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Week of: December 2, 2007
Title: The Mind of God (Became a Person)
Series: Christmas 2007 - Part 2

Scripture: John 1: 1-18; Romans 11: 33-36

          Do you ever wonder what other people think? Of course you do; all of us have said to someone before, “What were you thinking?” I’ve looked at someone who dresses funny or wears their hair or make up in an odd way and thought, “Who are they trying to act like or what do they really think of themselves?” People and human behavior really is a mystery. We don’t even know why we think, act, and say the things we do at times, let alone what someone else does. If this is true of human beings, it is especially true of God.

          Who can know the mind of God? I know a lot of preachers act like they do and even say they’ve got God figured out, but we don’t. I like what Paul says in Romans 11:33-36: “Oh, the depth of riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable His judgments, and his paths beyond tracing of. What has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor? What has anyone ever given to God that God should repay him? For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever.”

          But yet, even though we cannot know completely the mind of God, we can know certain things about God and what God wants. What do you think is on the mind and heart of God? What do you think God thinks about us? He loves us. How do we know that? Because we know that the Bible tells us so. John 3:16 says, “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have ever lasting life.” Yes, but what is love? How do we know that we are loved? How do we know that God loves us?

          What else might be on the mind of God? If He loves us, do you think it would be logical to assume that He might want us to love Him back? Some people think that it doesn’t matter to God if we love Him back at all. They believe that a true deity would be beyond having any needs, and that would include the need to be loved back. But again, that is not what the Bible says: “Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all you soul and with all your might.” (Deuteronomy 6:4-5) He does want us to love Him back according to the Bible.

          What does it mean to love God?
                    1) to believe in Him
                    2) to obey Him
                    3) to worship Him
                    4) to serve Him--in other words to give yourself to Him.


          Again, many people believe that if there is a God or creator, He really doesn’t need nor want anything from us. They believe that He is so great and detached from us and our world that He couldn’t care less about our world. He has got better things to do than be concerned about our little existence. But again, that is not what the Bible says and we believe. Yes, He is great, grand and glorious. Yes, we cannot and even dare not sanely compare Him to anyone or anything, but He is not detached. He is aware. He does care. He is involved, and yes, he even holds us responsible for how we act, what we say and do. He is all around us, but everywhere else at the same time. In the farthest reaches of the universe and in the closest molecules of our heart, He is both near and far. And everything about the Bible tells me that this God who created this universe does care about His world and about those who inhabit it. And because He cares, He wants us to care. Because He loves, He wants us to love. Because He is holy, He wants us to be holy. Because He is responsible, merciful, gracious, patient, kind, moral, creative, compassionate, He wants us to be likewise. We are His children; therefore we are to be like Him.

          To many people down through history the family photo album is missing, or all the pictures are blurred or cropped so badly that haven’t always had (at least to them anyway) a clear picture of who and what God is like—at least until Jesus came. So John writes in verse 14: “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

          William Barclay calls John 1:14 the greatest single verse in the New Testament. It is great because it is the word of God, and because it is full of so much wisdom. For example, as we saw last Sunday, “Word” is packed full of meaning: God, the creative power of the universe, the reason that made everything and holds everything together has come to dwell among us in the flesh. Literally, just as the glory and presence of God dwelt in the tabernacle as Moses led the children out of Egypt, this glory and presence of God has dwelt (or tabernacled) in the flesh and blood of Jesus.

          The “glory” John mentions is the glory of God. There are two kinds of glory in John. Glory or praise that comes from men and glory or praise that comes from God. Jesus says in John 5: 44 in talking to the Jews: “How can you believe if you accept the praise from one another, yet make no effort to obtain the praise that comes from God?” There are some, according to John, who are just concerned about the praise or glory they get from one another; but Jesus wants you to be concerned about the glory or praise from God. John writes that we the people and witnesses of God have seen the glory that comes from God in Jesus. His is the true glory and praise.

          John also writes (John 1: 14) that the word is “full of grace and truth.” Grace is neat word. It always holds the ideal of something that is completely undeserved, something in which we could never have earned or achieved for ourselves. Something or someone like Jesus coming and dying for our sin, someone that was an act of pure love on the part of God.

