell you Satan will tell you that you don’t have time – don’t let him deceive you with that argument.  Recently, in my own life I have chosen to focus on this intimate time each day with the Lord and it has been difficult because Satan has tried to make me feel guilty for taking time out of my day that I could be doing more work for the church.  It is pure deception, but the Holy Spirit has begun to move my heart to an understanding that if I spend my intimate time with God, the church matters will work themselves out in God’s time and God’s way; not my own!  As a pastor one time told me “WE SPEND TIME WITH THAT WHICH IS IMPORTANT TO US!”  We did a project years ago before I was a pastor at my home church – we wrote down for a week what we did in our free time – the time we were not at work.  After a week, it was amazing how much time we sat in front of the TV or were listening to music.  Very little of our time was spent with the Lord.  I challenge you to make the time you spend with the Lord an importance in your daily life!

Now let us read verse 12 through 14 together: ¹² giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light. ¹³ He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, ¹⁴ in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.  We come to something that many of us here today don’t want to hear but it is the final point I want to make today and that is – it is not us – IT IS HIM! We give thanks to the Father!   Why do we realize it is not about us – it is about God and we desire to give thanks to the Father?  Because it is God who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance. God did this, not us.  I did nothing, He did it all through Jesus Christ – I owe Him everything – I owe Him my life!  Do we really understand that this morning?  I wish I could say yes, but I am humbled by the thought of this point this morning, it is God who decided to qualify us to spend eternity with Him; think about that – how awesome is that!  Because of God we have been delivered from the power of darkness.  For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace (Romans 6:14); But you, brethren, are not in darkness, so that this Day should overtake you as a thief. You are all sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness (1 Thessalonians 5:4-5). As we can see by these two Scripture passages we have been delivered from the power of darkness – so we give thanks to the Father!  It is through God who has conveyed (transferred) us into His kingdom through Jesus Christ.  It is in Jesus we have redemption through His blood and it is in Jesus we have forgiveness of sins.  These three points dovetail last week’s message which spoke to the theme of Jesus Christ being the vehicle for our salvation and it is through His blood that our sins have been forgiven and we have been redeemed and the good news is that we are transferred into the family of God!  What hope this good news brings to us this morning!

My prayer as we come to a close is that God will give you a passion to desire a more intimate relationship with Him.  I can tell you spending more time with God will be life changing and invigorating.  I cannot force you to make this commitment and guess what God will not force you to make this commitment as well – it is your decision!  Satan will do everything to trick you and deceive you, but God just says “come to me all who are heavy laden and I will give you rest!”  My prayer is that you will come to Him and find that rest!

Confident Expectation

As we gather here today there is a lot of uncertainty in the world in which we live.  Our economy is not very good; nation after nation are having upheavals trying to remove their government leaders; an horrific event has taken place in Aurora, CO where innocent people were killed attending a movie; and let’s be real the word being a Christian has a stigma attached to it that makes people see us as lepers in a clean society.  I realize that life is hard and some of us would like to go back to the good ‘ol days, but we are where we are and I stand before you today to talk to you about hope in the light of what seems like a hopeless world.

We are going to jump into the Scriptures right away and if you will notice on your insert on one side is the Scriptures and on the other is your fill in the blank page.  I want to take us from where it all went wrong to a place that will give all of us a hope and joy to face not only today, but tomorrow as well.

In the book of Genesis we read, “²³ therefore the LORD God sent him out of the Garden of Eden to till the ground from which he was taken. ²⁴ So He drove out the man; and He placed cherubim at the east of the Garden of Eden, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life.”  This pericope of Scripture is the passage concerning man’s expulsion from the presence of God; the relationship between God and man has been fractured and as the Word says, “God sent the man out of the Garden.” Not only that in the very next verse we are told that “God drove out the man.” In a matter of a few words it went from Adam being told to leave the Garden to Adam forcefully being removed from the presence of God.  From Adam’s perspective he had to be feeling a mix of emotions: hurt; concern for his family; a feeling of abandonment; depression; fear; worry; his thought concerning what the future would hold; what emotions must have been running through his mind when he was separated from the actual presence of God. These emotions and concerns felt by Adam are the same emotions all of us feel when we are separated from God.  Adam had to have a feeling of hopelessness in a situation and a world that he saw as hopeless.  We also need to understand that all of these all emotions Adam felt are the same emotions that Satan uses to his advantage in our lives.  Now there is one important thing about Adam being banished from the presence of God, “Man no longer had access to the Tree of Life!”  When man was created by God, he and she were created to have an intimate, eternal relationship that was face-to-face with God and now – “that creation” – had gone horribly wrong.  Man’s hope was gone!  It is just a little while later in the Book of Genesis we are told that, “…the LORD was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart” (Genesis 6:6).  Man and God were separated – what hope is these for mankind?

