All People are Like Grass (Isaiah 40:1-11)

 

Second Sunday of Advent – December 6, 2020

watch it here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifBp6nMdD9k

Her son, 10, and daughter, 5 look at her with sunken, hungry eyes.  The Babylonian army has besieged Jerusalem for weeks.  Supplies have run out.  The assault begins and does not take long.  They break through the city walls.  The few soldiers who put up a defense are quickly impaled on Babylonian spears.  Families are dragged from their homes into the dust of the streets flowing with Israelite blood.  They watch as the Babylonians burn Solomon’s glorious temple. 

            Then, the march.  Mile after mile they walk to their new home, their new normal as slaves in Babylon.  She does not survive the journey but her son and daughter do.  They will live as people without rights on the bottom rung of the social ladder in Babylon until that little boy and girl are in their 70’s, the elder generation of Jews in this foreign place.  They do what they can to keep memories of Israel alive.

            They tell the stories of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  They remember Moses and the Exodus through the Red Sea.  They tell of Joshua and settling the Promised Land.  They remember the victories of David and the temple of Solomon.  But now the brother and sister are old, tired, broken people.  For decades they have listened as their Babylonian overlords mocked their God.  Is it true?  Are the Gods of Babylon superior to Yahweh? Is their God as dead as they feel?

            A rumor spreads of a new prophet rising in the Jewish quarter.  Young people are talking about what he has said.  At a make-shift gathering where one of the few available scrolls of the Torah is read on the Sabbath (thank goodness the Babylonians allow this), people are saying this Jewish prophet has something new to say. 

            This old man and old woman saw their dreams shattered decades ago, a thousand miles way.  Everything they hoped for was violently ripped from them.  Still, they go.  What else is there to do?  The surprisingly large crowd of Jews listen as the young prophet says,   

Comfort, O comfort my people,
    says your God.
² Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
    and cry to her
that she has served her term,
    that her penalty is paid,
that she has received from the Lord’s hand
    double for all her sins.

 

            Can there be comfort?  The people of God have been swallowed by the sands of history, buried under the force of an enemy too powerful for God.  No, says the prophet.  Mighty Babylon? Don’t buy it! Babylon was a tool in the hands of the Almighty God, used to punish his people, says the prophet. 

            Exile did not happen because of Babylon’s strength but because of Israel’s sin.  Now the prophet says the penalty for that sin has been paid.  The Lord’s punishment is over.  It’s a new day.  God punished, but did not abandon His people.  God does not do that.  God faithful and sovereign offers a new word. 

“In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord,
    make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
⁴ Every valley shall be lifted up,
    and every mountain and hill be made low;
the uneven ground shall become level,
    and the rough places a plain.
⁵ Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed,
    and all people shall see it together,
    for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

 

            The first command is “comfort.”  Heavenly beings are ordered by the most-high God to give solace to His people.  Scripture gives glimpses of a heavenly realm that is full of creatures we cannot imagine.  These heavenly beings are mentioned in Genesis, Job, Daniel, Revelation and other places, always in service to God.  “Comfort” – the word we see in Isaiah 40:1 – is a verb in the imperative form.  The heavenly beings must obey God’s order to comfort his people. 

A second command is “prepare.” The prophet prepares the way of the Lord – the way God will lead His people back to the Promised Land.  King Cyrus who will lead Persia to overthrow Babylon is to free the Jews and send them home in a second Exodus.  Centuries later, a wild-eyed prophet named John prepares the world for the coming of Jesus by preaching repentance and baptizing those who come to him. 

We who read the Bible, worship the Lord, and believe that God loves us are commanded to prepare the world to meet Jesus.  We tell our story of coming to new life in Christ.  We tell of His grace and the salvation He offers.  We help our friends who don’t know him clear away the clutter that blocks the pathway into their hearts. 

Comfort.  Prepare.  The third command is “Cry out.”  Proclaim God’s word.  What message is the prophet to announce? 

All people are grass,
    their constancy is like the flower of the field.
⁷ The grass withers, the flower fades,
    when the breath of the Lord blows upon it;
    surely the people are grass.
⁸ The grass withers, the flower fades;
    but the word of our God will stand forever.