          This word “grace,” according to the Greeks means charm or beauty. People down the years of history have thought of God as a being of might, power, majesty and judgment—something more of fear than love. But in Jesus, men and women were confronted with the sheer beauty and charm of Jesus. Not physical beauty and charm because we don’t know what Jesus looked like. But inward beauty and charm that goes deeper than looks alone. Jesus came to show us how beautiful, gracious and kind God is.

          Then there is “truth.” The truth can only be understood apart from a lie. Much like light can only be understood by comparing it to darkness. Jesus called Satan the “father of all lies.” God is the embodiment of the truth, the father of all truth. And Jesus is the embodiment of God and therefore the truth. The truth is reality, not as we know it, but as God knows and created it, because He is the truth. The truth is born, lived, and breathed in the mind and heart of God. And again, Jesus is the embodiment of God.

          Ever since men and women have been thinking about God, they have tried to define who and what He is—and our puny minds have come no closer to a definition. But we can cease pondering and wondering what God is like; just look at Jesus. He is what God is like. Jesus is the mind of God. Jesus didn’t just come to talk about God; He came to show us God. He came to show us a picture of the mind of God, for all people to see. Have you seen the mind of God in Christ?

Week of: December 9, 2007
Title:  The Light of the World

Series: Christmas 2007 - Part 3

Scripture:  John 1: 1-18

          In last Sunday’s sermon, I made mention that truth cannot be completely understood and maybe even fully appreciated apart from lies and falsehood. Much like goodness cannot be fully appreciated and understood without some understanding of sin and evil. Often to know where we are in life, we need a reference point, good or bad, to compare it to.

          In our scripture this morning, John is giving us some reference points in life—one being Jesus Christ, “the Word of God” and the other being “darkness.” The way he introduces the two reference points is to say in verse 5, “the light shines in the darkness.” And then in verse 9, “the true light that gives light to every person has come into the world.” The world is equated with darkness. So, according to John, “Jesus Christ, our true light, has come into the world of darkness, the light that gives light to everyone who believes.” In fact, this might be our Christmas motto. Look on your prayer sheet and say this with me.

         But what does it mean to receive “the light?” Again, without understanding and experiencing darkness, it might be hard to fully appreciate the necessity of the light. Let’s imagine you are in a cave or maybe back deep in a mine and your source of light goes out. The darkness is so black that you cannot even see your hand in front of your face. You grope around on your hands and knees until you feel the source of light that you lost. “Oh, Thank the Lord I found my light!”

          Now let’s imagine that it is night, not a star in sight, no moon or source of light available. It is raining, the seas are ruff, and you have no radar or sonar to warn you of the approaching rocks. All you have is the darkness, the wind, the water and your powerless boat which is being turned around and around by the seas. Then, out of the corner of your eye, you see a flicker of light. It is a boat and its lights are coming your way. “Oh the joy, and the happiness of that light.”

          Let’s imagine another kind of darkness. Suppose you are falsely accused of a crime and sent to a maximum security prison with only the most hardened criminals around you. It is a dog-eat-dog world, no respect, no kindness, no moral light. You’re not like them so you’re their prey and you are afraid. “Oh! If there was just someone to trust, only if there was some light of goodness to take sanctuary in.”

          These are just a few examples of what it might mean to long for the light. You might know of examples of what it means to long for the light of someone’s presence, the light of another person’s love, the light of a smile, a good word, a kind deed, or anything that might rescue you from the darkness around you. You might also believe that our world is in bad shape, that darkness is all around us… yet, in very few instances do Christians in our nation face the persecution and discrimination that John will speak of in his Gospel.

