Last week we looked at the example of the paralyzed man and his four friends. And how God used those four friends to bring about a radical change in that man’s life. God did the changing, but He brought it about through those four friends.

And originally, the plan for today was to look at another example of how God uses people to bring about change in people’s lives – however… This week, God brought about a change in my message. I was going to talk about David’s Mighty Men – a group of 37 men that gathered around the leadership of King David and did mighty and amazing things. But by Wednesday this week, I came to the conclusion that this was not the direction that God wanted me to go with the message, so I had to figure out what the right direction was. So as I was thinking and trying to discern what God wanted me to preach about this morning, I realized that there was a key part of our 2012 Discipleship Action Plan that I had just sorta taken for granted. I just presumed it was in place and so I hadn’t talked much about it.

In fact, if you remember back to January 1st, we started this whole series by looking at what Jesus said was the greatest commandments. It was Mark chapter 12 – verse 29-31.

 29 Jesus replied, “The most important commandment is this: ‘Listen, O Israel! The Lord our God is the one and only Lord. 30 And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength.’ 31 The second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ No other commandment is greater than these.” Mark 12:29-31

And because we were launching into our growth groups, we naturally focused on the second part – loving our neighbors as ourselves – Building relationships with the people around us. But I don’t want to neglect the first part. After all, Jesus said the most important commandment is to love God with everything you’ve got. So we’ve kinda gone about this in a backwards fashion, but that’s ok. We’ve talked about loving our neighbors and building relationships with them, but now we want to talk about loving God and building our relationship with Him.

So that’s the direction I want to go this morning. How can we build our relationship with God? Now that might seem like pretty basic Christianity 101, but I think it’s something that all of us struggle with to some extent. I think all of us want to grow deeper in our relationship with God. We want God to be more real in our lives – we don’t just want to know about Him – we want to KNOW Him. We want to be able to say, “Yeah, Jesus is my friend – I talk with Him every day – I love hanging out with him.”

But for many of us, that’s not the case. It’s more like – “I’m down here – and He’s up there. I pray to Him, and I think He hears – but I’m not really sure. I know lots of stuff about Him – but it doesn’t really feel like we’re close friends.” Do any of you guys relate to that?

I think many Christians do. Because after all, our relationship with God is way different than our relationships with anybody else. We can’t physically see him. We can’t hear him with our ears usually. We don’t go out for lunch with Him or watch a hockey game with Him. He doesn’t send us text messages or leave funny comments on our facebook page. So our relationship with God is unlike any other relationship we have, and because of that, it can be difficult to figure out how to cultivate that relationship. So the question I want to try to answer this morning is, How can we build our relationship with God?

This morning I want to base our discussion on the verses in Mark that we’ve already read. I think Mark 12:30 gives us the principles we need to build our relationship with God. So let’s take another look at that verse.

‘And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength.’ Mark 12:30

There are four categories – four parts of our person – that we are to love God with. Our heart – our soul – our mind – and our strength.

Let’s take a look at the first part – our heart. What does it mean to love God with all our heart? Well, to help us understand what exactly “our heart” is, I looked up how the Bible describes our heart in different verses.

• 5 times =  happy
• 3 times = heavy
• 3 times = compassionate
• 41 times = hard

Now isn’t that interesting – A hard heart. Let’s look at a few of those verses:

“They made their hearts as hard as stone, so they could not hear the instructions or the messages that the LORD of Heaven’s Armies had sent them.” Zachariah 7:12

For the hearts of these people are hardened, and their ears cannot hear, and they have closed their eyes— so their eyes cannot see, and their ears cannot hear, and their hearts cannot understand, and they cannot turn to me and let me heal them.’ Matthew 13:15

 Their minds are full of darkness; they wander far from the life God gives because they have closed their minds and hardened their hearts against him. Ephesians 4:18

So in reading these verses, it really sounds to me like our heart can be described as our attitude towards God. If we have a hard heart, we don’t want to listen to God. We don’t want a relationship with Him. I think sometimes even as Christians we harden our hearts. We resist God. We want to do things our way. But I tell ya, nothing will squash our relationship with God faster than having that hard-hearted attitude. But on the flip side of that, a soft heart is an attitude that wants to hear from God – that wants a relationship with Him. Let me show you one more verse:

And I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit in you. I will take out your stony, stubborn heart and give you a tender, responsive heart. Ezekiel 36:26

So I think the first principle in building our relationship with God is to have a soft heart – a heart that wants to hear from God – a heart that wants to have a relationship with Him. And the Bible tells us that went we seek after God – we will find Him. King David, when He was passing his throne down to his Son Solomon, He gives him this advice…

And Solomon, my son, learn to know the God of your ancestors intimately. Worship and serve him with your whole heart and a willing mind. For the LORD sees every heart and knows every plan and thought. If you seek him, you will find him. 1 Chronicles 28:9

God isn’t far away. He’s not hard to find. But we have to want to find Him. We have to have a soft heart that is willing to hear from Him.

So the first thing we need to do if we find that we’re struggling with our relationship with God – if God isn’t seeming very real or very close – the first thing we have to do is to check the condition of our hearts. Is your heart hard towards God? Do you really want to hear from Him? Maybe you don’t want to go through the work of getting to know Him? Maybe your afraid of the changes He might ask you to make in your life? Is your heart hard?

So that’s principle #1 – Love the Lord your God with all your heart – a soft hard – that wants to respond to Him.

The second of those four parts of our person is our soul. “Love the Lord your God will all your heart and with all your soul.

So what exactly is your soul? Now this is where it gets a little tricky, because heart and soul and mind and strength are all very intertwined with each other. It’s difficult to look at one of them completely separate from the others. In fact, where ever the Bible talks about the soul, about one third of the time it includes mention of the heart too. It talks about the “heart and soul”. They’re a package deal.

But for the sake of our discussion this morning, let me try to define our soul this way.

Look way back in your Bibles to Genesis 1:26.

Then God said, “Let us make human beings in our image, to be like us. They will reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the livestock, all the wild animals on the earth, and the small animals that scurry along the ground.”

 27 So God created human beings in his own image. In the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.

Genesis 1:26-27

So drawing from those verses, I think a good definition of our soul is “the part of us that is created in the image of God”. It’s the part of us that makes us different from the animals. It is quite literally, our God-like attributes. Now don’t misunderstand me when I say God-like attributes… We are not little gods – there is still a vast difference between us and God, but He has given us some of his characteristics.

For example, we are made to be eternal like Him. Our current bodies will one day die, but our souls will continue to exist. In fact, one thing we look forward to as Christians is the new eternal bodies that we’ll get for our souls when Christ returns.

That’s just one example of our God-like characteristics. But the one I want to focus on for our purposes this morning is our consciousness. Let me see if I can explain what I mean. I’m not a deep theologian or a psychologist, or a biologist or any of those other -ologist, so my explanation might be a little rough – But hopefully, it’ll be sufficient.

I want us to do a little experiment. I want you to think a thought in your head. Say something in your mind – not out loud – just say it in your mind.

Those words that you just spoke in your mind – that’s your consciousness – that’s (if I may) that’s your soul speaking. Some of your souls probably said “Well, this is dumb – I’m not going to do this.” Well by thinking that, you just did. Your soul expressed itself by thinking that thought. This ability to think thoughts like this is one of our God-like attributes.

You see plants and animals don’t think thoughts like we do. Our kids have a movie called “Cloudy with a chance of meatballs” and the main character is an inventor.  And so one of the things He invents is a monkey thought translator. You put this thing on the monkey’s head and it tells you what the monkey is thinking. But in the movie, when the inventor puts the monkey thought translator on his pet monkey named Steve – the only thoughts He gets out of the monkey is “Hungry Hungry Hungry Hungry!” Its not exactly deep, profound thought, is it? It’s more instinct than conscious thought, because conscious thought comes from having a soul.

And what’s interesting is that our soul is constantly expressing itself. If you pay attention throughout your day, you’ll find that you’re always thinking thoughts. Sometimes they come out in words that you speak, but most often they remain in your mind. Thoughts run through your head all day long. That’s your soul.

And right now, I’m guessing your soul is either saying “This guy is crazy” or “Where’s he going with this?”

Let me tell you. If we are supposed to love the Lord our God with all our heart and with all our soul…. what does you suppose that means? Well, I think part of it means to love the Lord our God with all our thoughts. Well, how do you love God with all your thoughts?

I think Paul gives us the key in 1 Thessalonians 5:17. It simply says this:

“Never stop praying.” 1 Thessalonians 5:17 NLT

“Pray continually.” 1 Thessalonians 5:17 NIV

Now obviously Paul doesn’t want us to be down on our knees with folded hands 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. That’s just not possible. So what does he mean? What Paul is saying is that we need to continually be in communication with God. And what’s cool is that we don’t have to use words. God know our thoughts.

“You know when I sit down or stand up. You know my thoughts even when I’m far away.” Psalm 139:2

So if God knows our thoughts, and if we’re thinking thoughts all day long anyway, how easy would it be to pray continually? All we’d have to do is turn our thoughts into prayers by directing them towards God. Let me show you want I mean…

Let’s say you’re having a great day – your soul is thinking “Man this is great! I’m having a wonderful day!” Just direct that thought towards God and it becomes a prayer – “God, I have having a great day! Thanks for all your blessings today!”

Or when you’re having a lousy day and you’ve got big problems and your thoughts are just stressing out -  just direct your thoughts towards God “God, I’m having a lousy day. I’ve got these problems I can’t figure out. I need your help.”

And as you turn all your thoughts into prayers, you find that you’re praying continually. And what’s cool about that, is that God can respond to your prayers continually. It becomes a conversation. You’re always praying and God’s always responding. And seeing God continually respond to your prayers is exactly what will help see how real God is in your life. You’ll know He’s there because He’s responding to your prayers. It’s actually pretty cool!

And that leads us into our third category. We are to love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, and now with all our mind.

Now our mind is a little bit different from our heart and soul in that our mind like our inner computer. We use our minds to understand, to learn, to problem solve, and to store information. So how do we love God with our mind? Well, I think Philippians 4:8 points us in the right direction.

 “Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” Philippians 4:8

In other words, we need to fill our minds with things that would please God. If we are going to love God with all our mind, we have to have the knowledge and understanding of God.

And of course, the best way to do that is to fill our minds with God’s Word.

This is an absolute MUST if you want to grow deeper in your relationship with God. If we are serious about really getting to know God personally, the Bible is got to be the first place we go. And It’s more than just facts about God that we get out of the Bible, although those are important too.

“For the word of God is alive and powerful.” Hebrews 4:12

It’s not just another book of information. God speaks to us through his Word. In fact, quite often God responds to our prayers through Scripture. As we spend time reading and memorizing and getting God’s Word planted in our mind, the Holy Spirit can use that knowledge and bring to mind just the right verse at the right time.

Say for example, perhaps you’re going through a really painful time in your life and you pray to God, “God why are letting this painful stuff happen to me?” God might bring to mind right then that verse that you were reading earlier -  Romans 8:28 that says “we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God.” We might not understand it – but we can have confidence that God is working for our good.

The more Scripture you plant in your head – the more God can use it to speak to you.

Are you seeing how all these things work together? Heart, soul, mind?  As we seek God with a soft heart, and as we continually direct our thoughts towards God in prayer, and as we fill our minds with the truths of Scripture – God become very real to us. We realize that God is right there. He hears us when we pray. And He answers when we pray. Imagine that!

But there’s one more thing that we need to do. And that’s to love God with all our strength. And I would sum up the principle behind this one with just one word. Obedience. Loving God with all of our strength means living in obedience to Him – even when it’s difficult.

Those who accept my commandments and obey them are the ones who love me. And because they love me, my Father will love them. And I will love them and reveal myself to each of them.” John 14:21

Our obedience to God is key to a close relationship with Him. It would be quite foolish of us to expect a close relationship with God while we’re living in disobedience to Him. It just doesn’t work that way.

So one of the things we need to check – if we find that we’re feeling distant from God – is, have we been disobeying God? Are there sins in our life that we haven’t dealt with? Stuff that we’ve just kinda let slide? If there is, that sin is going to be a barrier between you and God until you make it right. King David writes about this in Psalm 66:18.

“18 If I had not confessed the sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.” Psalm 66:18

When we have unconfessed sin in our heart, that sin keeps us distant from God. It’s as simple as that. But the solution is equally simple. All we need to do is to confess our sin to God. Stop hiding it or ignoring it. Deal with it. Make it right.

“But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness.” 1 John 1:9

When we confess and repent, God both forgives and forgets. He removes all barriers between you and Himself, and you’re free to enjoy a closeness with Him again.

Now I don’t know where each of you are in your walk with God this morning. I don’t know if you have a hard heart or a soft heart – whether you feel distance from God because of some sin – or whether you feel close to Him and can enjoy those soul conversations that we talked about.

But where ever you are, I want to encourage you – God isn’t far away. He wants to be close to you. He created you. He loves you. He wants to have a relationship with you. That’s what this life is all about. It’s your opportunity to build a relationship with your Creator. So I encourage you, make the most of that opportunity.

Soften your heart. Seek out a relationship with God.

Turn your thoughts into prayers and spent time in conversation with God.

Fill your mind with things that would please God – especially His Word.

And live in obedience to Him with all your strength.

Build a relationship your Creator!

But as a church body, our mission is to draw our community into life with Christ – and we believe these growth groups can help us do just that. But I want to clarify something. Every one of you are part of the community that we want to draw into life with Christ. This isn’t just for “those people” out there. We want everyone – from the people who have never set foot inside a church to you people who attend faithfully every Sunday – to be drawn deeper into life with Christ. We want to see Jesus radically transform your life – just as much as we want to see Him radically transform the lives of the people around us.

Now you might be thinking “Well, that’s noble cause, but how do we expect this transformation to happen? How do we expect God to change lives through these growth groups?” Well the short answer is that God uses people to change lives. You see, God created us for community – to be in relationships with each other. And its when we are in community that God brings about growth and change in our lives. Remember, God doesn’t work alone – He uses people to accomplish His will. He uses people to change lives. So if you and I have no relationships with the people around us, how will God transform our lives? Or theirs? To be honest, it probably won’t happen, because God uses people to change lives.

And that’s why we think these growth groups have such great potential – because they provide opportunity for building relationships with each other and with God. So for the next two Sundays, we want to look at a couple of stories from the Bible of how God uses people – specifically small groups of people – to bring about radically transformed lives. 

This morning we want to look at the story of a paralyzed man and his four friends. We find this story twice in the Bible – Mark records it for us in chapter 2 of his Gospel – and Luke records it for us in chapter 5 of his Gospel. So if you want to flip your Bibles open to either Mark 2 or Luke 5, you can follow along with me. It doesn’t really matter which one you choose – both are very similar, but I’m going to start in Mark – chapter 2, verse 1-3.

 1 When Jesus returned to Capernaum several days later, the news spread quickly that he was back home. 2 Soon the house where he was staying was so packed with visitors that there was no more room, even outside the door. While he was preaching God’s word to them, 3 four men arrived carrying a paralyzed man on a mat.

Mark 2:1-3

Ok, now let’s just pause here for a second. I want you to imagine for a minute what life would be like for that paralyzed man in Israel in first century AD.

His whole life has been lived out on mat maybe three feet wide and six feet long. He has to depend on someone else to feed him, clothe him, carry him around, wash and clean him, to help him go to the bathroom.

He has no way to contribute to society. He has no job, no influence, and certainly no future.

There’s nothing can be done for him medically speaking. There’s no surgeries, no rehab programs, no treatment centres that can help him. All he can do is lay on the side of the road and beg for people to drop him enough coins so that he can live another day.

It’s a pretty dismal existence. But you know, he does have one thing going for him – he’s got four great friends.