 

All people are grass.  The King of Babylon is grass just like the blind beggar wallowing in the dust of the street hoping someone will spare a bit of bread.  All people are grass. George Floyd, Donald Trump, Joe Biden, you, me – all people are equal.  All wither and fade.  The wealthy slumlord and the renter trapped in poverty stand before God in the same condition.  Right now, some have it easy and others suffer, but that inequality will end.  Injustice cannot stand before the almighty God.  He puts all things right.

The tears that suffering brings are real and maybe you have hard to bear hurt and loss.  God sees the tears shed by shattered hearts.  God knows death is claiming victims everywhere right now.  God hears our cries. 

Isaiah knows suffering.  The Old Testament knows disillusionment, defeat, and death.  Many 6^th century BC Jews had given up.  But the prophet saw beyond the immediate dire circumstances.  The prophet shows us that God is a deliverer. 

Get you up to a high mountain,
    O Zion, herald of good tidings;^[a]
lift up your voice with strength,
    O Jerusalem, herald of good tidings,^[b]
    lift it up, do not fear;
say to the cities of Judah,
    “Here is your God!”
¹⁰ See, the Lord God comes with might,
    and his arm rules for him;
his reward is with him,
    and his recompense before him.
¹¹ He will feed his flock like a shepherd;
    he will gather the lambs in his arms,
and carry them in his bosom,
    and gently lead the mother sheep.

 

We know Jesus is the ultimate fulfillment of these words.    

The birth of Jesus reminds us that God sees the inequalities and injustices of our broken the world.  God has done something about it.  In Jesus, God empathizes with us and takes upon himself the worst of us and nails it to a cross.  Our sins, our pain, our grief, our loss – it has been crucified with Christ.  In Him, we are no longer slaves to sin.  We are new creations and we have a mission.

We are witnesses.  In this age, the people of God, we who are in Christ, tell our story about how we have come to know God through the salvation we have received in Jesus.

Withering grass and fading flowers reminded Isaiah that in the end, all are equal before God – equally small, equally sinful, equally lost.  The wealthy, the poor and everyone in between, we all fade.  Isaiah reminds us that God gathers in his shepherd arms, holds us, feeds us, and lifts us to where He is. 

Jesus uses different metaphors, a table, and a cross.  At that cross, we are all dead.  He invites we who are dead to the table – all of us.  Everyone gets a seat.  The imperfect, the defective, the broken – we sit together in a community of love. 

We serve each other bread – his body broken; our sins covered.  We serve each other wine – his blood shed; eternal life given to us. 

As we walk in the promises of Isaiah, acknowledging that pain is real but has been defeated by the power of Christ, we walk to the table, guests of our loving Heavenly Father.  We are invited to be at home at this table.  We dare to believe that God is real, can be trusted, and will make the world right.  We dare to live in that belief.

Once we’ve eaten, we go out and tell our story of life in Christ. We walk in the light and we spend our lives inviting others to come with us as we enter the story of the God who comforts, heals, makes us whole, and gathers us in His shepherd arms.

AMEN

Tell What You See and Hear (Matthew 11:2-6)

“Tell what you Hear and See” (Matthew 11:2-6)

Rob Tennant, Hillside Church, Chapel Hill, NC

Third Sunday of Advent, December 15, 2019

* First Sunday with new name – “Hillside Church.”

                In chapters 2 and 3 of Revelation, Jesus sends messages to persecuted Christians in Asia Minor.  Here’s the final promise of the message to the church in the city of Pergamum, “To everyone who conquers I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give a white stone, and on the white stone is written a new name that no one knows except the one who receives it” (Revelation 2:17).  A new name.

            When God called Abram, he renamed him Abraham.  Jacob God renamed Israel.  Andrew brought his impulsive, boisterous fisherman brother to meet Jesus.  Jesus took one look at the man and said, “You are Simon, son of John.  You are to be called Cephas,” Peter (John 1:42).  A new name.