The good news this morning is that nothing catches God off-guard and He had a plan already in place.  Turn with me to Ephesians chapter 1 and let us look at this passage of Scripture.  ⁴ just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, ⁵ having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, ⁶ to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He has made us accepted in the Beloved. ⁷ In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace. If we believe that God is all-knowing and I do, then as this passage tells us, God knew Adam and Eve would sin and so He had a plan in place before the creation of the world to reconcile us back to Him.  I love how in verse 4 it tells us that God chose us before the foundation of the world.  God chose to adopt us through Jesus Christ because it pleased Him to do so.  And we see that through the blood of Jesus Christ our sins are forgiven and we are redeemed.  Are you beginning to see a glimmer of hope this morning?  Can you see that it is God who desires to have that intimate relationship with you and me, even more than we do? It is God who not only wants us back, but wants to give us access to the Tree of Life again and that can only happen through the blood, redemption, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

If you are like most people the small book of Titus is one that you don’t frequent too much, but it is chocked full of great information.  Turn with me to Titus 2 and let us read this Scripture together. ¹¹ For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, ¹² teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, ¹³ looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, ¹⁴ who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works. ¹⁵ Speak these things, exhort, and rebuke with all authority. Let no one despise you. First and foremost we need to understand that it is by the grace of God that we are saved. We cannot be good enough, we cannot work hard enough, and we cannot help enough needy people to earn our way in heaven.  As we saw in the Ephesians passage earlier, it is God’s desire that we be reunited with Him in an intimate and eternal relationship; we are to become His “special people”.  Now hope is a word that has so many meanings, but if we look at the Greek translation of this word I believe it puts it in perspective for us this morning.  In the Greek the word hope means confident expectation.  We are confidently expecting what we hear or read to be true and believe that it has happened, will continue to happen, and will happen in the future.  Although we were separated by the fall of mankind, Jesus Christ came back to be our sacrifice, placing us in a right relationship with God if we will only confess Him as Lord and Savior and believe that God raised Him from the dead (Romans 10:9).  Through Christ we are redeemed and purified. It is as simple as that brothers and sisters.  In the beautiful hymn Because He Lives, we hear these wonderful words: God sent His son, they called Him Jesus, He came to love, heal, and forgive. He lived and died to buy my pardon, an empty grave is there to prove my Savior lives. Christ came to love us, heal us and forgive us and through His death He bought our pardon and by His resurrection we have the hope of eternal life.  And our hope or shall we say “confident expectation” doesn’t just include the present, but our hope expressed by Paul to Titus is in the return or the 2^nd appearance of Jesus Christ.  The return of Christ to bring us back to Him is expressed in John 14 where He says, “That where I am is where you will be,” is a wonderful and powerful hope of being with Christ for all of eternity!

We have learned today how and why we were separated from God and how God had a plan to bring us back into that right relationship with Him through Jesus Christ.  Now we need to learn how to apply this in our lives.  How can we take this hope of the salvation of Jesus Christ and put it into common everyday practice.  Turn with me to Isaiah 63 for just a moment because it will tell us something important about Jesus and also reiterate what He did for us.  Read along with me, “¹ Who is this who comes from Edom, With dyed garments from Bozrah, This One who is glorious in His apparel, Traveling in the greatness of His strength? – ‘I who speak in righteousness, mighty to save.’ ² Why is Your apparel red, And Your garments like one who treads in the winepress? ³ ‘I have trodden the winepress alone, And from the peoples no one was with Me. For I have trodden them in My anger, And trampled them in My fury; Their blood is sprinkled upon My garments, And I have stained all My robes.’” There is a key word in this passage that most of us would miss that describes how Jesus can help us through those difficult and evil times and that word is “Edom”.  Edom was the name that God changed from Esau; Esau became known as Edom. When Saul was king he was told to wipe out the evil Edomites or the descendants of Esau, including the women and children and livestock.  King Saul did not do this and today those descendants of Esau are called Palestinians.  The point I want to make about this word is that Jesus has been to the evil places before us.  There is nothing that we will encounter in life that Jesus hasn’t already been there and done that.  So when we rest our hope in Him we can rest assured that He knows what we are dealing with.  This should give us a confident expectation or confident assurance to put all our hope and trust in Jesus Christ!  In this passage from Isaiah it reinforces and reemphasizes that it is by His blood we are redeemed or healed in the eyes of God.  Nothing we can do can achieve this – only the blood of Jesus Christ!

