Achieving God's Purpose

[The following is a manuscript of my sermon delivered on Sunday morning, the 19th of February, 2017.  Ivan Whiteheart of The Gideons International joined us this morning and spoke for a few minutes.  Look for the video on our Vimeo channel:  http://vimeo.com/pilgrimreformedchurch.]

Many of you know that I was a Gideon before being ordained into the ministry.  As a minister, I am no longer eligible to be a Gideon, but I still fully support them and their mission.

When I was a Gideon, I remember our motto came from Isaiah’s book of prophecy, chapter 55, verse 11.  But that one verse is surrounded by great meaning.  Listen and follow along as I read this beautiful passage from chapter 55 of Isaiah, verses 6 through 13, from the New International Version of our Holy Bible…

6 Seek the Lord while He may be found;
call on Him while He is near.
7 Let the wicked forsake their ways
and the unrighteous their thoughts.
Let them turn to the Lord, and He will have mercy on them,
and to our God, for He will freely pardon.
8 “For My thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways My ways,”
declares the Lord.
9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are My ways higher than your ways
and My thoughts than your thoughts.
10 As the rain and the snow
come down from heaven,
and do not return to it
without watering the earth
and making it bud and flourish,
so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,
11 so is My word that goes out from My mouth:
It will not return to Me empty,
but will accomplish what I desire
and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.
12 You will go out in joy
and be led forth in peace;
the mountains and hills
will burst into song before you,
and all the trees of the field
will clap their hands.
13 Instead of the thornbush will grow the juniper,
and instead of briers the myrtle will grow.
This will be for the Lord’s renown,
for an everlasting sign,
that will endure forever.”

--Isaiah 55:6-13 (NIV)

Let us pray…  Father God, we earnestly seek You this morning while You are still near.  We listen for Your word, that it might bud and flourish within us.  Speak to us, Lord, that we might better hear, understand, and obey Your word.  In the blessed name of Jesus we pray.   Amen.


You’ve probably seen me do this before, and you’ll likely see it again, but let’s do a little exercise…  Let’s snap our fingers for a few moments…  [Note:  We snapped our fingers for around 30 seconds.]  OK, my arthritis says let’s stop.

Each time we snapped our fingers, somewhere in this world, 2 people died.  We snapped for around 30 seconds, so that means about 60 souls left this earthly plane in that brief time.  How many of those 60 people – men, women, children – do you think knew Jesus as their personal Savior?  How many do you think received the gift of eternal life with God and Jesus, and not eternal damnation?

A Pew Research report from 2010 estimated about 31 percent of the world’s population considered themselves Christian – less than a third.  Putting that into perspective of our little finger-snapping exercise, less than 20 of those 60 souls who died will be granted salvation through Christ Jesus.  Many more of these could have been saved had they only had the chance to learn about Jesus.  And that is a primary goal of the Gideons, to spread the Good News of Jesus by distributing God’s word across the earth.

Isaiah puts what happens next into such a wonderful context.  Think about the rain or snow – it falls down, right?  The moisture falls from the heavens to the earth, and not up from the earth back to heaven.  Yes, the moisture does evaporate and go back up as vapor, but not before nourishing the soil, making it bud and flourish, providing us the food we need to survive.  And that’s what God’s word does, too.  It comes down to us from heaven above, and it does not return there until it has fulfilled the purpose that God intends for it.

God’s word will achieve the purpose He has for it.  And because of His word, we can find joy and peace.  The mountains and hills, the trees of the field, will all rejoice and celebrate God’s purpose being achieved within us and for us.  And it’s all as an everlasting sign of God’s kingdom that will endure forever.  It’s all for the glory of God.


Isaiah was an Old Testament prophet, one who spoke for God long before Jesus became flesh and came to earth to offer us all salvation.  But that doesn’t mean that Isaiah and other of our Old Testament authors had no clue about Jesus or His importance to mankind.  Moses was given a glimpse of our Lord Jesus, as we can read in the Book of Numbers, chapter 24, verses 16 through 17…

16 The utterance of him who hears the words of God,
And has the knowledge of the Most High,
Who sees the vision of the Almighty,
Who falls down, with eyes wide open:
17 “I see Him, but not now;
I behold Him, but not near;
A Star shall come out of Jacob;
A Scepter shall rise out of Israel,
And batter the brow of Moab,
And destroy all the sons of tumult.”

