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June 06, 2004
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"Holiness" |
Pastor Brian Shimer
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"THE WAY OF HOLINESS I"
Proverbs 1
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"I have been so blessed this week. Last Sunday I heard the wonderful message "
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Dexter delivered on Memorial Day and the place memorials have in our lives. And during the week I listened to the tape of Karen's message from the 23rd and was so inspired and blessed by the calling to be holy she eloquently shared. Isn't it wonderful to have in this congregation such witnesses to the greatness of God and such able speakers of the Gospel? I tell you, we are a blessed people here! I am grateful to be back with you again and to work with you in this ministry of the gospel in Banks. Let's pray together as we begin.
| | II. |
I have recently returned from a great vacation time in England visiting a dear brother
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of mine who many of you met two years ago, David Luce. One thing that he and I thoroughly enjoy is laughing about the differences in the English language between America and England. As he would say, "We had an acquaintance from Switzerland, who actually went to America to learn English. We told him: 'You go to America to learn American, but come to England to learn English.'" You have to wonder about the English they use. I learned some new words this time: chuffed and nattering. These are British slang terms. To be absolutely chuffed means thoroughly pleased about something. And "nattering" is what two teens might do on the phone for hours on end and is what David and I spent hours doing. One afternoon and evening alone we shared together pretty nonstop for about 10 hours!
In another culture one thing I found myself doing is listening more carefully. When David's 15 year old granddaughter was speaking, for example, although I knew she was using my language, I had such a difficult time understanding! I would listen and piece together the possibilities. This experience is similar to what some of you experience when you receive one of my cards -- you know I have written in English but deciphering it is another story!
| | III. |
"Listening" is what our brother Carl Ness does a lot of too.
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Over the years I have known Carl, this aspect of his relationship with God has been so stellar. Carl listens for God to lead and follows. It is following God that took him to Thailand the first time. And the Lord has led him back there now several times. And in the story he related about that incredible Teakwood piece of art it was listening obedience, which brought it into existence. Listening to God brought Carl to the right place at the right time and there it is in our building in answer to that timing and his prayers.
Actually it is listening to God that has Carl offering to prepare a Sunday breakfast at the church beginning next Sunday. The more I spoke with him and prayed about it, I simply sense God has a plan here. I okayed this direction to open the door to God's possibilities and see what God might do. So, if you want to be a part of this adventure, come for breakfast. It is not coming through any specific committee, for they are all up to their eyeballs in plans already. So, it is simply a brother with a vision for a ministry and that is something to simply applaud and support.
| | IV. |
In Scripture the action of "listening" finds a central place is what it means to be
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God's holy people. The first characteristic of the wise in Proverbs One is listed in verse 5. It says they listen and add to their learning.
If you do a quick glance through the book of Proverbs you will see that the wise are contrasted to the foolish throughout, and that the word "listen" appears again and again. What are we to be listening to? We are to be listening to the Instructions of God, responding to the warnings of God and receiving the promises of God.
The voice of the Father or King in Proverbs is God's voice to us his people. As we turn toward Him to listen, we are responding in the fear of God, a concept we will look at next Sunday.
Are you listening to God? Are you paying heed to what the Spirit is speaking to you?
In God's voice we find the way of holiness. Holiness is about my relationship with Jesus Christ and God my Father. It is about the life of this God flowing in and through me. It is not about me attaching certain behaviors to my soiled life so that I look better than I am, instead it is about responding to God in my heart and letting him change me so that I begin to be shaped into a Jesus-like person.
| | V. |
Look with me at this chapter of Scripture and notice what God says.
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In verse 8 we read: "Listen, my son, to your father's instruction and do not forsake your mother's teaching."
The sentence is written using Hebrew poetry where the second thought is not adding something new but explaining what has been written. To listen then, does not mean in one ear and out the other. It does not mean a glance at the Bible every three days whether you need it or not. It does not mean putting up with a sermon once a week and walking away dismissing what was said. Rather "to listen" in this book (and in life) means "do not forsake," do not turn away from what you have heard. Listening means to hear and apply something, to turn toward it and walk in it. For then what we are applying will adorn our lives and guard us.
Let's Listen to God and Apply what He says.
The next 10 verses bring us God's warning. "My son, if sinners entice you, do not give in to them" and again in verse 15, "do not go along with them, do not set foot on their paths;"
There are others who will seek to draw us into sin. Aren't their countless examples from history? The stories surrounding the now fallen leader Saddam Hussein are horrific and picture this kind of evil. 70 years ago a group of people so enticed made plans to swallow others alive, get all sorts of valuable things, and promote a false mythology about their superhuman race.