Verse 3 tells us that as Jesus was teaching, “four men arrived carrying a paralyzed man on a mat.”

Now that seems like a simple enough statement, but you’ve got to wonder how that happened, don’t you? How did this paralyzed man end up with four good friends like that? I don’t want to be too cynical of human nature, but that just seems a little odd to me.  A paralyzed guy wouldn’t have gone to school, so they weren’t high-school buddies. They obviously didn’t play on the same soccer team. They didn’t all work at the same vineyard. We don’t see any evidence that they were related… So how in the world did his guy on a mat end up with these four awesome friends that cared enough about him to bring him to Jesus?

Well, the Bible doesn’t tells us that information, but I would sure guess that it didn’t happen by accident. My guess is that these four guys probably several years before, intentionally decided that they were going to befriend this guy laying on the mat. It’s not likely that they just kept bumping into each other here or there and eventually became friends. Most likely, they saw this guy laying beside the road day after day begging for coins, and they decided, “Hey, this guys needs some friends. Let’s be those friends.” I don’t know for sure – I’m guessing.

But really, isn’t that how most of our friendships develop? Usually it takes an intentional effort to develop a relationship with someone. Meeting them might be by chance, but getting to know them takes intentional effort. A good example of this is marriage. You might “fall in love at first sight” – but that doesn’t mean there is any relationship there. Not yet anyway. A strong, loving, marriage relationship is only developed through intentional effort of spending time with each other, getting to know each other, doing things for each other.

You married couples know the heights and the depths you went to to spend time with your spouse back when you were dating.  I remember one weekend when Heather was going to Bible school up by Grand Prairie and I was going to Bible school up in northern Saskatchewan – we were 13 hours apart. This one weekend, I decided to make the 13 hour drive from my school to hers, visit for a few hours, only to turn around and drive back another 13 hours to get back in time for classes. That’s 26 hours of driving in one weekend just to spend one day with Heather. But you know, you do those impractical things when you’re in love. No distance is too far. No effort is too great.

Heather & I have been married for over ten years now – and we still have to put intentional effort into our relationship. If we don’t, eventually we’ll have no relationship. We’ll simply drift apart.  We have to continually put intentional effort into our marriage.

The same principle applies in your relationship with God. You have to put in the effort of building a relationship with Him – getting to know him through reading his Word and through prayer and obedience. If you don’t, before long, you won’t really have a relationship with Him at all. You’ll simply drift apart.

And perhaps that’s why the first century church grew so much so fast. From that little band of 12 disciples – Christianity exploded all over the Roman empire. In fact, I was reading that by the time that the last apostle died, there was approximately one million Christians in the world. That’s amazing! How did that happen? I think it had a lot to do with the intentional effort they put into their relationships – both with each other and with God. Acts chapter 2 gives us some insight on this – verse 42.

All the believers devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper), and to prayer.

 43 A deep sense of awe came over them all, and the apostles performed many miraculous signs and wonders. 44 And all the believers met together in one place and shared everything they had. 45 They sold their property and possessions and shared the money with those in need. 46 They worshiped together at the Temple each day, met in homes for the Lord’s Supper, and shared their meals with great joy and generosity—47 all the while praising God and enjoying the goodwill of all the people. And each day the Lord added to their fellowship those who were being saved.

Acts 2:42-47

That’s pretty cool stuff, isn’t it? Did you notice all that intentional effort?

They devoted themselves to the apostles teaching, to fellowship, to eating together, and to prayer.

They sold their property and possessions to take care of each others’ needs.

They worshipped together every single day.

Do we put that kind of intentional effort into building our relationships with each other and with God? Probably not. But perhaps that’s why we don’t see the same level of growth in our churches and our lives either.

That’s one of the reasons why we’re starting up these growth groups. We want to provide you with the opportunity to put intentional effort into building your relationships with the people around you while at the same time putting intentional effort into building your relationship with God. Because as we’ve said before – life is all about our relationships.

And this guy on the mat, while he didn’t have much else going for him – he had a great relationship with his four friends and they led him to a great relationship with God – and that’s what made all the difference in his life – as we shall soon see. Let’s continue reading in Mark 2 – starting again at verse 2.

“2 Soon the house where he was staying was so packed with visitors that there was no more room, even outside the door. While he was preaching God’s word to them, 3 four men arrived carrying a paralyzed man on a mat. 4 They couldn’t bring him to Jesus because of the crowd, so they dug a hole through the roof above his head.”

Mark 2:3-4

Ok, so let’s think about this for a minute. Try to imagine how this all went down. Here we have these four buddies. They hear that Jesus is in town and they immediately think of their friend on the mat. They say to each other, “We’ve got to get our friend on the mat to Jesus. I’ve heard He can make the blind see and the lame walk – maybe He can heal our friend!” So they tell their buddy on the mat – “We’re gonna take you to see Jesus tomorrow morning – we’ll pick you up at 8:00.” And of course, that literally meant they would PICK HIM UP at 8:00.

So they go get him the next morning, and they get to the house where Jesus was – but the place is just packed out. Verse 2 tells us that there wasn’t even room outside the door. So there is no way they can get through the crowd with their buddy on the mat and get to Jesus.

But then, instead of them getting discouraged and going home, one of them gets the great idea – “Hey, let’s rip a hole in the roof and then we’ll lower him down through the hole right in front of Jesus!” Ok, who comes up with the idea of lowering a paralyzed guy on a mat through a hole in the roof? I mean, not even Arlen would come up with something out of the box like that. Well… Maybe he would. But the point is, these guys were determined to help their friend. They weren’t going to let anything stand in their way – especially not a little ol’ roof.

But I wonder what little things stand in our way? We’ve been talking about how life is all about relationships and how God created us to live in community. What barriers keep us from experiencing real community with each other? What keeps us from developing deep relationships with God and with the people around us? Perhaps not a roof, but maybe something just as simple.

Perhaps its something as simple as our tv. Do your favorite shows or TSN get in the way of you spending time with God? Or spending time with your family? Or with your neighbor?

Or maybe it’s not your tv that’s getting in the way – maybe it’s your computer or the internet? I don’t know if you’re an AVERAGE Canadian – but in 2010 the average Canadian spent 35 hours per week watching tv and being on the internet. Now if you took those same 35 hours a week and spent it in meaningful conversations and meaningful activities with your friends, your family, and with God, do you think your life would change? I bet it would.

Now don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that watching tv and browsing the internet is bad – but what I’m saying is that we have to make choices about our priorities. We only have one life to live and only 24 hours in day. How are we going to spend the time we have? Ephesians 5 gives us a good reminder.

“So be careful how you live. Don’t live like fools, but like those who are wise. 16 Make the most of every opportunity in these evil days. 17 Don’t act thoughtlessly, but understand what the Lord wants you to do.” Ephesians 5:15-17

God wants us to choose our priorities wisely. He wants us to make the most of every opportunity that He gives us. We need to be like those four friends – when they had the opportunity to see their paralyzed friend be healed – they made the most of that opportunity. They were not going to let anything get in their way. Not the tv. Not the internet. Not the crowds. Not even the roof. Let’s see what happened next.

“They couldn’t bring him to Jesus because of the crowd, so they dug a hole through the roof above his head. Then they lowered the man on his mat, right down in front of Jesus. Seeing their faith, Jesus said to the paralyzed man, “My child, your sins are forgiven.” Mark 2:4

Then jump down a few more verses to 10… (Jesus is talking with the teachers of the religious law who didn’t believe that Jesus could forgive sins, and Jesus says…)

 So I will prove to you that the Son of Man has the authority on earth to forgive sins.” Then Jesus turned to the paralyzed man and said, 11 “Stand up, pick up your mat, and go home!”

 12 And the man jumped up, grabbed his mat, and walked out through the stunned onlookers. They were all amazed and praised God, exclaiming, “We’ve never seen anything like this before!” Mark 2:10-12

And that is a radically changed life! His sins forgiven – His body healed – He would never be the same. And that is exactly the point. God’s in the business of radically changing lives – and He uses people to help Him do it. Yes, it was God who forgave his sins, and yes, it was God who healed his body.

But what would have happened if those four friends hadn’t cared enough to bring that man to Jesus? What if they had become discouraged when they saw that they couldn’t get to Jesus because of the crowd? What if they hadn’t thought of had the crazy idea to rip a hole in the roof above Jesus and lower their friend down? These four friends were absolutely key to this man’s radical change. In fact, look at verse 4 & 5 again.

“They lowered the man on his mat, right down in front of Jesus. Seeing their faith, Jesus said to the paralyzed man, “My child, your sins are forgiven.” Mark 2:4-5

It says “seeing their faith” – not just the faith of the paralyzed man – but “their faith” – the faith of his four friends. That’s what moved Jesus to act. Those four friends were far more instrumental in bringing healing to this man’s life than what you might think. Not only did they bring him to Jesus – overcoming every obstacle that stood in their way, but it was their faith in Jesus that caused Him to radically transform this paralyzed man’s life.

God’s in the business of radically changing lives – and He uses people to help Him do it.

I look around this room and I see people who’s lives have been radically changed by God. But God hasn’t working alone. Over the last couple of months we’ve heard the testimonies of Dennis, Jordan, Ryan & Brittany – all radically changed by God, but in every one of their stories you hear about other people that God used to bring it all about. I think about my own story and the long list of people that have made an impact on my life. You probably have your own list of names of people, used by God, to change your life.

So I want to encourage you this morning to make the most of every opportunity that God brings you. Right now you’re sitting in a room full of people who love the Lord. And if you will take the time and make the effort to build some relationships with them, I guarantee you, God will use them to change your life. That’s how God works.

And don’t think this is just one great big growth group commercial either. While I do think these Growth Groups are a great opportunity to build relationships, you have so many other opportunities out there as well. It could be as simple as getting off the couch and playing a game with your kids or going for a walk with your spouse. Maybe you could go down to the skating rink or the jolly seniors just to visit with the people there. Maybe you want to invite another couple over for coffee this afternoon instead of watching the game – or at least invite them to watch the game with you! But build relationships. Take the time and make the effort to get to know the people around you. Because that’s exactly what God will use to change your life and theirs.

This morning we want to celebrate communion together. And really that’s what this is all about – not the communion itself – but what it means.

We talked in December about how God created mankind to have a perfect relationship with God and with each other. No awkwardness or fear or strain of any kind – just a wonderful deep friendship – like the best, closest of friends. But how all that changed when Adam & Eve sinned. Our relationships were broken. And in fact, it’s our broken relationships with God and man that cause us the most pain even today.

But in His great kindness and love for us, God send His Son Jesus – to die on a cross – to take the punishment for our sin – so that we can have a restored relationship with God and each other again. And communion is when we remember the great price that God paid for each one of us. We’ve talked a little bit today about putting time and effort into our relationships – well, Jesus gave His life. He loved us so much that no price was too great. He endured the whipping, the beatings, the crown of thorns, the nails in his hands and feet, the spear in his side, and the weight of all the sin in the world including yours and mine – so that we could have a relationship with Him. That’s the effort Jesus put in. And maybe the question we need to ask this morning is “How have we responded?”  John 3:16 says…

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16

Have you believed in Him? Have you accepted his free gift of eternal life? It’s free because He paid for it with own life…

If you have never accepted Jesus as your Savior, I encourage you to do that today. Put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ and begin your relationship with Him. If you’re not really sure how, please talk to me after the service, I would love to help you do that.

And after looking back to see what God has done in 2011 – I am totally excited to see what God is going to do 2012. But its interesting to note that in all these amazing things that God does, He doesn’t work alone. He involves you and me. God used people to put together this building. God used people to invite Dennis to church and to teach him and encourage him. God uses people to carry out his will.

We talked about that a little bit last Sunday. How after Jesus rose from the grave, He went back to heaven and left us with the task of telling people everywhere the good news of Salvation. We read the Great Commission in Matthew 28:18…

18 Jesus came and told his disciples, “I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. 19 Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. 20 Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

Matthew 28:18-20

You see, God didn’t just leave us on this planet to kill time until He returns. He’s given us a job to do – He’s given us a mission. And in our church DNA, we’ve worded it this way:

Our mission is to draw our community into life with Christ. 

That’s what we’re all about. That’s why this church exists. To draw our community into life with Christ. Because God doesn’t do that all by Himself – I mean, He can if He wants – But He has chosen to involve us in the process of drawing people to Himself.

So this morning, I want try to work out exactly what that means. What does it mean for us to draw our community into life with Christ? What does that look like? How do we actually make disciples as Jesus instructed us? What’s the game plan? Or as Steven Harper might put it – What’s our 2012 Discipleship Action Plan? That’s what we want to figure out this morning.

So where do we start? Well, there’s a saying that goes “A great commitment to the great commission and the great commandments will make a great church.”

We’ve already looked at the great commission in Matthew 28 – with Jesus instructing us to make disciples of all the nations. So why don’t we now look at the great commandments. We find these in Mark chapter 12 – starting at verse 28.

 One of the teachers of religious law was standing there listening to the debate. He realized that Jesus had answered well, so he asked, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”

 29 Jesus replied, “The most important commandment is this: ‘Listen, O Israel! The Lord our God is the one and only Lord. 30 And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength.’ 31 The second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ No other commandment is greater than these.” Mark 12:28-31

So here Jesus gives us the two greatest commandments. #1. To love God with everything you’ve got. And #2. To love your neighbor as yourself.

Both of these are absolutely key to making disciples. I mean, it kinda goes without saying that loving God with everything you’ve got is step #1. You can’t lead people to love God – if you don’t love God first. You can’t teach people to obey God – if you don’t obey God first. So that’s kind of a given. So let’s presume for the moment that we already do love God with everything we’ve got. What’s the next step? According to these verses, it’s to love your neighbor as yourself.

You see, God created us to be relational people. To have family. To have friends. To have neighbors. And so it’s not surprising that throughout the Bible, God instructs us to develop good relationships with the people around us. When I looked up the phrase “love your neighbor as yourself” in my online Bible, I was pretty surprised to see how many times that exact phrase was mentioned.

“Love your neighbor as yourself.” Leviticus 19:18

“Love your neighbor as yourself.”  Matthew 19:19

“Love your neighbor as yourself.”  Matthew 22:39

“Love your neighbor as yourself.”  Mark 12:31

“Love your neighbor as yourself.”  Luke 10:27

“Love your neighbor as yourself.”  Romans 13:9

“Love your neighbor as yourself.”  Galatians 5:14

“Love your neighbor as yourself.”  James 2:8

It almost seems like this is important. It is! By loving our neighbor as ourselves, we’re really doing two things. #1. We’re showing them the love of God. We’re giving them an example of what God is like. That in itself is a major part of making disciples. But also, in loving our neighbors, we’re developing relationships with them. Remember how we talked about in the first part of December how life is all about relationships – both with God and with each other? That means that building a relationship with your neighbor is really what life is all about.

It’s through developing relationships and friendships with the people around us, that we have opportunity to communicate the love of Jesus Christ through our actions and our words. Sure, we can share the Gospel with any ol’ Joe on the street, but when we’ve taken the time and made the effort to build up a friendship with that person, they have a much greater opportunity to see Jesus in us, and after they’ve had a chance to listen to our actions, they are much more inclined to listen to our words.

So friendship is a key element in making disciples. All of us know somebody who, at this point, has not yet surrendered their life to God. So what do we do to make disciples of these people? We start by loving our neighbors as ourselves.

So I want to encourage you, to keep on loving your neighbors just as I know that many of you are already doing. Keep building those friendships – even if it seems they’re totally closed to spiritual things. We have no idea what God is doing in their lives and in their hearts. Remember, it’s His responsibility to change peoples lives – not ours. So regardless of whether or not we see any ‘spiritual process’, our responsibility is to love our neighbors as ourselves no matter what.

