Sunday
Morning
June
27, 2021
Introduce yourself to someone / Dismiss Youth - Hannah
Pray for Jake – Prov. 3; Num. 6
Scripture Reading Together: Rom. 5:1-8
Introduction
Illustration
Sometimes when
we go through difficult times, we don’t always respond the way we should …
Ordering at McDonald’s
I was in the
McDonald’s drive-through this morning and the young lady behind me leaned on her horn, because
I was taking too long to place my order.
“Take the high road,” I thought to myself.
So
when I got to the first window, I paid for her order along with my own.
The cashier must have told her what I’d done, because as we moved up she leaned
out her window and waved to me and mouthed “Thank you,” obviously embarrassed
that I had repaid her rudeness with a kindness.
When I got to the second window I showed them both receipts
and took her food, too.
Lesson: Don’t
honk your horn at old people.
So have you been through some difficult times
lately? Have how you
done? I want to give you some tips from the apostle Paul on how to go through difficulty.
In Paul’s letter
to the Romans, Paul takes three chapters to carefully show that all men are sinners, and that it is impossible
for man to be made right with God just by trying to be good. So God sent Jesus
(Romans 3:24–25 NLT) —24 Yet God, in his grace, freely makes us right in his sight.
He did this through Christ Jesus when he freed us from the penalty for our
sins. 25 For God presented Jesus as the sacrifice for sin. People are made
right with God when they believe that Jesus sacrificed his life, shedding his
blood.
This sacrifice
of Jesus was a gift that God gave us that we didn’t deserve. Another term for “gift” is “grace”.
Grace is doing something good for someone that they don’t deserve.
And the way
that you and I can find this grace, find forgiveness, and receive eternal life,
is by simply believing.
When we make
the choice to believe in Jesus, God makes us right with Him. We call this being “justified”.
We are just going to look at the first five verses of Romans 5
5:1-5 Trials refine faith
:1 Therefore, having been
justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,
:1 Therefore,
having been justified by faith
As I’ve just said, we
are made right with God when we make this choice to believe in Jesus.
When you
realize that Jesus died on a cross in order to pay for
YOUR sins, and you make a choice to believe in and to follow Jesus, God changes what is
written in your record in heaven.
Instead of heaven recording you as “guilty”, God now declares you to be “righteous”, because all of your sins have been paid for by Jesus.
:1 we have peace
with God
Before we become “justified”, we have a big problem.
Our sin puts us
at odds with God. We are His enemies. James writes,
(James 4:4 NKJV) Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you
not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore
wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.
Lesson
Being right with God
Do you want to have “peace with God”?
Would you like to have God “on your side” instead of being your enemy?
Listen to me carefully – you don’t become right with God
by cleaning up your act.
Our sin has made too big of a mess of things for us to
clean it up.
You become right with God when you make a choice to
believe in Jesus – to ask God to have Jesus pay for your sins.
Are you right with God?
Would you like to be right with God?
At the end of the service I’m
going to give you a chance to make that choice.
:2 through whom
also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand,
and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.
:2 we have access
by faith into this grace
It’s through Jesus that we have this grace and forgiveness.
The word
translated “we have access” (prosagoge) speaks
of having a special privilege to get close to someone or something that’s pretty special.
Lesson
Special access
It’s kind of a cool thing to go to special places where not everyone is
allowed to go.
Years ago, on one
vacation, we took our boys on the special “VIP” tour of Universal
Studios. All three of my sons love movies and the process of making them. The VIP tour costs a bit more, but you are
taken into places in the studio that the rest of the guests don’t get to go. You see some of the workshops where props are made. You
go to a soundstage where they do the sound effects for movies and TV. You get
to go through the warehouse where props are stored – like a giant Costco with
aisles of toasters, combat weapons, fake shovels, dinnerware, furniture,
statues, etc.
We have the
most amazing thing available to us as Christians.
