Has Anything Changed?

[The following is a full manuscript of my sermon delivered on Sunday morning, the 22nd of May, 2016.  Look for the video on our Vimeo channel, http://vimeo.com/pilgrimreformedchurch.]

Jesus entered the city of Jerusalem one last time, arriving to the shouts of Hosanna! – Save me!  All the people turned out to see the King as He approached.  They threw flowers and palm branches at His feet.

But Jesus knew this celebration would be short lived.  He knew the people would soon turn on Him.  He knew their hearts would be hardened, no matter what He did.  And He knew this because it had all been foretold hundreds of years before.

Listen and follow along as I read to you from the 12th chapter of the Apostle John’s Gospel, verses 37 through 45, from the New Living Translation…

37 But despite all the miraculous signs Jesus had done, most of the people still did not believe in Him. 38 This is exactly what Isaiah the prophet had predicted: 

“Lord, who has believed our message?
To whom has the Lord revealed His powerful arm?” 

39 But the people couldn’t believe, for as Isaiah also said, 

40 “The Lord has blinded their eyes
and hardened their hearts —
so that their eyes cannot see,
and their hearts cannot understand,
and they cannot turn to me
and have me heal them.” 

41 Isaiah was referring to Jesus when he said this, because he saw the future and spoke of the Messiah’s glory. 42 Many people did believe in Him, however, including some of the Jewish leaders. But they wouldn’t admit it for fear that the Pharisees would expel them from the synagogue. 43 For they loved human praise more than the praise of God. 

44 Jesus shouted to the crowds, “If you trust Me, you are trusting not only Me, but also God who sent Me. 45 For when you see Me, you are seeing the One who sent Me.”

--John 12:37-45 (NLT)

Let us pray…  Father God, we come into Your presence this morning to worship You and to listen to Your word.  Please help us receive and understand the message You have for us so that our eyes may not be blinded, our hearts may not be hardened.  In the blessed name of Your Son Jesus we pray.  Amen.


Have you heard the story about the pastor who had a kitten that climbed up a tree in his backyard but was afraid to come back down?  The pastor coaxed with milk and gentle words, but the kitty would not come down.  The tree wasn’t sturdy enough to climb, so the pastor decided that if he tied a rope to his car and drove forward, bending the tree down, he could reach up and grab the kitten.

So that's what he did, all the while checking his progress in the car mirror.  At one point he figured if he went just a little further, the tree would be bent enough for him to reach the kitten.  But as he inched ahead the rope broke, the tree went "boing!", and the kitten sailed through the air and out of sight.

The pastor felt terrible!  He walked all over the neighborhood asking people if they'd seen a little kitten.  No one had seen any stray cats, so he just prayed, "Lord, I just commit this kitten to your keeping.", and went on about his business.

A few days later he was at the grocery store, and met one of his church members.  He happened to look into her shopping cart and was amazed to see cat food.  This woman was a cat hater and everyone knew it, so he asked her, "Why are you buying cat food when you hate cats so much?"

She replied, "You won't believe this," and went on to tell how her little girl had been begging for a cat but she kept refusing.  Then a few days ago, the child begged again, so the Mom finally told her little girl, "Well, if God gives you a cat, I'll let you keep it."  She continued: "I watched my child go out into the back yard, get down on her knees to pray, and - really Pastor, if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes - a kitten suddenly came flying out of the clear blue sky and landed right in front of her!"


Miracles do still happen but do we always recognize their source?  This woman clearly believed that God gave her little girl that kitten.  What do we believe when we see or hear of a miracle?

When someone is healed, is it a miracle of modern science, or the handiwork of the Great Physician?  Is it the good work of the weatherman when it rains in the middle of a dry spell, or God answering prayers?  Is it easier to believe the messages we receive through our television sets that we can find happiness if only we run out and buy a new car, or the message of our Bible that true happiness can only be found in a solid relationship with Jesus?

Do we still see, or have our eyes been blinded?  Do we still feel, or have our hearts been hardened?  We use the words, “In God we trust”, but do we really?  Let me give you an example of trust I think everyone can relate to.

You get really sick one night and someone takes you to the hospital emergency room.  There you are seen by a doctor whose name you don’t recognize and whose credentials you cannot verify.  This doctor gives you a prescription you cannot read.  You take it to a pharmacist you have never met who gives you a chemical compound you do not understand.  And you go home and take that medicine according to the instructions printed on a label of the bottle.

That is trust - that is faith.  If we put our mortal lives into the hands of people we  know very little about, why can’t we put our eternal lives into the hands of the One who made us, and who we can learn all about in our Bible?


Has anything really changed over the years?  Apparently very little changed in the more than 400 years between the time Isaiah spoke his prophecy for God and John wrote of these last days of Jesus’ life.  And now, over 2000 years later, the words of both Isaiah and John still hold true.