And our hope is that one day, through these friendships that you developed over weeks, months, or years – that these people would eventually come to know and love Jesus Christ. And it is a thrilling day when that happens. But it is certainly not the end of the disciple-making process. That is just the beginning. When Dennis showed up in church one year ago – it wasn’t “Mission Accomplished”… It was mission just beginning.

Once we become part of God’s family, we begin the life-long process of becoming like Christ. And having solid Christian fellowship is a key part of that. But this fellowship isn’t just potluck suppers that we typically associate with ‘fellowship’. The kind of fellowship that makes disciples is something much more intentional. Hebrews 10:24 says….

24 “Let us think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and good works. 25 And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near.” Hebrews 10:24-25

Fellowship is very intentional. It’s creatively thinking of new ways to spur each other on. To encourage one another. To build each other up. But it’s not all just ‘pats on the back’ all the time. Sometimes its a ‘kick in the pants’ that’s needed. Sometimes it’s correcting each other when we go astray. It’s caring enough to intervene when we see a problem.

Look here at 1 Thessalonians 5:14…

 14 “Brothers and sisters, we urge you to warn those who are lazy. Encourage those who are timid. Take tender care of those who are weak. Be patient with everyone.

 15 See that no one pays back evil for evil, but always try to do good to each other and to all people.”  1 Thessalonians 5:14-15

You see, this kind of fellowship is not just after the Sunday service chit-chat. It’s getting involved in each other’s lives. It’s going through the ups & downs of life side-by-side. It’s doing whatever it takes to help that other person succeed in becoming like Christ. That’s making disciples. That’s true fellowship.

This is exactly what Jesus did with 12 of his closest friends. He hung out with them. He taught them. He challenged them. He corrected them. He encouraged them. He warned them. He loved them. He invested three full years of his life into transforming these 12 ordinary guys into men that would change the world for Christ. And boy, did they ever! In fact, every one of us here could trace our spiritual lineage back to those 12 apostles. It’s because they went and made disciples of all nations – that we are here today. That all happened because of those three years of Jesus teaching, challenging, correcting, encouraging, warning, loving them…

So that’s exactly what we want to do in this church too. We want to see ordinary people like you and me – radically transformed into men & women of God that will change the world for Christ. We want to see hundreds and thousands of people be able to trace their spiritual lineage back to this little church in Mirror.

That’s the end goal when we say that we want to draw our community into life with Christ. We want to see radically transformed lives.

Now keep in mind, we don’t do the transforming – only God does that. Only He has the power change lives. But, that being said, God chooses to work through people to do his work. God wants us to be involved in the process. As we draw our community in life with Christ, as we make disciples, God transforms lives. That’s really what it’s all about.

So as a church, we want to do the best job we can at making disciples. We want to provide you with every opportunity – every tool that we can to help you make disciples.

And so that’s why we’ve come up with this idea of Growth Groups. This is our Discipleship Action Plan – if you will. This is our strategy to give you more intentional opportunities to draw your community into life with Christ.

And what’s important to remember is that these growth groups are not an end to themselves – the point isn’t to just to have growth groups. The point is to have radically transformed lives and if these growth groups can help make that happen – awesome! That’s what we want to see.

So what exactly are these growth groups that you’ve been hearing about for the past few months? How do they work? Well I am very excited to tell you this morning!

If you pop open your bulletin you’ll see an insert in there titled “Growth Group Catalogue”. These are the four growth groups that we will be offering in this first three-month period. As you can see, we’ve tried to give you a wide variety of choices. We’ve got financial training, fun & games, Bible study, exercise – And the idea is that you will sign up to join one of these four groups – whichever one interests you the most.

Then over the course of the 8 – 12 weeks that your participate in your particular group, you’ll have the opportunity to do several things:

You’ll have the opportunity to meet some new people – or at least get to know some people a little bit better than you did before. This will be especially helpful to you if you’re new to the area – or new to this church – or you just want to increase your circle of good friends. We want to give you the opportunity to build relationships. Remember, life is all about relationships. So here’s an opportunity to build some.

You’ll have the opportunity to grow spiritually – every group will have some element of Biblical teaching to it. This is where we want to build into your life – helping you grow, encouraging you, and spurring you on.

And then on the flip side of that, you’ll have the opportunity to build into other people’s lives. Whether its building a friendship with someone who doesn’t even attend church, or just being an encouragement to someone, or perhaps you’ll have the chance to share your testimony… or whatever it is. The opportunities will probably look different in each of the groups. But those opportunities will be there to build into other people’s lives.

And I believe these growth groups have the potential to totally change our church. I think God can use these groups to help every one of us grow spiritually way beyond where we are today. So I really want to encourage every one of you to get involved in one of these growth groups.

Here’s how you do it:

Read through your growth group catalogue in your bulletin. Find one that you think you’d like to be part of. You may want to take your catalogue home and look at your calendar to see what days you’re available.

When you’re ready to register – there are three ways to do it:

On the back of your communication card there are four little check boxes for the four groups. Check the one you’re interested in and be sure to fill out your name on the front – and toss that card in the offering plate or in the box at the back.

You can fill out your name and number on the Registration sheet at the back table in the foyer. (I should also mention that on that table are some invitations to each particular growth groups. These are for inviting some of your friends and neighbors – who maybe don’t come do church, but you think might be interested in joining one of these groups. So maybe once you’ve signed up for a group, you can take an invitation and invite some one you know to join the group with you.

The third way to register is to register online. You can go to our website – mirroralliancechurch.com and right on the front page – down near the bottom is  simple registration form. Just fill that out, click “submit” and you’re done.

So that’s it. If you have any questions about this whole growth group process, be sure to talk to me after the service or put a note on your communication card. I know this is kind of a new thing, and there’s probably going to be a few hiccups along the way – but that’s ok. We’ll get it all worked out. But that’s our 2012 Discipleship Action Plan. And we trust that as we do our part – drawing our community into life with Christ – participating in these growth groups – loving our neighbors as ourselves – then God will do His part – and radically transform lives.

You see, God had set up the perfect system for the perfect life – He would be the source of everything mankind would ever need. He would give them life, food, meaningful relationships, purpose in their work – everything they needed, He would provide. But He would also be their authority. Of course, He certainly gave them responsibilities and authority as well, but He was to be the ultimate authority. That was God’s setup for the perfect life. As long as mankind looked to God as their source and as their authority, life would be amazing.

And it worked great! With this setup, Adam & Eve enjoyed life to the fullest as God intended it – and it was sweet. They had everything they wanted. Their relationship with God and with each was perfect and beautiful – Never any conflict or never any strife – it was what you might describe as heaven.

But something happened. Sin happened. Adam & Eve rejected God as their source and as their authority and they took that role for themselves and as a result – everything fell apart. Their relationships with God and with each other was broken. The sweetness of life became bitterness and life on earth has been a struggle ever since.

But God had a plan. God knew this would happen even before He created the world, so all along, He had a plan. And this is what we’ve been looking at for the past three weeks – God’s plan to put things back to the way they were when He first created them.

And in case you missed those first three Sundays, let me give you just a quick summary.

On week one, we learned how God promised Adam & Eve that one day, one of Eve’s descendants would crush Satan’s head and defeat sin for all time.

On week two, we learned how God promised Abraham that one day, one of his descendants would be a blessing to every family on earth.

On week three, we learned that God promised King David that one day, one of his descendants would be King for all time.

And as we looked at some of the old testament prophecies and as we looked at the Christmas story as recorded in Luke, we came to realize that all these promises were fulfilled in the birth of Jesus Christ. He was the one that God had been promising for some 4000 years.

And that’s what makes Christmas such a big deal – its because finally, after years of hoping and waiting for God to fulfill his promises, finally, God’s own Son, Jesus Christ was born as a man and He would make things right again.

But here’s the problem. If you look around at the world today – it doesn’t really seem like everything right again – does it? There’s still pain. There’s still suffering. Satan seems as active as ever. Sin is still around in bountiful supply. Our relationships with God and with each are far from perfect. So… what happened? Was it all a joke? Did God’s plan fail? Or is it just that the story isn’t over yet? Well, that’s what we’re going to look at today.  

We left off last week with Mary about to have a baby. And I know that most of you probably came here on this Christmas morning expecting to hear the story of the angels and the shepherds and the wiseman and the manger and all that good stuff. But I’m guessing that you probably already know that part of the story and if you don’t, you can read all that in Luke chapter two later on today. But this morning, I’m going to fast forward a little bit. I actually want to talk about what happened after Christmas – what happened because of Christmas.

Now the Bible doesn’t give us much information about Jesus’ childhood. In fact, apart from one incident from when He was about 12 years old, we don’t hear anything about Jesus until He was about 30. And this was when He started doing all those miracles and teaching the crowds and training his disciples and doing all those things that you read about in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. All that stuff happens within a period of about three years. But that’s still not the part I want to focus on – let’s go just a little further.

At the end of those three years, we have what we know as the Easter story – Jesus’ death and resurrection. And this is probably THE KEY part of God’s plan to making things right again. Without the Easter story, the Christmas story is pointless. And most of you probably know the Easter story too. How Jesus was arrested, falsely accused, and then put to death on a cross. How He took the punishment for your sins and mine by laying down his life in our place. But also how He came back to life again. How He appeared to Mary, and the disciples, and about 400 other people.

And I know it might seem a little odd for a Christmas morning sermon, but this is where I want us to pick up the story today. I think this will help us see the big picture of God’s plan.

So if you have your Bibles with you, turn with me to Acts chapter 1. Now, just in case you didn’t know, the book of Acts is kind of a part 2 to the Gospel of Luke. Both of them were written by Luke to a guy name Theophilus. We read Luke chapter one last week to kick off the Christmas story, and so now we’re going to read Acts 1 to kick off ‘the rest of the story.’

1 In my first book I told you, Theophilus, about everything Jesus began to do and teach 2 until the day he was taken up to heaven after giving his chosen apostles further instructions through the Holy Spirit. 3 During the forty days after his crucifixion, he appeared to the apostles from time to time, and he proved to them in many ways that he was actually alive. And he talked to them about the Kingdom of God.

 4 Once when he was eating with them, he commanded them, “Do not leave Jerusalem until the Father sends you the gift he promised, as I told you before. 5 John baptized with water, but in just a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.”

 6 So when the apostles were with Jesus, they kept asking him, “Lord, has the time come for you to free Israel and restore our kingdom?” Acts 1:1-6

Pause here for a second. This is the obvious question. Here we have Jesus – the Messiah – the one that God had promised to Adam & Eve would come and crush Satan head, the one God had promised to Abraham would be a blessing to every family on earth, the one God had promised to King David would be king forever.

Of course the disciples are going to ask “Is it time now? Are you going to take your rightful place as King forever? Are you going to wipe out Satan and sin and make things right again?”

You would think that after Jesus’ death and resurrection, the answer would be “Yes it’s finally time.” But no, it wasn’t. Not yet. Jesus responds in verse 7

 7 He replied, “The Father alone has the authority to set those dates and times, and they are not for you to know. 8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere—in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

 9 After saying this, he was taken up into a cloud while they were watching, and they could no longer see him. 10 As they strained to see him rising into heaven, two white-robed men suddenly stood among them. 11 “Men of Galilee,” they said, “why are you standing here staring into heaven? Jesus has been taken from you into heaven, but someday he will return from heaven in the same way you saw him go!”

Acts 1:1-11

Now I don’t know about you, but I think that if I were a disciple, I’d be just a little confused right about now. Think about it: Just moments ago they were standing with the Messiah – the one that God had promised some 4000 years ago. They had seen him do miracles. They had seen him heal the sick and walk on water. They had seen him die and then rise from the dead. Clearly, Jesus was the one who would make all things right again.

And then, He leaves them. He goes back into heaven. They’re left standing there wondering – “What just happened here?”

It seemed like nothing had changed. Like Jesus hadn’t finished his job. He was supposed to be the King for all time – but they were still under the rule of the Romans. He was supposed to crush Satan’s head and do away with sin and its consequences – but there was still pain and suffering in the world. He was supposed to make all things right again – but the world seemed just as messed up as it was before. So what’s the deal?

Well, I think there’s a passage in 2 Peter that will give us some insight. 2 Peter 3:8-9

“But you must not forget this one thing, dear friends: A day is like a thousand years to the Lord, and a thousand years is like a day. 9 The Lord isn’t really being slow about his promise, as some people think. No, he is being patient for your sake. He does not want anyone to be destroyed, but wants everyone to repent.” 2 Peter 3:8-9

The reason it seemed like Jesus hadn’t finished his job, the reason that He hadn’t wiped out sin and made everything right again – was because He was being patient for our sake. He wanted everyone to have a chance to accept the forgiveness that He had just made available to them. That’s why, when the disciples were asking Jesus if now was the time that He would restore the kingdom, Jesus tells them in Acts 1:7…

“The Father alone has the authority to set those dates and times, and they are not for you to know. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere—in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” Acts 1:7-8

God’s promise to wipe out evil would still stand – He would indeed make all things right again – we read all about that throughout the New Testament – but not yet. First, the message of Salvation had to be proclaimed to the nations. He wanted as many people as possible to hear and believe the message that there is forgiveness for their sins.

And that’s were we are today in this History of Hope. We’re somewhere between Jesus’ death and resurrection – and His second coming. Jesus still waiting to come back and make things right, because there are still people out there that need to hear the good news of Salvation.

And so this morning I want to both challenge and encourage you. I want to encourage you in that Jesus IS coming back. He WILL take his place as King forever. He WILL crush Satan and eliminate sin and its consequences forever.

Let me show you one of my favorite passages. It really sums up what life is going to be like one day soon. It’s in Revelations 21 – starting at verse 3.

 I heard a loud shout from the throne, saying, “Look, God’s home is now among his people! He will live with them, and they will be his people. God himself will be with them. 4 He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. All these things are gone forever.”

 5 And the one sitting on the throne said, “Look, I am making everything new!” And then he said to me, “Write this down, for what I tell you is trustworthy and true.” 6 And he also said, “It is finished! I am the Alpha and the Omega—the Beginning and the End. To all who are thirsty I will give freely from the springs of the water of life. 7 All who are victorious will inherit all these blessings, and I will be their God, and they will be my children.” Revelation 21:3-7

This is the hope of Christmas. This is why we celebrate. Because of a little baby named Jesus born some 2000 years ago, we have the hope of eternal life with God – where there is no more death, no more sorrow, no more crying, no more pain. Just everlasting abundant life – just as God intended it. That’s a gift worth celebrating.

But here’s where the challenge comes in.

There are still people out there who have not accepted God’s gift of forgiveness and salvation. In fact, many of them have never even heard that forgiveness is available to them. And God has given us the task of letting them know. That’s why He tells his disciples in Acts 1:8….

But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere—in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” Acts 1:8

And this is our mandate just as much as it was for those original disciples. This gift of life that we’ve received is far too precious to just keep to ourselves. And what a better time to share that gift with our friends and family and neighbors than at Christmas.

So I challenge you, as God brings you opportunity this Christmas, to share His good news with the people around you. Let them know that the little baby that was once laying in a manger went on to die on a cross and rise from the dead so that our sins could be forgiven and we could have eternal life.

And if by chance, you happen to be one of those people who have not yet accepted God’s gift of Salvation – if you’re one of those people that God is still patiently waiting for – I’d like to challenge you accept God’s gift of life today.

Because Jesus is coming back and we don’t know when. It may be tomorrow. It might be today. It might be ten years from now – we don’t really know. But when He does come, when ever that is, the decisions that we’ve made in this life will be final.

If we continually chose to reject God in this life – rejecting him as our authority and rejecting him as the source of our life – then He will finally give us our wish – and we will be separated from Him forever.