            When the flood waters receded, Noah and his passengers disembarked on Mount Ararat.  When Moses dealt with a different ark, not a boat, but a gold-inlaid box carrying the law and samples of the manna God gave, he carried that ark to the top of Mount Sinai in order to meet God.  Atop Mount Carmel, in the power of God, Elijah defeated prophets of the false God Baal.  Psalm 148:9 invites mountains and hills to join nature’s song praising the Lord.  Isaiah 55:12 declares that the mountains and hills accepted the Psalm’s invitation.  “The mountains and the hills before you shall burst forth into song.”  Atop a mountain, three disciples, Peter, James, and John, see Jesus clothed with dazzling heavenly splendor (Matthew 17:2). 

            Where did Jesus win the victory, defeating death, covering our sins, and offering himself as the once and for all time sacrifice for humanity?  On a hill far away stood that old rugged cross.  Time and time again, God’s story is told on hills and mountains.  

            That’s what is happening here; God’s story is being told.  We will be a church for Chapel Hill, for everyone in Chapel Hill.  Hillside Church is here to tell God’s story, share God’s love, and help the people of our town see the way God is at work in their lives.  The late Senator Jesse Helms once derided us in his famous quip, “Why build another zoo?  Why not just build a fence around Chapel Hill?” 

We know better.  What Senator Helms mocked, we love.  We know Chapel Hill and Carrboro are exciting places full of interesting, beautiful people. We thank God for planting us here and giving us the privilege of being his storytellers.  We open our arms and our hearts to our community.

            Politicians and bigots today used less inflammatory language than Jesse Helms, but they still sneer as they describe the “Liberals” in Chapel Hill.  These so-called liberals are people Jesus loved.  He died for everyone in Carrboro and Chapel Hill and all the people living in the Triangle.  He wants us with Him for eternity.   “Hillside Church” is where people can come to be loved and introduced to the God who loves them. 

            A new name.  Hillside is the right name for us right now.  We’ve alluded to numerous times the story of God takes place on hills and mountains.  We’ve talked about our town’s name and what our town means.  Whatever anyone else has to say about our town, we know the people here are God’s beloved children.  We need God, and we as a church are here to point the way to God.  What about our church campus?

            Our church building, itself a setting in which we extend Godly hospitality, sits on a small hill.  If you think this slight incline insignificant, I invite you stand in the parking lot on a blustery day between November and early March.  As the wind whips up the grassy hill, it chills to the bone.  In this place, may the Spirit, the wind of God, blow fiercely, knocking our socks off, but also filling us that we may soar on Eagle’s wings.  In our people, in this place, from this Hillside, God bellows forth the blessing of salvation and life lived in Christ, free to all who would receive it. 

            John the Baptist had given his life to speak God’s word into the world’s pain.  For his efforts, the world almost swallowed him whole.  The wicked King Herod had John imprisoned when John publicly confronted him over his immoral marriage.  In isolation, only hearing reports when his followers were permitted to visit him, John wondered.  Alone, feeling cut off, he wondered. 

Matthew writes, “When John heard what the Messiah was doing, he sent word by his disciples and said to him, ‘Are you the one who is to come’” (11:2)?  Hearing about Jesus, he had to ask.  John reacted to God in action.   That same impulse guides Hillside.  A widely used Bible study that first came out in the 90’s, Experiencing God, asks a simple set of questions.  Do we see where God is already working in the world?  Once we see, then will we join in where God is at work?

Having heard of Jesus’ actions, John, once so confident but now chained in the prisons of doubt, asks, “Are you the one?”  We have the post-crucifixion, post-resurrection perspective John did not.  We know the baby in the manger, the one baptized and anointed by the Spirit becomes the savior.  Are we living in what we know?  As a community committed to following and worshiping the crucified, resurrected Lord, are we showing him to the world?  John asked, “Are you the one?”  We have to ask, “Will we show the world Jesus is the one?”

Jesus responds to John’s disciples.  “Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them” (11:4-5).  What do we hear and see?  The poor are all around us living throughout our town and in surrounding areas.  When we speak and act and open our doors to welcome the world in, do the poor receive good news?  The story John felt he was missing plays itself out every day here, in this space and in our community.  John was trying to respond to God at work.  Jesus honored John’s posture by inviting him to hear the story of healing that comes whenever Jesus is present.

