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Rejoice in What We Are!By John W. Ritenbaugh
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Do you ever compare yourself and your lot in life with those of other people? In a way that's kind of a dumb question, because we all do it. Everybody does it. It might even be considered as one of the great American pastimes. We look at the homes that people live in. We look at the cars they drive. We look at the clothing they wear. We consider how much money they have, their fame, their popularity, acclaim, and notoriety.
We especially at times admire the skills of others and wish that we had those same kinds of skills. We look at their personalities and think, "Boy, that person has the kind of personality I wish that I had." We look at the accomplishments these people have done, and sometimes we even envy them for what they have been able to do.
I want you to think right now about with whom it is, or against whom it is, that you are most likely to make your comparison. Do you compare yourself with the Pygmies of Central Africa, the Maori who are in Australia and New Zealand? Do you look at the Amazon Indians and say, "Boy! That's the kind of life I'd like to live"? I don't think so. How about somebody who lives in Calcutta, or maybe in Afghanistan where they're having terrible droughts right now? Or do you even compare yourself to an American Indian?
Now every once in a while we will do this. I'm not saying this is wrong, but most often the tendency is to compare ourselves with those who are our peers, or those we feel are our betters. We don't even tend to compare ourselves with our brethren who are less well-off than we are. We seem especially though to like to compare ourselves with what we might consider to be the high achievers, such as the big income producers, those of public fame and acclaim, the stars of entertainment and athletics, of politics and business, and of those who seem to accomplish more, make more, have more things, and lead more exciting lives. We compare ourselves with people who are in the public eye and have the adulation of others and seemingly live lives with an ease that we covet.
It might be very interesting and even helpful for you to evaluate who it is that you tend to compare yourself against. It seems as though the key word in these comparisons is "more." That is, we tend to compare ourselves against those who have more of the things that we admire, or would like to have. But as a rule, whoever it is, we usually conclude that the comparison to ourselves against them is not good. We have the tendency in this to make ourselves feel disadvantaged, and sometimes it can even put a pall over our life.
It seems as though we are spinning our wheels, that we're getting nowhere. It seems as if we are so tiny, a mere speck in vast humanity, encompassed as it were with endless troubles from which there is no escape. It seems as though we are just barely skimming by, living from paycheck to paycheck in a dull drab gray existence. For some this might be quite depressing, producing feelings of victimization as well as a great deal of self-pity. We might even say to ourselves, "Why is it, when the good things happen I'm always elsewhere?" "Why can't I get a break?"
We're going to take a look at a narrow segment of our culture's high achievers. We're going to look at a number of astronauts from our space program. I'm going to read a few things from an article that is only about the astronauts who have walked on the moon. The title of this article is What Next After You've Walked On The Moon? It is taken from The National Observer newspaper, May 17, 1975. This was a very good newspaper published by Dow-Jones, the same people who are on Wall Street. It's no longer published because it could not attract enough clientele to get advertising, so it's now defunct. This article is 26 years old now, but the principle that is found in the article is just as valid today even though the names of the people involved would change.
This article begins with a quote from Buzz Aldrin. You'll probably remember that name. He was the second man on the moon. He says, "I have gone to the moon. What to do next? Without a goal I was like an inert ping-pong ball being battered about by the whims and motivations of others. I was suffering from what the poets have described as "the melancholy of all things done."
In suburban Los Angeles the burned-out space hero, bedeviled by depression and frustration, rambles on about earthly failures and dark obsessions of nebulous conspiracies working against him.
In Houston, the millionaire space hero wonders impatiently why anybody would be curious about the board chairman of a company that built K-Mart Store.
In Colorado Springs, Colorado, the redeemed space hero who became a moon-missionary after surviving America's only scandal involving astronauts, candidly recalled the discord, bungled, and his own spiritual epiphany, of a lunar odyssey.
At the University of Cincinnati, the withdrawn space hero grudgingly suffers a two-hour intrusion into the haven that has insulated him from the nuances and pressures that have affected, for better or worse, the lives of those who followed him to the face of the moon. They are not the best of friends. They never get together to reminisce about what it was really like up there, yet they belong to the exclusive brotherhood of daredevils extant—the only 12 mortals who have had to cope with the question, "What do you do after you have been on the moon?"
In the article it shows that Neil Armstrong is described as an enigmatic withdrawn man who speaks in a frustrating emotionless monotone. "Enigmatic" means "puzzling." He talks and answers indirectly and seems evasive in things that he says. For Buzz Aldrin, the splashdown was hard. He had an emotional breakdown and divorce. At the time of this article, Al Bean had been unable to reach, get through to, and had a disturbing relationship with a withdrawn son.