But, if we’ve chosen to accept God in this life – if we accept his gift of forgiveness and the gift of eternal life that He offers us – if we again acknowledge Him as our authority and as the source of our life – then He will accept us and we will spend eternity enjoying life together with Him forever. It says in Romans 10:9-13…

If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For it is by believing in your heart that you are made right with God, and it is by confessing with your mouth that you are saved. 11 As the Scriptures tell us, “Anyone who trusts in him will never be disgraced.” 12 Jew and Gentile are the same in this respect. They have the same Lord, who gives generously to all who call on him. 13 For “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” Romans 10:9-13

If you would like to make that decision today, there is nothing that I would like better than to help you do just that. As these verses tell us, it’s really not that complicated. All that’s required is that confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, and you will be saved.

And if you’d like to talk with me further about this, by all means please do. You can talk to me after the service – or fill out your communication card and put a little note on there – drop it in the box on the back table and I’ll be happy to sit down with you over a coffee and talk more about it.

You know, the theme for this message series has been “A History of Hope” – because that’s exactly what it is. No matter how badly mankind has messed up, God has continued to offer us hope again and again and again. Right from Adam & Eve all the way through the Old Testament, all the way through the New Testament – and right to where we are today. God continues to offer us hope. What an incredible God!

I’d like to invite you stand with me this morning so that we can pray together and thank God for the amazing gift of hope that He gave us through his Son Jesus – whose birth we celebrate today.

And so today we’re going to continue looking at God’s story. Two weeks ago we started in the beginning – with God creating the heavens and the earth. And He made the perfect system for a perfect life. That was basically, as long as mankind looked to God as the source of everything they needed in life and as long as they looked to God as their ultimate authority, their relationships with each other and with God would be sweet and life would be awesome.

But of course, we know that Adam and Eve chose to reject God as their authority and as their source – and as a consequence, their relationship with God and with each other was broken. And although the consequences of their sin would effect mankind for the rest of history, God made a promise to Adam & Eve – that one day He would set things right again.

Well, then we fast-forwarded last week to Mount Sinai – where God made a covenant – or an agreement with the Israelites. And the basic gist of that agreement was that as long as the Israelites looked to God as the source of everything they needed in life and as long as they looked to God as their ultimate authority, their relationships with each other and with God would be sweet and life would be awesome. Sounds familiar doesn’t it?

The problem with that agreement was, that because the Israelites were all born with a sinful nature that they inherited from Adam & Eve, (just like the rest of us) it would actually be impossible for the Israelites or anyone else to fully obey God. Man was just too sinful. That rebellious nature in us kept us as slaves to sin. We couldn’t obey God even if we wanted to.

But God knew about that and He offered us another bit of hope. He allowed the Israelites to bring a lamb and offer it as a sacrifice for their sins. In other words, instead of that person being put to death for their sin (as they deserved), a lamb would be put to death in their place. The lamb would take their punishment.

Of course, the blood of those lambs couldn’t take away their sin, but it gave the Israelites hope that one day, the Lamb of God – Jesus Christ – would die in their place and His blood would take their sins completely away.

So that’s where we left it last week. There’s more to this story, so let’s see what happened next.

Now again today we’re going to be doing a lot of fast-forwarding – we’ve got about 1000 years to summarize and 40 books of the Bible to go through – so let’s jump right in.

After the Israelites accept God’s covenant at Mount Sinai, God leads them into the promised land. This is the land that God promised to give to Abraham and his descendants – we talked about that just a little bit last Sunday. So now they’ve finally arrived. Joshua leads them into battle against the inhabitants of the land and eventually they wipe out and take over most of the people living there. They settle into cities and towns and start living happily every after. Sort of.

As we’ve expected all along, they don’t do a very good job of obeying the terms of their agreement with God – their sinful nature just keeps getting in the way. And so it doesn’t take long for people to reject God’s authority once again and everyone’s off doing their own thing.  And there is a verse that really summarizes this time in history really well.

“In those days Israel had no king; all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes.” Judges 17:6

This verse is probably pretty descriptive of today too. Everybody does what’s right in their own eyes. You do what you want to do – I’ll do what I want to do. Don’t try to tell anyone else what is right or wrong – that’s up to them to decide.

But of course, this nothing new. That’s exactly what the Israelites were doing some 4000 years ago. So it shouldn’t surprise us when we find ourselves in the same mess as the Israelites found themselves.

You see, every time they started disobeying God, God would send enemies their way – just like He said He would do in the terms of their agreement. Well after a few years of being attacked and oppressed by their enemies, the people would finally recognize what they had done wrong and would call to God for help and he would then send them a rescuer to save them from their enemies. This is where we get all the judges like Samson and Gideon – we talked about these “heros” a few months ago. But this was the cycle for lots of years – the people would sin, God would send enemies, the people would repent, God would send a judge to save them. And then they would do it all over again – judge after judge after judge.

Well, eventually, the people of Israel decided that they wanted a king to led them – instead of all these judges. All the other nations around them had kings, so they wanted one too. Well, God knew that wasn’t the best option for them, but He gave them what they wanted. And so God chose a king for them and his name was…. {Saul}

Well, Saul started off really good, but before too long, his pride got the best of him (there’s that sinful nature again) – so he ended up being a really lousy king. And so God rejected him and his family as kings of Israel. His sons and grandsons would not be kings after him. God was going to choose a new royal family – a new line of kings. And of course, that first new king was… {David}.

Now David was one of Israel’s greatest kings. He was a great military leader – He was the guy that killed Goliath when He was still a boy – and He was a great spiritual leader. In fact, the Bible calls David “a man after God’s own heart”. Now that’s sure not to say He was perfect – David had a sinful nature too.  Probably his most notorious sin was that he committed adultery with Bathsheba and had one of his good friends murdered to cover it up. However, when he was confronted by the prophet Nathan, he sincerely confessed, and repented and did his best to make things right again. So even though He wasn’t perfect, He was a man after God’s own heart.

And so God made a unique promise to David – and this promise is very significant to our story – to the Christmas story – to this whole history of Hope.

If you have your Bibles, turn with me to 2 Samuel 7 – starting at verse 8. Here’s the promise that God gave to David.

 “Now go and say to my servant David, ‘This is what the Lord of Heaven’s Armies has declared: I took you from tending sheep in the pasture and selected you to be the leader of my people Israel. 9 I have been with you wherever you have gone, and I have destroyed all your enemies before your eyes. Now I will make your name as famous as anyone who has ever lived on the earth! 10 And I will provide a homeland for my people Israel, planting them in a secure place where they will never be disturbed. Evil nations won’t oppress them as they’ve done in the past, 11 starting from the time I appointed judges to rule my people Israel. And I will give you rest from all your enemies.

   “‘Furthermore, the Lord declares that he will make a house for you—a dynasty of kings! 12 For when you die and are buried with your ancestors, I will raise up one of your descendants, your own offspring, and I will make his kingdom strong. 13 He is the one who will build a house—a temple—for my name. And I will secure his royal throne forever. 14 I will be his father, and he will be my son. If he sins, I will correct and discipline him with the rod, like any father would do. 15 But my favor will not be taken from him as I took it from Saul, whom I removed from your sight. 16 Your house and your kingdom will continue before me for all time, and your throne will be secure forever.’”

2 Samuel 7:8-16

Now these are some impressive promises. God told David that he would make his name famous. God would give Him rest from all his enemies – AND (this is probably the most significant part of these promises) God would establish David’s house, his throne, and his kingdom forever.

That word ‘forever’ gives us a clue that there is more here than just what meets the eye. This is not just God telling David that there will be generation after generation after generation after generation of kings that come from David’s family. This is a promise that from David’s family line there will be A single king who will rule Israel forever.

Now, why would that be significant?

Well, let’s jump back to the promise that God made to Adam & Eve. Remember how He told the serpent in Genesis 3:15…

 And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.”

Genesis 3:15

That was basically a promise that one day a descendant of Eve would crush Satan’s head. He would be defeated and sin and it’s consequences would be no more.

Then many years later, God made a promise to Abraham in Genesis 12:2-3

 I will make you into a great nation. I will bless you and make you famous, and you will be a blessing to others. 3 I will bless those who bless you and curse those who treat you with contempt. All the families on earth will be blessed through you.”

Genesis 12:2-3

This was a promise that one day a descendant of Abraham (who would of course be a descendant of Eve) would be a blessing to every family on earth.

Now God is making this promise to David (who happened to be a descendant of Abraham) that one day a descendant from his family would rule Israel forever.

Do you think there is a connection here? Could that same person who was going to crush Satan’s head and defeat sin once for all – could He be the same person who was going to be a blessing to every family on earth – could He be the same person who would rule over Israel forever?

Don’t answer that yet.

Let’s keep following the timeline to see what happens next.

After David died, his son Solomon became king. And God absolutely blessed the socks right off Solomon and the entire nation of Israel. They had never had it so good. They were wealthy – they were at peace – they were the envy of the world. But when Solomon’s son Rehoboam became king, things went downhill fast.

Under his leadership, Israel split into two nations – ten of the twelve tribes split off, choose a new king, and kept the name Israel. The remaining two tribes stayed loyal to David’s family – keeping Rehoboam as their king and the took the name Judah.

So now the Israelites have become two separate nations – Israel & Judah. Well, to make a long story short, not a single one of Israel’s kings followed God. They were all evil. They led the Israelites to worship idols and they completely forgot about obeying God. This is the part of the Bible that you read about the Israelites serving the gods of Baal and Ashtoreth and making altars to these gods on every hill and under every tree. And so after a few hundred years of evil king after evil king, God had enough and He sent the Assyrians to attack Israel and basically wipe them off the face of the earth. The few remaining survivors were shipped off to different parts of the world and they pretty much disappeared from history.

2 Kings 17 gives us a bit of a summary.

 This disaster came upon the people of Israel because they worshiped other gods. They sinned against the Lord their God, who had brought them safely out of Egypt and had rescued them from the power of Pharaoh, the king of Egypt.

 13 Again and again the Lord had sent his prophets and seers to warn both Israel and Judah: “Turn from all your evil ways. Obey my commands and decrees—the entire law that I commanded your ancestors to obey, and that I gave you through my servants the prophets.”

 14 But the Israelites would not listen. They were as stubborn as their ancestors who had refused to believe in the Lord their God. 15 They rejected his decrees and the covenant he had made with their ancestors, and they despised all his warnings. They worshiped worthless idols, so they became worthless themselves. They followed the example of the nations around them, disobeying the Lord’s command not to imitate them.

And the people of Israel persisted in all the evil ways of Jeroboam. They did not turn from these sins 23 until the Lord finally swept them away from his presence, just as all his prophets had warned. So Israel was exiled from their land to Assyria, where they remain to this day.

2 Kings 17:7, 13-15, 22-23

So that was Israel. Now the nation of Judah, on the other hand, they did a little better. The kings of Judah – The royal family of David – ruled Judah for about 400 years. There were several of them that followed God and did very well. Kings like Hezekiah or Josiah. But there were also many kings that did not follow God. And so it wasn’t too long after Israel was destroyed, that God sent the Babylonians to conquer the nation of Judah because they too, had forgotten about obeying God and were worshipping idols.

2 Kings 21 tells us God’s response to Judah. Verse 13:

 “King Manasseh of Judah has done many detestable things. He is even more wicked than the Amorites, who lived in this land before Israel. He has caused the people of Judah to sin with his idols. 12 So this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: I will bring such disaster on Jerusalem and Judah that the ears of those who hear about it will tingle with horror. I will judge Jerusalem by the same standard I used for Samaria and the same measure I used for the family of Ahab. I will wipe away the people of Jerusalem as one wipes a dish and turns it upside down. 14 Then I will reject even the remnant of my own people who are left, and I will hand them over as plunder for their enemies. 15 For they have done great evil in my sight and have angered me ever since their ancestors came out of Egypt.”

2 Kings 21:13-15

So by about 600 BC, things were looking pretty bleak.

These descendants of Abraham, this nation of Israelites that God had chosen years ago to be his special possession – He would be their God and they would be His people – These same people who were once the envy of the world under the rule of King David and King Solomon – now found themselves in exile in Babylon – more than 80% of their population wiped out. Their homes destroyed. Their cities in ruins.

They were experiencing all of the curses that God had promised them if they refused to follow and obey God. It truly was Israel’s darkest hour.

But even in that darkest hour – even in the midst of God’s judgement and punishment – God gave them hope.

Right about the time that Israel was destroyed by the Assyrians, God send a prophet named Isaiah to deliver a message to the people. And it was kind of a two-part message. The most of it was a warning. God reminded them one more time of the curses that would come if they continued to refuse to obey God.  But in with those warnings was a message of Hope.

Look at Isaiah chapter 9 – verse 1.

Nevertheless, that time of darkness and despair will not go on forever. The land of Zebulun and Naphtali will be humbled, but there will be a time in the future when Galilee of the Gentiles, which lies along the road that runs between the Jordan and the sea, will be filled with glory.

 2  The people who walk in darkness will see a great light. For those who live in a land of deep darkness, a light will shine.

jump down to verse 6….

For a child is born to us, a son is given to us. The government will rest on his shoulders. And he will be called: Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 7 His government and its peace will never end. He will rule with fairness and justice from the throne of his ancestor David for all eternity. The passionate commitment of the Lord of Heaven’s Armies will make this happen!

Isaiah 9:1-2, 6-7

God had been promising ever since Adam & Eve that someone was coming to make things right. Someone was coming to crush Satan’s head and defeat sin once for all time. Someone was coming who would be a blessing to every family on earth. Someone was coming who would be king for all time. And that someone would be called: Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. His government and its peace would never end. He would rule with fairness and justice from the throne of his ancestor David for all eternity.

You can see what an incredible hope that was for the Israelites. After 4000 years of suffering the consequences of sin – You can see why they were longing for this person – for this coming king they called the Messiah – to show up and make things right again.

And that’s exactly what makes the Christmas story so incredible. After all this time – after all this waiting and hoping – finally all the promises that God has made over the course of some 4000 years – were going to be fulfilled.

And when you read through Luke chapter one, you can’t help but notice how clearly the Bible tells us that these promises were about to be fulfilled in Jesus Christ.

Turn with me to Luke 1:26. Look for all the subtle and not-so-subtle hints that this Jesus was the one they had been waiting for.

 In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a village in Galilee, 27 to a virgin named Mary. She was engaged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of King David. 28 Gabriel appeared to her and said, “Greetings, favored woman! The Lord is with you!”

 29 Confused and disturbed, Mary tried to think what the angel could mean. 30 “Don’t be afraid, Mary,” the angel told her, “for you have found favor with God! 31 You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you will name him Jesus. 32 He will be very great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor David. 33 And he will reign over Israel forever; his Kingdom will never end!”

Luke 1:26-33

I don’t think it could have been much clearer – This was exactly what all of Israel had been waiting for hundreds – even thousands of years. This baby that would be born would be the one to crush Satan’s head and defeat sin once for all. This baby would be the one who would be a blessing to every family on earth. This baby would be the one who would be King forever. God was about to undo the damage that was done way back in the garden of Eden. God was going to defeat Satan and sin once for all – and He was going to make things right again.

And in fact, further down in Luke Chapter 1, Zachariah – who was the cousin-in-law of Mary, says this:

68 “Praise the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has visited and redeemed his people. He has sent us a mighty Savior from the royal line of his servant David, just as he promised through his holy prophets long ago. Now we will be saved from our enemies and from all who hate us. He has been merciful to our ancestors by remembering his sacred covenant—the covenant he swore with an oath to our ancestor Abraham. We have been rescued from our enemies so we can serve God without fear, 75 in holiness and righteousness for as long as we live.

Luke 1:68-75

And it’s that last line that really gives us the true significance of Christmas. Because of Jesus Christ, coming to earth as a little baby – fulfilling all the promises of God – dying on a cross in our place, and coming back to life again – We can be rescued from our sin so we can serve God without fear, in holiness and righteousness for as long as we live. That’s the meaning of Christmas right there.