I’m sure you’ve said or heard someone say something to the effect of, “How can anyone not believe in God when…” and then add something that is a sign of God’s existence.  How can we not believe in Jesus when we read of all He did?  His resurrection alone should prove His Godhead.  After all, hundreds of people saw and heard Him during the 40 days after His death and burial before He ascended into heaven, yet not one of them ever contested the reports of His appearances in the flesh.  How can people still not believe?

Well, Isaiah tells us how.  Their eyes have been blinded and their hearts hardened.  We can read of a similar situation when the Jews were still captive in Egypt and Moses was trying to get Pharaoh to let them go.  Listen to this passage from the Book of Exodus, chapter 4, verse 21…

21 And the Lord said to Moses, “When you go back to Egypt, see that you do all those wonders before Pharaoh which I have put in your hand.  But I will harden his heart, so that he will not let the people go."

--Exodus 4:21 (NKJV)

We see words like “Pharaoh’s heart was hardened” many times over the next 10 chapters, until in Exodus chapter 14, verse 17, we find out why…

17 "And I indeed will harden the hearts of the Egyptians, and they shall follow them.  So I will gain honor over Pharaoh and over all his army, his chariots, and his horsemen."

--Exodus 14:17 (NKJV)

So that when it all worked out to God’s plan, God would get the honor and the glory.

I believe that story of the Exodus and what befell the Egyptians serves as a good example of what happens when God’s patience runs out.  A few more can be found in the Book of Genesis.  Remember the Great Flood?  God looked down and saw how wicked man had become and He regretted ever putting man on the face of the earth.  And we can surely see an impatient God at work in His reaction to the evilness of man and His destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.

And then there are the times the Israelites rebelled against God and were conquered and carried off into captivity.  But Isaiah and John provide us with the saddest result of God losing His patience with us: a hardened heart and all hopes for eternal salvation lost.

Just as Isaiah foretold, despite all the miracles Jesus performed and all who witnessed them, so many people still refuse to believe in Him.  Even when He said to trust Him was to trust God, too many people tend to put their faith in things or in others rather than in Jesus and our Father God.  We refuse to forgive, and the resentment and bitterness we carry harden our hearts.  Too soon we cannot turn to the One who can heal us.


John tells us that during his day, many people did believe in Jesus - even some of the Jewish leadership.  But these “leaders” were afraid to admit their belief in public, lest the Pharisees kick them out of the church.  They cared more about receiving praise and acceptance from other men than from God.  They were more worried over how they looked in the eyes of man than in the eyes of their Creator.

Has anything changed?  How many people do you know today that fit that description?  How many fall prey to peer pressure, seeking the acceptance of their friends rather than God’s?  How many don’t trust Jesus enough to stand up for Him in public?

Family, mankind must heed Jesus’ call.  If we do indeed trust in God, like our currency says, then we must also trust in Jesus being His Son.  To see Jesus, in our hearts, is to see God.  To get to that point, we’ve got to put Jesus first in our lives.  We’ve got to care more about what God thinks of us than what man thinks.  We have to trust Him fully, completely, knowing He will be by our side no matter what, even if we face ridicule, or worse, for declaring Him as our Lord.

And we – mankind – must do so while our eyes can still see, while our hearts can still feel.  For the time is coming when God’s patience will run out, when our eyes will be blinded and our hearts hardened and turned to stone.

Believe and trust in our Lord Jesus, the true Son of God.

Amen.


Let us pray…  Father God, we’ve seen what can happen when Your patience wears thin, and it isn’t very pretty for mankind.  Moses showed us the consequences of You hardening our hearts and blinding our eyes.  Father, forgive us our moments of disbelief, our fear of not being accepted by our fellow man, our times of internal turmoil when we fail to trust fully in our Lord Jesus.

Hear us now, Father, as we come to You in the silence.  Hear our prayers spoken directly from our hearts…

Lord Jesus, restore our sight that we might once again see Your truth.  Soften our hearts to once again feel God’s Holy Spirit filling us, strengthening us, guiding us.  We trust our Father God, and we put our faith in You.  It is in Your blessed name, dear Jesus, we pray.  Amen.

God Within Us

[The following is a full manuscript of my sermon delivered on Sunday morning, the 15th of May, 2016.  Look for the video on our Vimeo channel, http://vimeo.com/pilgrimreformedchurch.]

Jesus was dead and buried, but then He conquered death and rose from the grave.  Over the next forty days He appeared to hundreds of people before finally ascending into heaven and taking His rightful place alongside God the Father.

During that time He instructed His disciples not to leave Jerusalem until God had sent the gift He promised, the gift of the Holy Spirit.  So they stayed, and when about 120 of them were together in one place, they prayerfully chose Matthias to replace Judas and become an apostle with the other eleven.