Edgar Mitchell dabbled in para-psychology, and divorced his wife. James Irwin found religion and began a non-profit organization to establish a spiritual retreat. He also divorced his wife. John Young is described as a loner who admitted he had no interest outside his job and home life. He also divorced his wife.
I have another very recent article that came from The Charlotte Observer, Saturday, May 5, 2001. The article begins:
Fairytales aren't supposed to end the way this one did. The beautiful princess with the Julia Roberts smile is supposed to be carried away to the castle to live happily ever after with the handsome prince. Rochelle Antoinette Dwight, a Bristol Myers Squibb sales representative, died April 25 at age 27. Her funeral was Saturday, exactly six months to the day after her elegant wedding at St. Patrick Catholic Church. She had much to live for: a new husband, a new home, a new life. No one who knew Rochelle could understand her sudden and melancholy decision to leave them all so abruptly.
Bryan, whom she met when he served in the Coast Guard in Cape May, New Jersey, said she was honest and open. "Her whole life was about doing for others, and I was so proud, so happy to be her husband."
Everybody described Rochelle as compassionate, caring, warm, giving, charming, charismatic, vivacious, selfless. The list is seemingly endless. She was all of them, and more. "She was truly one in a million," said Karen Busing, her English teacher in Middle Township High School in Cape May. "Her smile was absolutely contagious. She was a star in my eyes."
Even her father-in-law, Ernest Dwight, agreed that everybody who met her felt that way about her. "She was so unique, so genuine, so beautiful. Her beautiful smile lit up the room everywhere she went. She was beautiful inside, compassionate, caring and warm. We all comment that nobody ever did not like Rochelle. She didn't forget anybody. She mailed cards, made phone calls, and when we moved to Charlotte three years ago, she embraced our family like it was her own."
"She would visit my grandparents, and they would tell me that she brought flowers to them. She was so unbelievably warm and compassionate."
Rochelle Dwight committed suicide.
She seemingly had it all: a new marriage, a high-paying job, a college education. The only thing she lacked it seems, at least on the surface, was any children, but she just hadn't had the time to be able to do those things.
What caused this? Something drove her to it. She gave every appearance on the outside to other people that she had it altogether, but something inside of her was eating away, and what was on the outside was merely a facade that was covering the cancer that was eating away at her mind.
This young lady was the kind of person that people admired, respected, and maybe were jealous of, and envied for all that she had been able to accomplish. We all know that there was at least one major thing that was missing from her life that is not missing from your life.
Let's begin in I Corinthians 10:11.
I Corinthians 10:11 Now all these things happened unto them for examples; and they are written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the world are come. 12 Wherefore let him that thinks he stands take heed lest he fall. 13 There has no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that you are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that you may be able to bear it.
It is interesting, that in preparation for this sermon, I saw in Expositor's Commentary a comment on this verse. Whoever the commentator was, I don't know, but he felt that this is one of the most helpful verses in all of the Bible, giving great assurance to those who have the truth of God.
The high-achievers that we're talking about here have a variety of the same run-of-the-mill problems that everybody experiences. Going to the moon did not change, if I can put it that way, the kind of person that Neil Armstrong would have been anywhere: withdrawn and enigmatic; a puzzling person who just wanted to be alone, as it were.
It's the same with others. Their fame, the fortune, the academic and professional accomplishments have not proved to be an advantage to help them avoid the very kinds of things that trouble you; and so all of their accomplishments, their fame, their money are not the solution to the very same things that trouble you. They have all of those other things, and yet they face the same kinds of problems. In most cases they are unable to meet them well. So having more brains, money, ease and fame has not insulated them from divorce, withdrawn alienated children, emotional breakdowns and health problems.
By the word "common" that is used here in verse 13, God means that the problems are nothing exceptional. They are not beyond the powers of endurance. The word that is translated "taken" or "overtaken" adds to our understanding as to the kind of problem. It is written in the perfect tense and it indicates a lasting condition—something one has to deal with every day; a chronic problem. It just doesn't blow away at one time.
The word "escape" indicates a way out of a defile, a tight spot, as if surrounded. Perhaps the word "temptation" is one of the more interesting ones in this whole series of verses because interestingly it tends to indicate something designed and unavoidable. Very interesting. It indicates a trial that could become a temptation—something that has been designed and is unavoidable rather than being a difficult happenstance. You know, a "time and chance" occurrence. In other words it's a test such as a teacher would give. You can't avoid tests that teachers give when you're in school. Sure as anything, they're going to come up.
Now, overall in context, because God is faithful, it indicates that our difficulties in life can be successfully met, and so there's a great deal of assurance here for those that God has called, and it leaves those He has not called on the outside of this assurance.