If we share what we know of Jesus is it good news for our town, especially the poor and downtrodden?

We could describe the past two years in our church life as surprising.  We could say it has been tumultuous.  We may feel storm tossed.  At times the seemingly endless blows from unexpected places have pounded and exhausted us.  But God has raised us to our feet.  God has set a new vision before us, calling us back to the work He has always had for us. We are to help people become disciples of Jesus.  That’s always been this church’s calling and God has led us right back to that mission.  God has breathed new life into us. 

The next chapter in our story is the step forward we take.  John the Baptist played his role, died in Herod’s prison, and now awaits resurrection.  The disciples, after meeting with the risen Christ, played their roles.  They went through Jerusalem, then into Judea and all Samaria, and finally throughout the world, preaching salvation, making disciples, baptizing in Jesus’ name, and establishing churches. 

Now it is Hillside’s turn.  We share the hope of eternal life in Christ with all who come to us.  And, we equip all who go out from us, training them in the word of God and in knowledge of the Spirit of God that they might go in Jesus’ name wherever in the world God leads them. 

Jesus gathered his disciples around the table to offer bread and wine.  The bread reminded them of him.  Take and eat; this is my body, broken for you.  John’s suffering at Herod’s hands was a preview of the sorrow of Jesus beaten and crucified for us.  We eat the bread, his body.  We drink the cup, his blood, the blood of the new covenant.  In this act, we remember that we are united in Christ; whatever differences exist between people in our body of believers we are united in Christ.  In His blood, our sins are forgiven and we have eternal life.

One or two here have been with this church dating back to the 1960’s.  You are invited to this table, to this bread and cup, and to this new thing the Spirit of God is doing among us. 

Many of you were here when Carrboro Baptist Church became HillSong Church.  It’s still Carrboro Baptist, still HillSong, and is now Hillside.   Across the decades, we’re linked in our gratitude to God, in our love for him, and for one another.  You are invited to this table, and to this new thing God is doing, this Hillside adventure.

Some here have only been with us a few months; maybe today is even your first time.  You are invited to take communion and to the party afterward, and after that to live life with us – Hillside Church. 

Jesus told the messengers from John to go to him and tell what they had heard and seen.  Together as a church, we celebrate the salvation, the forgiveness, and the new life we have in Christ.  Then, we go into our little corner of the world to tell what God has done and is doing in Jesus, and we invite people to come be part of it.

AMEN

Change Course, Eyes Forward (Matthew 3:1-12)

Second Sunday of Advent, December 8, 2019

            “I am the king!”  New Testament professor Michael Wilkens shouted that proclamation to the surprised students in his classroom.  Then he asked them what came to mind as he made that declaration.  Think about it.  When my first words were, “I am the king,” what, besides no you’re not ran through your mind?

            Professors Wilkins writes that one student said, “King Arthur and the round table.”  Another recalled that iconic scene from the movie Titanic and channeling his inner Leonardo DiCaprio shouted, “I’m the king of the world.”  Maybe you thought of a movie like The King’s Speech, or The Lion King, or the last installment of The Lord of the Rings, The Return of the King. [i]

            Wilkins’ point of course is that we have to think about what it is to serve a king if we are to read Matthew rightly.  We Americans, with democracy deeply engrained in us, might find this difficult.  John’s message is the kingdom of God has come near because of the arrival of Jesus – King Jesus.  Wherever Jesus is the Kingdom is.  John the Baptist told the people of the Judean countryside in about 28AD that the Kingdom of Heaven had come. 

            Matthew says in chapter 3 verse 3 that John is the one of whom the prophet Isaiah spoke when he said, “The voice of one crying out in the wilderness; ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.’”  Isaiah did not predict Jesus so much as Isaiah testified to what he saw God doing.  That’s important to remember.  Luther Theological Seminary Professor Karoline Lewis reminds us that Old Testament prophets were not forecasters, but truth-tellers.  Matthew, writing hundreds of years after Isaiah, believed Jesus was fulfillment of Isaiah’s vision.  It was true when Isaiah said it in the 6^th century BC but ultimate, final fulfillment would not come until the Messiah came.  John’s message was, the Messiah has come. 