We don’t have backstage access to some theme park…
We are allowed
into the throne room of the Almighty Himself.
We have
“access” to God Himself.
(Hebrews 4:16 NKJV) Let us
therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find
grace to help in time of need.
This comes because “peace” has been achieved with God by believing in Jesus
Christ.
So what will you do with this special “access” to
God?
It’s not even limited to office hours M-F. God is
available to you 24/7.
:2 and rejoice in
hope of the glory of God
(Romans 5:2 NLT) …and we confidently and joyfully
look forward to sharing God’s glory.
Lesson
A glorious future
We have the coolest things in our future.
(1 John 3:1–3 NKJV) —1 Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we
should be called children of God! Therefore the world
does not know us, because it did not know Him. 2 Beloved, now we are
children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know
that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. 3 And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He
is pure.
We may not be sure exactly what it’s all going to be like,
though we do have glimpses of heaven from the Scriptures.
We do know that we will be like Jesus. When we look at
Jesus in His glorified body, that’s a hint of what’s up ahead for us – stuff
like glowing in the dark, disappearing into nowhere, walking through walls,
even flying. Cool!
(Revelation 21:3–4 NKJV) —3 And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, “Behold, the
tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they
shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God. 4 And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no
more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former
things have passed away.”
I love sharing this verse at a believer’s funeral.
This is just one of the peeks at life in “forever”. We
will dwell with God. No more tears. No more death. No more pain.
Illustration
There’s
a story about an old missionary couple coming home from spending years in
Africa. They were
booked on the same ship as President Teddy Roosevelt who was returning from a
successful big-game safari. As the ship pulled into the harbor, the crowds were lining the
docks to cheer on the President. But nobody was waiting or cheering for the
missionaries.
That
night the man was so depressed that nobody seemed to care about how they had
spent their life. The man’s wife said, “Why don’t you go in the bedroom and
tell that to the Lord?” A short time later he came out from the bedroom, but
now his face was completely different. His wife asked, “Dear, what happened?”
“The Lord settled it with me,” he said. “I told him how bitter I was that the
President should receive this tremendous homecoming, when no one met us as we
returned home. And when I finished, it seemed as though the Lord put his hand
on my shoulder and simply
said, ‘But you’re not home yet!’”—
-
Ray Stedman, Talking to My Father
We have a glorious future, and it’s not in this life.
The more you realize what’s up ahead, the easier it is to “rejoice” in
what’s coming.
I know that some of you are so very worried about the
strange and terrible times we live in. I’ve
gotten more than one note from friends who are afraid that the antichrist is
going to pop his head up at any moment.
I’d like to remind you we don’t find hope by looking for the
antichrist, we find our hope by looking for Jesus Christ. And we have very good times ahead.
:3 And not only
that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation
produces perseverance;
:3 we also glory in
tribulations,
The original word for “glory” translates the same word as “rejoice” in
verse 2. He’s going to talk about another reason to be rejoicing, to be happy.
tribulation
– thlipsis – pressure; oppression, affliction,
tribulation, distress
I think we’ve been through a little bit of “tribulation” with the pandemic,
don’t you agree?
Some of you have other things right now that are putting pressure on your
life – sickness, loneliness, loss of a loved one, looking for a job, trouble in
your marriage, difficulty raising your kids … and on and on…
It is used to
describe the time of famine that made Jacob’s family go down to Egypt.
(Acts 7:11)
(Acts 7:11 NKJV) Now a famine and great
trouble came over all the land of Egypt and Canaan, and our fathers found no
sustenance.
It is used to
describe the first persecution the early church went through after
Stephen was stoned (Acts 11:19)
(Acts 11:19 NKJV) Now those who were
scattered after the persecution that arose over Stephen traveled as far as
Phoenicia, Cyprus, and Antioch, preaching the word to no one
but the Jews only.
James (1:27)
uses the word to describe the troubled life that widows and orphans had.