The final Scripture this morning comes from Philippians chapter 4.  Turn with me to this passage and let’s look at what it is saying to us this morning.  ⁸ Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy – meditate on these things. ⁹ The things which you learned and received and heard and saw in me, these do, and the God of peace will be with you.  Now I have to tell you I cannot do justice to this passage this morning from a time standpoint, but I will hit three quick points in these verses.  First, the word “meditate” means to “take an inventory,” so we need to take an inventory of our life.  This means we need to make sure we are doing things that are true, noble, just, pure, lovely, virtuous, and worthy of praise and good report.  If you go to Galatians 5:22 you are going to see many of these same words and thoughts used in the description of the fruit of the Spirit – But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness.  When we take inventory, we are taking stock of our life and we ask ourselves, “Does my witness, whether verbal or life-witness, reflect Jesus Christ or does it reflect the world?”  Once we have taken inventory we are told in verse 9 to put these traits into practice.  We’ve all heard we preach our funeral everyday – well as I have asked in this part of the Scripture: are we living a God-driven life or are we living a life that is more for the world, flesh and Satan.  We need to put into practice what we preach with our words.  This Scripture says that when we do that the God of peace will be with you.  The word “peace” means “to set at one again.”  When I studied this verse in-depth I realized something that all of us already know – we are made one with God through Jesus Christ.  Now this isn’t new to any of us, but something that God showed me in verse 9 did make this thought come to have new meaning.  Remember how I started out this message talking about the separation of Adam and Eve from God at the Fall of Man.  Guess what this verse is telling you and me this morning – it is teaching us that when we come to know Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior the relationship God had with mankind before the fall has been restored!  Our relationship with God becomes like the one that existed prior to the fall!  We can walk with God in the cool of the day!  We can talk with God face-to-face!  We can be in the presence of God on a daily basis!  We can have that intimate relationship with God that Adam and Eve had prior to the fall!  We can now eat from the Tree of Life; we are no longer banished from the Garden!  Now that is a confident expectation or as we call it hope this morning!

Do you have that type of relationship with God this morning?  You already have it if you have confessed with your mouth that Jesus Christ is your Lord and Savior and believe that God raised Him from the dead.  If you haven’t made that commitment and want that confident expectation or assurance of having that type of intimate relationship with God this morning, then come forward during our closing hymn and make that commitment today – God desires for you to have it and that is where our hope lies this morning – in Jesus Christ our Lord!  To all those who have ears let them hear!

What Is In A Meaning

Matthew 26:17-30

¹⁷ Now on the first day of the Feast of the Unleavened Bread the disciples came to Jesus, saying to Him, "Where do You want us to prepare for You to eat the Passover?" ¹⁸ And He said, "Go into the city to a certain man, and say to him, 'The Teacher says, "My time is at hand; I will keep the Passover at your house with My disciples." ¹⁹ So the disciples did as Jesus had directed them; and they prepared the Passover. ²⁰ When evening had come, He sat down with the twelve. ²¹ Now as they were eating, He said, "Assuredly, I say to you, one of you will betray Me." ²² And they were exceedingly sorrowful, and each of them began to say to Him, "Lord, is it I?" ²³ He answered and said, "He who dipped his hand with Me in the dish will betray Me. ²⁴ "The Son of Man indeed goes just as it is written of Him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been good for that man if he had not been born." ²⁵ Then Judas, who was betraying Him, answered and said, "Rabbi, is it I?" He said to him, "You have said it." ²⁶ And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to the disciples and said, "Take, eat; this is My body." ²⁷ Then He took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you. ²⁸ "For this is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. ²⁹ "But I say to you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in My Father's kingdom." ³⁰ And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives. (Matthew 26:17-30, NKJV)

