The Story - Chapter 15

Thank you. This is a season of Advent in which we look forward to celebrating the day in which Christ came. And these candles are sort of a representation of some very important things that we want to remember in this season of the year. The coming of Christ begins with a simple thing, that is that there is a truth in the Bible. And one of the great truths of the scriptures is that all of us have rebelled against God From the very beginning of the Bible's story, every human being who's come into this world rebels against the authority of God and refuses to live as God directs them. This is a fundamental truth. All of us here, at some time or other in our lives, said no to God. And because of that, God needed help us. The other reality of the Bible is that all of these rebellions against God are serious. They're deadly. The Bible says the payoff for the wages of sin is death, destruction. So it's not simply a matter of a choice that you make. It's a deadly thing that occupies our minds, our hearts, and our whole lives. But that paints a rather dim picture of life. And Christmas is about more than that. The coming of Christ is about the reality that God does not desire or will that any of us should suffer this destruction that sin brings. It's not a part of His plan for us. He wants far more than that. Now the story of the scripture is a story of how God has tried to deal with the reality of our rebellion against Him and how He can help us find the right path or the right direction. God never gives up on people. From the very beginning, He had every opportunity to say, I'm through with these people. They won't ever do what I tell them. But God has persistently, since the beginning, tried to say to us, here is a better way for you. God speaks to us. In the very beginning of the scripture, when Adam and Eve rebelled against God, what He did was He came into the garden with them, sat down with them, explained what they'd done and the consequences for it and what was going to happen to them. God talked to Adam and Eve. Now in the Old Testament, as it starts out, Adam and Eve were not the only ones. Their son Cain killed his brother and God came to him and said, I saw what you did and you're going to pay for it. He talked to Adam and Eve. He talked to Cain. He talked to Noah. When he was getting ready to destroy the whole world, he came to him and said, here's what I want you to do. I want you to build a boat. Here's all the dimensions for it. He spoke to him. We don't know if his speaking to him was out loud, like you're hearing me, or if it was speaking to him like some thought came to their mind so that they knew that's what God was saying to them. We weren't there to hear and the scripture doesn't differentiate between those, but they knew that God was talking to them. It also happened to Abraham. Abram was his name in the beginning and he was worshiping and suddenly he's realized that God was saying to him, I have a contract I want to make with you. If you will leave your family here, I will guide you to a place I want you to be. And when you're there, I will provide every need that you have. I will protect you from your enemies and I will make you a great and powerful nation. Abraham heard God and he did what God told him he should do. Now it wasn't that these people heard God every day of their lives. There were only a few occasions in Abraham's life when he actually heard God, only a few. But when he did, he listened and obeyed what God asked for him. Isaac, Jacob, his son, Joseph, all of these people experienced at one time or another in their life God spoke to them. But then we see with Joseph, God begins to speak to him and Isaac, his forefather, in a different way. They would go to sleep at night and have a dream and in that dream they knew that God was telling them something. So he communicated through dreams, pictures of what was taking place. So they knew that God was telling them something. Now whenever Moses came, God chose Moses for a special reason. He said, Moses, I've given you the responsibility of leading my people out of Egypt and their slavery, and I want to make a contract with them. He said to the people of Israel, I'm going to tell you what I want you to do. I want you to make a promise to me that you will do everything I tell you. And if you do, then I'm going to make you this promise. I will guide you in all the choices that you make as a nation. I will make sure that I provide all your needs. I will protect you from all your enemies so you'll never be destroyed. And I will make of you a great and powerful nation. All I ask is you do everything I tell you. Now before this time God had spoken to individuals once in a while. He had spoken to people in dreams. But now he did something unique and different. He took Moses aside and he said to Moses, I am going to write down instructions for my people. If you look in the Bible, in Exodus or Leviticus and Numbers and Deuteronomy, all those books that when you start reading it talks about priests and it talks about how they're supposed to do things. We sort of thumb through that pretty fast because it doesn't seem to mean much to us. But this was the guide for their life, written down. God was saying, I'm going to give you a permanent record of what I want you to do. You'll never have to say, what does God want from me? I'm going to have it right here. You know the Ten Commandments. They're simply instructions, sort of like the table of contents to all the rest of those books in the Old Testament. He explains in more detail what it means to love God and have no other God before him. He explains that in greater detail in those books. So they knew everything they were supposed to do. And if they had a question, they could go in there and look and say, here it is. Now they