It means we don’t have to be slaves to sin anymore. We can choose to serve God. We can accept His forgiveness and we can have our sinful nature taken away. We can have our relationships restored and we can one day again, enjoy life as God intended it.

Now how is that all possible? Well, you’ll have to come back next week and we’re going to talk about that. God’s story still isn’t over. We’re still in the middle of this history of hope.

But for today, lets thank God for all his promises – both the ones that He has already fulfilled in the birth of Jesus Christ – and for the ones that He will fulfill in the future.

You see, most people are familiar with the shepherds and the wisemen and the angels – but they might not have heard the parts of the Christmas story that come before all that.

Because as we talked about last week, the whole Bible is the Christmas story. It begins with Adam and Eve and it goes right through to the end of time. All of history is the Christmas story.

And so we started in the Beginning – when God created the heavens and the earth. And He set up the perfect design for the perfect life. God set up three principles that would make life on earth awesome and amazing. And I told you that if you remembered nothing else from my sermon last Sunday, to remember those three principles. So here’s the pop quiz: Do you remember what those three principles are?

God is the source. God is the authority. Life is about relationships.

And with these three principles in place, life on earth would have continued to be awesome and amazing. Except for the fact, that one day Adam & Eve decided to reject God as their source and to reject God as their authority – and as a result, their relationship with God and with each other was broken.

And to this very day, we suffer the effects of those broken relationships. But the good news is – there is Hope. The entire Bible is a History of Hope. One day, God would undo the damage that was done in the garden of Eden and we would again experience life as God intended it.

And so today, we’re going to continue looking at God’s story, the Christmas story – to see how God continued to give mankind hope throughout the course of history.

Now this morning, we’re going to cover a lot of ground in quick hurry. Last Sunday we ended in Genesis chapter 3 with God offering a glimpse of hope to Adam and Eve. Even though they messed up big time and basically turned God’s perfect plan for a perfect life upside down, God promised them one day He would make things right again.

But for now, they had to live with the terrible consequences of sin. And there a lot of consequences. Banishment from the Garden of Eden. No more access to the Tree of Life. Broken relationships with each other. A broken relationship with God. And that’s just the beginning. One of the worst consequences they had was that each of their children and their children’s children, and each of their children’s children’s children would all be born with a sinful nature – a natural desire to rebel against God as their authority and as their source. It was like a hereditary disease that every person on earth would be born with and have to suffer the consequences of.

In fact, the next few chapters of Genesis paint a picture for us of just how terrible this disease of man’s sinful nature was. In chapter four of Genesis, we read how Adam & Eve’s first born son, Cain, murders his younger brother, Abel. Later on in that same chapter we read of one of Cain’s descendants murdering another man.

By the time chapter 6 rolls around, this is what we read in verse 5.

“The Lord observed the extent of human wickedness on the earth, and he saw that everything they thought or imagined was consistently and totally evil.”

Genesis 6:5

Life on planet earth was just about as far from God’s original design as it could possibly get. People had completely rejected God as any type of authority – they had no concept of God as their source – and they were very literally destroying themselves. Verse 11 of chapter 6 tells us that the earth was filled with violence. It was becoming painfully clear that the hope of Life as God intended it was getting further and further from reality.

And I wish I could take you chronologically through the Bible now, story by story, to show you how they all fit into this, but because we’re jamming the entire world history into four weeks, we’re going to have to fast-forward through a lot of it. But I’ll try to give you an quick overview as we go.

The next major event after God observes all the wickedness of man is the flood. Everyone except Noah and his family are wiped out. The earth and mankind get a fresh start. But that doesn’t solve all our problems – Noah and his family still have that disease of the sinful nature. And we are reminded of that by an incident in Genesis chapter nine where Noah gets himself drunk. Man’s sinful nature was still causing problems.

Well, about ten generations after Noah, Abram (Abraham as God renames him) comes on the scene. And here again, God gives us a sneak peek at His plan for mankind. Look at Genesis chapter 12, verse 1 through 3.

The Lord had said to Abram, “Leave your native country, your relatives, and your father’s family, and go to the land that I will show you. 2 I will make you into a great nation. I will bless you and make you famous, and you will be a blessing to others. 3 I will bless those who bless you and curse those who treat you with contempt. All the families on earth will be blessed through you.”

Genesis 12:1-3

Now at first glance, this might seem pretty important to Abraham, but rather insignificant to us. It just sounds like God likes this guy Abram and is promising to take good care of him. But there’s that little line at the end… “All the families on earth will be blessed through you.” Now how could one man who lived thousands of years ago be a blessing to every family on earth – including your family?

Well, I don’t know if Abraham saw it at the time – but we can certainly see it now as we look back at history – that the answer is through Jesus Christ. Jesus would be born as a descendant of Abraham – both Mary and Joseph were from that family. And Jesus, through his death and resurrection, would make the way possible for every person on earth to have a restored relationship with God. Every family on earth could experience life as God intended it. Every family could have hope. That is how every family on earth would be blessed through Abraham.

But that’s not even my main point today. That certainly sets the stage for where we’re going, but we gotta keep fast forwarding…

Abraham has a son named Isaac, Isaac has a son named Jacob, and Jacob has 12 twelves sons and God changes Jacob’s name to Israel. And so it’s from Jacobs twelve sons that we get the 12 tribes of Israel.

It’s right at this time that the families of Jacob’s sons – the Israelites, begin living in Egypt. You read about that in the story of Joseph. Well, they live in Egypt for about 400 years and they have a lot of babies. By this time there are about 600,000 men – so maybe about 2 million people in all. And they are all eventually forced to work for the Egyptians as slaves. And that’s when Moses comes on the scene.

Moses, following God’s instructions, leads the Israelites out of slavery, out of Egypt and into the desert. And it’s here that God begins the next major phase of His plan to put things back to the way they were when He created the world.

So what happens in the desert with this nation of Israeli slaves? For you who know the story – what significant event happened in the Sinai Desert – or more specifically, at a mountain in the Sinai desert? {Ten Commandments / Law / Covenant}

God made a covenant with them. Now what’s a covenant? A covenant is like a contract – an agreement between two parties. And so God makes this covenant – this contract – with the Israelites. All those Old Testament rules and regulations (like the thou shalt not do this and thou shalt not do that) are the terms of this agreement.

Of course, the most famous part of these terms were the ten commandments. But it actually wasn’t just ten commandments – there were a whole pile of commandments. Basically last half the book of Exodus and pretty much the entire book of Leviticus are the terms of this contract.

So what’s this contract all about? And what does it have to do with Adam & Eve and the Christmas story? What does this have to do with God making everything right again?

All very good questions!

To help us figure it all out, let’s go to Deuteronomy chapter 28.

  “If you fully obey the Lord your God and carefully keep all his commands that I am giving you today, the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the world. 2You will experience all these blessings if you obey the Lord your God:

 3 Your towns and your fields
will be blessed.
4 Your children and your crops
will be blessed.
The offspring of your herds and flocks
will be blessed.
5 Your fruit baskets and breadboards
will be blessed.
6 Wherever you go and whatever you do,
you will be blessed.

Deuteronomy 28:1-6

Now jump down to verse 15.

 “But if you refuse to listen to the Lord your God and do not obey all the commands and decrees I am giving you today, all these curses will come and overwhelm you:

 16 Your towns and your fields
will be cursed.
17 Your fruit baskets and breadboards
will be cursed.
18 Your children and your crops
will be cursed.
The offspring of your herds and flocks
will be cursed.
19 Wherever you go and whatever you do,
you will be cursed.

 20 “The Lord himself will send on you curses, confusion, and frustration in everything you do, until at last you are completely destroyed for doing evil and abandoning me.

Deuteronomy 28:15-20

That’s some heavy stuff. And this is actually just a small sampling of that chapter – there’s more, but I think you get the idea. God’s making sure that the Israelites know how this works. If they obey God, God is going to bless their socks off. Life will be awesome. But if they disobey God, life is going to stink.

It sounds very much like the choice that Adam & Eve had. They could obey God and life would be sweet. Or they could disobey God – and life would become very painful.

So this is a very similar arrangement to the one that God had with Adam and Eve, although there is one major difference this time. You see, Adam & Eve were perfectly capable of choosing to obey God. They actually had to deliberately choose to sin.

But everyone of the Israelites was already born with a sinful nature. Every single one of them was already naturally inclined to reject God. Sin was their default. And with that sinful nature, there was NO WAY they could possibly obey all of the commandments that God had just given them. You see, our sinful nature makes it impossible to fully obey God. We just can’t do it.

Romans 3:10 says…

“No one is righteous – not even one. No one is truly wise; no one is seeking God. All have turned away; all have become useless. No one does good, not a single one.”

Romans 3:10-12

We just pull it off. History is proof of this. No one is perfect. Everybody sins. You do. I do. We all do. It’s because of this sinful nature that we are born with.

So for the Israelites to obey everything that God had said really was impossible. In fact, ironically, at the very moment that God was giving Moses all these commands at the top of Mount Sinai, the Israelites were at the foot of the mountain breaking those commandments. They had made an golden calf and were worshipping it, instead of God. That was rule number one – to worship only God. Rule number two was not to make any idols. So already, they had broken the first two commandments.

So what was God thinking when He gave them all these rules and regulations to follow? Didn’t He know about their sinful nature? Didn’t He know that they simply wouldn’t be able to obey them?

Absolutely He did. That’s part of the reason why He gave them those commandments. He wanted to show them that as long as they had that sinful nature within them, they would never be able to fully obey Him – and they would never be able to have the life that they were created for.  They could try really hard – but unless they were perfect, it simply wouldn’t be enough.

And it’s important for us to realize that too. So many people try to make things right with God by being good. They think that by being a good person, God will accept them. But the Bible doesn’t teach that. The Bible doesn’t teach that God weighs our good deeds against our bad deeds to see which one is the majority. The Bible teaches us that one single sin breaks our relationship with God.

Romans 6:23 says… “For the wages of sin is death.”

Any sin in our lives keeps us separated from God. The penalty is death. So what do we do? If we’re born with a sinful nature, and if our sin keeps us from the life we were created to have – what do we do? There’s nothing we can do. But maybe God can do something.

Remember, this is a history of hope. This is God’s story. And He loves people way too much to just let us die without hope. So here’s what He did:

Mixed into that covenant that God made with the Israelites – in with all the thou shalt do this and thou shalt not do that – God laid out a temporary system for dealing with sin.

Now the details of this temporary system were quite complexed and lengthly – as I said earlier – it fills up the second half of Exodus and almost all of Leviticus. So this morning I won’t explain all the details, but I’ll give you just the very basics.

The basic idea was that, when someone sinned, because the wages of sin is death, someone or something had to die. So God allowed people to bring a lamb to the tabernacle or the temple and that lamb would be killed in place of the person who had sinned. So in essence, the lamb would take the punishment for that person’s sin.

But there was a problem with this system. There was a reason that God only made this to be a temporary solution. We read that reason in Hebrews 10:1-4

The old system under the law of Moses was only a shadow, a dim preview of the good things to come, not the good things themselves. The sacrifices under that system were repeated again and again, year after year, but they were never able to provide perfect cleansing for those who came to worship. 2 If they could have provided perfect cleansing, the sacrifices would have stopped, for the worshipers would have been purified once for all time, and their feelings of guilt would have disappeared.

 3 But instead, those sacrifices actually reminded them of their sins year after year. 4 For it is not possible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. 

Hebrews 10:1-4

No matter how many times the people would bring their sacrifices to the temple – no matter how many animals died in their place – the people couldn’t get rid of their sin. The blood from the lambs and the other animals that they would sacrifice could never take away the sin.They would go home and they would sin again. Their sinful nature would get the best of them and they would sin. They would reject God as their source and as their authority and they would sin. They would try hard not to, but they would sin anyway. They were slaves to sin. And their relationship with God and their relationships with each would be continue to be broken.

So what was the point? Why lay out all these rules and regulations if the people couldn’t possible obey them anyway? And why make up this whole system sacrifices if the blood of the animals couldn’t take away our sin?

Well, the point of that system was never to take away our sin. The point was to give us hope. The point – was to point us to Jesus. It was God painting a picture for the Israelites of how God would one day fix the problem of sin for good.

God’s Son, Jesus Christ, would be born into the world as a human baby and He would do what the old testament sacrifices could never do.

Jesus Himself would become the sacrifice. He would die on a cross in our place and his blood would be spilled for us. And unlike the blood of bulls or goats or lambs which couldn’t take away sin, the blood of Jesus takes away our sin once and for all.

This is what John the Baptist was talking about when he declared that Jesus was the Lamb of God in John 1:29.

“Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”

John 1:29

Jesus death and resurrection provided a way for us to not only have our sins forgiven – but to have our sinful nature taken away. We wouldn’t have to slaves to sin anymore – we could actually choose to obey God and by doing so, we could actually experience the life that God created us to have.

This is the hope that God gave the Israelites through all that Old Testament Law. Every lamb that was sacrificed served as a symbol of hope – that although they were powerless to save themselves from sin and it’s consequences, Jesus Christ, the baby in a manger, the Lamb of God, would one day defeat sin and man could once again enjoy life as God intended it.

So my question for you this morning is, do you have that hope? Have you put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ?

Romans 10:9-10 says…

“If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For it is by believing in your heart that you are made right with God, and it is by confessing with your mouth that you are saved.”

Romans 10:9-10

Have you done that? Have you accepted God’s gift of forgiveness? Have you allowed Him to take your sinful nature and put it to death? Now that’s not to say that you will never sin again – that remain a choice for us. But we are no longer slaves to sin. We can choose to obey God. We can choose to have life.

It’s important to remember that history – that HIS STORY -  is not over yet. We’re still in process. God has not yet fully undone the damage that was done in the Garden of Eden. There is still sin and death in the world and we suffer the consequences of that. But we have the hope that one day, one day soon, Jesus will return and He will do away with sin and death for good. And every one of us who have accepted God’s gift of forgiveness will be free from sin and death and we will enjoy forever life as God intended it.

Quite often I shy away from a lot of seasonal messages – just because we hear the same things year after year after year. But this Christmas, I want to take the whole month of December to tell you the Christmas story – the whole Christmas story. I think sometimes we get gypped and we only hear part of the story. We hear about the angels, about the shepherds, about having no room at the inn, about the wisemen, but we miss out on all the stuff that happens before that.

So I want to start us off today, not with the wisemen, not with the shepherds, not with Mary & Joseph – not even with the prophets that foretold the birth of Jesus. Instead, I want us to start in the beginning. Literally. In the beginning – Genesis 1:1

That’s truly the beginning of the Christmas story. Because really, the entire Bible is the Christmas story. Everything that happens in the Old Testament is a lead up to the birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Everything that happens in the New Testament is the result of the birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

So this December I want us to take a look at the big picture. I want us to try to see what God was doing right from day one. You see, Jesus’ birth didn’t just happen. In fact, all of history didn’t just happen. God wasn’t just making stuff up as He went along. Before He even created the world, God had a plan. And that plan involved all the stuff that we read about in the Bible – everything from Adam & Eve in Genesis all the way to the end of time in Revelation. God had and still has a plan.

You may have heard the saying that history is HIS STORY. That’s absolutely true – History is God’s story. And believe it or not, you and I are a part of that story.

So over the next few weeks as we try to look at the Bible as one big Christmas story, hopefully we’ll be able to see where we fit into the picture. Hopefully we’ll be able to see how the whole Bible – how all of history – is a History of Hope – a grand story that each one of us is very much a part of.

I don’t know if you’re as excited about this as I am, but I trust that by the end of December, you will be.