            I thought about titling this message “Change Course and Don’t Look Back.”  But that would make the emphasis on the change and why it’s irreversible.  The heart of the message is God has acted and is acting.  We want to see what God’s doing; we want to be part of it.  So, yes, change is part of the good news.  That change is irreversible.  Once we come to know God in Jesus Christ, we are born again.  We become new creations.  We cannot go back to who we were before we knew Jesus.  Now that we are in Christ our lives don’t make any sense apart from him.  “Change Course and Don’t Look Back” is a good title.

            But, this morning, it’s not the best title.  The best is “Change Course and Eyes Forward.”  We have to keep our eyes forward because the entire story is about what God is doing.  The only way we see it and experience God and walk with God is to pay attention.  Last week, reading Matthew 24, we heard Jesus say, stay awake and be ready.  We have the eyes of our hearts open and focused on God.  In Jesus God has acted and is acting.  We want to see what God’s doing.  But why the phrase “Change Course?”

            John’s very first word is “Repent.”  Simply defined, it means we turn away from our sins and from a life of sin.  The charge, though, goes deeper.  We’re sorry for rebelling against God. We regret sins we’ve committed that hurt others, those around us, and ourselves, and bring offense to God.  Then, having expressed sorrow and brokenness, we completely reverse our life direction.  Repentance is change from a life apart from God to a life yearning for God, dependent on God, and moving the direction God indicates along the path God clears. 

            When I went through army basic training, the goal of the drill sergeants was to fix in our minds a new way of thinking and being in the world.  We hated all the push-ups.  They yelled “Drop and give me 10,” as a discipline, but it also made us stronger.  I’ve never been in the kind of shape I was in at the end of August, 1989.  Thirteen weeks of hundreds of push-ups a day will transform your body. 

            Physical fitness was just the tip of the iceberg.  If I came up to you and yelled, “Drop and give me 10,” you would look at me like I was crazy, and you certainly wouldn’t do push-ups because I commanded you to do so.  But in the army, you have to know to obey orders.  For one thing, it keeps the unit orderly and organized.  For another, in combat, with bombs exploding everywhere, you have to obey orders immediately.  It’s life or death. 

            Basic training is intense because they are trying to change who you are and how you see the world.  Thirty years later I still have dreams that I am back in the National Guard.  It is tattooed on my psyche.  John’s call to “Repent!” is even more serious.  When we turn away from sin and turn to Jesus, we abandon loyalty to systems, relational ties, and governments of this world. 

Every time I say the pledge of allegiance, I have to have a quick conversation in my own mind.  “Yes,” I tell myself, “I will serve my nation, the United States, and be a good citizen.  But that loyalty is nothing in light of who I am in Christ.  I belong to God as God’s property.  How I live out my life roles as husband, father, pastor, friend, and American citizen is defined by who I am in Christ and every one of those roles is subservient to the claims God makes on me.  When John says, “Repent!” that’s what he means.  Change the course of your life so completely that you see everything in your life in light of Jesus and who you are becoming in Him. 

It’s not easy.  Roads in Israel in 28 AD were rocky, full of bumps and holes.  The only time those roads would get clear was when someone extraordinarily important, royalty, was coming through.  John the Baptist, a prophet in the true sense of the word, saw repentance as the clearing the road to our hearts so we’d be ready for the arrival of King Jesus. 

Repentant, we quit behaviors that hurt others and offend God.  We have to give up activities that tempt us to sin.  We have to change the way we feel about people – even people who are evil to us.  We have to make faith an active, daily priority in our lives.  You know the things in your life that need to be jettisoned and the practices that need to be added so that you are attuned to God and alert to what God is up to.  Change is not easy.

John’s baptism helps, but it’s not the baptism that would get us to the point we are completely turned to God.  He immersed people in the water to symbolize that they were cleansed of sin.  However, John the Baptist knew full well that people come promising they repented, were baptized, and as soon as they came out of the water, returned to behaviors God condemns.  He was so aware of our tendency to choose our way instead of God's, he lashed out at religious leaders, Pharisees and Sadducees, who too often did this very thing (v.7).  He told them that if their water baptism were to mean anything, they would need to bear fruits worthy of repentance.  In other words, their lives would need to change and the change would be seen in how they treated people, especially poor, common peasants. 