          By the time of John’s writings, persecutions across the Roman Empire were increasing. Nero, the Emperor of Rome, had set fire to Rome and blamed it on the Christians. Christians were being forced out of the Jewish synagogues thus lost to the protection that Rome gave them and Jews to worship without discrimination and persecution. In other words, the Gospel of John is written during a time of political and religious turmoil. The chief concern seems to be religious persecution from the synagogue. Three times John mentions that Christians are being put out of the synagogue. Look at and read John 9: 13-23.  “…His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews, for already the Jews had decided that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus was the Christ would be put out of the synagogue. That is why his parents said, ‘He is of age; ask him.’” John 9: 22-33

          What kind of persecution would lead parents to direct authorities to their children in order to save themselves? What kind of darkness would cause parents to forsake their children? A darkness that John says ignores, and refuses to recognize the light. Look at John 1: 10-11 “He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was His own, but His own did not receive Him.” Darkness to John is disbelief. Darkness, to John, is everything that comes out of the world refusing to recognize that “Jesus Christ, our true light, has come into the world of darkness, a light that gives light to everyone who believes.” If you don’t believe, you are in darkness because you are rejecting the light according to John.

          But what about people who seem to enjoy the darkness? What about people who say they like their life apart from believing in Christ? Well, we would refer to them as being blind to the light—blind to Christ. Just like a blind person cannot see the brightness of the sun, some people cannot see the beauty and light of believing in Christ. The question we need to ask ourselves, and maybe even them, is why are they blind? Don’t they understand what is at stake? Don’t they understand how beautiful Christ is? Or do they know He is and just stubbornly refuse to believe? You and I might argue that they are just misinformed or just don’t know what they are doing—That, if anyone truly understood the beauty of the light, they would trust in it, believe in it, and follow Jesus. And certainly that’s true; many people are just uniformed and ignorant of the light of Jesus, and if they only knew Him the way we do, they might believe.

          Would Jesus always agree with our optimistic assessment of a lost person’s heart? In John 9:35-41, He heals a blind person and then says “For judgment I have come into this world, so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind.” Some Pharisees who heard this statement say: “Are we blind too?” To which Jesus responds: “If you were blind, (just ignorant of the truth and light), you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you see (and know the truth), your guilt remains.” The hardest people to convince about their need for the light are those who don’t believe they need the light. They’ve grown so used to the darkness, that things look good enough for them. They claim they are doing just fine and they don’t need this Jesus. They are satisfied apart from the light. Their eyes have gotten used to the darkness, and they don’t want the light. They are in a sense of being willfully blind, much like the Pharisees who thought they had God all figured out. Too, the hardest people to convince about Jesus are those who know just enough about the Bible to be dangerous to themselves.

          Look, Jesus came into the world to stamp out the darkness of ignorance. We believe that until Jesus came God was seen only in part. Suppose you were in this sanctuary with no windows, doors, and no lights except for a 5-watt light bulb in the ceiling. Can you imagine what it would look like in here except for that one little light bulb in the ceiling? I could see nothing but the outline of the pews, people, and pulpit—no detail, no color, only shadows and outlines of forms and shapes. Now, suppose I replaced that 5-watt bulb with a spotlight bulb. Imagine how much more detailed an understanding of this room and the contents there would be. Before Jesus, we saw God as in a dimly lit room but now, with Jesus, everything is much brighter and we can finally see what God is really like... the beauty of our God, the light of the world illuminates the world, but also illuminates our understanding of God.

          May God open our eyes to the beauty of the light.

 

Week of: December 16, 2007

No sermon this week - Our Adult Choir presented the Christmas Cantata, "A Love to Save the World," 

Week of:  December 23, 2007
Title:  Let the Christ Light Shine

Series:  Christmas 2007 - Part 4

Scripture:  John 1: 1-14

          There are several sources of light. One is natural light, like the light of the sun. Another might be a chemical reaction that produces heat and light, like an explosion. Combustion produces both heat and light when a candle burns. Electricity produces heat and light when we turn the electrical switch on. Everything that is created, except maybe a black hole, produces photons that register as electromagnetic radiation somewhere on a visible light spectrum that we see. Do you understand this? Anyway, everything produces light because everything gives off little tiny particles called photons.

          But did you know there is such a thing as uncreated light? About 11 miles west of the Sea of Galilee is located Mt. Tabor. Mt. Tabor is not very tall by our mountain standards (just about 1800 feet above sea level), but we don’t have any mountains that have its claim to fame. Does anyone know what happened on Mt. Tabor in the New Testament? Mt. Tabor is thought to be the mountain that the Transfiguration took place!