Much of the church in Germany was swept into the created myth. Rather than follow the Word's warnings about such people, the church rewrote creeds to applaud the Aryans. And many simply closed their eyes to the stench of wickedness around them.
But in our lives today, the enticements away from the Father's voice come not so frequently from a group outside of us, but from the response of our own hearts within us. I cannot drive down the road without the enticements of billboards shouting: "eat me, buy me, sleep with me, drink me, win me." There is the definite impression that without whatever "it" is I lack something. I am encouraged to buy that next lotto ticket so that I could be one among the some 192 millionaires created by that perverse system.
In England an article interested me about a woman who won 4 million pounds in the Lotto and refused to redeem her prize for she did not want, quote, "her life ruined." Can you imagine? The dreamy thoughts of what such money can buy evaporate quickly. The statistics are grim on lotto winners. Many have committed suicide or simply said it was the worst thing that happened in their lives. But we really don't think that would be the way with us. Generally we really live as if we believe that money will bring happiness-- so many keep buying tickets.
Many are wiser than this. John D Rockefeller, at one time the richest man in the world, had learned this grim truth. He was asked, 'How much money does it take for a person to be really satisfied?' His reply said it all: 'Just a little bit more.'
Listen the Bible says! "Don't go along with them! Don't give in to them!"
Let's Listen to God and Apply what He says.
The closing 13 verses in this chapter personify wisdom. The voice of wisdom is all around us inviting those who have never listened to listen, to embrace wisdom. God calls for the simple, the mocking and the most foolish with their knowledge-hating ways, to embrace wisdom.
There is clear warning here too -- if we too long reject God's call, ignore God's advice, and refuse God's rebuke, we will come to a place of calamity where our own cries will not be heard.
Listen again to verses 26-33: "I in turn will laugh at your disaster; I will mock when calamity overtakes you -- when calamity overtakes you like a storm, when disaster sweeps over you like a whirlwind, when distress and trouble overwhelm you. Then they will call to me but I will not answer; they will look for me but not find me. Since they hated knowledge and did not choose to fear the Lord, since they would not accept my advice and spurned my rebuke, they will eat the fruit of their ways and be filled with the fruit of their schemes. For the waywardness of the simple will kill them, and the complacency of fools will destroy them; but whoever listens to me will live in safety and be at ease, without fear of harm."
There was the promise: whoever listens will live in safety and be at ease, without fear of harm. That is the promise of God!
It is not God's desire that people fall into calamity by their own making -- that they pursue and die in their wickedness. God's desire is that people respond and enter life. His desire is that none perish. His will is for life in Him that is why the warning is here. God wants us to hear, to embrace wisdom, to listen and apply what He says.
| | VI. |
Sixty years ago today was D-Day -- a military action that stopped the machinery
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Without Jesus, we are like the citizens of the channel islands -- in the territory of the enemy, ruled by tyrants, controlled and oppressed. We too await the word of freedom as they waited.
Our friend David Luce remembers those days well -- he was 11 that June and remembers standing in his garden in the north of Jersey seeing the hundreds of allied planes flying overhead toward France. He remembers hearing the bombardment and feeling the ground shake beneath his feet on Jersey as the bombs were dropped and fired 14 miles away on the mainland. He remembers the sense of anticipation the islanders felt the hope that they would soon be freed. They had to wait another 11 months before they heard Churchill's announcement as they crowded into St Halia's square in main city on Jersey: "And our dear channel Islands will also be freed today."
They were freed and the air was electric with joy as the British troops landed throwing candy to the children -- David among them.
Will we remain in bondage to sin in our lives? Will we live as if we need to be oppressed by the enemy day in and out? Or will we listen to God and apply what He says?
Only with Jesus, the wisdom of God in our lives can we experience VE day for ourselves. Only by listening and applying can we "live in safety and be at ease, in peace, without fear from harm."
Let's listen and apply what God says.
Special Footnote:
This is the sermon that was meant for June 6, 2004. But God brought a different one to the sanctuary with Carl Ness as the speaker. That was important for this time. But this weekend, the death of our 40th president, Ronald Reagan, and the 60th anniversary of "D Day," present a timliness we can't escape for this message presented here in writing for us to savor, digest and apply to our lives. Read it again if necessary and "listen."
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