What happened next altered the course of the world.  It changed the relationship between God and mankind.  Listen and follow along as I read to you from the Apostle Luke’s Book of the Acts of the Apostles, the 2nd chapter, verses 1 through 4, from the New Living Translation…

1 On the day of Pentecost all the believers were meeting together in one place. 2 Suddenly, there was a sound from heaven like the roaring of a mighty windstorm, and it filled the house where they were sitting. 3 Then, what looked like flames or tongues of fire appeared and settled on each of them. 4 And everyone present was filled with the Holy Spirit and began speaking in other languages, as the Holy Spirit gave them this ability.

--Acts 2:1-4 (NLT)

Let us pray…  Father God, we come into Your presence this morning to celebrate the day so long ago when You first offered a part of Yourself to live within us, if only we would believe in and accept Your Son Jesus as our Lord and Master.  Help us understand, please Lord, why You made this remarkable gift available to us.  Help us follow Your Holy Spirit in our walk through life.  Help us receive the message You have for us on this Day of Pentecost.  In the blessed name of Your Son Jesus we pray.  Amen.


It was Pentecost Sunday, and as the congregation filed into church, the ushers handed each person a bright red carnation to symbolize the festive spirit of the day.  The people listened attentively to the reading of the Pentecost story from the Book of Acts about how the disciples had heard “what sounded like a powerful wind from heaven”; about how the Holy Spirit had appeared “like tongues of fire”.  Then came the sermon.  “The Spirit of the Lord is upon us,” the preacher began.  “Like the powerful wind from heaven!”, shouted a woman sitting in the first pew.  Then she threw one of the red carnations toward the altar.  The preacher began again.  “The Spirit of the Lord is upon us.”  The same woman’s voce rang out yet again, “Like the tongues of fire, the tongues of fire!”  And once more she threw a red carnation toward the altar.  The preacher looked straight at her and said, “Now throw your pocketbook.”  To which the woman replied, “Preacher, you have just calmed the wind and put out the fire.”


The Reverend Doctor Carlyle Fielding Stewart once wrote:

"Too many churches today are devoid of the Spirit of Pentecost because they are dry and stale, where people are in a stupor; where worship services are wooden and so scripted that they are hollow; where the preaching is dull and flat; where the singing is Geritol-tired and without the vim and vigor which speaks of a crucified, died and risen Lord; where if anyone taps his foot and says, 'Amen', he is stared into silence, and if anyone shouts, 'Thank you, Jesus!' the people call EMS or 9-1-1.  Too many churches have become mausoleums for the dead rather than coliseums of praise for a living God.  They have lost the spirit of Pentecost!  They have lost their enthusiasm.  They have lost their joy for Jesus and find themselves suffering from what William Willimon calls 'Institutional and Spiritual Dry Rot'.  If the Church is to survive the next millennium it must recapture some of the praise and enthusiasm it had two millennia ago."

And I might add to Dr. Stewart’s comments that in too many cases the wind has been calmed and the fire put out.


Do we still have that spirit of Pentecost?  What does that word “Pentecost” mean to us today?  Many think of it as the day when the Holy Spirit first came down to live in man.  And that is true, as far as it goes.

The word “Pentecost” in Hebrew means “fiftieth day”.  And Pentecost itself was first of all one of the three main Jewish feasts, coming 50 days after the feast of Passover, including the day of Passover.  It was to celebrate the very first fruits of harvest, and to tithe of those first fruits.

Remember how I said at the start that Jesus spent 40 days after His resurrection appearing to His disciples and others before ascending into heaven?  Do you also remember the time of Jesus’ arrest and crucifixion and resurrection?  That was during the Feast of Passover.  And there were a few days after His ascension while His disciples tried to get everything in order and selected a new apostle and…

Well… Do you see how the timing all lines up?


What happened on that day of Pentecost was foretold centuries before, by the prophet Joel speaking for God.  Listen to God’s promise as recorded in the Book of Joel, chapter 2, verses 28 and 29…

28 “Then, after doing all those things,
I will pour out my Spirit upon all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy.
Your old men will dream dreams,
and your young men will see visions.
29 In those days I will pour out my Spirit
even on servants — men and women alike."

--Joel 2:28-29 (NLT)

That is exactly what happened as we just read in the Book of Acts.  And that pouring out of God’s Holy Spirit, filling the hole in man’s own spirit, created a sound so loud that others heard it and rushed into the place where the disciples stood just to see what was going on.  There they witnessed the power of the Holy Spirit first hand for themselves.  And they were amazed.  Luke tells us about 3000 people came to believe in Jesus as Christ that day!