Among others things, John saw Jesus as a great divider.  He referred to the practice of winnowing.  The harvested grain would be in great piles and the harvesters would use pitch forks to fling it up into the wind.  The useless chaff, the shell-likes husks, would blow away.  The weighty grain, the “fruit” fell back to earth to be gathered and stored in the barn. 

Jesus, says John, is holding his pitch fork.  He tosses our promises of repentance in the air.  He looks at our lives.  Any empty faith words we speak float off and are ultimately burned as kindling.  Our words that are anchored to a life of prayer, to acts of forgiveness, to service to our fellow humans, especially the poor and downcast – our anchored faith is gathered.  This is the fruit that signifies our repentance has taken hold in our lives. 

Can we, by the power of our wills, commit to such weighty, life change?  No, and John knew it.  That’s why his baptism was just the start.  “I baptize you with water,” he said, “but the one coming after me will baptize you with the Holy Spirit” (v.11).  Just as we are immersed in water by John, we are immersed in the Spirit of God.

Have you ever sat at a campfire and watched the logs burn down?  The wood changes, is consumed, and can never again be a log.  Precious metals are refined by fire.  It hurts, but also produces warmth and in refinement greater strength and beauty.  Baptized in the Holy Spirit, we become something totally new and cannot go back to what we were.  The reason John the Baptist flashes into the gospels unexpectedly and then is gone from it even more quickly is he’s not the story and didn’t want to be.

John drew everyone out of the cities to the wilderness, grabbed their attention, and then directed it to Jesus.  Matthew, writing this story about 40-50 years after these events happened included John’s part but only to get us to Jesus.  I have often wanted to do an extended study on John the Baptist, but each time I try, I realize he doesn’t want that.  The gospel writers who present him won’t give that.  This luminous time is John’s time and he uses his time to shine the spotlight on the arrival of the Savior, Jesus.  That’s where John wants us to look. 

I don’t know what’s going on in your life, but as we sing Christmas carols about the birth of Jesus, I invite you to turn from whatever you think, say, and do that hurts others and disregards God.  Turn away from that and turn to Jesus.  John the prophet, Matthew the storyteller, and I, a preacher descended from these giants, I, a miserable sinner who’s been saved by grace – we all shine the spotlight on Jesus so you’ll look there.  In him, God is saving the world.  You want to be part of that.

Next week, we start life as Hillside Church.  A group of pastors I pray with met at our building this past Thursday and one of them said, as we prayed, that he sensed something.  He sensed that God is acting, doing a new thing, and our launch of a new name is just the start!  This is the beginning of us seeing what God is doing and joining where God is at work. 

I don’t know your life’s direction.  This is your time to change course and fix your eyes on God.  Jesus’ arrival is a statement of God’s love for you.  Give your life to Him.

AMEN

---

[i] Wilkins, Michael (2004), Matthew: The NIV Application Commentary, Zondervan (Grand Rapids), p.148.

“To Do What God Says” (Matthew 2:13-15, 19-23; 3:13-17)

Sunday, January, 2019

            It doesn’t matter what your job is.  Are you a student trying to graduate?  A young adult new in the workforce?  A professional, at the top of your game?  Or, has it been so rough, you’ve you given up on career ambitions?  Are you just trying to make ends meet and make it to retirement?  Or, are you into retirement?  Where we are in life - it doesn’t matter.  When we walk in the light, we are near God.  Being close to God, we have real joy and even if life is hard, we have grace and hope.  So, how do we have a close relationship with God?

            That’s the point of this series of sermons about walking in the light.  Last week’s truth: if we look for God, we’ll find him.  If we constantly seek, we will meet God in our everyday lives.  So, in 2019, commit to disciplines of awareness.  In a notebook write down every “God thought” you have throughout the day. At the end of each day, review what you’ve written, and pray.  Ask God to reveal himself to you in those moments.  Do this every day. 