Today I want us to look carefully at a meal that I think has become ritualistic and has lost some of its meaning to many sitting in pews of the church. In Exodus 12 and 13 we are told of the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread.  To many the Feast of Unleavened Bread is called the Passover. If we remember the Passover is a remembrance of the Angel of Death passing over the houses of the people of Israel that had the Blood of the Lamb on its doorpost and lintels. This has great significance to us today because it is through the true Blood of the Lamb (Jesus Christ) that death passes us over and we have the wonderful news of eternal life that is found in Him.

     As part of Passover, the first night and the seventh night is a time of meeting between God and man. It is an intimate time of relationship between God and His chosen people!  As we gather here this morning for Holy Communion we need to understand that this is our time of intimacy with our Lord and Savior and treat this time at the table as sacred and holy.

Leaven is symbolic within the Scriptures of sin or evil. Not only was leaven left out of the Passover meal because of the hurried state that the people of Israel left Egypt; leaven was left out of the bread as a symbolic gesture of the removal of sin and evil from the lives of the people who partook of the Passover meal.  I found it amazing that a common Jewish tradition in preparing for the Feast of Unleavened Bread is to sprinkle leavened (yeast) bread crumbs throughout the house and then subsequently sweep them all up and collectively burn them outside.  Leaven is also a fermentation agent. The Lord said to His disciples "Beware of the leaven (false doctrine) of the Pharisees" (Matthew 16:6; Mark 8:15). In addition, the apostle Paul warned the Church at Corinth that "a little leaven (yeast) leaveneth (ferments) the whole lump" (I Corinthians 5:6). Paul was simply saying that if sin goes unchecked, it will permeate and infect everything and everyone around them.

Unleavened bread symbolizes sanctification. In our partaking of unleavened bread or the symbol of unleavened bread it symbolizes that we are constantly in a state of sanctification; a state of being set apart to serve the Lord with all our heart, all our soul, and all our might.  The Lord Christ Jesus was crucified on the cross at Golgotha on the day of Passover. He was then buried in a newly hewn tomb donated by Joseph of Arimathea. However, unlike all other corpses, the body of Jesus (Yeshua) would not decay in the grave. There would be no decomposition of His body, no, none indeed. God the Father would not "allow thine Holy One (His Son Jesus) to see corruption (Psalm 16:10; Acts 2:27). The Feast of Unleavened Bread proclaims that Christ's physical body would not experience the ravages of death while in the grave; for He was sanctified (set apart) by God the Father.

      In verse 19 we come to our part of the preparation for the Service of Holy Communion.  Notice it says that the disciples did as Jesus had directed them.  They knew He was the answer and Lord of their life.  They were committed to Him.  As we come to the table today we need to come to Jesus with humility. We need to humble ourselves and come with the realization and understanding that we need Jesus’ intervention in our lives in order to have salvation and eternal life; which we cannot achieve on our own.  It is through Him, the true Paschal Lamb; the true Passover Lamb whose blood was shed for us; the one who truly delivers us out of the bondage of Satan and sin; that we come to this table today.  We come to this table with a renewed commitment to follow Jesus no matter what the cost. Out of love for our Savior and what He did for us, we willingly lay down our lives at the foot of the Cross in love and gratitude for what He has done for us; ever mindful of His death for our sake.  And finally, as we come to the table we come before the Lord in a time of examining our lives before we take Holy Communion.  As we read in 1^st Corinthians 11 we are told not partake of the Holy Supper without first examining ourselves and so after today’s sermon we will take a few moments of silent reflection to examine our lives and our unworthiness to come to this table, except for the intervention of Jesus Christ on our behalf.