Evangelist Francis Chan, in one of his many messages, refers to the Holy Spirit as the forgotten God.  We often talk about God the Father and Jesus His Son.  But the Holy Spirit can be a little tougher to get a handle on.

He has been with God all along and with us since the very beginning.  In fact, Genesis chapter 1 verses 1 and 2 tell us that…

1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 The earth was formless and empty, and darkness covered the deep waters. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters.

--Genesis 1:1-2 (NLT)

I love that image, of the Holy Spirit hovering over the surface of the waters, just waiting for God to command Him into action.  Just as I can imagine the Spirit hovering over the Jordan River one day, until the Father sent Him to descend like a dove onto God’s Son Jesus at His baptism.  And shortly after that baptism, the Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness, there to be tempted for forty days by Satan, giving evidence to the true identity of the Messiah.

Jesus spoke of the Holy Spirit before His death, telling His followers of God’s promise to man.  Let me read to you from the Gospel account of the Apostle John, from chapter 14, verses 16 through 18 and verse 26…

16 “And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Advocate, who will never leave you. 17 He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth. The world cannot receive Him, because it isn’t looking for Him and doesn’t recognize Him. But you know Him, because He lives with you now and later will be in you. 18 No, I will not abandon you as orphans — I will come to you.

26 “But when the Father sends the Advocate as My representative — that is, the Holy Spirit — He will teach you everything and will remind you of everything I have told you.”

--John 14:16-18, 26 (NLT)

Jesus did not want us to be alone after He returned to heaven, so He asked God our Father to send His Holy Spirit to each of us that believe.

We need to fully understand what Jesus said there.  The world cannot receive the Holy Spirit because the world does not recognize Him!  Only believers will receive God’s Holy Spirit.  And Jesus said the disciples knew the Spirit because He lives with them, but soon He would be in them!

Up until the Day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit only entered and lived within those individuals that God directed Him to indwell.  Only people directly specified by God received the Holy Spirit.  And that even includes Jesus His Son, there at His baptism.

But when Jesus returned to heaven, God sent His Holy Spirit to live within all believers, to be in us.  This marked a dramatic change in God’s relationship with mankind!  This made it all personal.  We now have God living inside us!  It’s His gift to us for believing in His Son and following Him.  It is the fulfillment of Jesus’ promise and the basis of our hope.  And the Apostle Paul tells us in the 5th verse of the 5th chapter of his letter to the Romans…

5 And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love.

--Romans 5:5 (NLT)

God loves us and He fills our hearts with love by filling us with His Holy Spirit.  Through Pentecost, God equipped His Son’s church with the power of His own Holy Spirit so that He will be glorified among the nations.  We are the church of Jesus.  We are equipped with the mightiest power.


Do we believe in Jesus as the one true Son of God?  Do we accept Him as our Lord and Master and strive to obey His commands?  Then we have within us a force more powerful than the mightiest wind.  A force that can rage like a thundering fire, or that can quietly lead us in the paths our Lord would have us walk.

In the Holy Spirit we have an Advocate, a Counselor, a guide, a constant and ever-present Companion.  And we have that power of resurrection.  How are we going to use that power?  Or are we going to even use it at all?

Don’t be afraid of the Holy Spirit or of His power.  Don’t be ashamed to let others know when He has moved you.  If you feel a “Thank You, Jesus!” building up inside you, let it out before you burst!  It’s just the Holy Spirit, making Himself heard through you.

Let us revive and keep alive the Spirit of Pentecost in our church family, and others will rush in just to see what is going on.  Thank You, Jesus!  Amen.


Let us pray…  Father God, when Your Son Jesus asked You to send Your Holy Spirit to all of His believers so none would ever be alone, You did not hesitate but did just as He asked.  You give us Your very own Spirit to live within us when we accept Jesus as our Lord and Master, our personal Friend and Savior.  Your Spirit is now our constant Companion and Guide - ever present, ever faithful.  Thank You, Father!

Hear us now, Father, as we pause for just a moment in the silence to personally give You our thanks, to seek Your forgiveness, to ask for Your help…

Lord Jesus, You asked our Father to give us a wonderful gift just because You love us and don’t want us to be alone in this life.  Please, Lord, help us always remember the Holy Spirit within us.  Help us keep His temple clean and pure.  Help us use the power He brings for the expansion of our Father’s kingdom across this earth.  It is in Your blessed name, dear Jesus, we pray.  Amen.

Faith of Our Mothers

[The following is a full manuscript of my sermon delivered on Sunday morning, the 8th of May, 2016.  Look for the video on our Vimeo channel, http://vimeo.com/pilgrimreformedchurch.]

Some try to downplay the role of women in the church.  Some even feel that the only appropriate role for any woman is as a wife and mother.  But our Bible is full of female role models, and it especially stresses the importance of mothers.  The most significant is the complete story of Mary, the mother of Jesus, who gave birth while still a virgin.  And there’s Naomi, probably better remembered as a mother-in-law, but look at the influence she had on Ruth, who went on to play a critical role in the history of Israel.