Disciplines of awareness.  Carry the word “Grace” on a card everywhere you go.  When anger at another person rises up in you, whip that card out.  Look at it, hard.  Remember, God has given you grace.  Pray.  Ask God to help you give grace to the other.  At the end of each week, review moments when grace invaded your anger.  Meet God in those moments. 

Disciplines of awareness. Take pictures of things you see that make you think of God.  At the end of the week, go through the pictures slowly, praying as you look at them and remember where you saw God in your everyday life.  

When we see the light, we can step into it and walk in it.  That’s today’s discipline.  Walking in the light, we obey God throughout our lives.  God won’t force His will on us.  He lets us choose to be disciples and as we choose to live under His rule, he walks with us, blessing us.  Three specific decisions must be made by anyone that desires to walk in God’s light: first, we decide that God is the absolute authority of our lives.  Second, we decide to know what God says by reading the Bible and learning how to listen to the Holy Spirit.  Third, we decide life with God is worth the cost.

Joseph the earthly father of Jesus, John the Baptist, Jesus’ cousin and the prophet who paved the way for Him, and Jesus Himself each model the obedience of a life lived under God’s authority.  

When Joseph decided to stay with Mary and be her husband, he didn’t know a woman could become pregnant by the Holy Spirit.  He did not understand that she was carrying in her womb the son of God.  What he knew was God told him to marry her, and he did.  God told him there was danger and he had to flee to Egypt.  He didn’t know anyone in Egypt.  But, he packed up their recently acquired gold, frankincense, and myrrh, and took Mary and the baby Jesus to Egypt.  When God told him the danger was passed, he believed and returned to Israel. 

John modeled the same obedience as he preached fiery sermons that so enraged Herod, he imprisoned and then executed John.  John never wavered in the message because he knew he was saying what God had told him to say.  Jesus did not want to die on the cross.  But he knew God’s plan and went with it obediently.  That’s what obedience is: doing what God says even when we don’t understand or, worse, do understand it and know it will be hard and don’t want to obey.  But we do anyway.  Each of these heroes of faith decided to obey God.

 If we believe God’s authority is absolute, we need to know what God’s instructions are.  We can memorize the the 10 commandments, study the sermon on the Mount, and contemplate the fruit of the Spirit, found in Galatians 5.  We can carry the lists of virtues found in different places in Paul’s letters.  We can and should read everything Jesus says about caring for the poor in Matthew 25 and throughout the Gospel of Luke.  We must know the content of the work.  Knowing the Bible is a starting point for obedient living.

The rubber meets the road when we’ve studied and then in our in daily interactions with people, try to live by what we’ve read.  The Holy Spirit, the third member of the trinity, helps us.  Joseph was surely tempted to leave Mary when he found out she was pregnant and he wasn’t the father.  He was a decent man willing to reject her discreetly.  But gentle or not, the temptation was to push her away.  The Spirit helped Joseph obey the message of the angel and marry her.  

John was undoubtedly tempted to fear Herod, but he in spite of the fear, he obeyed.  Letting fear guide us instead of faith is a real temptation.  A lot of people God calls to serve in missions don’t go because they’re afraid: afraid it is too expensive; or, afraid it is dangerous to travel to other countries.  If you feel in your gut God calling you to something and resist because you’re afraid, that’s disobedience.   John knew Herod would probably kill him for his preaching, yet he openly critiqued the king when the king’s marriage broke God’s law.  

Have you felt prompted by the Holy Spirit to talk to someone about faith in Christ?  Did you resist because you were afraid you’d look stupid or the person would reject you and maybe stop being a friend?  Walking in the light involves making the decision to risk speaking and looking like a fool or risk going, even to dangerous places, because we trust the nudge of the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit is God and living in a right relationship with God is more important than living safely or living an easy life. 

Maybe speaking out is easy.  You’ve already shared your faith with someone this and January is not even two weeks old.  Maybe you’re fearless.  You’ve already got your overseas mission trip for 2019 planned.  You may be tempted in some other way to disobey God.  Faith always has a cost. 