There is no doubt that life is difficult. But being a high-achiever in this world does not guarantee that one will escape those difficulties. Pentecost has a great deal to do with pointing us in the right direction to enable us to endure and overcome these lasting chronic problems that are common to mankind.
I want you to go back to the Old Testament to a series of scriptures that we are familiar with. In fact, in all of the Old Testament, it is one of the better-known sections of scripture in Ecclesiastes. Turn to Ecclesiastes 3:1-11. When this was written it was in poetic form.
Ecclesiastes 3:1 To everything . . . [meaning to every aspect of life, and most especially the things that he is going to mention here as generalities] . . . there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: 2 A time to be born, and a time to die, a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; 3 A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; 4 A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; 5 A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; 6 A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; 7 A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; 8 A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.
He gets there, and he finally asks this question:
V9 What profit has he that works in that wherein he labors?
And then he analyzes, and says:
V10 I have seen the travail, which God has given to the sons of men to be exercised [or tested] in it. 11 He has made everything beautiful in his time:
Incidentally, after the word "time" there is a colon. He's going to explain here.
V11 Also he has set the world in their heart, so that no man can find out the work that God makes from the beginning to the end.
That is a recurring lament that runs through the book of Ecclesiastes—that no man can find what God is doing. Let's understand by way of an overview of what God, through Solomon, is saying here. We might ask a few questions, because as you read through that and then finally get to verse 9, you read what Solomon has said there in the way of a question: "What profit is there in all of this?"
Do you understand what he is asking there from his perspective? I want you to think. Here was a man who was king. Here was a man who had power that was unbelievable over an entire nation. Here was a man who was so wealthy it's beyond our wildest imagination. He was a man who seemingly had control far beyond anything we could possibly dream, so that he could shield himself from anything that might come along. But he was observant, and he had all this wisdom about how to do, and when to do, and what to do. But he baffled. That's why he is asking these things.
Are things frustratingly out of control so that even somebody like Solomon, with all the power that he had, really had no control? He couldn't stop the times when it was to throw away, or to rend, or to repair? And without asking the question really directly, he is saying what profit is there in life when these things happen, and nobody can stop them? They come on you, and you are powerless, even as Solomon was powerless. We can come to the conclusion, in just thinking of this through the mind of Solomon, that nobody completely controls the start or the finish of his existence, let alone the things that happen in between.
You didn't determine when you were born, and you cannot forecast the day of your death, unless you're going to commit suicide. That doesn't count here. But what was so frustrating to Solomon was that he couldn't control what was happening in between either, and neither could the astronauts.
Verse 11 says, "He has made every thing beautiful." It will help if you just understand that the word "beautiful" here means "appropriate," and that begins to give you a little bit of hope because it's beginning to point to the fact that God is in control of these things, and everything happens appropriately.
Verses 9 through 11 involve God directly as an explanation for why these things seems to occur to all of mankind regardless of one's station in life, . . . even Solomon's. There are fourteen pairs of opposites, and almost everybody goes through some form and intensity of all of them. It seems as though they are designed to occur, and indeed in verses 9 through 11 they indicate that one thing very strongly. God is making them happen; therefore we can begin to understand that there is purpose behind these things occurring.
Let me read this series of verses 9 through 11 from two other freer translations, and see if that helps a little bit.
Moffatt Translation of Ecclesiastes 3:9-11:
What does a busy man gain from his toil? I have watched the interest that God sets the sons of men to labor at. He assigns each to its proper time. [What insight Moffatt saw there!] But for the mind of man, God has appointed mystery, that man may never fathom God's own purpose from the beginning to end.
Now you can begin to get a picture of God up there sitting at the controls of what is going on here on planet Earth. If you're thinking with me, you begin to understand that He is sitting at the controls at what is going on in our lives as well, because we have to go through these things. But when you're going through a difficult trial—these temptations that we see in I Corinthians 10—can you say exactly, directly, specifically, honestly, absolutely and truthfully that you know exactly why you're going through this? Hardly. Even the Apostle Paul said, "We look through a glass darkly."
Are you beginning to understand that this is why we need faith? Are you beginning to understand that this is why we need faith in a God who is absolute in His love, that He is always faithful to what He says He will do (being faithful to His promises) and that everything He puts us through is going to be for our good? Do you have faith in that? Do you have faith then that you know you're going to go through things like this—the good and bad times—and that He is with you in those things?
Let me read this to you out of The Amplified Bible:
Ecclesiastes 3:9 from The Amplified Bible:
What profit remains for the worker from his toil? I have seen the painful labor and business exertion which God has given to the sons of men in which to be exercised and busy. He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also planted eternity in men's hearts and mind (a divinely implanted sense of purpose working through the ages which nothing under the sun but only God can satisfy).