A mother’s influence cannot be overstated.  But it can be understated and if we’re not careful, we might miss the impact.  Listen and follow along as I read to you from the Apostle Paul’s 2nd letter to his young protégé Timothy, the opening chapter, verses 1 through 7, from the New Living Translation…

1 This letter is from Paul, chosen by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus.  I have been sent out to tell others about the life He has promised through faith in Christ Jesus. 

2 I am writing to Timothy, my dear son. 

May God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord give you grace, mercy, and peace. 

3 Timothy, I thank God for you — the God I serve with a clear conscience, just as my ancestors did.  Night and day I constantly remember you in my prayers.  4 I long to see you again, for I remember your tears as we parted.  And I will be filled with joy when we are together again. 

5 I remember your genuine faith, for you share the faith that first filled your grandmother Lois and your mother, Eunice.  And I know that same faith continues strong in you.  6 This is why I remind you to fan into flames the spiritual gift God gave you when I laid my hands on you.  7 For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.

--2 Timothy 1:1-7 (NLT)

Let us pray…  Father God, we celebrate our mothers this day, Mother’s Day, because of all they mean to us, all they do for us.  You, Lord God, command us to do more than that, though.  You mean for us to honor them each and every day, and for the huge impact they have not only over our lives but over the lives of all others we touch.  Help us hear the message You have for us this Mother’s Day, that we might better honor those who always loved us no matter what, just like You always love us.  In the blessed name of Your Son Jesus we pray.  Amen.


John Killinger wrote the following affirmation to mothers in his book, "Lost in Wonder, Love, and Praise":

I believe in Jesus Christ, the Son of the loving God, who was born of the promise to a virgin named Mary.

I believe in the love Mary gave her son, that caused her to follow him in his ministry and stand by his cross as he died.

I believe in the love of all mothers, and its importance in the lives of the children they bear. It is stronger than steel, softer than down, and more resilient than a green sapling on the hillside. It closes wounds, melts disappointments, and enables the weakest child to stand tall and straight in the fields of adversity.

I believe that this love, even at its best, is only a shadow of the love of God, a dark reflection of all that we can expect of him, both in this life and the next.

And I believe that one of the most beautiful sights in the world is a mother who lets this greater love flow through her to her child, blessing the world with the tenderness of her touch and the tears of her joy.


Killinger provides not only a beautiful sentiment, but he echoes and reinforces the point of Paul’s message, too.  There are a couple things I want you to remember about this affirmation of mothers.  First is the love of Mary for her son Jesus that led her to follow Him in His ministry.  And second is the love of all mothers that flows from them to their children, “blessing the world”.  That is what I want to look at: the impact of mothers - not only on their children, but on the world.


A few minutes ago I spoke to the children about how God means for us to honor our mothers and fathers.  This is so important to Him that He included it in His Ten Commandments to us.  This is how Moses recorded the Fifth Commandment, in the Book of Deuteronomy, chapter 5, verse 16…

16 "Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God has commanded you, that your days may be long, and that it may be well with you in the land which the Lord your God is giving you."

--Deuteronomy 5:16 (NKJV)

This is a commandment with a promise.  He always gives us a choice to follow His word or not, to obey Him or to ignore Him.  Here, if we do as God commands, He will reward us with long life and His great favor.


But getting back to today’s scripture reading from Paul’s 2nd letter to Timothy, only one verse carries the full weight of the message I felt compelled to share.  The first 4 verses show how much Paul cared for and loved his young friend and protégé Timothy.  The last two bear evidence of what can result from a mother’s influence on her child.

But the 5th verse, much like the 5th Commandment, gives us insight into God’s magnificent plan for mankind.  He gave us mothers for a very good reason.


Paul starts out this 2nd letter to Timothy as he begins all his epistles: by first identifying himself.  He is Paul, chosen by God as an apostle of Jesus.  We know an apostle is one who is sent and indeed Paul acknowledges that mission, noting that he has been sent out to tell others about the Good News that is Jesus.

Then he prays that God give grace, mercy, and peace to his young friend.  Paul assures Timothy that he thanks God for him, remembering him constantly in his prayers.

He tells Timothy how much he wishes they could get together again, recalling the tears the young man shed at their parting, envisioning the joy that will fill him when they are reunited.  Sadly, we are not sure if that reunion ever occurred.  This was Paul’s last letter, written from prison shortly before his execution.  Paul knew his time on earth was near an end, yet he wanted so much to offer encouragement to his young friend, the one he considered as a son.