Our story begins as I said before, In the beginning. The first few chapters of Genesis really set the stage for the rest of human history. Everything that has happened over the last several thousand years is a direct result of what happens in the first few chapters of Genesis. So that’s where we’re going to start. If you have your Bibles, feel free to turn with me to the book of Genesis, chapter one, verse one.

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”

Genesis 1:1

This may be the single most important verse in the whole Bible. It’s absolutely foundational because it tells us that this story is about God. This isn’t a story about Adam & Eve. It isn’t a story about the Israelites. It’s not a story about the human race. It’s a story about God. As we said earlier, history is God’s story. Its not about you. It’s not about me.  Everything that happens in this life is about God.

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth – This is His story. And while I won’t read through all the creation verses, you know what happens. God sets the stage for His story. He gives shape to the earth and divides the land from the water. He puts the sun, moon, and stars in place – He fills the earth with plants and animals of every kind. And then He creates man. And while everything else seems to just be spoken into existence – it seems that God puts a little something extra into creating man. He doesn’t just speak man into existence – He forms him out of the dust of the earth. Look at Genesis 2:7.

“Then the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground. He breathed the breath of life into the man’s nostrils, and the man became a living person.” Genesis 2:7

That’s is an incredible statement. That God could just breath into this pile of dust and it would become a living person. Doesn’t that just blow your mind? You and I are just piles of dust that God has seen fit to breath His life into. Life is such an incredible gift. Despite what some evolutionists would tell you, we would have no life if it were’t given to us by God. God is the source of all life.

And that’s actually the first of three things that I want you to remember. That God is the source. He’s the one who created the earth. He’s the one who created us. He’s the one who gave us life. He’s the one who sustains our life every day. God is the source. There is nothing that we have that God hasn’t provided for us. There is nothing that we need that God won’t provide for us. He is the source. That’s important to remember.

So after God creates man, He continues setting the stage for His story. He puts the man in a beautiful garden called Eden and then He lays down a few ground rules. Well, actually there was one ground rule. We find that in verses 15 – 17 of chapter 2.

The Lord God placed the man in the Garden of Eden to tend and watch over it. 16But the Lord God warned him, “You may freely eat the fruit of every tree in the garden—17 except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. If you eat its fruit, you are sure to die.”

Genesis 2:15-17

Now some might think that God’s just being bossy – making up rules just for the sake making up rules. But that’s not the case at all. Actually, God gave Adam all kinds of freedom and authority. In Genesis 1:28, God gives Adam dominion over the whole earth. Man was to be the master over Creation. That’s a lot of freedom and authority! In fact, one of Adam’s first jobs was to give names to all the animals that God created. God put a lot of faith in Adam – He gave him great freedom, great responsibilities, and great authority. But God was still to be the authority over man.

And this gives us the second thing to remember: #2. God is the authority.

This was all part of God’s design. God was the source – He provided and man enjoyed. God was the authority – He set the rules and man obeyed. As long as those two things were in place, life for Adam was going to be awesome.

But there’s one more thing: jump down to verse 18 of chapter 2.

Then the Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper who is just right for him.”

Genesis 2:18

Now isn’t that interesting? Here was God and Adam – sin hadn’t entered the scene yet, so they had a perfect, unbroken relationship. They were as close buddies as God and man could be – no problems there. And yet God says, “It’s not good that the man should be alone.” God designed us to have human relationships. They are key to life as God intended it. God never intended for us to go through life alone.

And so God makes a companion for Adam. He causes Adam to fall into a deep sleep, He takes one of Adam’s ribs and He creates Eve. And its the perfect setup. Not only does Adam enjoy a close relationship with God, but now He has another human to share his life with. And in fact, for a time, Adam & Eve enjoyed the closest relationship any humans have ever experienced. Look at verse 25.

“Now the man and his wife were both naked, but they felt no shame.”

Genesis 2:25

Now when we read this verse, we get a little awkward and feel a little embarrassed. We don’t want to read about naked people in church. But that’s what makes this verse so amazing. Adam and Eve had no awkwardness at all towards each other. They were perfectly comfortable being known for exactly who they were. They had nothing to hide. Nothing to be ashamed of. No insecurities. They knew they were loved and accepted for exactly who they were. They had the perfect relationship – no fears – only acceptance.

So that gives us the third thing I want you to remember: Life is about relationships. That’s the point of why we’re on this planet – to develop and enjoy deep, meaningful relationships with God and man. That’s what it’s all about. Not furthering your career. Not paying off your mortgage. Not achieving fame and fortune. Life is about relationships.

And those three things pretty much make up God’s formula for a perfect life.

#1. God is the source. #2. God is the authority. #3. Life is about relationships. 

That was God’s perfect design. It was all pretty straight forward. And it worked great.

With God as the source, Adam & Eve had everything they needed. God gave them life, God gave them a place to live, God gave them food to eat, a job to do – He gave them close relationships – both with Himself and with each other. It was really the perfect life.

As long as Adam & Eve looked to God as the source and submitted themselves to the authority of God, their relationships would be sweet and life would continue to be amazing. That was God’s design.

But as you know. Something happened. We read about that in Genesis 3.

The serpent was the shrewdest of all the wild animals the Lord God had made. One day he asked the woman, “Did God really say you must not eat the fruit from any of the trees in the garden?”

 2 “Of course we may eat fruit from the trees in the garden,” the woman replied. 3 “It’s only the fruit from the tree in the middle of the garden that we are not allowed to eat. God said, ‘You must not eat it or even touch it; if you do, you will die.’”

 4 “You won’t die!” the serpent replied to the woman. 5 “God knows that your eyes will be opened as soon as you eat it, and you will be like God, knowing both good and evil.”

 6 The woman was convinced. She saw that the tree was beautiful and its fruit looked delicious, and she wanted the wisdom it would give her. So she took some of the fruit and ate it. Then she gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it, too. 7At that moment their eyes were opened, and they suddenly felt shame at their nakedness. So they sewed fig leaves together to cover themselves.

 8 When the cool evening breezes were blowing, the man and his wife heard the Lord God walking about in the garden. So they hid from the Lord God among the trees.

Genesis 3:1-8

Now, before we go further, let’s back up and see if we can wrap our heads around what just happened here. This is very significant.

When Adam & Eve ate the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, three things happened.

They rejected God as the source.

Verse 6.

“The woman was convinced. She saw that the tree was beautiful and its fruit looked delicious, and she wanted the wisdom it would give her. So she took some of the fruit and ate it. Then she gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it, too.” Genesis 3:6

Adam & Eve believe that God was keeping something from them – that He wasn’t providing something that they needed. So they decided that they had to become the source. God couldn’t be trusted to provide for their needs – so it was up to them to look out for #1. They rejected God as the source of everything they needed and took that role for themselves. They would be their own source.

The second thing that happened was they rejected God as the authority.

When they took and ate that fruit, they were deciding that they were not going to live under God’s authority anymore. They wanted to be the judge of what was good and what was evil – what was right and what was wrong. They wanted to decide what they could or couldn’t do. And so they rejected God as the authority and took that role for themselves as well. So now in their minds – they are the source and they are the authority.

And as a result of them taking God’s role as the source and as the authority, a third thing happened. Verses 7&8.

“At that moment their eyes were opened, and they suddenly felt shame at their nakedness. So they sewed fig leaves together to cover themselves.

 8 When the cool evening breezes were blowing, the man and his wife heard the Lord God walking about in the garden. So they hid from the Lord God among the trees.” Genesis 3:7-8

The moment they rejected God as the source and as the authority, their relationship with each other and with God was broken. What was once the sweetest, closest, most intimate relationships one could experience, was now replaced with shame and fear – with Adam & Eve hiding from each other and from God.

Everything that God had setup so beautifully – so perfectly, was turned on its head.

Instead of God being their source – they would depend on themselves.

Instead of God being their authority – they were going to live by their own rules.

And instead of enjoying a close relationship with God and each other, they would lose that relationship and be distant from God and from each other.

And you and I are still feeling the effects of that event even today.

Everyone of us are born with the natural inclinations to be our own source – to be our own authority. Nobody’s going to tell me what to do. I can do it myself. We reject God as our source and we reject God as our authority.

And as a result, our relationships are a mess. This is why we have divorce – this is why we have crime – this is why we have wars. Every relationship problem we experience in life can be traced back to our rejection of God as our source and as our authority.

Think about your own life. What sins do you struggle with? Don’t they come from a belief somewhere deep in your heart that God won’t really provide for your needs? That God can’t fully be trusted to take good care of you? And because of that belief, we reject God’s authority and we act outside of God boundaries for our life – thinking that our way of taking care of our needs is better than God’s way. And as a results our relationships with God and with each other suffer.

We’re living in a world where God’s design for a perfect life has been turned upside down.

But that’s not the end of the story – remember: We’ve only looked at the first three chapters. There’s a whole history of hope to come.

And while we’re going to get into that in more detail later, God gives Adam & Eve just a glimpse of that hope in verses 14 & 15

 Then the Lord God said to the serpent,

   “Because you have done this, you are cursed
more than all animals, domestic and wild.
You will crawl on your belly,
groveling in the dust as long as you live.
15 And I will cause hostility between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and her offspring.
He will strike your head,
and you will strike his heel.”

Genesis 3:14-15

Now at first glance, that might not seem very significant. It just sounds like mankind and serpant-kind weren’t going to get along very well after this. But as you read through the rest of the Scriptures as we’re going to be doing over the course of this next month, you begin to realize that there was more to this statement than meets the eye. This was actually a fantastic promise of hope.

And while I don’t want to spoil the ending of my sermon series, since most of you know how it’s going to end anyway, I’ll give you a sneak peak today. I’m going to let you in on God’s plan to put things back the way they were.

In a few thousand years after Adam & Eve’s big blunder, God was going to send His Son, Jesus, to be born to the great great great….. granddaughter of Eve – to a virgin named Mary. And this baby Jesus would grow up and live a sinless life – and allow Himself to be put to death on a cross by evil men. The serpent striking the heel would be Jesus death on the cross. But the crushing of the serpents head – would be Jesus’ resurrection – His victory over sin and over death.

What God was telling them was that there was coming a day when He would undo the damage that was done. That He was going to turn things back to the way He had originally designed. Where we would look to God as our authority and as the source of everything we need. Where our relationship with God and our relationship with each other would be repaired. No more brokenness. No more more shame. No more fear. Just the shear joy of experiencing life together.

Seems too good to be true, doesn’t it?

We can hardly imagine the day when the backward, brokenness of this world is repaired – and life is again, as God intended it. But that’s the hope that we have in Jesus Christ.

But as you know, we’re not there yet. We are still in a place where there is pain, there is suffering, there are tears and there are sorrows. And as Christians we are not immune from all that.

There are no promises in the Bible that tell us that Christians will be free from pain and suffering. If anything, the Bible promises us the opposite – that there certainly will be pain and suffering for anyone who wishes to follow Christ. Jesus says in John 16:33…

 “Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows.” John 16:33

So how do we deal with that? How do we deal with pain and suffering, not just in the world in general, but in our own lives? Does God have a purpose for our pain (for our trials and sorrows) or is it just part of living in a sin-filled world? I mean, everyone experiences pain and suffering, but as Christians, as aliens in this world, how are we supposed to respond when we go through those dark, difficult times in life?

As I mentioned last week, right about the time that 1 Peter was written, the Christians in Rome were experiencing a very severe persecution at the hands of the Roman Emperor Nero. So they were very well acquainted with pain and suffering. And so Peter takes a large part of this letter he is writing to them to address this issue of suffering. So that’s what we want to look at today. What does God (though Peter) have to say about our suffering? How do we understand the trials and sorrows we go through in life? And while we may not come away with all the answers today, hopefully through our study this morning we can come away knowing that there are answers and that God allows these things in our lives for his good purposes.

Now the first passage that I want us to look at this morning is 1 Peter 4:12-16 & 19. And of course, we’ll jump around to some other verses as well, but that’s where we’re going to start.

12 Dear friends, don’t be surprised at the fiery trials you are going through, as if something strange were happening to you. 13 Instead, be very glad—for these trials make you partners with Christ in his suffering, so that you will have the wonderful joy of seeing his glory when it is revealed to all the world.

14 So be happy when you are insulted for being a Christian, for then the glorious Spirit of God rests upon you. 15 If you suffer, however, it must not be for murder, stealing, making trouble, or prying into other people’s affairs. 16 But it is no shame to suffer for being a Christian. Praise God for the privilege of being called by his name! 

 19 So if you are suffering in a manner that pleases God, keep on doing what is right, and trust your lives to the God who created you, for he will never fail you.

1 Peter 4:12-16 &19

So from this passage we can presume that the Christians that Peter is writing to are going some very difficult times. Now we don’t know exactly what trials these are – perhaps they refer to Nero’s persecution – where Christians were being imprisoned and put to death in all kinds of horrific ways. Perhaps they refer to other difficult things that they were going through. We don’t really know. But Peter calls them “fiery trials”. So that makes me think that whatever it is, its some pretty tough stuff. And while we may not have ever been thrown into prison or thrown to the lions because of our faith, I think probably all of us can relate. All of us have gone through some sort of “fiery trials” in our own life. I can think of at least three of our church families right off the top of my head that have gone through massively difficult times in the last year alone. We’ve all been there.

And that’s why Peter says first of all “Don’t be surprised when you go through these fiery trials.” They are going to happen. Jesus promised it. History has proven it. You will go through fiery trials. It shouldn’t be a surprise. But what might be a surprise is what Peter tells us to do in our trials.

Verse 13 He tells us… Instead of being surprised, be very glad. Verse 14. So be Happy… What?

Think back to the last time you went through one of those fiery trials – when life threw you a curveball and your world came crashing down around you. When you went through that, were you thinking “Boy, I’m just so glad that God allowed this happen to me”? Probably not.

It was probably more like “God why are you doing this? Why are you putting me through such a painful thing?”

So is Peter off the deep end to tell us to be very glad? To be happy? I know that we said earlier, that as Christian, as aliens in this world, we are to be holy. That means we are to be different. We need to respect our authorities even when they don’t deserve that respect. We are to work hard for our bosses, even our lousy bosses. We are to love our wives – even when they are difficult. And wives are to honor our husbands, even when they’re undeserving – and all these things that are very different from what the world does – but to be glad when we hurt? To be happy in the midst of our suffering? Isn’t that beyond being different – isn’t that borderline crazy? Impossible even?

And you know, Peter isn’t the only one to tell us to be glad in our trials. James says the same thing – In James 1:2  it says…

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds,” James 1:2

Pure joy? Are these guys loopy or what? What is it that Peter & James can see in the sorrows and trials of life that cause them to tell us to be happy and to consider it pure joy when we face trials of many kind?

Its almost like they see our suffering as something beneficial – something that is actually for our good. It’s like they see the pain and the trials of this life as blessings, rather than curses. Could that be true? Could our suffering actually serve a positive purpose?

There is a song on the radio these days called Blessings. And its written by a lady who was a successful Christian singer/song writer. She had a great ministry in a church of about 4000, she had recorded a #1 Worship Song in 2004. But in 2006, her husband was diagnosed with a brain tumor. And though they prayed and prayed for healing, for some reason, God wasn’t answering their prayers like they hoped He would. And so in that very dark and difficult time they they went through, they began asking the very questions about suffering and pain that we’ve been talking about today. And so this song, Blessings, was written out of all those questions that they were asking during that time. And I think that some of the answers that they came up with can be very encouraging to us today, so I’d like us to listen to that song this morning. It’s called Blessings – by Laura Story.

Laura Story – Blessings

What a question: What if the trials of this life – the pain, the suffering, those difficult dark times that we all go through – are God’s mercies in disguise? What if those things are God’s reminders for us that we are aliens – and that this world is not our home? What if God uses our suffering to draw us closer to Himself?