The statement above given in parenthesis refers to the eternity. Now I'm going to read that without the parenthesis.
He has also planted eternity in men's hearts and mind, yet so that no man can find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.
There are very many interesting terms in those translations that give a clearer sense of what is intended. Words and phrases like: Painful labor and business; For the mind of man God has appointed a mystery; Assigned each in its proper time; A divinely implanted sense of purpose; Only God can satisfy.
Brethren, what went wrong? What was lost as a result of what happened in the garden of Eden and has continued to plague mankind ever since? We might be able to number many things and be correct, but I feel one of the major things is that faith in the form of trust by men toward God was destroyed. Now because trust in the Creator was destroyed, each person has no alternative but to trust in his own knowledge and experiences, as well as the experiences of other people gathered from books or personal conversation rather than the knowledge of God and His experiences with man.
Following Adam and Eve's sin, God then set in motion a program, a purpose with a plan in which mankind would never be able to know God or His purpose without a calling in which God would reveal it. And then He requires those to whom it is revealed to live by the very thing that Adam and Eve lacked: to live by faith; that is, to trust the Revelator.
That purpose would be worked out by means of a continuing revelation of Himself and His purpose by putting those called through events—the 14 pairs of opposites—molding, shaping, forming, testing, and evaluating each of them individually and as a group in order to complete His purpose for them. And so Solomon is saying the events seem predetermined and beyond control, that they happen whether one wants them to or not, and to a very great degree he is correct. We may not be able to stop them, but we can, because of our calling, make the best possible use of them, because the mystery has been revealed.
Without a calling there is no hope that anybody will ever find God, and Solomon is one of the supreme clearest examples of this. Though he was so wise, he was a very confused wise man, as the book of Ecclesiastes clearly shows.
Turn to Ecclesiastes 7:25-29.
Ecclesiastes 7:25 I applied my heart to know and to search, and to seek out wisdom, and the reason of things, and to know the wickedness of folly, even of foolishness and madness: . . .[Notice he's going to begin telling you things he has discovered in his search.] . . . 26 And I find more bitter than death the woman whose heart is snares and nets, and her hands as bands: . . . [He had a lot of experience there! He should have never ever had to have that kind of experience.] . . . whoso pleases God shall escape from her; but the sinner shall be taken by her. 27 Behold, this have I found, says the preacher, . . . [Here comes another thing.] . . counting one by one, to find out the account: 28 Which yet my soul seeks, but I find not: one man among a thousand have I found; but a woman among all those have I not found.
What is he saying there? He said almost nobody is virtuous.
V29 Lo, this only have I found, that God has made man upright: but they have sought out many inventions.
I'll tell you, he is really down on mankind. He is saying there that everybody is corrupt. Solomon wants to comprehend what is going on, and so he keeps on discovering almost useless things. There is some use in some of the things he has said here, but it didn't help him in any way to discover what is really going on even though he made a very diligent search; so diligent that it says in Chapter 8.16:
Ecclesiastes 8:16 When I applied my heart to know wisdom, . . . [We heard this morning that wisdom is doing the right thing. It is righteousness. It is knowledge and comprehension applied in the right way.]
V16 When I applied my heart to know wisdom, and to see the business that is done upon the earth: (for also there is that neither day nor night sees sleep with his eyes.)
He's saying that he knows people, (and that probably included himself) who spent sleepless nights meditating, searching into this.
V17 Then I beheld all the work of God, that a man cannot find out the work that is done under the sun: because though a man labor to seek it out, yet he shall not find it; yea farther; though a wise man think to know it, yet shall he not be able to find it.
It is interesting that of all the astronauts, James Irwin—the one who had a religious epiphany on his trip to the moon—is the only one out of the twelve who believed he knew what was going on. The others generally felt as though going to the moon only complicated the mystery of what life is all about.
Because God has put in mankind's heart a quest for eternity, . . . [That's what he says in Ecclesiastes 3:11) . . . man wants to know more, and he will make great efforts to discover the mystery, even in virtually a sleepless quest, as these verses say. But all of man's efforts will be futile. He will never find it, because it must be revealed.
Man, on his own, cannot find out why he was born. He can find isolated things, and he can put some of those isolated things together and can create a theology, and maybe a religion will be born out of that, but it won't be the truth unless it is revealed. He can't put it together correctly anymore than Solomon could, and Solomon had access to the truth probably more than most of those people who write the commentaries today. Even if the truth is told to them, they will generally be too preoccupied with other things from the world, of their own interests, that they will not recognize nor accept it. It is not physically discerned, so a man overlooks the real truth as being unimportant to his well-being.