And then Paul says something to Timothy that I find remarkable, and feel it may easily be missed.  “I remember your genuine faith”, he begins.  Timothy’s faith in our Lord is genuine, real, not contrived or made up or pumped up to look good to the masses.  It’s real.  Then he adds what has influenced that faith: “for you share the faith that first filled your grandmother Lois and your mother, Eunice”.

Now faith is a gift we receive from God.  We have all been given a measure of faith.  Jesus assures us that even a small amount can move mountains.  But it’s up to us to form and shape and use that faith the way God meant us to.  It’s up to us to make our faith genuine, as Timothy’s.

Fortunately, we can get some help in that task.  Paul is pointing out just how great an influence Timothy’s mother, Eunice, had on Timothy.  The genuine faith within him first filled his own mother.  It may have come from God, but it was nourished and molded by his mother and her tender love.

Timothy’s faith, and how he applied it, was powerfully influenced by his mother’s example.  And she herself was influenced in the same way by her own mother, Lois.  From mother to daughter, then from daughter to son, a gift from our heavenly Father was shaped and molded and applied.  Followers of Christ Jesus all - first Lois, then Eunice, then Timothy.  And Timothy, as a leader in the early church and the example Paul used so often, influenced the world.


Remember the part in Killinger’s affirmation I read at the start about Mary following Jesus in His ministry?  Killinger also said she stood by His cross as He died.  Let me read to you from the Gospel account of the Apostle John, from chapter 19, verses 25 through 27…

25 Standing near the cross were Jesus’ mother, and His mother’s sister, Mary (the wife of Clopas), and Mary Magdalene. 26 When Jesus saw His mother standing there beside the disciple He loved, He said to her, “Dear woman, here is your son.” 27 And He said to this disciple, “Here is your mother.” And from then on this disciple took her into his home.

--John 19:25-27 (NLT)

In these three verses, John speaks of those who are at the cross of Jesus because of their love for Him.  But we need to understand that Mary was more than the mother of Jesus.  Being the mother of God is pretty important, but she was also one of His disciples, one of His followers.

She didn’t have to be.  She could have still loved her son without becoming all wrapped up in His personal ministry.  She chose to follow Him just as the other disciples chose to follow Him.

And indeed she has the same essential characteristics as seen in the other disciples.  Consider the fact that Mary, “the mother of Jesus”, like John himself, is not mentioned by name in John’s Gospel.  This may be in keeping with her humility, which is a key aspect of discipleship in John’s viewpoint.

Since John, the Beloved Disciple, and Mary, the mother of Jesus, are both examples of true discipleship, we can see a change in their roles with Jesus’ assignment of “here is your son” and “here is your mother”.  Jesus is reforming the group that has grown around Him, completing the structure of those who have chosen to follow Him.  This new community is now a family, just as we at Pilgrim are a family.

Here at the very end of His mortal life, we see Jesus showing great love and compassion, even as He suffers on the cross.  He wants to make sure His mother will be taken care of after He returns to heaven.  But I believe the greater, perhaps more urgent, need for Him was to form the body of disciples, His followers, into a loving family, so that they could see to the needs of each other just as a family does.

When Jesus commissioned us to go into the world making disciples, this is what He meant us to do.  He wants us to help others come to believe in Him, bringing them into the great and beautiful family of God, all united by our head Jesus Christ!


I know many of you here today have lineages similar to Timothy’s.  You enjoyed the blessing of a mother and grandmother and other relatives that had a strong and secure faith in God through Jesus Christ.  And that faith is strong in you.

I know you mothers here have passed or are still passing that faith along to your children, just as Lois did to Eunice and Eunice to Timothy.  But I can assure you women, those with children and those childless, that there are millions of sons and daughters out there, just waiting to be brought up in the family, just waiting for your faith to be shared with them.  And that goes for all you men, too.

All of us have brothers and sisters and sons and daughters that we’ve never met.  They’ve yet to come to know Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior.  Or they are struggling with their faith.  Whether they know it or not, they need a family to belong to.  They need mothering.

Let’s go make some disciples, and bring them into our family.  Let’s show them the faith of our mothers.  And of our fathers, too.  Amen.


Let us pray…  Father God, You gave us Your Son Jesus to offer us salvation and hope.  You gave us Your Holy Spirit to live within us and guide us, to be our constant Companion.  And You gave us mothers to get us through our formative years, to be the physical arms of Your loving care.  You gave us mothers so we could feel and touch and smell and hear and see You.  Thank You, Lord.

Hear us now, Father, as we pause a moment in the silence to give You thanks and seek Your forgiveness and Your help…

Lord Jesus, You showed us how to build Your church as You drew Your last breaths on Your cross.  We are to make new followers for You, and then we are to bring them into the greater family of God.  And as Timothy benefited from the faith shared from his mother and grandmother, we too are to share our faith with others.  Please, Lord, help us always do just that, while loving unconditionally.  It is in Your glorious name, dear Jesus, we pray.  Amen.

