Shine as Lights in a Dark World
This Is Us • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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· 1 viewDiscover how to shine as a lights in a dark world by trusting in God's justice, responding with love and kindness, and praying for those who mistreat us. Learn how to overcome evil with good and be a beacon of hope in a world that desperately needs it.
Notes
Transcript
Introduction (5m)
Introduction (5m)
This Is Us. But Who Are We Meant to Be?
This Is Us. But Who Are We Meant to Be?
Shining beacon? No! Shining lights out in the dark world you inhabit day by day.
Maidenhead Corps like every church/ekklesia (eck-eleh-sia) is a community called out of the world
Maidenhead Corps like every church/ekklesia (eck-eleh-sia) is a community called out of the world
As a community set apart for a distinct mission in relation to the world - to be shining lights in the darkest places.
The world will tempt us as a corps/church and as individual Christians to conform to its ways
The world will tempt us as a corps/church and as individual Christians to conform to its ways
It will intoxicate us with pursuit of power. It will tempt us to believe that the most important things about being a Christian community is our building, our budget, and our bodies (members).
Suddenly, we find ourselves
Suddenly, we find ourselves
playing church politics, believing we are entitled to certain rights, accumulating more and more resources, and acting like consumers rather than worshippers.
Worship becomes marketing - something we have to guard against in livestreaming. Stewardship simply becomes fundraising. Spirituality becomes simply looking like we’re living our lives the holy way. We confuse our vitality with a desire to simply grow in number. We replace true ministry with programme activities and endless meetings.
And we are no longer shining lights in the dark corners of our communities.
And we are no longer shining lights in the dark corners of our communities.
Why? Because we look no different to the darkness. There is nothing to distinguish us.
Who are we supposed to be in the 21st century?
Who are we supposed to be in the 21st century?
A community where we nurture each other to live differently, to live out our calling to be a shining beacon here in our corps family, but also to be shining lights in wider society, where we spend most of our time.
That’s our identity. That’s our mission.
Explanation (5m)
Explanation (5m)
What does a corps of shining lights look like?
What does a corps of shining lights look like?
So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.
We live in the power of the crucified and risen Christ.
We seek to bring life to our relationships.
We seen to be and act in ways that embody genuine love.
Paul says, don’t just pretend to love others. Really love them.
Paul says, don’t think you are better than you really are.
We think more of others than ourselves.
We are humble.
We work hard and serve enthusiastically.
We celebrate with hope.
We are patient when we face difficult circumstances.
We are always praying.
We help those in need.
We show solidarity, particularly with those on the margins of our society, and those who are left out or left behind.
We ensure everyone has a place at our table.
We promote peace and harmony.
We hate what is wrong and hold tightly to what is good.
We pray that God will bless our enemies.
Paul concludes:
Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good.
Whilst Paul talks about feeding enemies who are hungry, or giving them something to drink if they are thirsty, they are examples, symbols.
What he is really instructing us to do is to do good in every way we can think of.
Application (5m)
Application (5m)
So how can we be shining lights in the darkness wherever we find ourselves tomorrow?
So how can we be shining lights in the darkness wherever we find ourselves tomorrow?
Maybe showing generosity of spirit to the person driving too slowly in front of us, or cutting us up on the roundabout.
Maybe showing care and concern to the person serving us at the supermarket checkout.
Perhaps giving our annoying coworker the benefit of the doubt.
Perhaps being kinder to our classmates or members of our family.
As face a General Election later this year, perhaps its treating our political opponents less like something we’ve picked up on our shoe.
Perhaps it’s trying to persuade our employer not to disconnect from your customers, or supporters, or employees. Maybe it’s arguing that keeping them all at arm’s length means they’ve stopped caring about them.
Maybe it’s about using the CC button on your emails less. Perhaps it’s about realising that relying on the CC box is a question of distrust, of feeling the need to cover your back. Maybe it’s about trusting your fellow workers and not needing to be “kept in the loop” on everything.
Maybe it’s about promoting focusing on the relationships with your clients rather than simply sending them transactional emails or letters or calls simply asking for more and more business from them.
Maybe it’s about calling out discrimination in your workplace - whether that’s age, disability, race, equality, and so on.
Maybe it’s about calling out unethical accounting practices.
Perhaps it’s about standing up against favouritism and nepotism, or as a manager or leader, ensuring you are not indulging in them.
Maybe it’s about not cheating in your exams. Avoiding plagiarism or using AI to write your essays for you.
Maybe it’s about standing up to the bullies, or protecting someone from being bullied. Maybe it’s about ensuring you’re not the bully.
Maybe as a member of staff in school, it’s about ensuring you are treating each child equitably, not on how much you like or dislike them.
All sorts of ways we can be shining lights in a dark world.
We can only do all this in God’s power, but our corps family provides a laboratory for testing and growing our desire to do good out in the world
We can only do all this in God’s power, but our corps family provides a laboratory for testing and growing our desire to do good out in the world
We are only human, so …
If you need to learn patience, then there will be someone here who really frustrates you.
If you need to learn how to really love someone, then there will be someone here who does not love you back.
If you need to learn forgiveness, then someone may well upset you and refuse to apologise.
If you need to learn kindness, then someone here will judge you for what you’re doing.
If you need to grow in your faith, then someone here will show you what it’s like to remain stagnant in the Christian faith.
We are only human, so we will give each other plenty of opportunities to think of ourselves more than we should, to dislike each other, to be lazy, to lose our enthusiasm for God and our discipleship, to grumble and criticise, to be impatient, to stop praying, to curse each other, to take revenge, bear a grudge, give someone the cold shoulder.
All of these things give us the opportunity to practice being shining lights. After all, if we can’t be shining lights to each other, then there is no way our light is going to shine out there.
God loves us
God loves us
He has shown us grace, his undeserved mercy. He has recognised us, forgiven us, and loved us in spite of our sins.
So let’s share that love and grace with those around us as shining lights in our dark world.
Let’s overcome evil with good. Let’s love with a radical love. Let’s be shining lights.
Next Steps
Next Steps
SB 850 - I then shall live as one who’s been forgiven
SB 850 - I then shall live as one who’s been forgiven
I then shall live as one who?s been forgiven.
I?ll walk with joy to know my debts are paid.
I know my name is clear before my Father;
I am his child and I am not afraid.
So, greatly pardoned, I?ll forgive my brother;
The law of love I gladly will obey.
2 I then shall live as one who?s learned compassion.
I?ve been so loved, that I?ll risk loving too.
I know how fear builds walls instead of bridges;
I?ll dare to see another?s point of view.
And when relationships demand commitment,
Then I?ll be there to care and follow through.
3 Your Kingdom come around and through and in me;
Your power and glory, let them shine through me.
Your hallowed name, O may I bear with honour,
And may your living Kingdom come in me.
The Bread of Life, O may I share with honour,
And may you feed a hungry world through me.
William and Gloria Gaither
© 1981 Gaither Music Company/Adm. by Integritymusic.com, a division of David C. Cook, songs@integritymusic.com For the UK & Ireland. Used by permission.
Used By Permission. CCL Licence No. 135015
Copied from The Song Book of The Salvation Army
Song Number 850