We're going to take a look at two verses. The first one is in I Samuel 3:1 which poses something that is similar, but occurring in different venues.
I Samuel 3:1 And the child Samuel ministered unto the LORD before Eli. And the word of the LORD was precious [meaning rare] in those days; there was no open vision.
Let's understand the setting here. This takes place first of all among God's covenant people. It takes place among those who should have known God and to be ready to do His will. But the word of God was rare in those days, because this takes place during the period of the Judges when every man was doing what was right in his own eyes. In other words, the people were not being submissive to what they did know of God and His purpose.
The word "vision" means "revelation." The sum of this is to show that one's attitude toward what has been revealed to him is going to pretty much determine what life is going to produce for him. Now you know what it was like in the book of Judges, and you know what the people's attitude was toward what had been revealed to them through the prophets and through the judges that God sent every once in a while. They did not have a good attitude toward what had been revealed to them, and so the word of God was rare.
We're going to look at another better-known scripture in Proverbs 29:18.
Proverbs 29:18 Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keeps the law, happy is he.
The word "vision" here is exactly the same word that appears in I Samuel 3:1. It is saying that without revelation, people cast off restraint. Your Bible margin probably shows this. I have always liked what The Living Bible's translation is of this verse, because it gives a better sense of what it is saying. It says: "Where there is no revelation, the people run wild." That translation does not mean that the people were running around like madmen, but they were moving about through their lives without direction or purpose.
The reason I chose these two scriptures is that each one of them comes from a different setting. One is in the setting of God's covenant people—people who should have known. The other one comes where the people are, let's just say, totally unconverted: "Where there is no revelation the people run wild." And yet what happens to the one is the same as what happens to the other. This is where the attitude, the understanding, begins to become so important, whether it is with the unconverted or whether it is even with God's people where they are ignoring it, the result is the same. The people live aimless, purposeless, fruitless lives.
Now therefore, since we are a Covenant People, our attitude toward what we have is extremely important to making use of the calling, because it is inherent to God's revealed will that brings the blessings represented by the word happy. That's what it says in verse 29. "Happy is he that keeps God's word, God's law."
Now here comes the key question for this sermon: Do you believe that you have been given a revelation from God? The follow-up question is: What is your attitude toward it if you do believe that you have been given a revelation from God? These are so important that I feel that they cannot be over-estimated in value, because this revelation is very much needed for us to have a sense of direction and well-being about life.
The times that we live in are oppressive, and depressive, and it's not hard at all to let them give us a sense of hopelessness. But we do have the revelation from God of the mystery of life. We have the most valuable pieces of knowledge that can be given to any human beings anywhere regardless of their station in life. You were not behind the door whenever the gifts were handed out by God. You were standing right in front of it, and He gave it to you, and He bypassed the high achievers. He bypassed the high, the great, the mighty, and as he says in I Corinthians 1, not many of them are called. But instead God called the people who thought they were behind the door and hidden from His view.
We have what would make everybody's life—including the high achievers, the rich and famous, the powerful and intelligent—complete, because it would give them the proper direction to vent their gifts into something truly useful. We have not been short-changed. Whereas they may be rich in power, intelligence, prestige, fame, social influence and money, we are rich in what really matters regarding life and its purpose.
Turn now to Isaiah 65:8-10.
Isaiah 65:8 Thus says the LORD, As the new wine is found in the cluster, and one says, Destroy it not for a blessing is in it: so will I do for my servants' sakes, that I may not destroy them all.
I think you can begin to see the context. God is talking about His Covenant People. In this case He is talking about Old Testament Israel, but I think that we can see the principle here because we're going to see that we really are the ones He is talking about here. "Destroy that cluster not!" Don't destroy it. Why? Because there is a blessing in it.
V9 And I will bring forth a seed out of Jacob, and out of Judah an inheritor of my mountains.
Who's going to inherit? We are! He's talking about the church. He's talking about His begotten children.
V9 And my elect shall inherit it, and my servants shall dwell there. 10 And Sharon shall be a fold of flocks, and the valley of Achor a place for the herds to lie down in, for my people that have sought me.
I'm going to turn back to Isaiah 5, because I just want to read a couple of verses here to show you the analogy that God uses that Israel is His vineyard.
Isaiah 5:1 Now will I sing to my well-beloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My wellbeloved has a vineyard in a very fruitful hill: 2 And he fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also made a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes. 3 And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, between me and my vineyard. 4 What could have been done more to my vineyard that I have not done in it? Wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought if forth wild grapes? 5 And now go to; I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard: I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be eaten up; and break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down: 6 And I will lay it waste.