Those are some pretty incredible questions, aren’t they? But you know, I think there’s a lot of truth in that song. And many of those truths come right out of 1 Peter. So what I’d like to to this morning, is to encourage you with three truths about suffering. I don’t know what fiery trials you’ve gone through in the past, what you’re going through right now, or what you will go through sometime in the future, but I hope that these three truths about suffering will give you some encouragement and hope so that you can actually be very glad and consider it great joy when you go through these difficult times.

Truth #1: Suffering is temporary.

“So be truly glad. There is wonderful joy ahead, even though you have to endure many trials for a little while.” 1 Peter 1:6

For a little while. Now if you’re like me, you’re idea of “a little while” might just be different from Peter’s idea of “a little while” – especially when it comes to suffering. If I’ve had a cold for a couple of days, I think I’ve suffered for a little while. But when it drags out to a few weeks, then I’ve been suffering for a long time! We’re not very patient when it comes to suffering. But that’s why its so important to keep an eternal perspective.

Paul talks a little bit about keeping an eternal perspective in 2 Corinthians 4.

 8 We are pressed on every side by troubles, but we are not crushed. We are perplexed, but not driven to despair. 9 We are hunted down, but never abandoned by God. We get knocked down, but we are not destroyed. 10 Through suffering, our bodies continue to share in the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be seen in our bodies.

That is why we never give up. Though our bodies are dying, our spirits are being renewed every day. 17 For our present troubles are small and won’t last very long. Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever! 18 So we don’t look at the troubles we can see now; rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen. For the things we see now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever.

2 Corinthians 4:8-10, 16-18

It goes right back to our whole alien theme. This world is not our home. There is an eternity waiting for us where all the hardships and and all the sorrows and all the trials that we are going through now, will all be quickly forgotten. So we have to fix our gaze on eternity and remember that no matter how difficult life on earth becomes – it is only temporary. When Christ returns, He will do away with sin and death and suffering forever – and everything will be right again. I find great encouragement in Revelation 21.

1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the old heaven and the old earth had disappeared. And the sea was also gone. 2 And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven like a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.

 3 I heard a loud shout from the throne, saying, “Look, God’s home is now among his people! He will live with them, and they will be his people. God himself will be with them. 4 He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. All these things are gone forever.”

 5 And the one sitting on the throne said, “Look, I am making everything new!” And then he said to me, “Write this down, for what I tell you is trustworthy and true.” 6 And he also said, “It is finished! I am the Alpha and the Omega—the Beginning and the End. To all who are thirsty I will give freely from the springs of the water of life. 7 All who are victorious will inherit all these blessings, and I will be their God, and they will be my children.

Revelation 21:1-7

That’s the reality that we have to look forward to. Our suffering, as difficult and as long as it seems now, is temporary. Soon we will be home and suffering will be no more! What an encouragement that is! So that’s truth #1. Suffering is temporary

Truth #2. Suffering Causes Growth

Our physical muscles illustrate this very well. The only way our muscles grow stronger is if they are stressed to the point where they are actually injured on a small scale. The muscle fibers break down and then it’s the healing process and the rebuilding of those fibers that makes them stronger than before.

You’ve all experienced sore muscles after a strenuous day of work. They’re sore because they’ve been injured – they’ve been damaged. But that’s exactly what is going to cause them to grow and become stronger. The saying is true – no pain, no gain.

And that’s also what happens in our spiritual lives as well. No pain – no gain. We actually need difficult things in our life so that we grow.

And there are several passages that we could look at for this point, but perhaps the clearest is in that verse in James that we started looking at earlier.

 Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. 3 For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. 4 So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing. James 1:2-4

It’s like that line in the Blessings song – “What if a thousand sleepless nights are what it takes to know God’s near.” I think it’s quite possible that there are some lessons that we can only learn through some of these painful experiences. There is a level of intimacy and closeness with God that we can only have by going through those difficult times where we have no options but to fully rely and trust in Him.

If we were to take the time today, I’ll bet that many of you could tell us stories of how, because of some difficult times in your life, you came to know God in a new and more intimate way. How you’ve discovered that the trials of this life really are God’s blessings in disguise.

And that leads us to our final Truth about Suffering.

#3. Suffering is part of God’s plan.

Now its important to note that God doesn’t cause all suffering. Suffering comes from a variety of sources – sometime we suffer because of someone else’s sin, sometimes we suffer the consequence of our own sin, sometimes we suffer because we take a stand and do what’s right, sometimes we suffer because simply because we follow Christ. There are many reasons why we suffer.

But while God does not cause all suffering, He does cause all suffering to work together for good. One of my favorite verses is Romans 8:28.

“And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them.” Romans 8:28

God causes everything to work together for our good – even our suffering. Sometimes that’s hard to believe – but it’s true. Peter assures us of this at the end of his letter in 1 Peter 5:12.

 12 I have written and sent this short letter to you with the help of Silas,whom I commend to you as a faithful brother. My purpose in writing is to encourage you and assure you that what you are experiencing is truly part of God’s grace for you. Stand firm in this grace. 

1 Peter 5:12

Believe it or not, what you are experiencing – those fiery trials that you’re going through – those difficult times, those painful experiences – are all part of God’s grace for you. He’s using it for your good and His glory. We can’t always see it. There are things we go through that we may never see any good come out of it, but we can be assured, that everything we experience is all part of God’s grace for you. So in the words of Peter…

6 Be truly glad. There is wonderful joy ahead, even though you have to endure many trials for a little while. 7 These trials will show that your faith is genuine. It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold—though your faith is far more precious than mere gold. So when your faith remains strong through many trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day when Jesus Christ is revealed to the whole world. 1Peter 1:6-7

The trials of this life are difficult – and don’t want to gloss them over or make light of them – I know there are some very painful things in life we go through. But I want to encourage you this morning: Don’t forget – you are an alien. This world is not your home. You have a home that is waiting for you – where all the messy, painful stuff of life will be gone. And in the meantime, you have God who created you, who loves you like crazy, and will see you through anything this world throws at you.

But that day hasn’t come yet. We are still living here as aliens in this sin-filled world. So what do we do in the meantime? How do we live as aliens in this world until Christ takes us home? That’s the question we set out to answer two week ago as we began looking at the books of first and second Peter.

Now the first thing we discovered, as we looked at 1 Peter chapter 1 was that God wants us to be holy. In other words, God wants us to be different. Why? Because when you’re different, you can make a difference. When we live in the awesome power of God, we will be very different from the world, (we’re gonna stick out like sore thumbs) but that’s exactly what will give us opportunity to make a difference in the world.

So this morning I want to pick up where we left off two weeks ago – kinda on that theme of being different in order to make a difference, because Peter talks a little bit more about this in chapters two and three.

I want to start at 1 Peter chapter 2, verse 9… Now I realize we’re hopping over a lot of good stuff in the verses that come before this, but I’m going to leave that to you to fill in the blanks. You can consider that your homework for this week – to read the verses that come before verse 9. But to give you a quick summary, Peter is talking about how God has chosen us, how He has redeemed us, and how He has given us life. And now he says in verse 9:

You are a chosen people. You are royal priests, a holy nation, God’s very own possession. As a result, you can show others the goodness of God, for he called you out of the darkness into his wonderful light.

 10 “Once you had no identity as a people;
now you are God’s people.
Once you received no mercy;
now you have received God’s mercy.”

 11 Dear friends, I warn you as “temporary residents and foreigners” [or as some older translations put it “as aliens and strangers in the world”] to keep away from worldly desires that wage war against your very souls. 12 Be careful to live properly among your unbelieving neighbors. Then even if they accuse you of doing wrong, they will see your honorable behavior, and they will give honor to God when he judges the world.

1 Peter 2:9-12

Now there is a lot in that passage, so let’s maybe go through it a bit at a time. Let’s start with part one of verse 9.

You are a chosen people. You are royal priests, a holy nation, God’s very own possession.

1 Peter 2:9a

Sometimes I think we forget just how privileged we are. As Christians, we are a chosen people. We didn’t choose God – God chose us. We weren’t seeking out God – God was seeking us out.  Look at Ephesians 1:3-8…. This is a great passage!

All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms because we are united with Christ. 4 Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. 5 God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure. 6 So we praise God for the glorious grace he has poured out on us who belong to his dear Son. 7 He is so rich in kindness and grace that he purchased our freedom with the blood of his Son and forgave our sins. 8 He has showered his kindness on us, along with all wisdom and understanding.

Ephesians 1:3-8

That’s incredible. God has done everything for us. God loved us. God chose us. God adopted us. God purchased our freedom. God forgave our sins. God showered us with kindness. We didn’t do anything! All we can do it stand in awe and accept God’s marvelous grace.

You know, sometimes our egos get a little inflated and we start thinking that God loves so much because of how good we are, or because of how much we’ve served Him over the years. Sometimes we even get to the point where we think things like “Boy, God, you’re sure lucky to have good Christian like me on your side.” But that’s just nonsense – the only reason that God loves so much is simply because He decided to. As it says in verse 5 “This is what He wanted to do, and it gave Him great pleasure.”

Some of you might be familiar with the Casting Crowns song titled “Who Am I”. And the lyrics basically pose the question, Who are we that God should love us like He does?

And the chorus answers that question by saying…

Not because of who I am

But because of what You’ve done

Not because of what I’ve done

But because of who You are

God chose us – not because of who we are or because of what we’ve done – but simply because “This is what He wanted to do, and it gave Him great pleasure.”

And that’s another important point to remember – that loving you gives God great pleasure. God doesn’t “reluctantly” love you… He loves loving you!

In contrast to our over-inflated egos thinking that God loves us because of how great we are, probably more often we go the other way, thinking that God must hate us because of how terrible we are. Quite often, especially after we sin for the umpteenth time, we think, “God, how can you even put up with me!? I know the Bible says you love me, but it’s gotta be just by a thread.”

But that’s totally not true. There is no reluctancy to God’s love. Loving you is one of His favorite things. Loving you gives Him great pleasure. Isn’t that incredible?

It is because of His great love – and ONLY because his great love – that we are  a chosen people, royal priests, a holy nation – God’s very own possession. What a privileged people we are!

And it’s because of that, we can serve as a testimony to others of God’s amazing goodness and grace.  That’s why Peter says, after telling us that we are a chosen people, royal priests, a holy nation, God’s very own possession…

…As a result, you can show others the goodness of God, for he called you out of the darkness into his wonderful light. 1 Peter 2:9

That’s our role as aliens. That’s why God has us remain on earth for a time – to be a living testimony of God’s amazing goodness and grace.

Sometimes you have to wonder why God would use people – with all our imperfections and all our faults and all our short-comings – why would God use people as his one and only method of bringing the good news to the nations of the world? You know, He could written the whole Bible out in the clouds. He could have sent a mass email from God.com. He could have beamed the four spiritual laws right into everyone’s brains. But He didn’t do that. He chose to use people.

And I think its because it’s one thing to know the information of the Gospel – but its another to see it in action in somebody’s life.

Think of the person in your life that has had the biggest impact on your spiritual walk. Who’s been your greatest spiritual mentor? Got that person in your mind? Now, I could be wrong, but I’ll bet that it wasn’t the person that just talked to you the most about God – but I’ll bet it was the person that you saw live out the Gospel right in front of you. I’ll bet it was the person who’s life talked to you much louder than their words.

You know, we can quote the whole Bible to our friends and neighbors, but if they can’t see that it makes a difference in our lives – I really doubt they’re going to buy it. But on the other hand, when they see us live holy lives – different lives – they’re gonna think “Hmmm, this following Christ business is the real deal.”

That’s why God decided that it would be His chosen people, His royal priests, His holy nation, His very own possessions – that would go out into their neighborhoods and into their communities and into their towns and into their cities and be a living testimony of the Gospel.

He wanted people to be able to look at their neighbors and say “Wow! If God can love that guy, then maybe God can love me? If God can change that’s guys life, maybe God can change mine too. If there is hope for him – then maybe there’s hope for me.”

Are you seeing the crucial role we have as aliens in this world?

It really isn’t what we say to our friends and neighbors, it’s our alien-like lives that proclaim the good news. And I think that’s why Peter gives us this warning in verse 11…

 11 Dear friends, I warn you as “temporary residents and foreigners” to keep away from worldly desires that wage war against your very souls. 12 Be careful to live properly among your unbelieving neighbors. Then even if they accuse you of doing wrong, they will see your honorable behavior, and they will give honor to God when he judges the world. 1 Peter 1:11-12

Peter’s telling us, “Don’t let the desires of this world lure you into living just the same as everybody else. Be careful to live properly – be careful to live differently among your unbelieving neighbors so that your life can be a living testimony for God.

Its right after these verses that Peter gives us some concrete examples of how we are to live differently. These are actually the verses that Gord from Camp Little Red was talking about last week.

You might remember that, when Gord was speaking, that he talked about all those different “pod”s – “pod” standing for Pray for, Obey, Don’t Sin. And he applied those pods to the Government, your Boss, Your Wife, and Your Husband. We are to pray for them, obey them, but don’t sin because of them.

Well these are the examples that Peter gives us in chapters 2 & 3 of 1 Peter of how we are to be holy – how we are to be different from the world in the way we relate to these different people because we are aliens.

And while I don’t want to re-preach the same things that Gord shared, I do want us to take a look at one of these examples to see how they fit into this whole “living differently as a living testimony to the people around us”.

So let’s take a look at verse 13…

 For the Lord’s sake, respect all human authority—whether the king as head of state,14 or the officials he has appointed. For the king has sent them to punish those who do wrong and to honor those who do right.

 15 It is God’s will that your honorable lives should silence those ignorant people who make foolish accusations against you. 16 For you are free, yet you are God’s slaves, so don’t use your freedom as an excuse to do evil. 17 Respect everyone, and love your Christian brothers and sisters. Fear God, and respect the king.

1 Peter 2:13-17

Now I know how hard it is at times to respect our government. They do a lot of things that we don’t agree with. But if you think our government is difficult to respect, think about the government that was in power when Peter wrote this. It’s hard to pinpoint the exact date that Peter wrote this letter, but most scholars agree that it was probably in about 64-65 AD. And that’s very significant when you realize what was going on at that time.

In July of 64 AD, much of the city of Rome burned to the ground. Nero was the emperor at that time and many people believed that He was responsible for the fire. They figured that He had wanted to make room for all of his building projects and so He burned down the existing buildings. (That’s where we get the idea that Nero was gleefully fiddling while Rome burned.) The fires burned for about 8 days and Rome was absolutely devastated and the citizens were furious. So in order to save his own hide, Nero passed the blame to the Christians.

Now most people already thought the Christians were rather strange and a little bit anti-Roman. For one thing, Christians refused to worship all of the Romans gods – so that kinda put them on the outside already. To add to that, at that time there were rumors that the Christians were actually cannibals because of communion – they totally misunderstood how Christians would symbolically drink the blood and eat the body of Christ. So these “strange, cannibalistic, anti-Roman Christians” became the scapegoats and a terrible persecution broke out against them.

At the hands of Nero and his government, Christians were being torn apart by wild dogs, nailed to crosses, covered in tar and set on fire as human torches and all kinds of horrendous, terrible things. History tells us that Peter himself was eventually put to death by Nero by being nailed upsidedown on a cross.

So it’s pretty amazing that it’s right in that time that Peter writes…

For the Lord’s sake, respect all human authority—whether the king as head of state,14 or the officials he has appointed. For the king has sent them to punish those who do wrong and to honor those who do right.

 15 It is God’s will that your honorable lives should silence those ignorant people who make foolish accusations against you. 16 For you are free, yet you are God’s slaves, so don’t use your freedom as an excuse to do evil. 17 Respect everyone, and love your Christian brothers and sisters. Fear God, and respect the king.

