Joy

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2.1.09

1 Peter 1:6-9

Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

Peter is describing three things that happen in the present
love, faith, joy

joy is not simply something a Christian experiences when Jesus returns
but something which is experienced in the present

even though they do not see Jesus in the flesh and never saw him

they love Jesus
they rest in him
and they rejoice in him with this great joy

so this age is characterized by the absence of Jesus in the flesh
but a continual love for him, rest in him, and joy in him

this joy is described by two words
inexpressible: cannot be expressed by words
glorious: it is a joy infused with that future glory

love, faith, joy
are all different aspects of one reality in the heart of a Christian
one thing you experience in your heart

verse 9

salvation the final future goal of faith
what faith is heading toward

salvation is future
the final deliverance from sin, death and misery and this present evil age

but in the present Christians experience a joy
in resting in Jesus and the final salvation

So the obvious question is this:
Do you have such a joy in Jesus?

a joy in belonging to Christ
and that Christ will return to deliver you from all the misery, death and sin of this life.

I am not asking do you believe ideas about Jesus.
I am asking do you have a present joy in Jesus and his salvation?
Do you rest in him in a way that brings you great joy?
a joy and comfort that dwarfs all other misery in your life?

I know some of you would have to answer
“No. I do not have such joy.”
I want to ask the question why?

If there is something other than Jesus Christ
that you feel you must have to be happy
then there will be no joy in Jesus

Your problem is that you are resting in something other than Christ for your happiness.

there is nothing wrong with taking pleasure in the good things of this world as long as we do not make them of ultimate importance and seek our joy and happiness in them

If you don’t have joy in Christ
you will spend your life desperately looking for joy in other places
and you will live in misery and anxiety because all those other things fail and end

beneath each particular sin
is the general sin of rejecting the salvation of Jesus offered us by grace
instead we want something else

Heidelberg Catechism: Question 1
Q. What is your only comfort in life and death?
A. That I am not my own,[1] but belong with body and soul, both in life and in death,[2] to my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ.[3] He has fully paid for all my sins with His precious blood, and has set me free from all the power of the devil.[5] He also preserves me in such a way[6] that without the will of my heavenly Father not a hair can fall from my head;[7] indeed, all things must work together for my salvation.[8] Therefore, by His Holy Spirit He also assures me of eternal life[9] and makes me heartily willing and ready from now on to live for Him.[10]
[1] I Cor. 6:19, 20 [2] Rom. 14:7-9. [3] I Cor. 3:23; Tit. 2:14. [4] I Pet. 1:18, 19; I John 1:7; 2:2. [5] John 8:34-36; Heb. 2:14, 15; I John 3:8. [6] John 6:39, 40; 10:27-30; II Thess. 3:3; I Pet. 1:5. [7] Matt. 10:29-31; Luke 21:16-18. [8] Rom. 8:28. [9] Rom. 8:15, 16; II Cor. 1:21, 22; 5:5; Eph. 1:13, 14. [10] Rom. 8:14.

I ask each one of you to think about yourself.

Is your life controlled by emotions of unhappiness, depression, anxiety, worry, fear, anger?
I am not asking if you have problems and suffering. I am asking are you controlled by these emotions?

Are you a woman who is unhappy with her marriage, unhappy with her husband?
This makes depression or anger or frustration a dominant emotion in your life.
You are seeking your joy and your happiness in a husband and marriage.

Are you a man who is seeking joy and happiness in success in your career or business?
Is this what drives you?
You will never find joy in such a pursuit and you will always be anxious and frustrated
and when things go badly you will be utterly devastated and dejected.

Are you deeply afraid and worried about not being able to pay the bills?
This is because financial security is where you are looking for joy.

Are you depressed about your physical health?
Are you depressed about being overweight or not attractive?
Are you unhappy because you have no man or woman in your life?
Are you unhappy because your children are not what you want them to be?

It is because you are looking for joy in those things.
You will never find complete joy in any of those things.

Some diagnostic questions (with a nod to Tim Keller for these)
What is your greatest nightmare? What do you worry about the most?
This is what is stealing your joy.
Your desire for this is what has taken Jesus’ place in your heart.