     Looking over at verses 26 and 27 we come to an interesting time in the meal that comes out of our time of self-reflection.  The Scripture says that Jesus took the bread and blessed it.  Have you ever thought of this and what Jesus is actually doing here?  Jesus is blessing His upcoming torture and Crucifixion.  Think about that – Jesus is blessing His upcoming scourging and death!  This amazes me because He did this for you and me.  Jesus was blessing the beating He would take on our behalf; in other words he was blessing the stripes by which we are healed.  He then goes on to bless the shedding of His blood, just like the sacrificial lambs blood would be shed for the sins of the people, so that we might be cleansed of all unrighteousness and be place back in a right relationship with God.  Yet, this sacrifice that Jesus is speaking to at the Last Supper will be the final sacrifice.  Later on when on the Cross Jesus said, “It is finished,” we need to understand that another way of translating that phrase in Greek is, “It is paid in full!”  Jesus was willing to bless His upcoming death because He knew the end result would be that He was paying in full our debt before God!  This amazed me when I saw this point this week.  Have you ever thought of Jesus blessing His death as part of the Holy Supper!  How many of us here this morning can bless the things we are called to sacrifice?

     Finally we need to understand why we have communion and what it means to us here today.  I call it a time of anxiously awaiting the return of Christ.  Jesus told his disciples to do this in remembrance of me. He was telling you and me this morning to be in remembrance of His death for our sins until He returns.  And then tucked away in verse 29 is something I don’t want us to miss.  He speaks to His resurrection and more importantly His return.  Look at this verse along with me.  He states that He will not drink of this cup again until the Father’s Kingdom.  What He is actually saying is that He will not drink of this cup again until the Father’s Kingdom is reestablished on earth.  Can you see what verse 29 is telling us this morning – this meal we are about to partake of reminds us and points us to the Return of Christ!  There is coming a day when we will all partake of that meal with Jesus Christ at the great wedding feast and become the bride of Christ.  What a day that will be and I am looking forward to it, are you?

     The final point I want to make this morning speaks to one of the crowns that will be available to us at the Day of Judgment.  Without going into too much detail, there will be five crowns we can receive when we are judged by Christ.  This Day of Judgment is for Christians only and will take place in Heaven right after the Rapture of God’s church.  This is not the Great White Throne Judgment which will happen after the 1,000 year millennial reign of Christ – that is for the unsaved only.  This crown I speak of is found in 2^nd Timothy 4:8, “Finally, there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give to me on that Day, and not to only me but also to all who have loved His appearing.”  This Crown is for those believers who are ready and waiting for the Return of Jesus – all those who have Loved His Appearing. So as we come to the table we do so with that anxious expectation of the Return of Christ or as I like to say we are anxiously awaiting the Return of Christ. 

     As one can see the meal we are about to partake is not some ritual we do the first of every quarter or on special occasions.  Zwingli had it right when he wanted emphasis only on the meal and that it should be seen as a special occasion to spend quality and sacred time with the Lord.  Today, we have learned about what the Feast actually means in the context of Jesus’ time; what our preparation should be; what Jesus was really blessing and can we make that same commitment to bless our sacrifices; and finally that we are to celebrate this meal by anxiously awaiting the Return of Christ.  Jesus gave us this Remembrance Meal for a reason and let us never take it lightly.  To those who have ears let them hear the Word of God and His message…

When, If, Then, Now

2^nd Chronicles 7:13 – 16

Today we gather to celebrate July 4^th in the church. July 4^th speaks to the freedom founded in our country 236 years ago this coming Wednesday.  This week I thought back to what those men who signed the Declaration of Independence sacrificed.  They sacrificed their ties to their former country (England); they sacrificed the life of comfort and peace; they sacrificed the surety of tomorrow (for they did not know what this new life would bring); in other words they sacrificed everything to stand up for a new nation that was being created.  The early settlers came to seek religious freedom from a tyranny led government who wanted to tell them how they were to worship and to what church that would be. And through that expansion to a new world the United States of America was formed.  Religion played a big part, if the not main reason, this country was founded!

Our Scripture text for today talks about freedom as well.  Yet, in our search for freedom we must look within to start with.  We gather here this morning to worship our Lord and Savior and not a nation – we gather to look within our own lives and seek the freedom that can only be found in Jesus Christ. 