Stretching Out

[The following is a full manuscript of my sermon delivered on Sunday morning, the 1st of May, 2016.  Look for the video on our Vimeo channel, http://vimeo.com/pilgrimreformedchurch.]

You’ve heard me say before that everything in the Bible points to Jesus.  Even the Old Testament books - which some consider nothing more than a history lesson leading up to Christianity… even the Old Testament paints a beautiful portrait of Jesus.  It speaks of Him before He took human form.  It foreshadows His earthly life.  And yes, it gives us some history so that we can understand what led up to God’s greatest gift to mankind.

But one of the neatest things about the Old Testament is that it provides us with God’s word, directed to us as given voice by His prophets.  God speaks to us through the Old Testament prophets, instructing us, rebuking us, telling us how to be righteous in His eyes.

Listen and follow along as I read to you from the book of the greatest of prophets, Isaiah, chapter 54 verses 1 through 5, from the New King James Version…

1 “Sing, O barren,
You who have not borne!
Break forth into singing, and cry aloud,
You who have not labored with child!
For more are the children of the desolate
Than the children of the married woman,” says the Lord.

2 “Enlarge the place of your tent,
And let them stretch out the curtains of your dwellings;
Do not spare;
Lengthen your cords,
And strengthen your stakes.

3 "For you shall expand to the right and to the left,
And your descendants will inherit the nations,
And make the desolate cities inhabited.

4 “Do not fear, for you will not be ashamed;
Neither be disgraced, for you will not be put to shame;
For you will forget the shame of your youth,
And will not remember the reproach of your widowhood anymore.

5 "For your Maker is your husband,
The Lord of hosts is His name;
And your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel;
He is called the God of the whole earth."

--Isaiah 54:1-5 (NKJV)

Let us pray…  Father God, we have come together this morning to worship You and to receive the message You have for us this day.  Lord God, please enable us to discern Your will for us from Your word and our meditations.  In the name of Your blessed Son Jesus we pray.  Amen.


Most of you know of my background in science, and I know some of you have a similar history.  Let’s talk science for a just bit, because so many people think science and Christianity are not compatible.

Dr. Stephen Hawking is a world renowned physicist and noted atheist that many consider to be the most intelligent man alive.  He calculated that if the rate of the universe’s expansion one second after the Big Bang had been smaller by even one part in a hundred thousand million million, the universe would have collapsed into a fireball.  British physicist P. C. W. Davies has concluded the odds against the initial conditions being suitable for the formation of stars – a necessity for planets and thus for life – is a one followed by at least a thousand billion zeroes.  Davies also estimated that if the strength of gravity or of what is called the weak force were changed by only one part in a ten followed by a hundred zeroes, life could never have developed.

There are about fifty constants and quantities – for example, the amount of useable energy in the universe, the difference in mass between protons and neutrons, the ratios of the fundamental forces of nature, and the proportion of matter to antimatter – that must be balanced to a mathematically infinitesimal degree for any life to be possible.  And yet, here we are.

Let me remove the science-speak and try that again.  If what scientists like to call the Big Bang had been even slightly less violent, the expansion of the universe would have been less rapid and it would have quickly collapsed back in upon itself.  If that event had been slightly more violent, the universe could have been dispersed into a soup too thin to coalesce into stars, let alone to form planets.  The odds against life were - and this is absolutely the right word - astronomical.  Yet here we are.

How can anyone still think that all this just happened by random chance, a happy accident?  How can they not understand that the Big Bang occurred when, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."?


In my opinion, the Big Bang was all about God stretching out His realm and creating the natural world, to make room for His creation, including mankind.  He made room for us to grow.  He wanted us to be fruitful and multiply and we sure got that one down pat.  But there are other ways to grow, and other ways to stretch out.  How are we doing in those areas?


You’ll notice in the picture on the screens that some rubber bands are being stretched.  This appears to be a difficult task, that the hands might be struggling a bit to stretch the bands.  Why is that?  Because as we stretch things, the tendency is for them to snap back into their original shape and size.

Of course if we keep them stretched out long enough, that will become their normal shape and size, as my belly can attest to.  But the thing is, sometimes we meet some pretty fierce resistance when we try to stretch things.  And sometimes, if we’re not careful, they’ll snap right back in our faces.

The trick is to stretch slowly, and hold the new shape for a while to let it settle in.  We have to be strong against the resistance so we don’t fall back to the point we started from.


God, through His prophet Isaiah, tells us we need to enlarge the place of our tent, stretch out the curtains of our dwellings, lengthen the cords and strengthen the stakes.  Put in more familiar terms, He wants us increase our reach, our capability of extending our ministry further into the world.