What is the thing that if you lost it or if you failed in it, you would be devastated and destroyed?
This is what has taken Jesus’ place in your heart.

What makes you feel the happiest and the proudest and the most self-worth?
Whatever this is, the desire for this is what has taken Jesus’ place in your heart.

How would you finish this phrase:
“I can only be happy if….”
What would you put there?
That is what is stealing your joy.
You can’t have joy in Jesus
unless you are resting in him alone and his salvation
for your ultimate deliverance
and your present joy

we enjoy the good things of this life more and find more pleasure in them
when we have joy in Jesus

only the Spirit can put this joy in your heart
but you must spend TIME
meditating on finding your joy in Jesus and his salvation
and contrasting it with what is the desires at the center of your heart

you must spend TIME “praying this joy in”

Prepare your Mind for Action

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8.17.08

1 Peter 1

Three commands

I – “Prepare your mind for action”
verse 13

prepare your mind for action
so when the moment comes you will act

prepare your mind so you are ready
at all times
ready for action
like the football player who gets ready in the locker room, puts on his equipment
or the soldier who cleans and checks his gun

“be self-controlled”
The word means sober or alert, ready
not intoxicated in your mind by distractions, but sharp minded and ready for action
“set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed”
Some think grace means there is no action now– passivity
Some think hoping for Jesus return means no action now– passivity
But real hope and grace mean action in the present

literal: “gird the loins of your mind”
basic garment a long, sleeveless shirt that reached to knees or ankles
when resting, eating, talking this was worn long hanging down
to prepare for work or war, for action
it was tucked up into a belt at the waist to leave the legs free

we must prepare ourselves in our mind
for action

II – be Holy in all you do (your conduct)
vs. 15

Holy means “separate”
Not being told to remove ourselves from unbelievers, live apart, distance

our actions should be distinctive/ different from the way most people act

14
“do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance”
be different from the way you once lived and the way those around you still live

17
“live your lives as strangers or exiled here” does not mean you just want to get through this world and have nothing to do with it
it means you act like a stranger to the ways of this place, you act in a distinct manner

18-19

ransomed from what?
death or hell not mentioned here
ransomed from empty way of life

purchased out of that by the great cost of Jesus’ blood
God paid a great deal for you
to liberate you
you have been released from your old way of life
live in a distinctive way, different

Story of Telemachus the monk in the arena
We are to be different as Telemachus was in Roman society
A witness for God and his holiness

III – Love one another deeply from the heart
Verse 22

notice the first distinctive action that Peter puts forward:
loving one another deeply from the heart
this is what it means to be holy
to live in real sincere loving community

to be different from the disintegrating families and communities all around us

this is the actions that we are to prepare our mind for

Let me give you six kinds of actions
And encourage you to prepare your mind and then pursue these in action

FUTURE – think now
1. Come early and fellowship with us on Sunday

NEW SUNDAY SCHEDULE
(starts September 7th) 3 weeks from today
9:30 Classes for Children, Youth and Adults
10:15 Fellowship Time for Everyone
11:00 Service of Praise and Teaching
12:00 Meal and Communion
prepare your mind now for this action

2. Join a Small Group
In September
Sunday afternoon and evening there will be various small groups that meet
Led by me, Fred Manning, Jeff Grisham , David Miller
And monthly groups with Clifford Ackerson, Bert Hicks, Sam Jones

My group is going to expand and alternate between a Men Only Group and a whole Family Group
(possibly a Women’s Group if it can be arranged)

Prepare your mind now for action

3. help with the teaching of our children/youth

Get to know and love the children and youth of this church, you don’t have to be the lead teacher

TODAY/THIS WEEK

1. Eat together during the week
Invite someone over or get together with someone this very week

2. help each other during the week

man puts in an AC, man puts in a toilet, man changed a bathroom to a copier room so Jeremy could have an office, a woman babysat another woman’s children , a woman fixed a meal for a family that was struggling, a woman counseled another woman on the phone for a few hours, a few members painted some rooms in another member’s house

today and this very week help another member, look for opportunities to help

3. visit one of our shut ins

The goal is not fun,
or personal benefit and reward
The goal is loving one another deeply from the heart