Turn with me to today’s text and if you would find your bulletin insert as we talk about what it means to seek God and have Him listen to our calling out to Him.  Read along with me the passage found at 2^nd Chronicles 7:13-16:

¹³ "When I shut up heaven and there is no rain, or command the locusts to devour the land, or send pestilence among My people, ¹⁴ if My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land. ¹⁵ Now My eyes will be open and My ears attentive to prayer made in this place. ¹⁶ For now I have chosen and sanctified this house, that My name may be there forever; and My eyes and My heart will be there perpetually" (NKJ).

There are 4 key words in today’s passage and they are listed as our sermon title for today.  We start in verse 13 with the word “when.”  In this case in the Hebrew vernacular it is the word “behold,” which means we are to stand up and take notice about what is about to be said.  God told Solomon, “When I do these things…”. Now some of your translations may say “if” but I believe “when” is more appropriate here because of the prayer of Solomon at the time of the dedication of the Temple which is found at 2 Chronicles 6:26-27.  Solomon prays, "When the heavens are shut up and there is no rain because they have sinned against You, when they pray toward this place and confess Your name, and turn from their sin because You afflict them, then hear in heaven, and forgive the sin of Your servants, Your people Israel, that You may teach them the good way in which they should walk; and send rain on Your land which You have given to Your people as an inheritance." 

Today’s Scripture is in response to Solomon’s prayer, so as Solomon prayed with a realization of a time of struggle God responds that this will indeed become a fact.    The first thing that has to take place is for us to look realistically at our lives and see what the true condition of our lives really is.  In verse 13 we get a glimpse at that condition.  When this verse says that there is no rain, we need to understand that this means that nothing is growing and we are starting to die spiritually.  I liken this to someone who has a garden.  In order to plant a garden there must be a turning of the soil in order to get the produce to grow.  We must not become complacent in our lives as to which we are not growing stronger spiritually.  We need to continue to plow the spiritual fields in order to grow.  We should do 5 things each day of the week, not only on Sundays and they are: Worship, Pray, spend time in Solitude with the Lord, Listen for the Lord, and read the Word of God.  If we do this then we will draw closer to Christ and the days of no rain with go away or at least be lessened.

Now if we continue to stay the same and remain comfortable without growing spiritually, we will find that the locust will devour us.  This means what little is growing will be eaten up.  Satan will see this as an opening and jump to seek, devour, and destroy.  This is a critical time in our individual life and the life of the church, because if we have not taken a realistic look at ourselves we will open ourselves to the onslaught of Satan as we learn when we look at the third point made from God of a person or church not growing in Christ.

God teaches us in verse 13 that when we are not growing and are under attack, pestilence will come amongst us.  This means that we are so weak that we open ourselves to Satan and everything he has to throw at us.  At this point we are in dire straits and in need of some major spiritual overhaul. I want to emphasize we may be down, but we are not out – God has a plan to redeem us and pull us out of this sinful pit.

Look at verse 14 and we see the second word of today’s sermon and that is the word “if”.  It is a conditional conjunction, so this passage is saying when these things happen, “if my people” do as I say “then” this will happen to them.  So we must first look at who the people are that God is speaking to in this passage and is He talking to us today? Verse 13 is explaining the condition of Israel, but we know by Romans 9:22-26 and 2^nd Corinthians 6:16 that it explains that this is also for us to here this morning.  I leave that up to you to read at your convenience – that is Romans 9:22-26 and 2^nd Corinthians 6:16. 

The key word in verse 14 is the word “humble.”  This means that we as individuals and as a church are to take a position that is not easy nor is it in our character.  As the Scriptures say the 2^nd chapter of Philippians, “…at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (10-11, NKJ).  We fall before the Lord with a realization that it is only Him who can save us and help our miserable condition.  In other words it a realistic look at who we really are when all our make-up has been removed and who we really are in the eyes of God. And we are truthful we will realize that we are sick and sinful and we need to pray, because you see a sick land, a sick church, a sick person (with sick meaning sinful) who continues to remain in their sickness or sinfulness cannot humble themselves before God and pray.  We have to come to that moment when we realize we need God and then we will truly humble ourselves and pray, “God we messed up, if it is to be fixed it is going to have to be you who fixes us!”  Brothers and sisters, when we humble ourselves it is shown by the evidence of prayer life, for the fruit of humility is prayer and humility is the fruit of prayer.