--Numbers 24:16-17 (NKJV)

Moses heard the words of God and was granted a vision of Jesus.

Now we know how crucial Jesus is for us, for our own salvation.  But what about the role of Gideons like Ivan?  We already know about Jesus, but only because we have heard of Him, we have been taught about Him, we can read about and study His life in our Bibles.  But it’s like the Apostle Paul said in his letter to the church in Rome, in chapter 10, verses 14 through 17…

14 How can people have faith in the Lord and ask Him to save them, if they have never heard about Him? And how can they hear, unless someone tells them? 15 And how can anyone tell them without being sent by the Lord? The Scriptures say it is a beautiful sight to see even the feet of someone coming to preach the Good News. 16 Yet not everyone has believed the message. For example, the prophet Isaiah asked, “Lord, has anyone believed what we said?”

--Romans 10:14-17 (CEV)

That is where the Gideons come in!  They do everything they can, with our help and prayers, to try to get the word of God out to the whole world for all to hear and know the Good News of Jesus.  They spread the Gospel one Bible at a time, directly from one person to another.  And oh, how beautiful these Gideons are to the ones who receive God’s word.

Ivan and the rest of the Gideons would tell you they’re just trying to do what God would have them do, trying to help Him achieve His purpose.  They’ll also tell you they pretty much can’t do it without us, the church of our Lord Jesus Christ.  The church helps fund the costs of printing and distributing all the Bibles that end up in doctors’ offices and hotel rooms and people’s hands everywhere.  And equally important, the church prays that doors will be opened to Gideons to go into places they have not been allowed, to go and spread God’s word to people who have not heard the Good News.

And family, this is our job as much as theirs.  They are following Jesus’ command and so should we.  In chapter 16 verse 15 of the Apostle Mark’s Gospel account, Jesus instructs His disciples and us…

15 And He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.”

--Mark 16:15 (NKJV)

There’s more than one way to preach.  The Gideons do it with words, with Bibles, and with personal contact.  They help provide access to the Living Water to a world dying of thirst.  They give God’s daily bread to a hungry people.  And we can “preach” the Gospel by supporting them, with our dollars, and with our prayers.

During our last hymn this morning, I’m going to ask the ushers to come forward again and we’ll take up a love offering for the Gideons.  We need to understand that Gideons are a purely volunteer organization.  No one is paid – every dollar we give goes to the printing and distribution of God’s holy word.

Please be generous in your giving, so that more people might hear God’s word, and be saved.  Please pray for them, that they may reach more of the lost of this earth.  Please help achieve God’s purpose.  In the name of Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.


Let us pray…  Father God, You are so good to us.  You send the rains from heaven to water and nourish Your creation, so that it might bud and flourish, providing food for all peoples.  You also send Your word to us, in our Holy Bibles, that we might come to know and believe in Your Son Jesus, and in our belief be saved.  And You sent us Your Word in the flesh of Jesus, because You love us so much and Your desire is that we be granted Your mercy if we put our faith in Him and heed His instructions.  Father, Your word has not returned empty, for we do believe, we do follow Your Son, we do know Jesus.  Please help us and the Gideons by opening closed doors so that more might hear and be saved.

Please listen and hear us now, Father, as we pray silently from our hearts, repenting of our wicked ways and seeking Your forgiveness, asking for Your help to achieve Your purpose…

Lord Jesus, You came to this earth to offer us salvation.  This is the very best news anyone could ever hear!  Please forgive us when we hesitate to share this Good News with other, when we fear to give our own testimony, when we forget to pray for our Father’s help in reaching out, when we fail to give as we are able so that God’s word might be heard by and Your story told to a lost world.  Help us, Please Lord, to achieve God’s purpose for each of us.

This we pray in Your blessed name, Lord Jesus Christ, our Master and our Savior, the one true Son of God, in whom we place all our hope, all our trust, all our faith.  Amen.