The place of our tent is this building, these grounds.  Is God saying to enlarge our sanctuary, maybe buy up some more property and get into construction mode?  No, I don’t think so.  I think He means for us to expand beyond these grounds, to stretch our curtains out into the greater community, lengthening our cords, all the while keeping our stakes strengthened that hold us firmly to His word and to Jesus our Lord.

Now I’ve already said the natural tendency for stretching is snapping back.  What are some of the forces that work to keep us from stretching out?  What are some of the hindrances to expansion?

One might simply be misunderstanding.  For instance, it kind of sounds like the 1st verse of our scripture reading is talking about childless women.  But it’s not.  It is addressed to Christians, even though it was written long before Christ walked this earth.  And it speaks of all the people in this world who do not know Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior.  There are far more who don’t than we who do.

And that is why we, Christ’s church, need to enlarge the place of our tent!  We need to carry our ministry into the world and let God and His Holy Spirit do the real work of expansion, of bringing the lost back to Jesus.  God says our descendants, those we touch, will inherit the nations, will bring the cities desolated by sin back to life in Christ.


Another hindrance may be our own reluctance to change, to enlarge the place of our tent.  Fear of the unknown is a powerful force.  We may be afraid to move, content with what we have.  We prefer simply maintaining the status quo, doing the same things we’re used to doing.

God already addressed this, though, through His servant Moses during the Israelites’ long journey through the wilderness.  In Deuteronomy chapter 1 verse 6 He tells us…

6 “When we were at Mount Sinai, the Lord our God said to us, ‘You have stayed at this mountain long enough.’”

--Deuteronomy 1:6 (NLT)

We’ve stayed in this place long enough.  It’s time to move on.  Not necessarily this physical place, but this ideological place.  We need to move out of the mindset that this is our place in the world and we’re happy here doing what we do, what we’ve been doing for years.  No, God has other things for us to do, other places to go, all to carry out our commission of making disciples and spreading the Gospel.


Another resistance to be reckoned with is our worry of how the world will react to us if we step out into it.  We’ve seen how modern culture treats Christianity, and it isn’t very pretty.  At best we can expect sneers and derision, at worst pain and suffering, even death at the hands of a world that cares not for Jesus.  All of this can easily make us ashamed of our belief in Jesus as Christ, fearful of rejection and scorn.

God has foreseen this resistance, too, and encourages us through the Apostle Paul, in his letter to the Romans, the 1st chapter and the 16th verse…

16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek.

--Romans 1:16 (NKJV)

What is there to fear?  What is there to be ashamed of?  We, as believers, have the full power of God right here within us, because His Holy Spirit lives in us!  Verse 4 of our scripture reading this morning clearly tells us not to fear being shamed.  We will not be disgraced, neither for our current belief nor for whatever our past might hold.


God tells us to stretch out, to move from this place and expand our horizons.  But our natural tendency is to stay in place.  Science has a term for that: inertia.  Or we start to do something new and things don’t go exactly as we’d like and we snap back to our old ways.

Family, we must continue to move forward even against those forces that would pull us back.  We must strain against inertia and resistance.  For God promises us great things.

In the Gospel according to the Apostle Matthew, chapter 5 verses 14 through 16, Jesus tells us…

14 “You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. 16 Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.”

--Matthew 5:14-16 (NKJV)

If we let others see our “light”, they will see Jesus, for He is the Light of the world.  When they see our good works, they see Him in action.  And it is all to glorify God our Father.


Family, we’re starting to stretch out.  We’re doing more and more outside these walls.  We’re including more of the greater community, even those we know will never join our church family but who still need our help.  They still need to see Jesus and know He is there for them.  We’re letting our light shine brighter and brighter.

Let’s not snap back into our old ways, but forge ever ahead.  Expanding the place of our tent, keeping our cords and stakes strong that bind us to Jesus.  Stretching out, so we can take in more.  Just as Jesus did.

Amen.


Let us pray…  Father God, in our flesh and in our thoughts, growing can often be painful.  Stretching out can hurt, and too often it all just snaps back in our faces, and that hurts even more.  We know, Lord, that You want us to move from this place, that it’s time to get off our mountain and into the greater community around us.  We’re doing that, Father, a little at a time.  Help us keep making those baby steps.  Help us resist the forces that oppose us.  Help us strengthen our stakes that anchor us firmly to You even as we lengthen our cords to reach further out.

Hear us now, Father, as we come to You in the silence, confessing our sins and seeking Your comfort and strength…

Lord Jesus, You are the Light of the world.  You have given us God’s Holy Spirit to live within us and to empower us to do great things in Your name.  May Your light shine through us and brighten the path of all those we meet, so that they too might come to know You as Lord.  It is in Your glorious name, dear Jesus, we pray.  Amen.