The next thing God says to the people in verse 14 is seek my face. The word “seek” means to deeply desire to get God’s attention; you seek until you get His attention; remember the woman who came to Jesus and ask for His attention even to the point of being so pushy as to ask for the scraps from the table.  She deeply desired Jesus and His attention, so should we!  This means we don’t get up from prayer until we receive an answer from God.  I am reminded of reading Billy Graham’s autobiography where Rev. Graham and his team would spend all night on their knees in prayer together in preparation of an upcoming or an ongoing revival.  Or what about Pat Robertson, when planning the start of the 700 Club, took orange juice into the church and said he would come out of the church when he had received an answer from God as to whether or not to start this ministry; and 7 days later emerged with the answer God gave to him. Now that is what this verse is talking about we seek God with that passion and commitment, and that is the same passion and commitment we have as we find in Rev. Graham and Pat Robertson because they took what Jeremiah 29:13 said to heart and that is what we should do so as well; when it says: “And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.”

But that is not all we are to do, then we are to turn from our wicked ways.  It is at this point that we have realized we are sinners, that we are off track, and we need God’s help and we drop all our attitudes, our desires, our agendas, our wants, our pride, our selfishness; and we repent.  I believe the first act of repentance is that we have to agree with God that His way and His plan is best and we need to follow Him with all our heart, all our soul, and all our might.

The third point of today’s Scripture then takes place: when these things happen or begin to happen and if we will do these things that God has mention then He says “I will hear from heaven”.  When we have God’s attention, because He has our total attention and commitment, the word says He will hear us, that He will forgive our sin, and He will heal our land.  What God is telling us here this morning is that when we come to Him broken and open to His Will for our life, then He will forgive our sin and heal our lives from the ravages of a Satan-led existence.  When we finally realize our total need of God and truly confess and repent, instead of just lip-service; God says, “I will hear you; I will forgive you: I will heal you.”  What great news this morning.

The final point of today’s message is the 4^th word in our sermon title and that is the word “now.”  God says when this happen, and if you do this, then I will do this, and now here is our new relationship that exists between You and me, whether it is individually or corporately as a church or a nation.  My eyes are now opened; my ears are attentive to your prayers; and my name and heart will be where you are.  We will have a new and vibrant relationship with God because first we are in tune with Him and He knows we are committed to Him in a complete subjection and submission mode; we have totally surrendered to Him with every aspect of our life and we are seeking Him daily in a new and exciting way.  We can read at John 14:13 that Jesus said to us, “And whatever you ask in My name, that I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.”  This Scripture is fulfilled when we get into the right relationship with God as we have talked about today. 

So in closing when we realize our total need and reliance on God, and we humble ourselves in prayer by seeking our God with a passion that desires to hear His answer and repent of our wickedness and sinfulness; He will hear our prayers, forgive us of our sins, and heal our lives; and then a new and wonderful relationship will begin with our Lord and Savior that will be life altering and life changing. As my pastor friend said this past Tuesday as we studied this passage, “When we get serious with God, God will get serious with us!”  I think that says it all this morning.  If you truly what freedom, you must do as our early forefathers did, be willing to give up everything to follow Jesus. 

Victory is Found in Jesus Christ

Have you ever messed up?  Have you ever done something after the fact you were sorry you acted the way you did?  Have you ever said something that afterwards you wished you could take it back?  Guess what, if this describes you I want you to know something that you are not alone!  We all have done this and we have done this during our walk of faith.  Can I tell you something this morning – you are not perfect and neither am I.  When Christ comes into our life we are made new, but we also have the human sinful nature bubbling underneath that is waiting to come forth at the most proper time.  The Scriptures tell us that “Now when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from Him until an opportune time” (Luke 4:13, NKJ).  We need to understand that we are going to be under attack from satan, but we don’t have to give in to this temptation.  However, we have victory and that is found in Jesus Christ.  That is the good news for us here this morning.

Turn in your Bibles as we look at a few verses that will show us that we can have victory and how that victory is found through the love of God.  Let us look a verse that we learned as a child – John 3:16. I love the HCSB version of this verse – For God loved the world in this way. He gave His One and Only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life.  From the time of Adam and Eve mankind had been messing up and yet, God still loved His creation and He made a way for that creation to be reconciled to Him.  It was through the sacrificial love of Jesus Christ that this happened and it was not because mankind was deserving, but because of God’s love for mankind.  We are told in the Scriptures, “But God proves His own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us!” (Romans 5:8, HCSB)  Think about this simple verse, God is saying although you mess up; although you upset me from time to time; even though you get angry with me sometimes; even when you turn your back on me – I STILL LOVE YOU!  No matter how far we fall or how hard we try to run away – God will always still love you and me!  That truly is good news!