          Everyone, turn in your Bibles to Mark 9:2-4: “After six days Jesus took Peter, James and John with Him and led them up a high mountain, where they were all alone. There He was transfigured before them. His clothes became dazzling white, whiter than anyone in the world could bleach them.” Matthew 17:2 says: “he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his garments became white as light.” The Eastern Orthodox Church calls it uncreated light because Jesus himself was uncreated. Therefore the light around him was a reflection of His own God-like glory. There might be another example of this light in the New Testament. Turn in your Bibles to Acts 9:1-9 and read with me:

          “Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord’s disciples. He went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he found any there who belonged to the Way, whether men or women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem. As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” “Who are you, Lord?” Saul asked. “I am Jesus, whome you are persecuting,” he replied. “Now get up and go into the city and you will be told what you must do.” The men traveling with Saul stood there speechless; they heard the sound but did not see anyone. Saul got up from the ground, but when he opened his eyes he could see nothing. So they led him by the hand into Damascus. For three days he was blind, and did not eat or drink anything.”

          This uncreated light is the called “the Shekinah Glory of God.” It has its own special kind of brightness and illumination that outshines normal created light. It is thought to be so awesome and bright that no one could look upon the face of God and live. Maybe what James, Peter, John, and Paul saw was just a small reflection of that light of God’s glory.

          In our scripture this morning, is that what John means when he refers to Jesus as being “the light that shines in the darkness…a light that all men might believe…a light that gives light…was coming into the world?” Is that what He means when he says that “the Word” became flesh and dwelt among men, a light that dispels darkness where ever it is recognized? Is that what the Bible means when it declares Jesus as the light of world?

Probably not…

          When John has Jesus saying that the “light has come into the world” (John 3:19), he is not talking literally, but symbolically. Light that symbolically does not stand for things not created or uncreated, nor bright or dim, but moral, good, and loving. Something that, in its own way, was just as opposite to our world in a godly sense as darkness is to the light of day.

          Christmas is proclaiming that Jesus, the light of the world, has come into the darkness of this world. A light, not of photons, but of something that the world has yet to clearly define, to capture, or create on its own—and that is unconditional love. Christmas is about unconditional love coming into this dark and selfish world—a light that has dissipated the darkness of hate and selfishness in the hearts of men and women everywhere.

          1 John 3:10 says: “This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not a child of God; nor is anyone who does not love his brother.” In verse 14, he goes on to say: “Anyone who does not love remains in death. Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murder has eternal life in him.” We all have to learn to love our brothers and sisters. The light demands it.

          Another thing that the light does is dissipate the shadows and darkness of doubt—the doubts about God. I know I’ve talked to you a lot about the mystery of God and that, in a certain fashion, we all have to learn to live with that mystery and uncertainty about God. And this is true to a great extent, but when Jesus came we saw in Jesus what God was like. The shadows and guessing about God where gone, and finally we understood more about God than ever before because the light had come.

          His coming also has dissipated the shadows of despair. Roman philosopher and historian Senecia once wrote: “Men are conscious of their helplessness in necessary things…they hate their sins but cannot leave them.” People despair over making themselves or the world they live in any better. But with Christ all things are possible. His grace is sufficient for all of us. Look, I know that this is easier said than done but for the Christian, pessimism and despair should be gone forever.

          And, what about the darkness of death? Death is a reality and will be until Heaven becomes reality on Earth. But for the Christian, the coming of the Light, the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ has taken the bitterness out of death.

          The coming of the Light has taken the darkness out of how we see every person. Some refer to people in slang or derogatory terms. Names that I am not going to mention here today, names which demean and devalue people of color, sexuality, nationality, vocation, and creed. Jesus came to show the world that God values all people. “God so loved the world” is the motto of all Christian people (John 3:16). God values all people equally.

          Now, there is a negative side to light!  If there is a flaw or imperfection, the light enhances it. If colors seem to clash, light will show how they don’t belong together. If there is sin, light shows how imperfect and ugly it really is. Jesus, as the Light, shows all of us how far we have to go in being the way that God wants us to be. Jesus, as the Light, shows us all how far we have to go. All of us, do doubt, think of ourselves as being good people. In truth, we all will have to let our lives be judged by the brilliance of the light. If we dare to look at ourselves in His light, then we will understand what true humility is about.