(James 1:27 NKJV) Pure and undefiled
religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in
their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.
It is the word Jesus used to describe the troubles that can make shallow
Christians fall away.
(Matthew 13:21 NKJV) yet he has
no root in himself, but endures only for a while. For
when tribulation or persecution arises because of the word, immediately
he stumbles.
Some of you may need to pay attention here. Perhaps you haven’t been doing so well in
your “tribulation”.
The answer to being a “shallow” Christian is to let God
break up the hardness in your heart so the roots of your faith can grow a lot
deeper.
Lesson
The value of trouble
It’s one thing to shout “Woo-Hoo” about heaven, but shouting for joy for
the tough times? It can almost sound like somebody who is a little twisted, like the owner of this
dog in an ad that reads…
LOST DOG with 3 legs, blind in left eye, missing right ear, tail broken and recently castrated. Answers to the name of “Lucky.”
-- Barbara
Johnson, Stick a Geranium in Your Hat and Be Happy,
Word, 1990, p.1.
Our tendency is to run from anything that begins to hint at being trouble. We
think of “tribulation” or “pressure” as being bad.
It’s not necessarily bad.
God has
promises for us when we’re in “tribulation”:
Jesus promises
us peace when we’re clinging to Him:
(John 16:33 NKJV) These things
I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have
tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have
overcome the world.”
By the way, we will all
have trouble. You are not
unique. You are not exempt. It is a part of life.
Tribulation
cannot separate us from the love of Christ:
(Romans 8:35 NKJV) Who shall
separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or
distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
God has comfort
available for us, and wants us to give comfort to others in it:
(2 Corinthians 1:4 NKJV) who comforts
us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort those
who are in any trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves
are comforted by God.
When I’m going
through a tough time and someone asks me how they can pray for me, I’m often
wanting them to pray that the tough time is over quick.
I wonder if we ought to change some of our prayer requests.
Maybe
we should be asking: “God help me to learn what I should in this tough time”.
:3 knowing that
tribulation produces perseverance
Here’s one of the positive byproducts of “tribulation”. Or let me say, this is what tribulation has
the potential to produce.
perseverance
– hupomone (“under” + “to remain”) –
steadfastness, constancy, endurance; in the NT the characteristic of a man who
is not swerved from his deliberate purpose and his loyalty to faith and piety
by even the greatest trials and sufferings
Perseverance can be one of the products of a difficult
time – endurance, patience, perseverance.
An athlete
doesn’t build endurance without “tribulation”, without having an exercise
program of workouts. Think of it as “stamina”.
When you are out of shape and haven’t exercised in awhile,
it takes time to build up your stamina.
Illustration
Wilma
didn’t get much of a head start in life. A bout with polio left her left leg
crooked and her foot twisted
inward so she had to wear leg braces. After seven years of painful therapy, she
could walk without her braces. At age 12 Wilma tried out for a girls’ basketball team but
didn’t make it. Determined, she practiced with a girlfriend and two boys every
day. The next year she made the team. When a college track coach saw her during a game,
he talked her into letting him train her as a runner. By age 14 she had outrun
the fastest sprinters in the United States. In 1956 Wilma made the U.S. Olympic team but
showed poorly. That bitter disappointment motivated her to work harder for the
1960 Olympics in Rome—and there
Wilma Rudolph won three gold medals, the most a woman had ever won.
Lesson
Don’t ignore your training
In the original “Karate
Kid” movie, young “Daniel-son” has been bullied by a
group of kids, and so he wants to learn Karate to be able to fight back. Mr. Miyagi eventually agrees to teach him.
Yet Mr. Miyagi doesn’t give him traditional karate lessons. Instead he asks Daniel
to do menial chores like wax his car, paint the fence, and sand the
floor. Daniel-son begins to think he’s being taken
advantage of.
There’s a point in the movie where Daniel is frustrated that he isn’t
learning karate, so he confronts Mr. Miyagi about this.