Now there are a couple of things I want to touch on this morning concerning the love of God and how we can remain strong in our walk of faith.  I believe it starts and begins with LOVE!  This is a love that we receive we confess Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior.  The picture of the church is that when one of us hurts we all hurt – when one of us is happy, we all are happy – when one of us needs prayer, we all gather around that person and pray.  That is what I believe 1^st Corinthians 13 tells us when it says to the church: “If I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all the faith so that I can move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing” (1^st Corinthians 13:2, HCSB). I also love the beginning of chapter 14 of this wonderful book of Paul where he tells us to “Pursue love” (1^st Corinthians 14:1a, HCSB).  Love is the key to people knowing we are followers of Jesus Christ; it is even a command from Him when he says, “I give you a new command: Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you must also love one another. By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:34-35, HCSB).  Notice in this verse it doesn’t say that we can pick and choose whom we will love or whether we are to love others, it states clearly in Greek text that you must have love for others in order to be a follower of Christ.  The phrase concerning our relationship with each other and with those we come into contact with in the world in which we live is translated in this verse as “one must prove their love.”  We need to come to the understanding that love is an attribute of God and it is to be an attribute of us as well – and let us be honest at times it has to be a sacrificial attribute of us!  I think all of us can agree that sometimes loving others is difficult and it is a sacrifice to do so, but when we realize the love that Jesus Christ has for us and the sacrifice He made for us then we should be more than willing to love each other abundantly.  Let’s be honest at the end of the day the choice is ours whether we choose to love or we choose to hate!

In addition when we love one another we will find that the love of the Lord brings about a commonality of Christ with one another, and we do not focus on our short-comings and differences; we tend to build on the issues and problems when love is absent; but when we focus on the love of Christ we will strive to build each other up!  See when we know the love of our Lord and Savior we will not feel beat up or beat down, but we will feel lifted up by the love of Jesus Christ!  We need to understand that He is pouring His love out on us so we can pour that love out on those we come into contact with in this world in which we live! Are we pouring out that love in our lives each and every day?

Secondly, how do we love like Jesus?  Turn with me to Galatians 2:19-20. I have been crucified in Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now lives in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me (HCSB). When we confessed Christ as our Lord and Savior our old self is crucified and we are resurrected into a new life with Christ as our Lord and Savior.  The Scriptures speak over and over about our old self being crucified. One of those times is the passage that says, “For we know that our old self was crucified with Him in order that sin’s dominion over the body may be abolished, so that we may no longer be enslaved to sin…if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with Him!” (Romans 6:6, 8)  We need to understand that when the love of Christ is in us we are a new person, a person that lives in the world, but is not addicted to the world. The Scripture tells us, “Do not love the world or the things that belong to the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in him.” (1^st John 2:15, HCSB).  Now this may seem harsh, but we that know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior realize this is just a temporary place we are passing through on the way to our eternal home!  How can this attitude of love happen in our lives?  In the Scriptures we read, “For Christ’s love controls us” (2^nd Corinthians 5:14a, HCSB).  The measure of your love of God is manifested by the measure of love we have for each other!

When we allow Jesus to come in and take control of our life the love for Him will allow us to see this world and people in it differently; it will also make us see love in a different light.  However, I know that there will be times that I cannot love you without the help of the Holy Spirit and there will be times that you cannot love me without the help of the Holy Spirit.  Brothers and sisters the Spirit is here to teach us how to love, how to live a life that is pleasing to God as individuals and as a church.  It all begins with the love which we receive when we confess Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior!  Then life changes as we know it and even though we mess up from time to time, we are forgiven by the love covering of Jesus Christ!  This is good news that our Lord desires for us to experience this love and share that love with others we come into contact with. This morning I desire that you receive and experience the kind of love that can only come from Jesus Christ! 


Just remember that love covers a multitude of sins!