A Church for the Outside Community

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12.30.07

I was ordained in January of 2004.
In the last 4 years I have not baptized a new believer.
The church is growing in number
but almost entirely by taking Christians from other churches
not by making converts from the world

And this is true of most churches that grow.
Their new members come from other churches.
and from the children of families already in the faith

Having almost no impact on the oustide community

I want to examine 3 reasons why I believe this is the case.
(there are, of course, many other reasons as well)

I. The first problem is that we speak the gospel only
and we do not do the gospel

speaking the gospel is not sufficient
We must do the gospel

Imagine a church that was known not for going door-to-door (speaking)
or handing out tracts or inviting people to come to a service (speaking)
or holding revivals or conferences,
but known for doing good to the people in the community.

Imagine a church that was a blessing to the people in the community
who do not go to the church.

Imagine getting a reputation for being those who do the gospel,
not simply speak it.

I don’t think they listen to gospel words preached on the street,
presented door to door, written in tracts, etc.
They cannot hear our words about the gospel,
when our actions deny the gospel.

Q: Are we doing good to the people in our city/ community
as members not of East Ridge Pres, but Christ’s church?

What do I mean by “doing the gospel”?

Ephesians 5:1-2

We are to live a life of love
because this is the way of God
because this is the way Christ loved
this is the gospel!
doing the gospel is imitating the love of God
and the love of Christ for sinners

Colossians 3:12

Why does Paul tell the Colossians to clothe themselves
with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience?
Because the gospel is that God and Jesus acted toward us
with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.
He is telling them to do the gospel.
In fact, Paul never commands lay Christians
to evangelize and preach the gospel to outsiders.
But he tells them dozens of times to do the gospel.

1 Peter 2:12

The pagans/the outsiders
those in the community
are to see in us good deeds:
deeds of love and mercy, gospel deeds.
This will result in the conversion of some
but even if they do not convert– this is our duty.

1 Peter 3:1

A wife is taught to win over her unbelieving husband
by her actions not her words.
It is my opinion that this is good advice
for most of us in many of our relationships with the outside community.
We should win the community by doing the gospel.

II. A second problem is that American churches are filled with American individualists.

In the American culture we put the individual before the community
and we live in isolated private individualistic worlds.

We shield ourselves from the community
and maintain our private worlds against the public world.
We hide in our homes as sanctuaries.
No one can get in without our permission.

Unlike other cultures in the world
where your home stands open to the community
where you don’t barricade yourself in your own home
but you live with the whole community
through the day

Typical American man has a wife and 2 kids
he goes to work where he comes in contact with a few people out of the necessity of his work, the rest of the people he doesn’t need and he ignores them.
At noon he buys his lunch from someone he does not know.
He gets in his car and drives home into his garage, closes the garage door behind him, goes straight into the house and does not come out again until it is time to go to work. He turns on the TV, eats his dinner with his household, and remains in his sanctuary.
On Sunday he goes to a service. He shakes a few hands, sits through the service, shakes a few hands on the way out, goes out to eat and sits at a table with his family alone and then goes right back to his house again.

Where is the opportunity for love to the community?
Many Americans Christians very rarely love anyone outside a very small circle of Christians and family.

Philippians 2:4
Look to others interests beside your own
(notice next verse– we are to do this because it is the gospel of Jesus)

Individualism is looking to your own interests (your households interest).
the gospel way is looking to others interest

Individualism is exclusion.
It is shutting out people that we don‘t want in.
Individualism is a rejection of the gospel.
The gospel is about embracing those outside.
Looking to their interests.

III. A third problem is that Churches emphasize Church services and programs over everything else.

Galatians 6:10

There is a call here to do good especially to your fellow believers
but there is also a clear command to do good to all

We think of church and Christianity as the big worship service and this distracts us from what God really told us to do: love one another and do good to all men
Church services are not wrong.
It is just that they are secondary.
The love commands are primary.
We have it reversed.
We put church services as primary.
When we do church services, we think we are doing good.
But this is not doing good.
It is possible to attend church services and not do good to anyone– in the church or outside in the community.
God never told Christians to hold big worship services and build big buildings.
He did tell us to get together and love one another.
He did tell us to do good to all people.
This is primary.