Now back to Isaiah 65 where He is telling you now, "Don't destroy the whole thing because there is a blessing in it." What is helpful here is to understand this last phrase of verse 10. He's doing this for "My people who have sought Me." What is important here is to understand what "seek Me" or "sought Me" means in the biblical usage.
"Seek Me" does not mean "to search for," as if looking for something lost or hidden, because God must reveal Himself in every case. In the Bible it means the sense of working, striving to be like God; to imitate God, to be patterned after God, because they already have had God revealed to them, and now they are in the next step. The next step is to be seeking God to be like Him, because now we know a bit of the image of what He is like. We see a character image of Him, and we know that He wants us to be in His character-image. When it says "Seek Me," He is talking there about "Imitate Me." "Be patterned after Me." "Live your life like I do."
In verse 8 of this chapter, He says despite the fact that Israel is failing, it is producing a small blessing. That blessing is the remnant—those who seek Him—and because of them He will not totally destroy Israel. This is knowledge that gives us a hook on what the future holds for us. It gives us a vision that we can follow after, knowing having assurance of the fact that God is working with a group of people, a remnant.
He mentions in verse 10 both Sharon and Achor. They are two well-known locations in Israel, and He is showing that those areas will blossom forth in great beauty and productivity, and it will be done because of those who seek Me. He is prophesying that the dangerous, oppressive, and depressive spirit of this world is going to end, and that He is going to bring those who seek Him through that period of time. It will end because of God's mercy extended toward the remnant, and the church is that remnant. He gives us just a tiny bit of information here that begins to create a vision, a reason for enduring; a reason for the hope of making the best of life.
Let's add another question in this sermon. Not only, "Do you believe that you have a revelation?" but also, "Do you believe that you are part of that remnant?"
Go now to Romans 9:1-3. I want you to notice the way this chapter and the two following open up.
Romans 9:1 I say the truth in Christ. I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit, 2 that I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart, 3 for I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh: 4 who are Israelites: to whom pertains the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises.
Romans 10:1 Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they might be saved. 2 For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. 3 For they being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God.
Romans 11:1 I say then, Has God cast away His people? God forbid. For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. 2 God has not cast away his people which he foreknew. Don't you know what the scripture says of Elias? How he makes intercession to God against Israel, saying, 3 Lord, they have killed your prophets, and digged down your altars; and I am left alone, and they seek my life. 4 But what says the answer of God unto him? "I have reserved to myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal." 5 Even so then [says Paul] at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace.
We are not the only ones who have ever lived who have felt that they live in a culture that operates in a spiritual, moral and ethical confusion that produces violence, oppressively discouraging and dangerous times. Not since the flood has the whole world been so close to the edge of extinction, but there is still reason for hope.
We're going to take a look at a series of familiar scriptures, that when they're tied together provide a foundation for hope. We're going to begin in Matthew 16:15-17.
Matthew 16:15 He said unto them, But whom say you that I am? 16 And Simon Peter answered and said, You are the Christ, the Son of the living God. 17 And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed are you, . . . [Now do you feel that way?] . . . Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood has not revealed it unto you, but my Father which is in heaven.
Turn now to Matthew 13:10-17. These are familiar scriptures, but it is good to remind ourselves of them, and know that God has personally, individually chosen us to be a part of that remnant; that He has chosen us personally and individually to receive the greatest gift that can be given to a man—the knowledge of what life is about—and therefore begin to give him the power to provide real solutions to meet that purpose.
Matthew 13:10 And the disciples came, and said unto him, Why speak you unto them in parables? 11 He answered and said unto them, Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given.
"Jacob have I loved; but Esau have I hated." God makes a difference. God separates people away from the rest of the world, and He does it not because of anything that we have to offer Him. He does it simply on the basis of His own love, choice, whatever.
V12 For whosoever has, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance: but whosoever has not, from him shall be taken away even that he has. 13 Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand.
V16 But blessed are your eyes, for they see; and your ears, for they hear. 17 For verily I say unto you, That many prophets and righteous men have desired to see those things which you see, and have not seen them; and to hear those things which you hear, and have not heard them.
Let's go back to Romans 9:13-16. This is a theme that runs through the entire Bible, and right now we fit the picture.
Romans 9:13 As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated. 14 What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid. 15 For he says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. 16 So then it is not of him that wills, nor of him that runs, but of God that shows mercy.