didn't have very many people who read, but the priest would be able to tell them. The people who studied the law would be able to tell them. They didn't have to guess, what does God want from me? This was a tremendous step forward. God said, I want you to know how you can be safe. How you can live your life and know that it's exactly as it ought to be. And so he gave them what we call the law. Really it was instructions about what's safe and what isn't safe to do. What you can do that will make your life better and what you can do that will make your life worse and destroyed. And that's what the law was. And so the people of Israel now had in their hands a message from God to rescue them from sin that controlled their lives, to rescue them from the death that comes from sin because God cared for them. That's why he did all this. You know what happened? Whenever you get used to something, you sort of take it for granted. And that's what happened to God's people. They would go along and they'd think, well, I don't see any reason why we need to do that. They'd go along and say, well, I don't know why we have to go. You know, they went every year and they read the law out loud. All the people of Israel would go and they'd hear the law read out loud. One time they went and read it out loud in the rain. Everybody, women, children, men, didn't have any soft seats, no air conditioning. It was raining. They stayed there the whole time until all the law was read. It was so critical to them. But as time went on, they took it for granted. And then there was a time when they'd even lost the book that God gave them. They didn't even have it. And they found it. They began to read it and say, wow, there's so many things we're doing wrong. We've got to come back to God and straighten this out with us. They did. But then as people began to drift away, God did something different. Now this week, those of you who've been reading the story have been reading about the prophets. So God would send people, men, he would say to men, women too, this is a message I have for my people. They're straying away from what I want them to do. So a prophet would come and he would say, this is what God says to you. This is what you're doing wrong. This is what you ought to be doing. And so because God cared for his people, he sent them prophets. Now you know what happened. Have you ever had someone try to correct you, tell you what you're doing wrong? Every married couple has. And if you're in a family, your older brother and sisters or your younger ones, they do the same thing. And whatever they do, you never appreciate it, even though you should. You don't like people telling you what you're doing wrong. And every messenger or prophet that God sent, God said, now my people here in the northern tribes are doing something wrong. I want you to go up there and tell them this is what they're doing wrong. Unless they change, I'm going to destroy their nation. So the prophet, obedient to God, would go and say, hey, God has a message for you. You're doing something wrong. Unless you change, your nation's going to be destroyed. And they said, stone him. They didn't want to hear it. They were comfortable with what they're doing. And God, even though he tried to help them every single time, they rejected his prophets, even tried to kill them, even did kill them. But God never gave up. Even though he gave them the law and they wouldn't read it and they didn't keep it, he didn't give up. He sent them prophets. Even though they ignored the prophets, he didn't give up. He kept sending them prophets. And then he said, there's something even more that I can do. I've given them this message about how to live, but they've never really seen anyone do it. You know how hard it is, you know, on your Christmas night, you're trying to put together this summons you've bought and you have these instructions by someone in China who's written them out and you're trying to figure out what plug A should go into plug C or whatever it is. And if you can go on the internet, you know, and get a picture of someone doing all that, it's just so much easier. So God never gave up. And he said, I'll tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to send my son. He's going to come into this world and be born of a normal family. He's going to live in human flesh and he's going to keep everything that I want my people to keep. He's going to live the life people ought to live. So Jesus came to his followers and he said, I want you to come and follow me. You must deny yourself. You must say, I'm not going to do what I want to do or what I like doing. You must deny that. And then you must do what I tell you. Take up your cross. You must obey me. Even if it hurts you, even if you don't like it, you must do that. And then you must watch me and imitate me. Follow me. Listen to what I say and say the things that I say. Look at what I do and do the things that I do. So he came now and gave us a living demonstration about how we could avoid rebelling against God and how we could avoid the consequences of destruction as a result of our rebellion. And he gave us the message in Jesus Christ, this is the way you can live with victory in this world. And his disciples followed him. They listened to what he had to say, wrote it down for us so we could see it. They listened to his corrections for them. Sometimes he said to them, you're way off base. The devil is controlling your mind and your heart. And he let us know that there are times in which he says very stern and hard things to us because we need to hear what God needs us to do. God never gives up. Not only did Jesus live to give us an example of what it's like, not only did people write that down so we would have a record now of how Jesus kept the same things that was told to Moses in his time