Important Conclusion:
This is not a technique to get more converts.
We are to love because Christ loved us, not as a ruse to score a convert.
Christians and the people in churches are to live for the benefit of outsiders.
We are to live for the benefit of unbelievers.
We are to live for the benefit of Muslims and Jews and Atheists and the average people who have no clear beliefs.
We must love the people who are raw: uncooked by years in the church.

We are not told “Do this because you will get converts.”
We are told, “Do this because this is the way God is. This is the gospel.”
To speak gospel and not do gospel is a lie and hypocrisy.

Christmas for the Broken

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12.17.06

There are many broken people in our congregation,
families and community

people whose minds are broken
mental retardation, mental illness, Alzheimer’s
people whose emotions and desires are broken
debilitating depression, homosexual desires, anorexia,
addictions, pedophilia
people whose bodies are broken
those in chronic pain
malformed by birth defects or injuries
people with brokenness in their lives
marriages shipwrecked, careers wrecked,
in prison, lost children

Q: What does Christmas, the coming of Jesus, mean for such broken people?
Has anything really changed since Jesus came?

Jesus is not fixing most of these people.
Even the ones who follow Jesus
often remain broken

Mary and Joseph, Simeon and Anna,
Elizabeth and Zechariah, the shepherds
All must have expected that this baby would grow up
to fix broken people in his lifetime
but he did not
he healed a few people,
but they were signs
Christmas, the Advent,
the first coming of Christ
did not fix all the broken people.

And what about you?
Are you broken?
Are there things in your life that have not been fixed by Jesus?
One of the illusions of church-life is that most of us
are whole and doing well
and there are only a few broken people here
I want to tell you a secret
everyone here has a mess,
there is pain, there is brokenness in every life here
some of you look real good,
but you know inside you are broken
and Jesus knows you are broken

It is the clear teaching in the NT
that the day of fixing is still future
Jesus will fix broken people at his second advent
a future day, we do not know when
on that day Jesus will save people from broken bodies and minds

but we must ask again
what is there for broken people now?
Is Jesus any help to seriously broken people right here right now?

I want to look for answer to Jesus’ disciple, Peter,
in the first chapter of his letter to the churches of Asia Minor.
Peter was writing to broken people,
people who were suffering.
“you have been grieved by various trials”

Peter teaches in this letter that Jesus is helping broken people now.
He is giving them now in the present
while they are still broken:
Hope, Love, Faith, Joy

1) all 4 strong present realities,
not odors and smoke with no substance
they are very real right now,
despite present suffering and brokenness
2) all 4 focused on the future

verse 3
Hope
the word hope is a much stronger word
than what we mean by hope in America
it is not a wish
“I hope this will happen”

hope is a present reality:
confidence, trust, peace
focused on a future reality:
one day the broken will be fixed

verse 8
Love
love is a stronger word than our word
it is not a good feeling about Jesus

it is adoring and revering him now in the present
because he is your hope for the future
the one who will fix your brokenness

verse 8
Faith
(faith is the noun for believe)
believe is a stronger word
it is not simply I feel like this is true
personal opinion without any reason

Faith is depending on him, trusting in him,
resting in him while still broken in the present,
because of your hope in the future
the broken will be fixed

Joy
joy is a stronger word than our word
it is not a lighthearted moment of happiness
a delight in present circumstances

it is a powerful hope which rejoices in the midst of brokenness
delight in knowing that one day you will be fixed
Peter says the joy is indescribable
it is deeper than anything else in human life
the joy is glorious or full of glory
because it is joy in his final glory of that coming day

verses 4-6
it does not take away present pain or sorrow
but it upholds you and comforts you in that sorrow

I believe there is a gospel of hope
for the mentally retarded, the homosexual,
the depressed, the anorexic, the autistic, the alzheimer’s victim,
for all of us who are broken
who need to be fixed

we do not produce by our own effort
hope and faith and joy in us
we look to Jesus
Jesus must give it to us
this is grace

this Christmas time
Ask Jesus to give you and the other broken people around you
in the midst of our brokenness
faith and hope and love and joy