Solomon ran into this and he got frustrated by it. He willed himself, even to the point of sleepless nights, delving into these things with his brilliant mind and all of his powers that God gave him, but God apparently never revealed Himself to Solomon, and Solomon felt the frustrations that anybody would feel regardless of their station in life, regardless of how much money they have, or their intelligence quotient, or whatever. Solomon experienced the same feelings of frustration.
V21 Has not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump, to make one vessel unto honor, and another unto dishonour? 22 What if God, willing to show his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: 23 And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory, 224 even us, whom he has called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?
What we very clearly see here, that it is not merely a gift—one that might be given at random, as if God was scattering grass seed on an empty plot of ground—but rather it is a specifically and personally given gift that is directed at some and not at others. The gift is given only to those who are to be prepared beforehand. This puts a major responsibility on our shoulders.
I don't know whether you have seen the movie Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, but I will tell you that it was the most influential and best movie that I saw all year. It's one that requires some understanding before you see it. It's better if you understand what you're looking at. It is a Chinese fable.
You see this girl who is leaping tall buildings with a single-bound kind of thing, running up the sides of walls, standing way out on the leafy ends of branches. She does all kinds of fantastic things. But all of those things are nothing more than metaphors that they are trying to get across in the fable, in the lesson that is contained in the story.
The girl represents somebody who has been gifted with great powers, and this is the way they show it in the movie. She's very intelligent. She was born in a high family. The family had money, power, position—everything to go with her intelligence. She had a mind that could put things together. But she also had an evil influence in the person of her attendant, who was an elderly woman who really played a part in leading her down the wrong path.
And so she is able to do these fantastic things with these great gifts that she has been given, but she misuses them, and when people come into the story to try to get her turned from the direction of her thinking, they cannot turn her from the abuse of her abilities, of her powers. Everywhere she goes she destroys. She produces bad fruit everywhere she goes, and she ends up like this young lady, committing suicide, and having caused the death of everybody who tried to help her, except for one person, and that one person was left alone in life with nothing.
You see, the lesson remains for you and me. What are we going to do with this greatest gift that God can give to a person as a human being: the revelation of Himself, and the revelation of what life is about? He not only gives those things, He also promises us whatever powers we need to fulfill His will for us so that we'll be helped along the way.
James 1:17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of light, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. 18 Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures. 19 Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath; 20 For the wrath of man works not the righteousness of God. 21 Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls. 22 But be you doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.
These verses say that we are the firstfruits of that vineyard that we read of back in the book of Isaiah, and we are the blessing, and we are the reason that this oppressive world has not been destroyed. But the firstfruits have responsibilities, and those responsibilities encompass taking advantage of the gifts that are given that is our calling. The gifts are given, and we have no valid justification for feeling that somehow we were behind the door when the brains were passed out, or behind the eight ball when it comes to dealing with the trials of life that Solomon was listing, or that somehow God does not love us.
Take a look with me in Deuteronomy 7:6-11. This was said to Israel, but please understand that we are the real ones that are intended to understand this.
Deuteronomy 7:6 For you are an holy people unto the LORD your God: the LORD you God has chosen you to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth. 7 The LORD did not set his love upon you, nor choose you because you were more in number than any people; for you were the fewest of all people; 8 But because the LORD loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, has the LORD brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. 9 Know therefore that the LORD your God, he is God, the faithful God, which keeps covenant and mercy with them that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations. 10 And repays them that hate him to their face, to destroy them: he will not be slack to him that hates him, he will repay him to his face. 11 You shall therefore keep the commandments, . . . [That's our responsibility, our duty] . . . and the statutes, and the judgments, which I command you this day, to do them.
Turn now to Luke 24:49. Jesus told those men to hang around Jerusalem.
Luke 24:49 And, behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you: but tarry you in the city of Jerusalem until you be endued with power from on high.
Acts 1:4 And being assembled together with them, commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which, says he, you have heard of me. 5 For John truly baptized with water; but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days hence. 6 When they therefore were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, will you at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel? 7 And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, [and that still applies to you and me], which the Father hast put in his own power. [Regarding the times and seasons, we still just look through a glass darkly.] 8 But you shall receive power, after the holy spirit is come upon you: and you shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.
Now what God gives in the way of power is the ability to meet whatever in His will for us is required. One thing that is good to remember here is that God's will for His people is not always exactly the same. For instance, God's work through Noah was different from God's work through Abraham. Abraham's work was different from Moses' work, and Moses' work was different from David's work, and David's work was different from the apostles' work, and so on.
There is one aspect of the work of God that remains constant, whether Abel, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, Moses, or you or me, and this is that everybody must grow in the grace and the knowledge of Jesus Christ. That is a constant. We may never do great things in the work of God so that our names are written in the book, but it will be great, whether written or not, if we fulfill God's will for us.