(online only)
At this point in the message, if you are with us
in-person at 11:00am, I’ll be playing a video clip. If you want to see the video clip, there’s a
link in my notes on the app, or come back tomorrow afternoon and I will have
inserted the clip in our YouTube archive of today’s message. But to keep Facebook from cutting off our
feed here at 9:00am, I’m only going to tell you what happens instead of play the clip.
So back to the Karate Kid …
There’s this point when it all comes together. Mr. Miyagi tells Daniel to show him “wax on,
wax off” as he throws a punch. Daniel’s
arm movements block the punch. He then tells
him to show him “sand the floor” as he kicks at Daniel. Again, Daniel blocks the attack. As Mr. Miyagi starts throwing all sorts of
punches and kicks, Daniel finds himself blocking all of them.
And then Daniel realizes he hasn’t
been doing stupid chores, he’s been training in
karate.
(only show video during in-person service)
https://youtu.be/9O-cigbF9Tc?t=83
Don’t ignore your training.
When we go through difficult times, we have a hard time seeing anything
good.
But beloved, it is all a part of your training.
The things you are learning have the potential to help you and others down
the road.
So just what are you learning?
:4 and
perseverance, character; and character, hope.
:4 and
perseverance, character;
character
– dokime – approved, tried character; a specimen
of tried worth;
NAS has “proven worth”
It’s a word
used of coins in the ancient world, coins that were not counterfeit, but were tested
and “proven genuine”.
So … while trials produce endurance, endurance produces “character”.
Lesson
Enduring shows who you are
It has been said,
“You can tell a lot about a man by the way he handles these three things: a
rainy holiday, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree
lights.”
You’ve probably
seen a movie or two about astronauts and their training. We watch them get into the centrifuge to see how many “g-forces”
they can handle.
Then there’s
the multi-axis trainer …
(First service only)
In the 11:00 service I’ll play a
clip from the movie “First Man”, where you will see …
…astronauts strapped into this machine that
rotates on several axes at once, causing the astronaut to face great pressures
as he twists and turns, often blacking out.
There’s a great clip of this in the movie, where you see Ryan Gosling
playing the part of Neil Armstrong, riding this strange contraption. After enduring a minute or two of this
twisting and turning, he passes out and has this brief dream of his
daughter. Then he wakes back up and as they’re
about to let the next guy try, Armstrong says, “Let’s go again”. You see him going through the test again, and
then it fades to him in the bathroom vomiting in the toilet.
First
Man (2018) – Astronaut Training
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atBUgwJAD0U
I’m
sure NASA did some of these tests to make the astronauts stronger. But I
think there’s a measure where they did the tests to see whether
or not these men would be able to handle the potential difficulties they
might face in space.
The tests proved what kind of men they already were.
One of the
blessings of your trial is that people are going to see that “inner life”, they’re going to see your
true character.
What will they see? Will they see
bitterness in your trial? Will they see your anger at your circumstances?
Or will they catch a glimpse of you trusting Jesus through your trial?
:4 and character,
hope
hope – elpis –
expectation; expectation of good, hope; joyful and confident expectation of
eternal salvation
If we endure trials properly, we will see one more thing happen. This isn’t guaranteed, but there is a
possibility that this will happen if I learn to endure the right way.
I will learn what
I can count on.
I can’t depend
upon people (as helpful as they sometimes are).
I can’t depend
upon circumstances (though sometimes they do work out).
I can always
depend upon the Lord.
I am left with nothing but hope in my Savior.
We learn as the Psalmist did:
(Psalm 46:1–2 NKJV) —1 God is our refuge and strength, A very present help in
trouble. 2 Therefore we will not fear, Even though the earth be
removed, And though the mountains be carried into the
midst of the sea;
Learning to endure trials properly produces hope in a God
who loves me.