When I was young, I had a mixed record of obedience.  My idea of what a man should be led me to play high school and just a little bit of college football.  My idea of what a man should be led me to enlist in the army and go through infantry basic training.  Part of my commitment as a Christian was to stay a virgin outside of marriage.  I kept that commitment.  However, in the locker room and in the barracks guys were constantly bragging, usually in vulgar terms, about the women they had been with.  In those conversations, I stayed as quiet as I could, but inevitably, someone would look at me with a wry smile and ask, “What about you, Tennant?”  My  commitment to sexual purity wasn’t tempted.  My commitment to honesty was. 

Sometimes, I said, “I am Christian.  I am waiting for marriage.”  There might have some teasing, but usually when I made a statement like that, my teammates or fellow soldiers respected me.  Other times I was asked, “Tennant, you’re awfully quiet.  Have you been with a woman?”  And with the opportunity to speak about my faith, I lied.  I said, “Of course I have.”  Instead of representing Jesus, I thought lying would make things easier on me.  I broke of one of the 10!  Thou shalt not bear false witness.  

I had already decided God was my authority.  I made the first decision.  I knew the Bible and heard the Holy Spirit.  I had make the second decision.  But, when I lied, I didn’t make the third one.  I did not decide that life with God, in that moment, was worth the cost.  Since then, God has forgiven me of the sin of lying and the greater sin of ignoring the Holy Spirit.  God has given me additional chances to tell the truth and be a witness and I have done that.  It’s taken time and 2nd and 3rd and 100th chances from God, but I have since decided that the cost - I might get teased for being a 30-year-old virgin - was worth it.  

Of course I have been tempted in numerous other ways and succeeded to represent and obey God at times, and failed at other times.  And my decision to obey God’s teaching about sexual purity and about truth-telling is nothing next to Joseph’s life-or-death moments of obedience, or John and Jesus’ decisions to obey God to the point of death.  But God is not comparing me to Joseph or John or Jesus.  God is not comparing you to anyone.  God meets us in the midst of our obedience. 

I had shame when I lied about my experiences in order to fit in with other soldiers.  The Holy Spirit let me sit in that embarrassment, but was with me the entire time.  God gave me grace and additional opportunities.  When those opportunities arose, God emboldened me to be a truth-teller and to be someone more concerned with my identity in Christ than with what others thought of me.  Looking back on these times, I have gratitude. 

What matters most today is your story, your walk with God in 2019.   First, decide that God is God - the ultimate authority not just in the universe but in your life.  Second, decide to know what God says by reading the Bible and studying it with other believers.  Third, the hardest part, decide that whatever the cost, you’ll obey; you’ll live God’s way. 

The third decision is the hardest because of the ways we get tempted and what tempts me is different than what tempts you, but we all get tempted.  We don’t have the willpower to resist. We need the Holy Spirit’s help. 

I talked earlier about disciplines of awareness.  We also need disciplines of obedience.  You could think of many and should choose what works for you.  I offer one suggestion.  Bring to mind what tempts you.  What is it in life that leads you to forget about God and do things your own way?  Temptations are so powerful, you won’t even need to write this down.  But you do need to name it.  Name two temptations and imagine those specific places in your life these temptations come up.  

Now, commit to praying every day for a minute or so specifically about this temptation.  In this daily prayer, name the temptation, confess to God that it’s hard to resist, then ask for help from the Holy Spirit in resisting.  Don’t miss a day. 

Finally, at some point every month, review.  Review the previous 30 days.  Identify moments in which you felt the temptation.  Be honest in your review.  If you gave into the temptation and disobeyed God, confess, receive grace, and repent.  If you succeeded, with the Spirit’s help in resisting the temptation, celebrate.  Thank God and praise God for God’s willingness to walk with you.  

God helps us obey.  We practice the spiritual disciplines in order to position ourselves so that that we’re ready and willing to receive the love and grace and help God has for us.  I can tell you from my own experience that deciding it’s worth it to obey God is hard sometimes, but brings great joy.  In those times I failed to obey, but then confessed, I received forgiveness.  And the life I have in Christ, is one I would not trade for anything.  There is no greater joy than the joy we have in the light of God.  God wants that joy for you. He holds it out to you because He loves you.  Make the decision today to follow Christ and walk in His light.

AMEN