so we could do it in ours, but when Jesus was getting ready to leave he told us something absolutely critical. He was talking to his disciples about the fact that he was going to leave this earth. And no longer would they have him to sit down and talk with them about all the things that were going on, how to be able to understand what was right and wrong. Now I'm going to him who sent me, yet none of you ask me where you're going because I have said these things. You're filled with grief. But I tell you the truth, it's for good that I'm going away. Unless I go away, the counselor will not come to you. The counselor. You know what a counselor is for? When you don't know what to do, you go to a counselor. When you can't figure out what's wrong, you go to a counselor. When you have trouble, you go to a counselor. Unless I go away, the counselor will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. When he comes, he will convict the world, that's us, of guilt in regard to sin. These things we're talking about rebellion. And righteousness and judgment, which is the consequence of sin. In regard to sin, because men do not believe in me. In regard to righteousness, because I'm going to the Father where you can see me no more. And in regard to judgment, because the prince of this world now stands condemned. And when we rebel against God, we join up with the prince of this world who's the devil. I have much more to say to you. More than you can now bear. Now that's a little alarming. I have a lot of more things I want to say to you, but now I'm going away and I can't say them. We want to say, wait a minute, tell us that. But when the spirit comes, the spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own. He will speak only what he hears. He will tell you what is yet. He will tell you what is yet to be known to you. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you. All that belongs to the Father is mine. That's why I've said the spirit will take from what is mine and make it known to you. This is the most remarkable thing in the world. If you were living in Jesus' day and you watched him and you listened to him, you might go away saying, well, what am I supposed to do about that? Have you ever gone on the computer on the internet and you went to a site and you ordered, say, something from Cabela's? Or you even looked at something from Cabela's. And then you go on and you start doing something else and all of a sudden there pops up on the side of your screen exactly the thing you were looking at before and didn't order. How do they know that I'm interested in this? They figured out a way by your computer to know what you're interested in by seeing what you look at. So they take the knowledge they have and they direct the advertising personally to you so it's customized to you. Now when the Bible says, love your enemy, what does that mean to me? So whenever I'm living every day, going along, and suddenly my wife does something I don't like and I really get mad about it and act toughy or act withdrawn, the Holy Spirit of God says, love her no matter what she does to me. He doesn't say it to you, he says it to me. The Holy Spirit is God's way of customizing his message uniquely for every single one of us. The Spirit of God talks to you about your rebellion and the consequences of your rebellion because he cares about you. Now let me tell you how this happens. You go on about your normal activities of the day and you do something and you all of a sudden realize that something you said wasn't quite right. Do you know why you realize that? It is the Holy Spirit of God in your mind and in your heart that's talking to you. He's saying, hey wait a minute, you rebelled against me, you did something that I don't want you to do, you didn't do something I want you to do, and if you keep doing this you're going to ruin your relationship with your people or your boss and you might get fired if you steal from them or lie to them. Watch out buddy, you're in trouble. I want to change you. I want to help you get on the right road so this won't happen to you. That's what Jesus did for us. Now what he does is he reminds us of what the stories are in the Old Testament. He reminds us of the story in Jesus' life and he says to us, you know, if you remember that time when Jesus was on the cross and they were sticking the spear in his side, he didn't get mad and say anything nasty to anybody, that's what you should do. He applies the story of Jesus uniquely to us in every circumstance of our life. Why? Because he never gives up on you. He's with you every moment of every day, listening to the thoughts in your mind, listening to the things that you say, watching the things that you do. Not because he wants to hurt you, but because he's guarding you from the dangers that life brings to keep you from rebelling against him so that the consequences of death and destruction will not come to your life. And so he sends his Spirit to you. And whenever you hear one of those warnings, guilt we call it, I feel ashamed, we call it that sometimes, it's really God talking to you. And whenever you feel ashamed of something you've done, God will tell you what to do about it. You should go apologize to that person. We'll say, that's going to be embarrassing and I don't want to do that. If I just leave it alone and never mention it again, it'll be better. See, that's rebellion. And he'll keep saying to you, you ought to go talk to that person. Tell them you're sorry for what you said and what you did. That's where the taking up our cross part of it is. Swallow your pride and you say, okay, I want you to approve of me, God, more than I want things to be comfortable for myself. So I go and say, I'm sorry, Carol, it's my wife's name, for what I said, the way I acted yesterday, I want you to forgive