In the next verse Paul fleshes out this hope thing…
:5 Now hope
does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts
by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
:5 hope does
not disappoint
To be honest, not
everyone grows through trials. Some
people are crushed beneath the weight of their trials.
How can we find this
“hope that does not disappoint?
Paul says it’s because of the
love of God that the Holy Spirit pours out.
:5 by the Holy
Spirit
If you are a believer in
the Lord Jesus Christ, then God has already put His Holy Spirit in you.
But there is a step further that
some believers are not aware of.
Before He ascended into heaven, Jesus told His disciples to wait in
Jerusalem. He said,
(Acts 1:8 NKJV) But you shall receive power
when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in
Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
The word
“power” is dunamis, and yes, as some teachers
like to point out that’s where we get our word “dynamite” from. But I think there is a more subtle meaning to
the word. At its root is the idea of “ability”.
God wants every
believer to have this relationship with the Holy Spirit where He empowers them,
fills them, and enables them to do all that God wants them to do.
Yes,
sometimes the Holy Spirit brings the miraculous, such as speaking in tongues,
or healing. Jesus told the disciples they would be
witnesses.
But
sometimes it’s something as quiet as the ability to endure difficult
times.
I believe at it’s simplest understanding, the
baptism or filling of the Holy Spirit is all about yielding to God. It’s about me getting out of the pilot’s seat
in my life and allowing God to direct my life.
Have you done this? Have you done
this lately?
I find I need to be filled every day with the Holy
Spirit. Why everyday? It’s because I “leak”. I want all that God has for me.
:5 the love of God
has been poured out
When I yield to the Holy Spirit,
this is one of the things that happens.
I will see God’s love poured out
in my life.
Paul will tell the
Galatians (5:22-23) that love was one of the things the Holy Spirit would
produce in their lives.
Not just loving others, but experiencing the love that God has for us.
Paul will explore this love a
little further in our passage when he writes,
(Romans 5:8 NKJV) But God demonstrates His own love
toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Jesus displayed
His love for us on the cross, when He died to pay for our sins, even when we
were stubborn and rebellious and shaking our fist at Him.
He laid down His life for His enemies.
If Jesus loves you this much, do you think it is possible for you to trust
Him when you are going through difficulty?
In the 1963
movie “Charade”, starring Audrey Hepburn and Carey Grant, a young woman’s
husband dies mysteriously. Over the days
that follow, she starts to find out that her husband wasn’t who she thought he
was, and she finds herself being pursued by four men each of whom claim that
her husband left a great fortune that belonged to them.
(In the second service, I’ll play a clip from the
movie …
Carey Grant shows up and initially it seems like he’s
a good guy. He’s on her side. He even rescues her from one of the other men
who has tried to kill her.
So Audrey Hepburn says to Carey Grant, “you’re the only one I
can trust”. And then she receives a
phone call from that other man who tells her that Carey Grant isn’t who he
claims to be. After the phone call,
Carey Grant tells her that she shouldn’t worry because he’s going to stay in
the room next to her … and the music gets suspenseful…
Charade – Who
can you trust? (1963)
In the end you
find out that … well I won’t spoil it for you.
For some of
you, this might be a picture of you and Jesus.
People have told you that He isn’t what He claims to be. People will tell you that you can’t trust
Him.
The real
question for you is, who will you trust?
Can you trust someone who has died for you?
So here’s the bottom line.
Do you trust Jesus? Do you realize
just how much He loves you?
Have you admitted to God that you need Him?
Have you found that peace that God wants between you and He? Or are you still fighting with God?
Perhaps you’ve never said “yes” to Jesus and accepted His gift of
forgiveness and eternal life.
Let me give you a chance to do that very thing … (pray)
Are you a believer, but you realize you haven’t been doing so well in your
“tribulations”?
Ask God to break up your “shallow” ground.
Open your heart today and yield yourself to the Holy Spirit.
Allow God to pour out His love on you.
pray