1 Peter 2:13-17

Now that is being different. When those Christians, who were being so severely persecuted by their own government, continued to treat those in authority with respect – do you think that made an impact of the people around them? Absolutely! The way they lived their lives preached the Gospel loud and clear without having to say a word! And in fact, the church continued to grow greatly during that time because people were seeing the Gospel lived out right in front of them. They could see what a difference Jesus makes in a person’s life.

So I want to challenge you this morning: Can people see the difference that Jesus makes in your life? Is it obvious to your family that you follow Christ? Is it obvious to your friends? To your neighbors?

How about to your boss and to your co-workers? Does the way that you respect your boss – even if he’s a lousy boss – does it preach the Gospel to them by how you live your life?

What about your spouses? Husbands – does your self-sacrificing love for your wife – does the way you honor her – preach the Gospel to her and anyone who sees you? Are you a living testimony to the goodness and grace of God to your wife and kids?

Wives – does your love for your husband – the way your honor and respect and support him – does it preach the Gospel to Him? To your kids? To your friends and neighbors?

Because, listen – people notice how you live. There are a lot of people in our community that have no intentions of stepping through that door on a Sunday morning to listen to me preach the Gospel. But I tell ya, every day they are listen to you preach the Gospel by the way you live your life. It’s quite a responsibility, isn’t it?

But you know, its more than a responsibility – It’s our purpose. That’s why God has us remain on planet earth for a while before He takes us home. So that we can proclaim God’s goodness and grace to the people around us – not just through our words, but through the way we live our lives.

We’re not just here to kill time or to make money or to have a nice life – we’re here to make a difference. God chose you before He even created the earth, not only to love you and adopt you into His family, but He chose you so that you could use your life to make a difference. Before you were born, He worked it out so that you would be right where you are today so that you could be a living testimony for Him – to your family – to your friends – to your neighbors.

You are not insignificant. You are an alien with a purpose. Will you live out that purpose?

One of the most challenging things that I’ve found about being a pastor is that by the time I preach this message to you, I’ve preached it to myself about six or seven times. So by Sunday morning, I’m usually feeling pretty convicted.

And this morning while I was making my last minute adjustments to this message, I took some time to think about how well I’ve been living out my purpose as an alien. I know I get to preach the Gospel with my words quite a bit, but what has my life been preaching?

And particularly, what has my life been saying to my kids and my wife? Have I been a living testimony to them about God’s goodness and grace? And as I thought about that, I have to admit I wasn’t entirely pleased with my answer. I could think of several times in this last week when I was not preaching goodness and grace through my actions.

So to close this morning, I want to challenge you – not as someone who’s got it all figured out, but as someone who’s working through the very same things you are – I want to challenge you to do two things with me this morning.

James 5:16 says “Confess your sins to one another and pray for each other so that you may be healed.”

So first of all, I want to admit before you and before God that I fall short. My life does not always preach the goodness and grace of God – just ask my wife and kids. But I want it to. I want to be the most effective alien I can be. I feel very privileged to be able to preach the Gospel to you on Sunday mornings, so I sure don’t want to negate all that by preaching a different message through the way I live my life. So I’m going to ask that you pray for me and keep me accountable.

And perhaps you want to do the same thing. Maybe you want to grab a friend on the way out today and ask them to pray for you and keep you accountable so that you can be the living testimony that God wants you to be.

We don’t know how long God will keep us on this planet, so let’s make sure we fulfill our purpose while we’re here.

Answer: They are all cowboys. (Dallas Cowboys , John Wayne, Woody from Toy Story)

Let’s try another one:

Answer: They are all Prime Ministers of Canada (Kim Campbell, Wilfred Laurier, Paul Martin)

And one more…

This one might be a bit tricky for those who don’t know my buddy Dustin, but the answer is, they are all aliens!

And I’m sure some of you know exactly where I’m going with this, but for others of you – this might seem like an odd way to start to a sermon. So maybe I’d better explain a little bit before we get too far.

Let’s start off by defining exactly what we mean when we say “alien”. What is the definition of an alien?

According to the Oxford dictionary, an “alien” is: “a foreigner, especially one who is not a naturalized citizen of the country where he or she is living”

In others words – an alien is someone who is living away from their home.

So superman is an alien because his home (if you remember the story) is the planet Krypton. His home planet was destroyed when He was a baby, so his parents put him on a rocketship to earth. He landed in Kansas and he grew up and he lived his life as an alien on planet earth.

Marvin the Martian is an alien because the planet Mars is his home planet. So whenever Marvin comes to earth or goes to the mysterious planet X, Marvin the Martian is an alien – he’s not at home.

And then we come to my buddy Dustin. Now some of you might argue that Dustin is not an alien. After all, he was born on planet earth. He lives on planet earth. What makes Dustin an alien?

Well, the answer is that Dustin is a follower of Jesus Christ – He’s a Christian. And as such, the Bible tells us that this world is not his home.

Hebrews 13:14 says it quite clearly…

“For this world is not our permanent home; we are looking forward to a home yet to come.” Hebrews 13:14

So if this world is not Dustin’s home – that makes him an alien! And that goes for any of us who are Christians. This world is not our home. But if this world is not our home, where is our “home”? What home (as it says in Hebrews) are we looking forward to? Well, of course, the answer is “heaven” as we read in Philippians 3:20.

“But we are citizens of heaven, where the Lord Jesus Christ lives. And we are eagerly waiting for him to return as our Savior.” Philippians 3:20

As Christians, heaven is our real home. We are only here on earth for just a short, short time. The few years we spend on earth are nothing compared to the eternity that we will spend in Heaven.

So let’s face the facts people: We are aliens. We are a people not living at home.

And in some ways, that’s a very good thing. I’m glad that this world is not my home, because, quite frankly, this world can be pretty junky sometimes. Just watch the news. This world is full of pain & suffering, loneliness, heart-ache, tears, disease, death. Doesn’t sound like home sweet home, does it?

But what about heaven? What kind of home do we have to look forward to? Revelation 21:3-4 gives us just a tiny glimpse of what our heavenly home will be like.

I heard a loud shout from the throne, saying, “Look, God’s home is now among his people! He will live with them, and they will be his people. God himself will be with them. 4 He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. All these things are gone forever.”

Revelation 21:3-4

Now THAT sounds like home sweet home. That’s the home we’re looking forward to. But here’s the kicker – we’re not there yet. We are still aliens living on a sin-filled planet earth.

For some reason, God doesn’t beam us up to heaven the minute we become Christians. He keeps us here, for a time, as aliens living on planet earth, until He decides its time to bring us home.

And that brings me to what I really want to talk about this morning. For the next few weeks we’re going to to talk about…

Living As Aliens

If this world is not our home, but yet, God has placed us here – how does He want us to live as aliens in this world? Have you ever thought about that? Why does God keep us here when our real home is somewhere else? What does He expect us to do? How does He expect us to live our lives as aliens in this world?

If you’ve watched a lot of alien movies, you’ll know that most aliens choose to live in one of two ways while they’re on planet earth.

You see, there are some aliens who try to blend in. They try to look and act like humans. They don’t want anybody to know that they are aliens, so they disguise themselves and do their best not to stick out.

Sometimes as Christians, we try to do that. We don’t want to be the religious weirdos, and so we try to just blend in with everybody else – try not to be too obvious.

Then there are other aliens on the opposite end of the spectrum – and they don’t care who knows what they are. They fly around in their spaceships, causing mayhem in the streets. They’re not afraid to show the world that they have 27 eyes, a green face, and drip slime where ever they walk.

Some Christians are like that too. They’re just right out there – in your face. They don’t care what people think of them. They’ll live their Christianity as publicly as they can.

But I think for most Christians, typically we try to find a middle ground. We’re more like superman. Half the time he goes around as Clark Kent – just another average Joe – but the other half of the time, he’s superman – clearly NOT your average Joe! In fact, I think the story of superman is a great picture of how most Christians experience life.

Think about it: All his life superman wrestles with this issue of how he lives his life on planet earth. On one hand he just wants to fit in – to be like everybody else – to have a normal life. He wants to marry Lois Lane, have a nice family and live happily ever after. That’s why He goes around as Clark Kent – mild mannered reporter most of the time – just an average normal guy. But on the other hand, He knows he’s different. He has super abilities. He has the power within him to make a huge difference in the world. So there’s this inner conflict.

If he uses his super abilities to make a difference in the world, he won’t have that normal life that he wants. But if he doesn’t use his super abilities, he’ll have his normal life – but he won’t make a difference.

And isn’t that the same struggle we have? On one hand, we just want to fit in. To be like everybody else. We don’t want to be the odd duck out. And yet we know we’re different. As Christians, we have the all-powerful Creator of the universe living within us – and He’s ready to empower us to change the world.

And if we live our lives, directed by the incredible power of God, we can be sure that we’ll make a difference in this world – But we’re going to stick out big time – we’re not going to be able to live a normal life.

So that brings us back to our original question: How then do we live as aliens on this planet?

Do we live in the power of God – changing the world, but sticking out like a sore thumb? Or do we simply live normal, average lives – fitting in, but never making a difference?

Ultimately that’s a question that everyone of us will have to answer for ourselves, and hopefully over the course of the next few weeks as we study this topic, I hope that each of you will be able to come to a point of firm decision of how you will live your life as an alien in this world.

Thankfully, we’re not the first ones to have to work through all this. There have been thousands – even millions of Christians who have gone before us and have wrestled through these very issues.

In fact the books of 1 & 2 Peter (in the New Testament) were written by Peter for Christians who were working through this stuff. So that’s where we’re going to be focusing most of our attention over these next few weeks. What does Peter have to say about how we should live our lives as aliens in this world?

So if you have your Bibles, you can turn with me to 1 Peter chapter one right now. I want to look at just a few verses – 1 Peter 1:13-16.

Ideally, I’d read through all of chapter one, but for the sake of our time this morning, I’m going to leave that to you. Inserted into your bulletin, you’ll find a little bookmark that you can take home with you. It’s got a few ideas of some easy to do, practical things that you can do this week in light of what we are talking about this morning. And reading through 1 Peter chapter one is one of those ideas, so I’d encourage you to do that sometime this week. But for now, let’s start at verse 13.

 So think clearly and exercise self-control. Look forward to the gracious salvation that will come to you when Jesus Christ is revealed to the world. 14 So you must live as God’s obedient children. Don’t slip back into your old ways of living to satisfy your own desires. You didn’t know any better then. 15 But now you must be holy in everything you do, just as God who chose you is holy. 16 For the Scriptures say, “You must be holy because I am holy.”

1 Peter 1:13-16

So these are the first of Peter’s instructions for us on how we are to live as aliens in this world. And He covers a lot of material in just four verses. He tells us:

Think clearly, exercise self control, look forward to our salvation, live obediently, and be holy in everything we do. Now most of that is pretty straight forward – doesn’t need a lot of explanation. But I’d like to spend some time focusing on that last part.

“Be holy in everything you do.”

What does it mean for us to be holy?

A few months back we talked some of the attributes of God and one of His attributes that we looked at was that God is holy.

And we discovered that God’s holiness wasn’t just His purity – or just his moral perfection – although that certainly is a part of it.  The word “holy” primarily means “set apart” – a more literal translation of it might be to ‘to cut’ or ‘to separate’. So to say that God is holy – basically means that God is set apart – He is separate from His creation.

That’s not to say that He is distant from it – but He is different from it. That’s an important distinction. God is not distant from Creation, but He is certainly different from Creation.

Nothing on earth can compare with God. His power is a holy power – it’s completely different from any other power we know – above and beyond anything we could imagine. His love is a holy love – above and beyond anything we could imagine. His wisdom is a holy wisdom – above and beyond anything we could imagine. Everything about God is above and beyond us. Although we are made in the image of God, He is very different from us. That’s what it means that God is holy – everything about Him is above and beyond anything we could imagine.

So what does it mean for us to be holy? Good question. But it think it’s exactly what we’ve been talking about.

As Christians, as aliens in this world – God does NOT expect us to be distant from the world. He’s put us IN this world for a reason. If He wanted us to be distant from the world, He’d take us home right now. But He hasn’t done that. Instead, God expects us to be different from the world. That’s what it means to be holy.

It means that as Christians, everything about us, every area of our lives – our character, our lifestyle, our marriages, our finances, our priorities – everything about us – everything should be above and beyond the things of this world. We are to be different.

Remember, this world is not our home and so it doesn’t set the standard for how we live our lives. God does. He is the standard.

So when we determine how we’re going to treat our wives – we don’t look to see what the world expects – we look to see what God expects.

When we determine what to do with our money – we don’t look to see what the world expects – we look to see what God expects.

When we determine what we allow in our homes in the way of tv, or movies, or internet – we don’t look to see what world expects – we look to see what God expects.

This principle carries into every area of our lives. If we are going to be holy as God is holy, then we can’t look to the world for the standard of how we live our lives – We have to look to God for the standard.

For some of us, that might mean some pretty radical changes in the way we live our lives. I know it’s very easy to get caught up in the things of this world. Maybe we don’t do it on purpose, but its easy to find ourselves living the same way as the rest of the world. We just kinda do what everybody else does.

But God didn’t leave us on planet earth to do what everybody else does. He left us here to be different – so that we could make a difference.

The problem is, when we do that – we’re going to stick out big time. Because God’s standards are very different from the world’s standards. God’s priorities are very different from the world priorities. It’s going to be obvious to the people around us that we are aliens – that this world is not our home. We’re going to be the odd duck out. But that’s ok.

Because on the flip side of that, when we start living our lives differently – when we start determining how we live our lives by what God says – rather than what the world says – I guarantee you, your life will make a difference.

Don’t you think that, when your kids, instead of seeing you on the couch watching tv, see you instead on your knees in prayer – that will make a difference in their life? Absolutely.

Or when your co-workers, instead of hearing you cuss and swear like everybody else, instead they always hear you say words of encouragement – do you think that will make a difference in their life – I bet it will.

When you live in the awesome power of God, you’re gonna stick out! But you will make a difference!

So I challenge you this week: How then, as aliens in this world, will you live?

Will you live in the power of God – sticking out like a sore thumb, but changing the people around you? Or will you simply live a normal, average life – fitting in, but never making a difference?

Earlier this week I went to the website “persecution.com” and I was reading about a Chinese pastor named Zhang Rongliang or something like that – but most people call him Uncle Z.

But this is a guy who knows he is an alien. He knows this world is not his home and so He is happy to stick out like a sore thumb – so that more and more people can come to know and love Jesus Christ. Let me just read for you a few sentences from one of the articles on that website.

Zhang, a founder of one of China’s largest churches with over ten million members, has endured constant persecution for his ministry in China. Zhang has been imprisoned five times and has spent about a fourth of his life in prison.

In early December 2004 Zhang disappeared, and eventually, the Chinese government admitted they had him in custody. Zhang was sentenced to seven years and six months in prison. People and organizations around the world pressured Chinese Communist leaders to release Zhang. Thousands of individuals wrote letters and prayed while multiple organizations worked to secure his release.

But now look what Zhang says…

“I am happy that you and others tried to arrange for my release, but in one way, I am happy that you failed,” Zhang says. “You almost made a big mistake. If you had been successful, there would be no church in that prison today.”

Chinese Christians are not allowed to visit prisons or start prison outreach ministries, so Zhang ministered to everyone he could while in prison — prisoners, prison guards and officials he could never have met outside prison. Over 5,000 men lived in prison with Zhang, and many of them were able to hear the good news of Jesus Christ.

That’s pretty fantastic, isn’t it? Because Zhang understood that this world was not his home, he was willing to give up the temporary comforts of “fitting in” – so that He could make a difference. What a powerful testimony for us! When we are willing to live differently for God, no matter what the cost, God will use us to make a serious difference in the world.

How then, as aliens in this world, will you live?