His promise to us is that the powers that we receive may not be that we will do miracles out on the street, that we will start or stop the rain, or cause an earthquake, or heal anybody, or cast out demons. God has a time and a place for those things, but we may never be involved in anything like that. God does promise us that the powers that we receive will be things like guidance, truth, light, the ability to understand sin. We know His purpose. He will give us spiritual powers that will enable us to do our part.
How about knowledge? How about comprehension of that knowledge? How about wisdom? How about a gift of faith? How about the love shed abroad in our heart? How about joy and peace? How about abilities to communicate? How about being one who encourages, one who gives solace and comfort, one who is hospitable? We can look at these things in Romans 12 where Paul mentions them.
Romans 12:3 For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God has dealt to every man the measure of faith. 4 For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office [or function]: 5 So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another. 6 Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, whether prophecy, let us prophesy according to the proportion of faith; 7 or ministry [meaning service], let us wait on our ministering: or he that teaches, on teaching; 8 or he that exhorts, on exhortation: he that gives, let him do it with simplicity [or generosity]; he that rules, with diligence; he that shows mercy, with cheerfulness. 9 Let love be without dissimulation.
And on and on it goes. All of those gifts are powers to fulfill God's will, and nobody has been left out. Nobody! Everybody has been created to this point to fulfill God's will. All of us. He never requires anything of us that is greater than what He has already created within us. It can be done.
Let's go to Colossians 1:9-13.
Colossians 1:9 For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that you might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding: 10 That you might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God: 11 Strengthened with all might, according to his glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness.
Do you understand these are powers that He has given to us?
V12 Giving thanks unto the Father, which has made us fit to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: 13 Who has delivered us from the power of darkness, and has translated [transferred] us into the kingdom of his dear Son.
V23 If you continue in the faith, grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven; whereof I Paul am made a minister: 24 Who now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body's sake, which is the church. 25 Whereof I am made a minister, according to the dispensation of God which is given to me for you, to fulfil the word of God.
Do you realize that Paul—the teacher of these people—was actually a power given to them so that they would know, so that they would understand, and then could grow from what God, through him, gave to them?
V26 Even the mystery which has been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints: 27 To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
Remember the verse I ended with yesterday, how that Christ is everything to us, and that we are to look at that as from God to Christ to us, who has wisdom and power and sanctification and glory, and on and on, and He says don't let any man glory in His presence, because everything is being supplied to us so that we can do the very little by comparison that is required of us.
V28 Whom we preach, warning every man, and teaching every man in all wisdom; that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus: 29 Whereunto I also labor, striving according to His working, which works in me mightily.
As God was working in Paul, He was working in those people that Paul was writing to as well.
Let's finish this sermon in II Peter 2:1-2, 9-10.
II Peter 2:1 But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you who privately shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction.
I read this verse only because we have suffered what this verse is prophesying, and it has blown the church apart. That makes this period of time more depressive and more oppressive than it otherwise might have been, so that we feel shaky about the things that we have believed, and we lack assurance that we should have. He says:
V2 And many shall follow their pernicious ways, ... [and the many have. It's the remnant that is continuing on with what was delivered to us.] . . . by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of.
After Peter gives several examples of how God delivered Noah, of how He delivered Lot from Sodom and Gomorrah, and so forth, he comes to this conclusion. There is much assurance here. He wants to assure us that God is in control in every situation. Remember Ecclesiastes 3 and the 14 contrasts that everybody is going to go through at sometime in their life. When we go through the negative ones we tend to get shaken up and wonder what's going on, and who's in control. "I wish I had the control." "This never would have happened to me if I had the control." But always remember even Solomon couldn't control those things that were going on. But verse 9 tells us that:
V9 The Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptations, [I Corinthians 10.13], and reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished. 10 But chiefly them that walk after the flesh in the lust of uncleanness, and despise government. Presumptuous are they, self-willed, they are not afraid to speak evil of dignities.
Peter is assuring them, because even in his day this same thing was happening. Peter is assuring them, that though he may not have an exact and specific answer to their calamity that they might be going through, he did have the record that God had delivered His people who trusted Him in similar situations. So whatever we go through in life, it can be overcome, because God is in control and He has given us the powers to at the very least endure the things that we go through. But we can always have the hope that we will not only endure, but actually we will overcome and grow through the midst of the difficulty, because that is exactly what God wants us to do, and what He has empowered us to do.
Let us all remember what God has done in the past, the same God is still in control, and the same God will bring those promises to pass. He will bring us through, so let's work, using the spiritual powers He has given to us to overcome and to grow during these difficult times.
JWR/smp/
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