me. I don't mean to offend you or hurt you, I love you with all my heart. That's what he wants you to do. It isn't easy to do, that's why he calls it taking up your cross. But you see, what God is saying is, I don't give up on you. The little bitty things in your life are important to me. The big things in your life are important to me. I care about you. So all of us have a personal contact with the living Lord of the universe because the Holy Spirit's here and he can tell us things that Jesus never had time to tell us. You couldn't go if Jesus was alive today and the millions of people in the world say, I need to talk to Jesus just a minute, get in line, it'll be 2,500 years before you can get to the front of the line, but get in line, we'd never make it. Now all you have to do is to say, Lord, I've got a problem, what should I do? The line is never overloaded. It doesn't matter about your speed of your computer, it's instantaneous. The moment you say, Lord, you're connected. The moment you tell him your problem, he responds. This is what Jesus was talking about. All the way through the Bible there were evidences that God cared for his people, but now we know because we've seen the whole story of the great power of God's love. He never gives up on people who need him. Now, here's the reality. What has God been saying to you? Are you living with guilt about things that you've done in the past? Are you living with guilt because you know that your life is not the way God wants it to be? Don't be upset about that. It's a sign that God cares for you and he doesn't want you to suffer the consequences of what you're doing. What he's wanting you to do is get your attention, to get your attention the same way he did with the prophets of old when he sent them to the nations where they were giving their message to them. You guys were studying this week, Prophet Hosea. Hear the word of the Lord you Israelites, because the Lord has a charge to bring against you who live in the land. There is no faithfulness, no love, no acknowledgment of God in the land. There's only people who are bringing curses on others, lying, murdering, stealing, adultery, all the bounds, bloodshed flows from bloodshed because of this the land mourns. The warning and the consequence of what happens. And all who live are wasting, all who live in it waste away. That's what the prophets did. The one prophet for a whole nation, now the Holy Spirit is in every single person's mind here. Little children, grown ups, old people. God has a prophet in your life. He tells you what you've done that's wrong. He tells you what you should do that's right. He corrects you when you make mistakes. He answers your issues. You don't have the most complicated issue in the world so I have no idea what to do about that. He won't tell you everything but what he'll tell you is the first thing you ought to do. And when you do the first thing then he'll tell you the second thing you ought to do. And when you do that then he'll tell you the third thing. And when you do that then he'll tell you the fourth thing. And that's the problem. And never knew it that God was giving me the answer. God cares for everyone. For everyone. And he never gives up. That's the story of Christmas. And I decided that this season is no different than any other Christmas. No different than me. What is it that God is trying to say to us? He's saying something different to me than he is to you. Would you bow your heads please just a moment? I want you to ask God. God, what is there in my life that you want to see changed? And whatever came to your mind, it's probably a problem, an issue that's wrong. All I want you to say is I believe that you'll guide me through this. If you will tell me what I need to do right now, I will do it regardless of how stupid it seems or how difficult it seems or how embarrassing it is. I will do it. I will begin to read the Bible and listen for you telling me how to change myself so that I can get myself through this issue. The most important thing for you is for you to say to God, whatever you tell me to do, I will do it. And then listen to God in church, small group Sunday school, reading the Bible. And when you do, you listen for God's message for you. Every morning I get up, read the Bible, and I read the listening for a message for me. When I find it, I put it on Facebook. You may want to read that sometime. Because God talks to me every day. He does it to everybody who listens. And it's answers to the big issues of our lives. Now, whatever God's told you today, he wants you to answer it. He wants you to say, okay, I'll do it. If you've never promised God that you'll live your life in obedience to him, that's the first step. He needs you to say, okay, I'll listen. So I want to ask you, if you've never said to God personally from you to him, God, I will try my best to do everything in this world that you want me to do, no matter how hard it is. I'd like you to promise that to God right now. I want you to remain seated. I'm going to ask Viennese to play some music. If you've made a promise to God today and you'd want someone to pray for you, that you'll be able to keep that promise, I want you to get up from where you are, come in the front, and say to me or one of the other people here in the front, I've made a promise to God. Would you pray for me? God cares for you. He wants to give you what you need, and he wants to rescue you from the danger that rebellion will bring to your life, your home, your marriage, your family, your business. So listen to him. And if you've made a promise to God and you feel like you ought to get up and come and share that with me or Debbie, that's God talking to you, just the same Holy Spirit he talked about. It's working now. Do what God tells you, and you will find life. Amen. Amen. Amen.